REA, ALONSO DE LA

Franciscan chronicler; b. Querétaro, Mexico, 1606?;d. place unknown, 1660? He is called also Fray Alonso de Larrea; some bibliographers erroneously call him Roa. He was the natural son of the Spaniards Tomás Angulo and Francisca de la Rea. He took the habit in November 1624, in the convent of Valladolid (today Morelia). He became a lector in philosophy and theology, a definitor of the order, chronicler (1637), and first Creole provincial of the Franciscans of Michoacán (1649). He wrote Crónica de la Orden de N. Seráfico P. S. Francisco, Provincia de San Pedro y San Pablo de Mechoacán en la Nueva España, published by the widow of Bernardo Calderón (Mexico 1643, 1822). Rea was a truthful and precise historian with a clear and concise style. He described the artistry of the Tarascans (natives of the province) in their featherwork mosaics, paintings of indigenous lacquer, religious sculptures of sugarcane pulp, especially their famous "Christs of Michoacán," as well as their ability as metal workers. An eyewitness to the plague that devastated the region, he described the charity of the Franciscan missionaries in curing and burying the native Mexicans and reported that towns of 20,000, such as Tzintzuntzan, dropped to 200 and that in the whole province five out of every six Tarascans died.

Bibliography: j. m. beristain de souza, Biblioteca hispano americana setentrional, 5 v. in 2 (3d ed. Mexico City 1947).

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