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Mexican Lithograph of Northern Mexican Franciscan Colegio

An early lithograph of the Colegio de Guadalupe (Zacatecas, Mexico), an important training center for Franciscan missionaries to northern Mexico and parts of the present southwestern United States. Though wrongly identified in the caption by an early owner - this early Mexican lithograph does not depict Mission San Luis Rey in Southern California - there is a connection between the Colegio de Guadalupe and Mission San Luis Rey.

In 1893 the Colegio established a novitiate and apostolic college at the site of the old Southern California mission at San Luis Rey. The exiled Mexican Franciscans came to California due to anti-religious laws in Mexico. These latter day Franciscans were the first to reside at the Mission in nearly half a century.

The Colegio Apostólico de Propaganda Fide de Guadalupe, established in Zacatecas, Mexico, in 1707 by the Franciscan order, holds significant religious and historical importance. This institution was pivotal in the Catholic Church's missionary efforts in northern Mexico, serving as a center for training and dispatching missionaries to evangelize indigenous populations. Its establishment marked a strategic effort to extend Christian doctrine and Spanish influence into remote and often resistant territories. The Colegio played a crucial role in the cultural and spiritual transformation of the region, fostering the spread of Christianity and supporting the establishment of numerous missions, which laid the foundation for many communities in northern Mexico.

Early Mexican Lithography

Though the name of the lithographer has been trimmed from the present example, this view was likely made by the firm of Massé y Decaen, an early lithographic partnership of Joseph Antoine Decaen and Augustín Massé, located at Callejon de Santa Clara No. 8 (currently Motolinía, between Madero and Tacuba) in Mexico City. The firm was active in the 1840s. The present lithograph was likely made for one of the now rare early lithographically-illustrated Mexican periodicals, possibly El Museo Mexicano. Massé y Decaen's other work includes Pedro Gualdi's Monumentos de Mejico (1841).

See: Recuperan crónicas monásticas que datan de los siglos XVIII y XIX | Secretaría de Cultura | Gobierno | gob.mx (www.gob.mx)