[Caption title:] Señor. El Ministro General de la Orden de S. Francisco, postrado à los pies de V. Majestad com humildad debida, dize: [...]

[Madrid?]: [s.n.], 1644. First edition. Unbound, disbound from a larger volume. Contemporary handwritten note on first page. Pages numbered in ink (ff. 207-220). Wide margins, untrimmed. Chipped at the edges, light stain on the first and last leaves. Last blank leaf torn. Otherwise in fine condition.. First edition. Unbound, disbound from a larger volume. ff. 13 [1 (blank)].
Unrecorded memorandum related to José Maldonado's scandal caused by appointing Luis Catena as Comisario General del Perú in 1643.

Soon after Maldonado became Comisario general de las Indias in 1641, he dismissed Fray José Cisneros and appointed Luis Catena, a father from Quito just as Maldonado, as General Commissioner of Peru (Comisario General del Perú). It was out of Maldonado's authority, as such assignments were in the power of the General Minister of the Order, at the time Juan Merinero. After a noisy lawsuit and due to the averse of the Peruvian church officials, the General Minister revoked Catena's patent and reestablished Cisternos as the Commissioner. The present memorandum, addressed to Philip IV of Spain by the General Minister of the Order, supposedly printed only for the court in Madrid, thus in very limited number, describes the scandalous situation and argues against the appointment by citing legal references and precedents. (Rocher Salas, 2022)

Fray José de Villamor Maldonado was born in Quito in the last third of the 16th century. His ancestors on both sides were among the first conquistadores of Peru. Maldonado left America in 1618, when the Franciscan Province of Quito sent him as its representative to the General Chapter held in Salamanca, and remained in Spain until he died in 1652. He held various high positions in the Order that no other American could reach during the colonial era. He was the first and only American to serve as General Commissioner of the Indies, and in 1648 for some time, the head of the entire Order. Besides religious works, he is the author of the curios booklet about the discovery of the Amazon river, "Relacion del primer descubrimiento del rio de las Amazonas" (1641-2), claiming its glory to the Franciscan friars. (Sanz, 1955)

Unrecorded. No copies in institutions could be located.

Litarature: Arroyo, L. (1952). Comisarios generales de Indias. Archivo Ibero-Americano, XII (46). Madrid: Costa. p. 166.; Canedo, L. G. (1977). Evangelización y conquista. México: Editorial Porrúa. p. 342; Rocher Salas, A. (2022). Entre Roma, Madrid y México: competencias y jurisdicción en torno a la provincia franciscana de San José de Yucatán al mediar el siglo XVIII. Archivo Ibero-Americano, 80 (291), pp. 621-649. https://doi.org/10.48030/aia.v80i291.207; Sanz, B. G. (1955). Semblanza historica del cronista peruano fray Diego de Cordova y Salinas (Siglo XVII). Revista de Historia de América, 40, 425-486 (432-3). http://www.jstor.org/stable/20136984; Torrubia, J. (1756). Chronica seraphica, vida del glorioso patriarca san Francisco de Assis [...]. Noventa parte. Roma: Gereroso Salonom,. pp. 217-9;.