The Library will display the Huexotzinco Codex Oct. 6 through Feb. 9 in the "American Treasures of the Library of Congress" exhibition. The document will replace Thomas Jefferson's "original Rough draught" of the Declaration of Independence in the "Top Treasures" case.
The Huexotzinco Codex will go on display in its entirety for the first time beginning Oct. 6.
Due to popular demand, Thomas Jefferson's rough draft of the Declaration of Independence will remain in the exhibition for a month longer than previously announced. The document had been scheduled to be replaced Sept. 4. Instead it will remain on view through Oct. 5.
This exhibition of the Huexotzinco (Way-hoat-ZINC-o) Codex marks the first time all eight panels of the document will be displayed. The document will be placed in the award-winning "Top Treasures" case. The 12-by-10-foot, 3-ton case is unique in the world and was built according to the highest standards of preservation and security to display the most rare, valuable and fragile items in the "American Treasures" exhibition, the only permanent exhibition ever mounted by the Library of Congress.
Other items that will be exhibited for the first time beginning Oct. 6 in "American Treasures" include:
- A very rare Jan. 4, 1800, issue of the Ulster County Gazette (Kingston, N.Y.), which reported on the December 14, 1799, death of George Washington.
- Sketches of Ancient History in the Six Nations, an 1828 compendium of sketches drawn from legends by David Cusick, an artist of the Tuscarora Native American tribe in New York.
- Photographs, marked "Top Secret," taken in 1945 six miles from the first nuclear bomb explosion at the Trinity Test Site, New Mexico.
- Early baseball cards from the Carl Sandburg collection featuring Connie Mack, Charles Cominski, Cap Anson and King Kelly.
The Huexotzinco Codex is a legal document by the Nahua Indian people from southeast of Mexico City. They joined Hernando Cortés in a legal case against the abuses of the Spanish administrators 10 years after the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1521.
The document, which combines Christian imagery and indigenous graphic symbols, is a precise accounting of the products and services that the people of Huexotzinco were forced to render as tribute to the new Spanish colonial government. They included corn, turkey, chili peppers and beans, adobe bricks, lumber, limestone and woven cloth. They also included the amount of gold and feathers needed to create a Spanish military campaign banner of the Madonna and Child.
The exhibition is made possible by a generous grant from the Xerox Foundation.
The "American Treasures" exhibition is also available online, where viewers can see 264 items and read about their significance.
The "American Treasures" exhibition features more than 270 items representing a cross section of the Library's vast repository of rare books, music, manuscripts, maps, photographs, drawings, audio clips and videotapes. Continuing highlights of "American Treasures" include the contents of Abraham Lincoln's pockets on the night of his assassination, a photograph of the Wright brothers' first flight taken at the instant of takeoff and early comic books.
Exhibition hours are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday. The Library is closed on federal holidays. The exhibition is free. Tickets are not required.
