e American Indian Series Durán traces the history of the Aztecs from their mythic origins to the destruction of the empire, when bearded strangers came from the east in "houses floating on the water." He tells of Cortés's alliance with the enemies of the Aztecs, the ensuing battles, and the death of Motecuhzoma II. Durán, a sixteenth-century Dominican friar, was born in Spain but raised in Mexico. His firsthand experience of Mexican culture and fluency in the Nahuatl language made him one of the most sympathetic and knowledgeable of the missionary-ethnographers. He based his History on a Nahuatl chronicle now lost as well as on interviews with living Aztec informants.