‘This kind of history does not obviously obey Western models of historical narrative’ (p. 16). With this assertion Robert Haskett asks us to leave behind a view of history that is familiar, even comfortable for us, in order to understand the primordial titles produced by some indigenous communities in (usually) eighteenth-century New Spain. This is precisely what he attempts to do with Visions of Paradise, guiding us through the analysis and interpretation of the key sources of his book, the titles written to describe and authenticate corporate land ownership.

The geographical focus is on Cuernavaca, which has in fact produced only one well-known título primordial, but titles from other areas support the study, as well as a great variety of other types of sources from Cuernavaca itself, creating a colourful and fascinating canvas of an important part of the Mexican indigenous world at that time.

Indeed, what Haskett has in mind is not just a linguistic analysis of the documents; rather the philological approach he deploys is a tool to reconstruct the image of the place and its past as it was conceived by the indigenous elite who produced these titles. The rendering of this conception starts with a wide-angle view on the history of the settlement, beginning well before the arrival of the Spanish, when it was still the Cuauhnahuac inhabited by the Tlalhuicas, and covering the main events of the colonial period as well as some details about daily life (chapters one and two). In the following three chapters the focus narrows to the titles themselves. The major aspects of a title are exhaustively explored as to the physical markers on the landscape, both natural (mountains, ravines, springs and the like) and constructed by men (chapter three); temporal markers such as dates, introduction of political and religious figures and symbols, local heroes (chapter four); and references to Christianisation (chapter five).

What emerges from a detailed look at these components is a complex process carried out by the indigenous elite to try and recreate the primordial paradise disrupted by the Spanish arrival. But were the Nahua leaders of the colonial period truly longing for a ‘paradise’? Haskett argues that they needed to assert their own position vis-à-vis the devastation of native society, thus founding their legitimacy in the perpetuation of Cuernavaca as an eden of ancient times that was being preserved through the actions of the new leaders. The original eden of Tamoanchan from which the Olmecs reached out to the rest of Mesoamerica was located here, and the elite affirmed the legitimacy of their altepetl and its people through its recreation and adaptation to colonial times.

Primordial titles became the vessel into which various events and heroes were mixed, from the arrival of Hernando Cortés and the first Franciscan guardián fray Pedro García, to the symbolic ancestors don Toribio Cortés and don Joseph Axayacatzin, to mention just a few. Through the mixture and re-enactment of the past, a collective memory emerges and is maintained, stressing the characteristics of Cuernavaca in a movement of local pride that was evident in the native elite, if not amongst the more humble inhabitants of the altepetl. The fusion of dates and names has been the pillar on which many scholars have based their view of the titles as historical frauds, inaccurate memories created in the eighteenth century rather than much earlier. We often think of this type of accounts as myths, implying that they are not grounded in evidence. Haskett invites us to approach these sources from another perspective; they do not follow Western patterns of historical narrative, but rather blend stories and beliefs in a way that makes the past vivid in the indigenous mind, therefore validating it. It is a different kind of accountability, and yet history is still accountable from a non-Western point of view. Haskett wishes Visions of Paradise to be read beyond specificities of the Cuernavaca case, as a reflection on how indigenous societies construct their historical memory and react to conquest and colonisation. Furthermore, while focusing on the creators of this historical memory, the author suggests we need to move from the conception of conquest as a broad category toward an analysis that concentrates on a regional and class-oriented model. It is a quest to value the local sense of identity and belonging of the indigenous actors, at the same time pushing the study of any colonial experience to consider sources and directions that we may at times find more difficult to pursue. In this sense, the author's inspiration for this book is wholly and effectively realized.