Nuns are hardly associated in the popular mind with rebellion and turmoil. In fact, convents have often been the scenes of conflict, but what went on behind the walls of convents was meant by the church to be mysterious. Great care was taken to prevent the "scandal" of factionalism in the nunneries from becoming widely known. This has made it very difficult to reconstruct the battles fought, the issues debated, and the relationships tested in such convents. Margaret Chowning has discovered a treasure-trove of documents that allow an intimate look at two crises that wracked the convent of La...

Unprecedented in the historiography of post-independence Mexico for its combination of rich archival detail and chronological scope, this book focuses on the wealthy men and women of the state of Michoacan from the last decades of colonial rule to the 1910 Revolution. The breadth of its documentary base and the sweeping span of time it covers transcend narrow social history to enlarge our understanding of the economic, political, and intellectual history of nineteenth-century Mexico. Though not primarily a study of development or politics, the book nonetheless suggests strikingly original...