Indigenous paintings discovered in Mexican church

Indigenous symbols painting found next to Roman Catholic motifs at a 1550s-era convent near Mexico City suggest Spanish priests negotiated with Indigenous leaders in the first years after the conquest.

The National Institute of Anthropology and History announced that Indigenous symbols like a feather headdress, an axe and a shield have been found under layers of lime plaster at open-air chapels in a convent in the town of Tepoztlan, just south of Mexico City. The meaning of the pre-Hispanic symbols are still being studied and may refer to some Indigenous gods.