Mexico : Hospital Real de Indios

[Begins:] Copia de la representacion, que en 14 de Octubre de 1764, hize al Exmo. S[eñ]or Marqués de Cruillas, Virrey de este Reyno, manifestando el Estado en q[ue] se hallaba el R[ea]l Hospital de los Indios de esta Nueva Esp[a]ña. Mexico The plans are in a scale of varas. Signed by Antonio de Arroyo 'Mayor domo, y Administrador interino' of the Hospital 1761-88, and dated; the financial addendum is dated 31 January 1765. A covering (but undated) letter by Arroyo (ff. 93-94) establishes that this set of copies, whose originals had been submitted to the Marqués de Cruillas [Viceroy 1760-66] by the Administrador, was passed to Francisco Javier de Gamboa [1717-94], the prominent Mexican advocate who later became Alcalde del crimen, Oidor, Regente of the Audiencia, and President of the governing Junta of the Hospital. [See Alcedo (1786-89), 3, 174; and Osores (1908), 1, 248-251]. The document points out the many recent additions and improvements to the Hospital carried out under Arroyo's supervision, including the enclosure of waste ground to provide a new Campo Santo, accommodation for the nurses and chaplains, for the laundry, for the temascales, and for other services, as well as the provision of a large room for a public anatomical theatre. The addendum, listing sources and amounts of income for 1763, draws attention to the serious shortfall in the major item of income from the medio real contribution owing to the severe typhus and smallpox epidemics of 1762.

1764-1765

4 ll., & 2 fldg. col. plans [i.e. ff. 92-97]. 30.5 x 21 cm. & 21 x 15.5 cm. (the plans 45.5 x 32.5 cm. & 73.5 x 32 cm.). Unbound; extracted from a larger collection.

Purchased 1968

The Hospital is said to have been founded by the Franciscans c. 1531; it was officially established by Real Cédula of 1553 to care for Indian patients. The Real Escuela de Cirugía was founded within the Hospital by Real Cédula in 1768, and opened officially by Viceregal Bando in 1770. The Hospital was closed by Iturbide in 1822. As the present report indicates, proposals [printed in Velasco Ceballos (1946) pp. 3-23, with a useful introduction at pp. v-xxxii] for a public anatomical theatre had already been initiated in 1763.

Described in: Robin Price, An Annotated Catalogue of Medical Americana in the Library of the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine (London: Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine, 1983).

Formerly part of the León Collection.