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There is no quire signature in the familiar position at folio 1r, though it is possible that a curving vertical stroke at the center top margin, crossed through with a long horizontal stroke, might have been intended as the “1” of this sequence.

Foliation

The still-used foliation of the Codex Mendoza consists of a sequence “1” to “71,” written boldly in dark ink at the top right-hand corner of each leaf; each number is marked off on the left and below with a curved line. It seems likely that the foliation was created in the seventeenth century, although it is difficult to be more precise. The fact that it does not extend into Part 2 is interesting but not decisive. The foliation is of particular importance for the order of leaves in Quire VI (folios 51-5), q.v., where the folio numbers of folios 53-5 show signs of alteration.

For some openings in the second and third sections of the Codex Mendoza, the folio number of the recto is repeated on the facing verso, in the same hand and usually with the familiar bracketing line. This happens especially at the beginning of the sections, presumably to show that the opening is to be read across as a unit of text and pictures, with “19” (on 18v) and “20” (on 19v) at the start of the tribute section, and “57” (56v), “58” (57v) and “59” (58v) at the start of the final section on the Aztec life. Whilst this could possibly mean that the foliator intended to number openings rather than folios (and maybe sometimes rather than always), the modern convention is to interpret and cite the numbers only as folio numbers (thus, the first opening of the third section is to be cited as “folios 56v-57r,” not “57-57”).