Arte plumaria — Mesoamerican featherwork under Spanish patronage

The Nahua amantecatl laid undyed bird feathers into pictures. After the conquest the craft was redirected rather than ended: friars and Spanish householders commissioned feather images and retablos, painters supplied the drawing and the featherworkers the colour, and Torquemada describes twenty craftsmen dividing one image between them and rejoining it seamlessly. The same chapters carry the cost, including the friar's contempt for what those makers had painted before.