A Question for Experts Here

[Richley Crapo]

I'm in the process of publishing an English translation of ANÓNIMO MEXICANO and want to include a few illustrations from other early codices, including for instance, Codice Xolotl (which was published as a facsimile edition by UNAM in cooperation with the University of Utah Press back in the 1950s.

Here's my question, when the original source is a Nahuatl manuscript such as Xolotl or Anonymo where the original is housed in a library, does the library typically assert control of all copyright authority so that they are the entity that must grant permission or is the several hundred years age of such a document place it into public domain?

Richley