The work is a "remarkably dense text," because of its theological digressions, contradictions, and anachronisms, since Torquemada incorporated material without resolving contradictory and competing points of view from his sources. In addition to the texts written by Spaniards, Torquemada draws on the work of mestizo Tlaxcala patriot Diego Muñoz Camargo, and Texcoco indigenous nobility Fernando Alva Ixtlilxochitl, Juan Bautista Pomar, and Antonio de Pimentel, and the account of the conquest from the Tlatelolco point of view compiled by Bernardino de Sahagún. He incorporates a large quantity of information taken from indigenous pictographs and manuscripts. Torquemada interviewed elderly indigenous people about their ancestors and recorded their oral traditions. The "Monarquía indiana" is the best work on what was known of the indigenous past at the beginning of the seventeenth century. It is considered an especially important source on the Mexica, Totonac, Pipil and Nicoya cultures.