Alfonso Caso
Andrade Alfonso Caso
Andrade Alfonso Caso was born in Mexico City. By 1919 he a degree in law and an M.A. in philosophy from the Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico (UNAM). A year later he acquired a masters in the latter. He found anthropology to be his true calling. Between 1918 and 1940 he taught logic and epistemology at the National University of Mexico while taking classes for archaeology. In 1930 he was appointed Professor of Ethnology at the school of Philosophy and Letters. For 40 years, Caso delved into mysteries of pre-Hispanic writing and strived to decipher the forgotten inscriptions.
Only a few days before he passed on 1970, Alfonso Caso finished his most famous work, Kings and Kingdoms of the Mixteca. His first work, El mapa de Teozacoalco, published in 1949, is basically the key to Mixtec history in one document. During the 1930's, he was Director to the National Museum and in 1939 he founded the Istituto Nacional de Antropologia y Historia and the School of Anthropolgy. From August of 1944 to March of 1945 he was President of the National University of Mexico and later was in the Cabinet of President Miguel Aleman. Even during these times, Caso went on digs at Monte Alban. He was instrumental in the discovery of the prehispanic city of Monte Alban and Tomb Seven of Monte Alban. Other places where Mixtecan people had lived, like Yucuita, Monte Negro and Yucunicahui, were found by Caso. Not only did he make many great discoveries, but he was able to make interpretations and therefore, establish the chronology of Monte Alban history. He also deciphered Mixtec codices.
Alfonso Caso Andrade believed that the best way to understand Mexican cultural roots was the systemic study of ancient Mexican civilizations.
From 1949 when he founded it, to his death, Caso was director of the Instituto Nacional Indigenist.
Other published works:
Urnas de Oaxaca (1952)
El pueblo del
sol (1953)
Los calendarios prehispanicos (1967)
La ceramica de Monte
Alban (1967)
El tesoro de Monte Alban (1969)
This picture reprinted by permission of the American Anthropological Association from American Anthropologist 36:4 1971
Bernal, Ignacio. American Antiquity Instituto Nacional de Antropologia y Historia. Vol 36 [4,1971] page 449
Leon-Portilla, Miguel. American Anthropologist National
University of Mexico. Vol 75 [3, 1973] page 877
Written by: Students in an Introduction to Anthropology Class, Minnesota State University, Mankato, Minnesota