Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimería Alta: A Contemporary Ac-
count of the Beginnings of California, Sonora, and Arizona, by
Father Eusebio Francisco Kino, S. J., Pioneer Missionary Ex-
plorer, Cartographer, and Ranchman, 1683-1711. By Herbert
Eugene Bolton, Ph. D. (Cleveland, The Arthur H. Clark Co.,
1919. 2 vols. Pp. 379, 329.)
The history and bibliography of the Spanish Southwest has
been notably enriched by the publication of Professor Bolton's two
volumes on Father Kino. The author and editor has rescued from
oblivion what may be justly characterized as one of the most val-
uable sources in the field of which he is the acknowledged pioneer
and master, and has given to the scholarly world a final and au-
thoritative picture of the great missionary whose name will always
be intimately associated with the northward expansion of New
Spain. "Bolton's 'Kino'" will doubtless become as well known a
phrase as is "Parkman's 'La Salle'," "Fiske's 'Las Casas'" and
other similar works.
The major portion of this work consists of a carefully edited
translation of Father Kino's lost history known as "Favores Celes-
tiales." The original manuscript was discovered by Professor
Bolton during his researches in the Mexican archives. There had
been a few vague references made and much speculation indulged
in by earlier writers as to the existence of a formal history by
Father Kino, but Professor Bolton was the first to locate and defi-
nitely identify such a work. The text of the translated manu-
script comprises a total of 567 pages in the two volumes, and
contains Kino's personal account of his labors in the region of
Pimería Alta, roughly corresponding to present northern Sonora
and southern Arizona.
history of North. America. It is not only an interpretation of
Kino's manuscript, but also an excellent biographical sketch of
that interesting personage. Kino's labors and personality may
best be described in the words of Professor Bolton:
He was great not only as a missionary and church builder,
but also as an explorer and ranchman. By him or directly under
his supervision missions were founded on both sides of the Sonora-
Arizona boundary, on the Magdalena, Altar, Sonóita, and Santa
Cruz Rivers. The occupation of California by the Jesuits was
the direct result of Kino's former residence there and of his per-
sistent efforts in its behalf, for it was from Kino that Salvatierra,
founded of the permanent California missions, got his inspiration
for that work. To Kino is due the credit for first traversing
in detail and accurately mapping the whole of Pimería Alta.
. . . During his twenty-four years of residence at the mis-
sion of Dolores, between 1687 and 1711, he made more than fifty
journeys inland, an average of more than two per year. . .
In the course of them he crossed and recrossed repeatedly all of
the two hundred miles of country between the Magdalena and the
Gila and the two hundred and fifty miles between the San Pedro
and the Colorado. When he first opened them nearly all his trails
were either absolutely untrod by civilized man or had been alto-
gether forgotten. . . . One of his routes was over a forbid-
ding, waterless waste, which has since become the graveyard of
scores of travelers who have died of thirst because they lacked
Father Kino's pioneering skill. . . . In the prosecution of
these journeys Kino's energy and hardihood were almost beyond
belief.
In addition to all of this, as Professor Bolton points out, Kino
was very active in his literary work and map-making. The editor
has also given us the personal, subjective side of the great mis-
sionary, and draws a picture that constitutes a new tribute to the
sincerity and value of Spain's civilizing work in America. Kino's
perseverance, piety, resourcefulness, business ability, personal cour-
age, and medieval asceticism bespeak an unusual character worthy
of close study. The sympathetic enthusiasm of the editor adds
charm and interest to the entire work.
The translation is unusually accurate and painstaking. The
volumes abound in helpful footnotes indicative of Professor Bol-
ton's marvelous familiarity with his field. A number of contem-
porary maps are reproduced for the first time, and the editor has
compiled a detailed map of the scene of Father Kino's labors
which locates accurately for the first time all of the principal
frontier settlements of northwestern New Spain. The typograph-
ical excellence of the work is worthy of mention, and the modern
scholarly aids in the way of bibliography and index are unusually
complete. The work may well be considered a masterpiece in the
historical literature relating to the Spanish regime in the Americas,
W. E. Dunn.
How to cite:
"Kino's Historical Memoir of Pimería Alta: A Contemporary Account of the Beginnings of California, Sonora, and Arizona, by Father Eusebio Francisco Kino, S. J., Pioneer Missionary Explorer, Cartographer, and Ranchman, 1683-1711", Volume 24, Number 1, Southwestern Historical Quarterly Online, http://www.tsha.utexas.edu/publications/journals/shq/online/v024/n1/review_DIVL1132.html
[Accessed Thu Dec 4 12:26:54 CST 2008]
