Overview

• Investigators from the FBI Art Crime Team, the NYPD and the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York tracked the stolen page to the continental United States and repatriated it on August 13.
• The Feb. 20, 1527 manuscript records payments in gold pesos for expedition logistics, offering rare insight into the administration of New Spain.
• Authentication drew on Mexico’s 1993 microfilm inventory and a distinctive 1985–86 wax-numbering system to narrow the theft window and confirm provenance.
• Officials announced no criminal charges after determining the page had exchanged hands multiple times since it vanished from Mexico’s national archives between 1985 and 1993.
• This repatriation follows the 2023 return of another Cortés document and highlights Mexico’s broader efforts to recover colonial-era cultural property.