“MODO DEL DECIR” EN LAS CRÓNICAS MISIONERAS. LAS HISTORIAS DE MOTOLINÍA Y MENDIETA

Abstract

Historia de los indios de la Nueva Espana and Historia eclesiastica in-diana written by the missionary friars Toribio de Benavente Motolinia and Geronimo de Mendieta are chronicles which differ from the rest of the Franciscan corpus in a series of characteristics which conform a specific “way of telling” the novohispanic evangelization and the function of the enunciating self. In this article I analyse these chronicles from a literary perspective and I describe the literary resources and the enunciating position that make these texts unique among the colonial Spanish Ameri-can chronicle. Keywords: Missionary chronicles; Toribio de Benavente Motolinia; Geronimo de Mendieta; “ways of telling”; novohispanic evangelization.