The 'Nican Mopohua' of Guadalupe

an early manuscript detailing the apparition:

Our Lady of Guadalupe is very popular. Studies, devotional literature, pictures and even web sites abound. However, there is a document about Guadalupe which is not often mentioned. It was written in 1545, fourteen years after the Guadalupe event of December 9 to 12, 1531. Called Nican Mopohua because of the exact chronological order in which it relates the various phases of the apparitions, this account is also the first and oldest written source on Guadalupe. It is considered a masterpiece of Nahuatl literature and was written by Don Antonio Valeriano... The following text is a condensed version of the translation made by Primo Feliciano Velazquez from the original in Nahuatl. Elise Dac translated the Spanish text into English. The story was published 1951 by Publisher Dac, Mexico/Paris, under the title Stream of Light, Queen of Tepeyac. Fernando Leal made the illustrations inspired by native Indian codices. In the Nahuatl language of symbols birds, as well as winged angels, are expressions of divine mediation and flowers point to the truth of things. Because hill of Tepeyac where Juan Diego first met Our Lady has the shape of a face, it is known as the "Hill of the Nose."

Guadalupe is more than a shrine. It is a national monument. Its message has been imprinted on the soul of the Mexican people. Pope Leo XIII expressed this in 1895 when he wrote, "The Mexican people rejoice before your wonderful image ... may it preserve its faith, strong and immovable..."

Carl Anderson and Fr. Eduardo Chavez's book has a very literal, rather beautiful translation of the text at the end.