There is a need for a fresh view of the process of Independence in Latin America. This has become particularly important, in view of the increasing interest in the formative period of national development during the first half of the nineteenth century. Furthermore, recent studies of the late colonial period in the Viceroyalty of New Spain (Mexico) have placed an emphasis on the regional context of economic developments, and it has now become possible to compare and contrast social conditions among and within the provinces. Few such works, however, have examined the ‘Independence period.’.Their conclusions have rarely been projected into the complex processes of regional change that accompanied and formed part of the Mexican revolutionary movement of the 1810s. It is the purpose of this book to examine the regional dimension of the process of Independence, particularly in its social aspects. The focus will be upon the protracted insurgency that developed from the initial, failed attempt in 1810 to overthrow Spanish peninsular rule by a revolutionary uprising. The intention here is to make the connection between the social tensions of the late colonial period and those of the nineteenth-century Mexican Republic. The War of Independence (1810-21) constituted a broader expression of the limited popular discontent which from time to time erupted in the periods both preceding and following it. Stripped of the nationalist casing, the struggles of the 1810s often subsumed earlier conflicts and foreshadowed later ones. Very few works, to date, have attempted to make this connection.