Francisco del Paso y Troncoso: Su Mision en Europa 1892-1916

xx+644 pages with frontispiece, appendixes and index. Royal octavo (9 1/4" x 7") issued in wrappers. From the library of George M Foster. First edition.

Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, 1842-1916, sixth son in a family of 10 born to Pedro del Paso y Troncoso and Teodora Medina in Veracruz. He was locally educated for a mercantile career, but in 1867 his family sent him to Mexico City to prepare for a future in Medicine. However, through accident and luck, he turned to preparation a history of medicine in Mexico. He laid out an elaborate plan that encompassed examination of Aztec science as a prelude to that in the colonial and national periods. His completed parts of aboriginal botany, astronomy and medicine appeared in the MNA Anales. He never finished his thesis or received a degree. He was appointed Visitor to the National Museum in 1888, and successively was named acting and then permanent director (1889), a post he nominally held until his death. He reorganized the publication programs, rehabilitated the library and undertook other salutary administrative reforms, as well as sponsoring national scientific expeditions. From 1892 through 1902, he remained directory of the national Museum, on extended leave while in Europe, where he spent 23 years searching out, copying and preparing for publication a vast store of prime documentary materials for the pre-Conquest and colonial history of Mexico. At his death in 1916 most of the collected materials remained unpublished. The Mexican government was able to repatriate or purchased most of his collection, but much remains lost.

George McClelland Foster, Jr born in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, on October 9, 1913, died on May 18, 2006, at his home in the hills above the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, where he served as a professor from 1953 to his retirement in 1979, when he became professor emeritus. His contributions to anthropological theory and practice still challenge us; in more than 300 publications, his writings encompass a wide diversity of topics, including acculturation, long-term fieldwork, peasant economies, pottery making, public health, social structure, symbolic systems, technological change, theories of illness and wellness, humoral medicine in Latin America, and worldview. The quantity, quality, and long-term value of his scholarly work led to his election to the National Academy of Sciences in 1976. Virtually all of his major publications have been reprinted and/or translated. Provenance from the executor of Foster's library laid in.

Condition:

Foster's stamp on title, light rubbing to extremities and corners, original onion skin parchment still in place, unread a very good to fine copy.