Juan Roque

Who is Juan Roque?

Juan Roque was an African living in colonial Mexico City. He died in 1623, leaving behind one of very few wills and testaments of African residents of Colonial Latin America. His daughter Ana María, and the confraternity to which he belonged in the hospital of the Limpia Concepción, also left behind documents describing a court battle which detail the final requests made by Juan Roque concerning a house “in the neighborhood of San Hipólito in the lane next to the College of San Juan where it meets the open air market of San Hipólito, bordering the houses of the marshals and those of Don Ángel de Villasaña.”