Witnessing the Invisibility of Inca Architecture in Colonial Peru

Witnessing the In-visibility of Inca Architecture in Colonial
Peru
Author(s): Stella Nair
Source: Buildings & Landscapes: Journal of the Vernacular
Architecture Forum, Vol. 14 (Fall,
2007), pp. 50-65
Published by: University of Minnesota Press
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STELLA NAIR
Witnessing the In-visibility of Inca
Architecture in Colonial Peru
Chinchero, Peru, January 9,1999
I had awoken that morning full of excitement and
anticipation. As I ate breakfast with Simeona and
her children in the warm adobe kitchen, I could
not wait to begin that day's work. The day before
I had spotted in the distance what appeared to be
a beautiful Inca wall. As I had found very little
surviving Inca architecture in this portion of the
town, I was thrilled. The wall could be a critical
piece of the puzzle, help me to reconstruct what
the Inca royal estate had looked like, and I began
to envision the various possibilities. As Jacinto

and I hiked over the hill from Simeona's house
to the new wall, I felt my chest tighten, not only
due to the altitude (11,000 feet) but also because
of my own towering expectations.
However, upon arriving at the wall, I was
filled with disappointment. Although the wall
had the formal elements of an Inca wall (which
I had noticed from afar), up close the wall
revealed some surprising evidence. Staring back
at me on the stone blocks were the small, evenly
distributed tool marks unmistakably left by a
particular metal chisel, a tool that was brought
to the Andes after the Spanish invasion in 1532
CE. This made the wall useless to my study of
imperial Inca architecture. Since the wall was
clearly erected after 1532, it could not have been
part of the original Inca royal estate, which had
been built for the ruler Thupa 'Inka sometime
between 1480 and 1500 CE (Figure i). Thus, at
first I dismissed the wall as an anomaly of the
colonial period and returned to study the archi
tecture at Chinchero that was built during the

imperial Inca period. Yet, in the next few months,
more and more anomalous walls appeared, and
the questions regarding their significance con
tinued to grow in my mind as I measured and
mapped the indigenous town.
After a few months, the rainy season came
full force to the south-central Andes, turning the
steep, stone-lined streets in town into cascading
fountains and mountain paths into muddy traps,
rendering fieldwork impossible. I escaped to the
archives and libraries of Cuzco and began to focus
on the issue of the anomalous walls from the
Spanish occupation. I searched the literature on
Inca architecture built in the colonial period, only
to discover that there was very little written on the
topic. As I read further, I also realized that there
was no actual place for Inca?or for that matter
indigenous?architecture in the current defini
tions of Latin American architecture in the colo
nial period, at least not in any meaningful way.
Instead, I found that any opportunities to allow

for its existence seemed to disappear, occluded by
rhetorical conventions (such as architectural cate
gories and naming practices) and falling between
disciplinary boundaries and scholarly assump
tions (such as the relationship between style and
ethnicity, as well as historical and cultural rup
tures and periodizations). My discovery of these
slips and occlusions not only revealed how a part
of the architectural record had been overlooked,
it also uncovered a larger problem of how colo
nial-era indigenous architecture has been seen or,
more
accurately, not
seen
by scholars.1
Architecture as a Product of Empire
Inca architecture is ubiquitous in the Andes; its
proliferation is understood as a visible manifesta
tion of the power of the Inca Empire. The Incas
were the last of a series of indigenous nations
that ruled over most of the western rim of South
50 I BUILDINGS <*; LANDSCAPES 14, 2007

2014 22:49:52 PM
America during the fifteenth century. The Incas
rapidly built a powerful, well-organized empire
that stretched from modern Colombia in the north
to Argentina and Chile in the south. Along the
way, they implemented an impressive building
campaign in the newly colonized lands, one that
incorporated a distinctive architecture, was easily
recognizable, relatively simple and quick to build,
and adapted to diverse environments and uses.2
As part of their conquest strategy, the Incas built.
Their architecture was marked by its unique stone
masonry, walls that had an inward batter and by an
emphasis on single-room, rectangular
structures
with trapezoidal doorways, niches, and windows
(Figure 2).3 While adapting skillfully to local con
texts (hence, allowing for regional expressions and
variability in the imperial architectur e), Inca archi

tecture read?much as it does today?as distinctly
different from other built environments, visually
proclaiming the expanse and power of the Inca
Empire. However, in 1532 the Spanish arrived on
Andean soil, quickening the dramatic decline of
the Inca Empire, and, it is often assumed, bring
ing an end to Inca architecture.4
Just as the proliferation of Inca architecture
across the Andes has been seen as visual evidence
of the might of the Inca empire, the destruction
of indigenous cities and buildings and their
replacement by European counterparts has been
seen as a visual manifestation of the power of
the Spanish empire over indigenous empires.
Indeed, European architecture spread rapidly
across the Americas. As historians Burkholder
and Johnson have pointed out, "in a remark
ably short time, the conquerors' cathedrals,
convents, administrative buildings, and private
residences replaced the pyramids, elevated pla
zas, ball courts, and palaces of the indigenous
elites."5 Imperial capitals such as the Mexica capi
tal Tenochtitlan and the Inca capital Cuzco were
transformed into visual attestations of Spanish
power. In indigenous towns and cities, Spaniards

"destroyed many of the Indian structures to make
room for churches, government buildings, and
Spanish residences."6 In addition, the Spanish
imposed new urban plans in a demonstration
of their power to resettle indigenous communi
ties across the New World.7 Research has shown
that much of this dramatic change seems to have
been deliberate and self-conscious, as was the
Spanish practice of intentionally leaving visible
remnants of the prior buildings under or within
the new structures to serve as clear reminders of
the changes in power.8
These dramatic changes have captivated
art historians, whose studies have explored the
introduction and transformation of European
styles and architectural practices in the New
World. These studies have shown the rapidity
with which European influences moved across
the Americas. One of the leading authorities
on colonial Andean architecture, Valerie Fraser,
states that,
within a hundred years of Columbus's landfall
in the Caribbean, the Spanish settlers had super
imposed a recognizably European imprint on the

landscape from Mexico to Chile, burying the vast
religious and urban complexes of the indigenous
inhabitants, especially the Aztec and Inca, beneath
uniform grid-plan towns, straight streets and
arcaded squares, stone-fronted government build
ings, palaces and town houses, and above all, reli
gious foundations: churches and monasteries with
generous dimensions, and imposing facades and
bell-towers.9
The resulting image is of an indigenous landscape
that was rapidly destroyed and thoroughly sup
planted by a European one.
But in this sweeping introduction and impo
sition of European architecture, what happened
Figure i.
View of the street
Conquista in Chinchero.
Note the stone walls
topped by adobe blocks.

From a distance, the
stone walls appear
similar to imperial Inca
walls at Chinchero,
with their inward batter,
height, and stone blocks.
However, on closer
examination, one notices
that many of the blocks
have been worked with
metal hammer tools
introduced by Europeans
immigrants. These
hard metal tools do not
deform noticeably with
continued use and leave
the distinct wear pattern
found. By contrast,
imperial Inca masons

used a series of stone
tools, which also left a
distinctive tool mark.
From this evidence I was
able to determine that
many of the walls lining
the street were made
after 1532. In addition,
remnants of a series of
parallel imperial Inca
walls and one finely made
building were found
embedded in the fabric
of the colonial era street.
Photograph by author.
STELLA NAIR, WITNESSING THE IN-VISI Bl LITY OF
INCA ARCHITECTURE | 51
2014 22:49:52 PM

building at Pisac, a ^^^^^^KI^^Êi^^KE^^BSSh^^^HMiJ'ta^^
fî cayplifti attributed to Thupa
^vE^^^HHHI^^BÎB^?H^^^^BB&AjIÎ^^J^ Srara
Mnka's father Pachakuti. lFH*fl^Bf||BBPHMW ?* M&^ ̂ii
This structure shows Hk?d|^H9EHH|LuJBt:V^^^^ . . ,
ur??c!MinK^
the typical niche form, Kftg^f^^BtoMg**?--<!** T
mW?mT'**." . jLTt!aC10fe M?4
' *v "?
,vJ.!S S???t^-'iW^-V '^
niche arrangement, stone g||^5fS?J'??ifc^ > , jR
,,
f|HH[K|fi^^^^*?
inward wall batter that BSJflPHE^1
jS^J^^^BOi^^MBB^^^KÎ^K^raMl^ it ̂^^M Jjl^^fe? *Jg^^^^^B
characterized imperial Bfe; ̂ BBBB^?iK^ ^^^BSft?B
ST^^B??^K??i3B^SlCr^r*^^^?
Inca architecture. Hp, ?KIM'' /^l?r^^^K?BfiBffi^-
^^Km^BrPSBf-1^& .^^^H-"J^^^SI^m?^^^^B- '
Photograph by author. HO^SB^^^K I^^^HnaSRiE?tJIH
H^^B^^^flBiBuiBjkj^^BÊXÊ^w^^^K'
,:'?iMKii^^BM*M^BHBBfeBR*^KM^
9?^-Î^^ÎBil'lyHÊ^^^BHEiP^BHr^^
to indigenous traditions? Did any indigenous
traditions survive the onslaught of European
artistic and construction practices? Scholars have
long noted the abundance of indigenous traits

in colonial material culture. Early scholarship
held that these traditions were lingering, often
meaningless aspects of the past that were soon
to disappear.10 However, subsequent research on
colonial-era paintings, tapestries, drinking ves
sels, and other movable arts demonstrated that
indigenous traditions were vibrant and varied
during the European occupation of the Americas.
Indigenous artists, who rejected, transformed, or
embraced European traditions in their own work,
remained active during this period. Colonial arts
were dynamic expressions of complex cultural
interactions."
Art historians, trained to pick up on the mul
tiple inspirations and layers of meaning in works
of art, have increasingly focused on these mani
festations of cultural entanglements, yet architec
tural historians exploring colonial Latin America
have not been as thorough in reading layers of
influence. The focus on tracing European-derived

styles has tended to obscure complex cultural
transformations. Although there have been a few
important studies that have highlighted indig
enous practices in colonial architecture, these
have often been dismissed as regional manifes
tations that do not call into question the belief
that colonial Latin American architecture is still
fundamentally European in character.12
One of the reasons architecture is treated as
a distinctly different type of material culture is
its presumed association with the state and its
institutions. Due to this belief, architecture in the
colonial period is thought to reflect the intentions
of the Spanish government and its elite citizens
and associated institutions (such as the Roman
Catholic Church). The speed with which Euro
pean architecture overtook indigenous forms in
the Andes is seen as an expression of the rapid

ity with which the Spanish forces overcame their
indigenous cultural counterparts. However, it is
important to remember that what the Iberian
powers claimed to be in their control was often
not, at least not in the beginning. Historians in
the last several decades have challenged the idea
of a swift and complete transition from indig
enous to Spanish control in the Americas, and
their work has revealed the nuanced, multifac
eted dynamics of invasion, resistance, and adap
tation that characterized the first centuries of the
European invasion.13 For example, studies
con
ducted on the extended Maya resistance and the
mid-colonial Aymara revolt have exposed how
52 I BUILDINGS ?f LANDSCAPES 14, 2007
2014 22:49:52 PM

fragile Spanish control in parts of the Americas
could be. There was often a significant difference
between the intent of the colonizers in terms of
their conquest strategy and what they were actu
ally able to enact on the ground, a disparity that
varied greatly across space and time.
In the Andes, such a disjuncture is most evi
dent in the vast mountainous areas, which made
up a significant portion of the new territories
in Viceregal Peru and housed the preponder
ance of the people, the majority of whom were
indigenous.14 In 1532, the Europeans arrived on
the north coast of South America, encountering
an Inca empire devastated by a brutal civil war
and the introduction of European diseases.15 The
Spanish kidnapped the Inca ruler Atahualpa and
demanded an enormous ransom for his freedom.
However, upon receiving the treasure, the Span
ish killed Atahualpa and proclaimed control over
the lands in the name of Spain.

As we now know, this declaration of Span
ish imperial dominion was premature, as the
brutal murder of the Inca ruler anticipated a
lengthy period of negotiation, during which vari
ous indigenous and European groups vied for
power, each manipulating the other in hopes
of (re)gaining full control over the Andes. Dur
ing this period, lasting from 1532 to 1570, there
were proportionally few Europeans in the Andes,
fostering a practice in which Spaniards relied on
indigenous leaders to mediate their intents and
carry out their plans, as well as build their archi
tecture. Continuing well after the Spanish were
able to bring the high Andes under firm Spanish
control, the use of indigenous intermediaries was
particularly evident in areas of large indigenous
populations, such as the Inca heartland, where
indigenous resistance and cultural production
remained strong.
Hence, while the Spanish colonizers deployed
architectural projects as part of their conquest

strategy, they did not have the power to com
pletely transform the built environment of their
newly conquered lands. In many parts of the
Americas, indigenous individuals, groups, and
communities continued to wield some form of
control over the built environment, particularly
in their own cities and homes where there was
limited European influence.16 The architecture
ranged from those sponsored by individuals to
those sponsored by indigenous organizations
and included domestic, religious, and civic build
ings, as well as urban places, such as the Inca city
of Vilcabamba and the Itza Maya city of Tayasal.
With so many areas jostling for control and other
areas far from Spanish reach, we must rethink
the assumption that the Spanish government
controlled the Americas to the extent that it deter
mined the architectural landscape and eclipsed
indigenous practice completely.
Monumental versus Vernacular Architecture

If the Spanish governments and its elite patrons
did not have complete control of the built envi
ronment, what was being built in areas in which
struggles for power continued or where Spain
loosely held sway over a large and not readily
controlled indigenous population? What type
of architecture did indigenous people build for
themselves during the Spanish occupation?
Unfortunately, we know very little about the
buildings made in the colonial period for patrons
not directly aligned with Spanish authorities.
Most of the architectural studies in the Andes
have focused on the major monuments of the
European conquest, specifically those buildings
associated with the Spanish government, its elite
citizens, and the Catholic Church. This bias is due
to assumptions and practices within the field of
architectural history, rather than an issue related
exclusively to the study of colonial Latin American
architecture.
Architectural historians in Europe and the

Americas (North, Central, and South) have
focused primarily on "high-style" or monumen
tal architecture. This category is an elusive one
but tends to concentrate on the architecture of
powerful state institutions and the elite. Some
scholars have called the focus of these studies
"Architecture with a capital A."17
By contrast, all other architecture has tended
to be grouped under the rubric of "vernacular."
This category is equally difficult to define. Some
have attempted to do so on the grounds of the
training of the builders, systems of construction,
scale, or the state of development of a culture
who builds.18 However, Dell Upton has pointed
out that the actual definition of the category of the
STELLA NAIR, WITNESSING THE I N-VISI Bl LITY OF
INCA ARCHITECTURE | 53
2014 22:49:52 PM

vernacular is not as important as understanding
how the category has served as a foil for high
style architecture, which is at the core of Western
architectural history. He notes that vernacular
and high-style architecture are not normative
categories but are a culturally constructed dichot
omy that enables a hierarchy of buildings to be
established, such that those made for the elites in
power can be placed above all others.19 One does
not need to read very far in the architectural lit
erature to see the examples of this. Until recently,
studies of architecture have focused almost exclu
sively on the architecture of the powerful rather
than the modest architecture of the everyday.
Differences of materials have reinforced the
dichotomy, such that the architecture that has
endured has tended to be large scale and built
of durable materials. Usually this requires the
resources of a state. By contrast, architecture

created by individuals of modest means tends to
be made of perishable materials and on a much
smaller scale. With time, these buildings visually
disappear, leaving us with the enduring architec
tural complexes that are often the deliberate ges
tures of imperialism.
The availability of written sources has bol
stered this emphasis on high-style or monumen
tal architecture. In areas of the world where there
is a vibrant writing tradition, architecture created
by elites and powerful institutions is more likely
than vernacular architecture to be referred to in
written material. Thus, architectural historians
have much more evidence available to study
when looking at architecture of elites. This has
reinforced which types of buildings architectural
historians study, namely architecture of literate
elites and their institutions rather than structures
built by nonliterate groups, historically often the
majority of a population.

True to disciplinary practices, the study of
colonial Latin American architecture has empha
sized the grand and enduring monuments of
the colonial period, such as the impressive and
costly structures relating to the Spanish govern
ment, the Catholic church, and the homes of
the elite (usually Spanish) citizens. What could
be classified as Andean vernacular architecture
(primarily structures built for people not directly
associated with European powers nor designed
by architects trained in European academic insti
tutions) has been largely ignored. Thus the archi
tecture covering the majority of the Andes and its
largely indigenous population built after 1532 has
escaped study.
Naming Colonial Architectural Categories
The influence of the monumental/vernacular
dichotomy can be seen in the practice of naming
colonial Latin American architectural categories.
This has been set in motion by a disciplinary
divide between archaeologists on one side and
art and architectural historians on the other, with
archaeologists focusing primarily on indigenous

architecture built before 1532 and art and architec
tural historians studying European architectural
traditions after this date.20 Disciplinary boundaries
have resulted in a divergent language for pre- and
post-1532 architecture, one that implies an end
of indigenous architectural practices and their
replacement with European designs. For example,
architecture built before 1532 in the Andes car
ries the names of the many indigenous groups
with which they are associated, such as Aymara,
Moche, Inca, and Chachapoya architecture. How
ever, for architecture built after 1532, there are just
two categories, Spanish and mestizo, suggesting
the end of the diverse indigenous architectural
practices. Spanish architecture tends to be equated
with the monumental and hence is often the focus
of research, while mestizo is a more nebulous
category, frequently applied to more modest struc
tures, a type of Andean vernacular expression.
These naming practices have played a criti
cal role in how we understand architecture in
the colonial period. Spanish architecture (Fig

ure 3) has traditionally been analyzed in terms
of its European elements, and mestizo or hybrid
architecture (Figure 4) has been highlighted for
its unusual mixing of European and indigenous
elements.21 In addition, Spanish and mestizo
styles are assumed to reflect the ethnic groups
that designed, built, and often inhabited the
structures. Spanish architecture is usually found
in the major cities, while mestizo architecture
tends to be found in secondary centers, usually in
the form of provincial churches. The prevalence
of mestizo style in remote settings is seen as a
lack of Spanish influence and control in more
54 I BUILDINGS ?f LANDSCAPES 14, 2007
2014 22:49:52 PM
hard-to-reach locations. The Spanish and mes
tizo categories focus on structures built by Span
ish institutions, such as the Catholic Church, as
well as by wealthy individuals. They reiterate an

emphasis on European powers and cultures, but
they also hint at the possibility that other players
may have been involved in the colonial fabric of
the New World.
Clearly these two categories do not sufficiently
encompass all of the architecture built during the
Spanish occupation of the Andes. For example,
indigenous structures built in the colonial period
fall into neither category, potentially threaten
ing the stability of these rubrics. An example of
excluded architecture is neo-Inca architecture.
Scholars have used this catchall label to describe
a variety of buildings that have clear links to
imperial Inca architectural traditions.22 It ranges
from architecture that looks nearly identical to
structures built before the arrival of Europeans
on Andean soil, to Inca architecture that includes
Spanish influences.
This category of buildings has received almost
no attention by scholars. Federico Kauffmann
Doig is one of the few scholars to examine the
continuation of Inca architecture practices.23 One

reason for this lack of attention is the previously
stated notion that indigenous material culture
stopped being produced soon after the European
invasion. Kaufmann Doig's important work
could have easily destabilized these assumptions
and practices but was prevented from doing so
by the author himself. He described his "Inca
influenced" architecture as being part of the
category "mestizo." In doing so, he effectively
removed this architecture from a longer indig
enous tradition. Instead, he has placed it as a
subset of a new European-dominated architec
tural category, thus reinforcing the notion of a
Spanish-dominated colonial landscape.
However, even the name "neo-Inca," used by
subsequent scholars to describe this perceived
subset of mestizo architecture, does not menace
the pervasive belief in the dramatic cultural and
architectural rupture of 1532. Instead, the name
suggests that this category of buildings is part
of a revival, therefore reinforcing the assumed
rupture. When used to describe architectural

traditions, "neo" means a revival, a rebirth of a
tradition that has died. As we can see in exam
ples such as neogothic or neoclassical, archi
tectural revivals are usually introduced after a
significant period of time, usually measured in
centuries rather than decades.24 Furthermore,
revivals are often the products of groups that are
culturally and geographically distant from the
original creators of the style. The revived style is
also frequently used in different contexts. Exam
ples are the monuments to North American
governance, such as the neogothic parliament
building in Canada or the neoclassical Capitol in
Washington, D.C. Both are far removed in time,
space, and ethnicity from where these styles
were first used. Likewise, neo-Inca suggests a
revival of Inca style after a significant time of
abandonment and the style may have had little
(top) Figure 3
Cathedral of Cuzco, Peru.

Front fa?ade. Photograph
by author.
(bottom) Figure 4.
San Pedro Church, Lake
Titicaca, Zepita, Peru.
STELLA NAIR, WITNESSING THE IN-VISI BILITY OF INCA
ARCHITECTURE | 55
2014 22:49:52 PM
Figure 5.
Exterior view of two
colonial-era buildings
from shared private
courtyard. These
structures were
separated by an entrance

space that opens out
to the public street.
Chinchero, Peru.
?B?V**i
to do with Inca descendants or have carried the
same original meaning.
Problematizing terms like "neo-Inca" leads to
other questions such as when did Inca architecture
die? For how long was it abandoned? When did
the revival begin? As no one has seriously inves
tigated these questions, we must turn directly to
the physical evidence. Indeed, a study of the sur
viving evidence?and there is an abundance in
Cuzco?reveals that there is no time in the early
colonial period when we can say that Inca archi
tecture was no longer being built. Rather, neo
Inca architecture appears in seamless continuity
with imperial Inca constructions. Sometimes it is
impossible to separate the types stylistically. This

suggests that the name neo-Inca is historically
misinformed and highlights the subtle yet pro
found effect that scholarly naming practices can
have on how we understand the past.25
The name neo-Inca appears to have been
erroneously given to this category of buildings
because of their assumed link with a political
entity, the neo-Inca state.26 This implicit relation
ship reflects a tendency to interpret all (colonial)
architecture as products of a state and its asso
ciated institutions. Yet, linking all architecture
with political bodies or movements disregards
the many types of buildings that are produced
separately from or contrary to the state, and it
ignores the complex ways that architecture func
tions within a culture. In the case of the build
ings labeled neo-Inca, most of these structures
had nothing to do with a political movement but
were the individual or communal efforts of local
ethnic Incas in the form of shared spaces or pri
vate homes.27
Inca Architecture in Chinchero, Peru

Examples of Inca architecture produced in the
colonial period can be found in the very walls that
had so confounded me during the early days of my
fieldwork. These "anomalous walls" lie in public
spaces such as the town plaza as well as in private …
Running Head: DIVISION OF A COUNTRY
1
DIVISION OF A COUNTRY
4
Division of a Country
Name
Institutional Affiliation
Thesis
The thesis is that the commonly discriminated groups of the
members of the society are black Americans since they are
considered inferior than the other races within United States.
Introduction
The government of the United States divide the country as a

result of ho it operates where some groups in the society are
discriminated while others are favored. The division between
the favored and the discriminated groups will emerge thus
leading to nation being subdivided. The divisions that are
common are the racial discrimination which results from
discrimination of a specific race and favoring of another race by
the government officials. Also, the way the media is used can
contribute to the division of the nation. Finally, politics divides
the county when politicians play divisive politics where they
prefer a group in the society to the others. The preferred group
will be divided from the other groups within the society. With
divisions in the country, there is threat of insecurity hence the
need to have the government officials to avoid conducting
themselves in a manner that will contribute to the division.
References
Gilens, M. (2009). Why Americans hate welfare: Race, media,
and the politics of antipoverty policy. University of Chicago
Press.
Turaev, A. (2020). The Impact of Changes in Public
Administration on the Development of Neoconservative Ideas in
the United States. Архив Научных Публикаций JSPI.
American Academy of Religion
Religion and Other Products of Empire
Authors(s): Richard A. Horsley
Source: Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Vol. 71,
No. 1 (Mar., 2003), pp. 13-
44
Published by: Oxford University Press

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In the Lodge of the Chickadee: Architecture and Cultural
Resistance on the Crow Indian
Reservation, 1884-1920
Author(s): Thomas Carter, Edward Chappell and Timothy
McCleary
Source: Perspectives in Vernacular Architecture, Vol. 10,
Building Environments (2005), pp.
97-111
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CHAPTER 7
IN THE LODGE OF THE
CHICKADEE: ARCHITECTURE
AND CULTURAL RESISTANCE
ON THE CROW INDIAN
RESERVATION, 1884-1920
THOMAS CARTER,
EDWARD CHAPPELL,
AND TIMOTHY McCLEARY
The Crow Indians of southeastern Montana recognize
the seminal role words play in their lives. As they say,
"Iichikbaale bilaxpaiake diawassakaashe f`uwuushka ataak
iliahihcheem baleeiiwaaxpaak" (The First Maker blew

his breathe into the first humans, therefore our words
are holy). Arranged into stories, and especially those sto-
ries that originate in dreams and visions, words form the
basis for human action. Not only do they explain how
and why the world is the way it is, but they also present
information individual tribal members use to chart a
successful course through that world. For the Crow,
truly, the words come first, and any attempt to under-
stand Crow history and culture must start with the
important stories.1
By looking at architecture through the veil of narra-
tive, one sees how a particularly powerful narrative, the
story of the chickadee, helped shape and bring meaning
to the built environment created by and for the Crows
as they moved onto their reservation during the early
1880s. The Indian response to this new-and what
must have seemed to them mostly hostile-political
landscape was informed by a story whose message of
guarded resistance allowed the Crows to ride out and
ultimately survive the oncoming wave of American fron-
tier expansion. The story centers on the wisdom of the
chickadee and, through its telling and retelling among
the Crow people, it became the story that, in the words
of Coyote Runs, "we traveled by."2
The chickadee story came to a young Crow warrior
named Plenty Coups in the 1850s during a vision quest
in the sacred Crazy Mountains of western Montana.
The young future chief dreamed the buffalo were re-
placed everywhere on the plains by the white man's
spotted cattle. He also saw a great storm destroy the

2017 01:17:27 UTC
green forest, and only "one tree, tall and straight, was
left standing." As Plenty Coups later told the story,
"The Four Winds that always make war alone had this
time struck together, riding down every tree in the
forest but one. Standing there alone among its dead
tribesman, I thought it looked sad. What does this
mean? I whispered in my dream. 'Listen, Plenty Coups,'
said a voice, 'in that tree was the lodge of the Chickadee.
He is least in strength but strongest of mind among his
kind. He is willing to work for wisdom'."3
The vision was a clear sign to Plenty Coups that if
the Crows were to avoid destruction by the whites,
they must rely on ingenuity rather than warfare; they
must outsmart rather than outfight their foes. Other
tribes might perish before the American onslaught, but
the Crows, in their actions from this point on, would
remember the story of the lone tree and the lodge of
the chickadee: they would join with the whites against
common enemies such as the Lakota, Cheyenne, and
Arapaho, they would "work for wisdom" by educating
themselves in the ways of the intruders, and they would
preserve their culture by adapting it to the changing
world. Bending, the Crows would not break.
The Crow people followed a generalized yearly pat-
tern: living in tipis, they moved about the Great Plains
in search of game, primarily buffalo, and fought inter-
tribal battles over honors and horses. During the win-

ter the Crow were broken into small family groups that
would gather into larger kin-based groups in the spring
to harvest edible roots. As summer approached, they
regrouped into their respective bands, or possibly even
the whole tribe, for large buffalo hunts. Fall brought a
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MAP 7.1 The Crow Indian Reservation, circa 1884. Drawing by
Collin Tomb, courtesy of the Western Regional Architecture
Program, University of Utah.
98 Thomas Carter, Edward Chappell, and Timothy McCleary
2017 01:17:27 UTC
return to somewhat smaller groups to pick berries and
then a break into family groups again for the winter.
By the early 1880s the traditional seminomadic Crow

lifestyle, with its dependence on following the buffalo
herds, had become untenable. The buffalo were gone,
slaughtered by white hunters as part of the grand effort
to subdue the Plains Indians, and the thirty-three mil-
lion acres of land set aside for the Crows in the 1851
Fort Laramie Treaty had been reduced to just over four
million acres. And there were signs that still more con-
cessions would have to be made to satiate the seemingly
endless American appetite for land.4
Crow leaders wanted to preserve and control the
center of their original homelands, the abundant lands
along the Big Horn and Little Big Horn rivers, and ne-
gotiations with the federal government would make this
desire evident. In 1884, after visiting the previous year
in Washington, D.C., Crow leaders returned to their
people and moved them eastward, away from lands
ceded in the western part of their former reservation, to
the new reservation headquarters of present-day Crow
Agency (map 7.1), an act that ushered in what histori-
ans call the "assimilation" phase of tribal history.s
From the outset, the policy of the U.S. government
toward Indian peoples was to isolate them on reserva-
tions until they could become "civilized" enough to
enter and function within European American society.
Federal policy saw acculturation-forcing the Indians to
adopt white ways-as the principal objective of reserva-
tion life. This policy would be carried out in two ways,
educating the children in white-run schools and forcing
the adults to adopt a sedentary agricultural lifestyle sim-
ilar to that of other rural Americans.6

Theories of the day concerning human behavior
centered on what is known as environmental determin-
ism-the idea that people's surroundings, customs, sto-
ries, food, and clothing largely determined how they
would behave and act. Sen. Henry Dawes, the major
proponent of this theory, as it related to American Indi-
ans, stated, "Till this people will consent to give up their
lands, and divide them among their citizens so that each
can own the land he cultivates, they will not make much
progress." Following this philosophy meant that the
success of the acculturative process hinged on changing
the Indians' environment. Not surprisingly, architecture,
as one of the most obvious and easily manipulated as-
pects of the human landscape, figured heavily in the
efforts to "civilize" the Indians.7
One well-oiled vehicle for such architectural deter-
minism was the boarding school. These institutions
were located either on or off the reservation, and run by
the government or by another institution like a church
or benevolent society. Common to all forms of board-
ing schools was the physical separation of Indian chil -
dren from their families, either by a simple fence or half
a continent. Whether the school was located nearby on
the reservation or miles away at a district or regional
school, a barrier was effected between parents and chil-
dren and between the Indian past and American future.
Placed in the new boarding school setting, which was
aggressively Eurocentric with its emphasis on order
(gridiron seating patterns, a daily schedule ruled by the
clock), individualism (separate desks, chairs, and beds),
geometry (square buildings with square rooms), and per-
manence (substantial masonry buildings). Indian chil-

dren were supposed to abandon their native culture and
accept new religions, thought patterns, and behaviors in
hopes of a smooth passage into American society. Sepa-
ration from family helped prevent backsliding into the
"old" Indian way of life.8
Some Crow children were sent to boarding schools
on the east or west coast, but during the early years of
reservation settlement generally the Crows were, as his-
torian Fredrick Hoxie has noted, "unwilling to part with
their children."' The two Roman Catholic missions
established on the reservation had the most successful
schools. The first, St. Xavier, was founded in 1887 in the
Big Horn District. The second, opened in 1891, was
St. Charles Mission (fig. 7.1), located in the western
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In the Lodge of the Chickadee 99
2017 01:17:27 UTC
district of Pryor. Around each of these missions Indian
camps consisting of tipis, tents, and small log cabins
sprang up, filled with families of new converts to Chris-

tianity and those interested in taking advantage of the
church-sponsored schools. Education in these settings,
Crows knew, could be gained without removing chil-
dren from the parents-and their traditional culture.
Barney Old Coyote, a Crow elder and lifetime educator,
describes upward of forty small single-room cabins built
near St. Francis Xavier mission between 1900 and 1940.
Only one survives, a low structure of hewn logs built
by Ties His Knees to house his family seasonally, during
the time when the children and grandchildren attended
the mission school. Even though the children stayed
in dormitories while not in class, the nearness of the
family allowed for some interactions during the week.
Viewed out of context, the building could represent the
materially modest life of any poorer western farm family.
However, built by Ties His Knees adjacent to the mis-
sion boundary segregating his family's school-age chil-
dren, the house is a dramatic representation of the effort
by Crows to preserve the traditional family unit.1'0
Another Crow institution that the U.S. government
sought to dismantle was the Indian camp. Crow political
and social life was based on extended family and clan
relations forming numerous subbands within three larger
bands that ultimately formed the tribe under a principal
leader, or chief. The subbands gathered in camps ar-
ranged in a rather loose, linear fashion, usually along a
river (fig. 7.2). In the middle was the lodge of the head-
man or band chief. Next, on both sides, came the lodges
of prominent warriors and medicine men. Finally, toward
the outside on each end were found families of lesser

standing and their lodges. It was a type of social organi -
zation that fostered band solidarity by reinforcing Crow
nationalistic identity and culture. However, the commu-
nal nature of the camp contradicted the essential individ-
ualistic nature of white communities and had by federal
policy to be changed."
The importance government strategists placed on
the dissolution of the Crow camp is evident in the
Dawes Act of 1880, also known as the Allotment Act.
This directed government agents to divide collectively
held tribal lands into surveyed parcels of privately
owned and operated farming plots known as "allot-
ments" (map 7.2). Indeed the grid pattern of enforced
land division resembled, in miniature, the blueprint for
Manifest Destiny that had been official governmental
~Q6 ? b- LIMER
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.. . .....::.) .. ..- ... R.
? " ..... :: ...... : .... . " " . ':- w
FIG 7.2 Conjectural axonometric view of a traditional
prereservation Crow camp. Drawing by Bryce
Allison, courtesy of the Western Regional
Architecture Program, University of Utah.
policy since Thomas Jefferson's presidency. The Dawes
Act marked a new, advanced phase of federal control of
Native Americans, from military conquest and settle-
ment on managed reservations to a much more in-
tensively controlled environment with Indians-turned-
farmers assigned surveyed squares and rectangles-
placing Indian families on the land in much the same

way as having Indian children assigned to desks with
seats in their rectilinear classrooms. Once settled on the
abstractly delineated properties, Crow families were vis-
ited and their progress toward civilized behavior moni-
tored by government agents and their aides. Once offi-
cially partitioned, parts of the reservation could also be
legally leased or sold to whites, whose intended perma-
nence was increasingly marked by the construction of
substantial houses. Allotment-the dispersal of the
Indians over the land the way that white people lived-
had another objective: it was pivotal to the federal gov-
ernment's overarching goal of undermining both tradi-
tional tribal authority and the collective orientation of
Indian people.12
The introduction of European American house
forms and nuclear-focused family structure was another
legacy of the Dawes Act. The customary Crow dwelling
was the four-pole lodge, or tipi. Not only was it classically
round and mobile, making it somehow unagrarian and
definitely un-Euro-American, the tipi was also laden with
religious meaning. Simultaneously it represented both
the Crow concepts of femininity/motherhood, and the
spiritual and physical aspects of the universe. Each of the
twenty-one poles-four principal ones plus seventeen
others that were structural but not load-bearing-repre-
sented either land or sky beings. The white buffalo
2017 01:17:27 UTC

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hide/canvas covering represented purity of the family
within. And the tipi itself was considered the property
of the woman of the household in a real and spiritual

manner. Metaphorically the tipi was spoken of as a per-
son's second mother, the canvas embracing the poles
as a mother embraces her children. The tipi, an object
of great cultural significance for Crows, was viewed by
whites as both "primitive" and an obstacle in the road to
"civilization." Square houses were deemed essential if
the Crows were to become good citizens. Government
agents therefore focused their energies and limited re-
sources on providing European American-type housing
for chiefs and band headmen, hoping that these leaders
would set an example for their followers.'3
Cultural memory and interaction are generally more
complex than students of material culture perceive
them. It has been argued that precontact Crows and
their predecessors in the Yellowstone Valley used un-
notched logs for the base and walls of their lodges, and
this may be the case. Also, contact with the fur trade
undoubtedly exposed Crows to European American
techniques of log construction early in the nineteenth
century, but they became more intimately acquainted
with log houses during the 1870s at the original agency,
which was at Absarokee, Montana, in the western half
of their original reservation. Here a number of log cab-
ins were constructed for tribal leaders, but this initial
attempt at "civilizing" the Indians had little immediate
effect because the native political structure and econ-
omy had not been disrupted. However, when the Crows
moved to the eastern half of the reservation in the early
1880s, to the Big Horn and Little Big Horn river valleys,
the buffalo had almost disappeared, and intertribal war -
fare had ceased. Now, white agents worked more vigor-
ously not only to break up the camps but also to impose
new non-Indian housing standards on the tribe.'4

In 1886, several years after the move east, white
visitors to the reservation noted that though peaceful
the Crows "still cling with tenacity to all the traditions
of the past, and have not deviated in dress, habits or
pursuits from the tribe of fifty years ago." It was an
observation that held for the architectural landscape as
well, with the Indians in this preallotment era setting
up familiar-looking camps along the rivers and major
streams or next to the missions at St. Xavier and St.
Charles. The three major bands of the Crow had settled
in different areas of the newly formed reservation. In
the center, occupying the Big Horn valley, lived a seg-
ment of the Mountain Crows led by Pretty Eagle and
Iron Bull. In the north were the River Crows, follow-
ers of Sees With His Ears and Two Leggings. In the
east, along the upper reaches of the Little Big Horn
River, were the Kicked In The Belly camps of Medicine
Crow and Spotted Horse. And in the west, along Pryor
Creek, settled the remainder of the Mountain Crows
under Plenty Coups. Plenty Coups purposely located
his group as far from the new government headquarters
at Crow Agency as possible to maintain, by keeping his
distance, his own autonomy. At this time Pretty Eagle
was the principal leader of the Crow, but Plenty Coups
was a rising young leader and the heir apparent to
Pretty Eagle's position.'s
The Crows were well aware of the implications sur-
rounding allotment. The attractions were few and the
detriments many. Individual ownership of land, after all,
meant little to them, and they rightly feared that once
they were situated on specific parcels, the agents, not
the chiefs, would gain control of tribal affairs. Thus,
actively, if in a nonconfrontational way, in the chickadee

tradition, the Crow resisted dispersal. Initially govern-
ment agents lacked the resources to enforce provisions
of the Dawes Act, and most Crow camps on the reser-
vation followed the traditional model.'6
One main difference, however, was that at the cen-
ter of the camp often stood a government-built log
house, newly erected for the band leader or chief. Most
band leaders, including Pretty Eagle, Medicine Crow,
and Plenty Coups, adopted for their followers what
might be termed the "reservation camp." The one
Plenty Coups established on Pryor Creek is representa-
tive of those established by the other bands (fig. 7.3).
On the north end was located Plenty Coups's home-
stead, consisting at the time of a one-room, single-story
log house, a tipi, a round horse corral, and a log stable.
To the south lay Plenty Coups's camp, a diverse collec-
tion of small log houses-there may have been as many
as fourteen at one time-army wall tents, and tipis
arranged in a traditional manner. While it is true that
some Crows accepted the Anglo-American rectilinear
house form, closer inspection suggests that the Indians
may nevertheless have had a say in the actual design
process.17
Plenty Coups first saw his future house in a vision
he had as young man. This vision began with the chief
being led through a cave by a spirit guide and then
shown that the buffalo would disappear and be re-

2017 01:17:27 UTC
N"Y COYP5 CAMPK
MrYO [email protected]
FIG 7.3 Conjectural axonometric drawing of Plenty Coups's
house and camp, circa 1890, Pryor, Montana.
Drawing by Bryce Allison, courtesy of the Western
Regional Architecture Program, University of Utah.
placed by cattle. As he described his vision to William
Wildschut, one of his biographers: "At that time I had
not yet seen many cattle, except those that were used to
pull the wagons that traveled through our country. But
now endless strings of cattle came and passed me. We
were standing in front of the mouth of the cave and my
guide pointed to a house and said: 'That is your house,
there you will live to be an old man and a great chief
among your people.' We knew nothing about houses at
that time and even very few cabins were built in our
part of the country yet. My guide spoke again and said;
'This will be your home hereafter.""'
Again the story had a "shaping" effect, helping-as
a form of cultural validation-Plenty Coups and those
around him in accepting the idea of the new kind of
house. In 1883, a year before the move of the agency
eastward, agent H. J. Armstrong wrote to Washington,
stating "that I have the honor to request authority to
employ two carpenters . . . to assist Plenty Coos [sic]
band in building cabins on Pryor Creek. ... Plenty Coos

[sic] insists that he is now able to manage a farm and
... there is no other place where he wants to put his per-
manent home." The house, which combines both Euro-
pean American and Crow features, was finished by 1885
and was a subtle but purposeful combination of both
Anglo-American and Indian architectural themes. A
photograph of the house taken before subsequent re-
modeling shows a story-and-half house, rectangular
in plan, with little to distinguish it from houses white
settlers were then building in the region.19
Although lacking circular plans and hide or canvas
coverings, early Crow houses, like that of Plenty Coups,
nevertheless possessed a number of distinctive tipilike
features (fig. 7.4). For example, the fireplaces or stove
chimneys of contemporaneous European American cab-
ins were generally located on the building's gable end,
while in cabins built for Crows, the stove was located in
the center, much like the fire pit in the tipi, with the
stovepipe running up the through the center of the
roof. In European American cabins, the front door usu-
ally faced the road, whatever direction that was, but in
Indian cabins, like the tipi, the front invariably faced east
in anticipation of the rising sun. Also, whereas in houses
built for whites there were windows to one or both sides
of the front door, in the Crow examples the tendency is
to make the cabin more tipilike by cutting only a single
door opening.20
Early Crow log houses were also often decorated,
furnished, and used in the same manner as their tipi
predecessors. Take for example the tipi "liner." In

Crow tipis, a curtain, or liner was hung around the in-
terior wall. The liners or curtains served both practical
and social functions. On a practical level, they formed
FIG 7.4 Comparison diagram showing on the left a traditional
Crow tipi, in the center Plenty Coups's original log
house, and to the right a typical Anglo-American log
house. Drawings by Danielle Grabarz and Bryce Allison,
courtesy of the Western Regional Architecture Program,
University of Utah.
In the Lodge of the Chickadee 103
2017 01:17:27 UTC
an air space that helped insulate the lodge in both win-
ter and summer. Socially, the liners were decorated to
publicize a man's war record, thus declaring his status
in the tribe. This practice lasted into the early reser-
vation period. Robert Lowie, an anthropologist who
worked on the Crow reservation in the early 1900s
observed that "pictorial representations of deeds in
realistic style were made upon men's robes and on the
windbreaks (bitaalasshia) inside the lodge. . . . Nowa-
days some men ... have corresponding decoration on
the canvas lining the inner walls of their log cabins."
Personal items were customarily hung along the top of
the liners, with sacred objects being placed in the back,
or west, side of the tipi. This tradition was carried over
to the cabins as well, and it would not have been un-

common to see hanging along the west wall of the
cabin a warrior's medicine bundles, sacred objects, and
other war accouterments.21
Other similarities between the two dwelling forms
are visible in patterns of use. Well into the twentieth
century, for instance, Crows had little use for European
American furniture, preferring to use the floor, which
was, in the earliest cabins, probably without wooden
planks, as is the case with Plenty Coups's original cabin.
Beds were made on the floor and were rolled up and
placed against the wall as backrests-just as in the tipi.22
Government pressure for Indian dispersal contin-
ued, and it appears that, by the first decades of the twen-
tieth century, some Crows started to take up their allot-
ments. One of the first was the principal leader Pretty
Eagle. Around 1905 the chief moved from his log
cabin, along the Big Horn River, into a house beside the
main thoroughfare that connected the mission of St.
Xavier to Crow Agency and the growing European
American community of Hardin. The choice of loca-
tion, one that increased the aging chief's visibility, may
have come as an attempt by Pretty Eagle to maintain
his authority during his twilight years. His house too
represents one of the first of a new kind of dwelling
that would dominate domestic architecture on the reser-
vation for the next several decades. Sometimes called
"allotment" houses, these houses differ from earlier ones
in that they have multiple-room plans and are con-
structed of light balloon framing covered with drop or
novelty siding. Lumber for Pretty Eagle's house, like

many others from this period, came from Fort Custer,
located on the bluffs south of present-day Hardin. The
fort was decommissioned in 1890; while some fort
buildings were moved intact to Indian homesteads, most
were dismantled for their lumber, which was put into the
construction of the new allotment-type houses.23
On the eastern side of the reservation, the Kicked In
The Belly bandleader, Medicine Crow, moved with some
of his followers to individual allotments near the Little
Big Horn River (fig. 7.5). Like Plenty Coups, Medicine
Crow had seen his house in a vision, and in 1906 he had
an allotment-type house composed of salvaged lumber
built on the rise, near the spring, indicated in his dream
(fig. 7.6). From the outside, a house such as Medicine
Crow's appears typically European American, having a
basic rectilinear shape and a familiar two-room, front-
kitchen, rear-sleeping-room plan. Covered by a gable
roof, wall studs, siding, roof sheathing, and floors were
all mill sawn and machine finished. Inside, the walls were
covered with new matchboard of a kind used for modest
turn-of-the century houses all across the United States.
Like Plenty Coups and many other Crows, however,
Medicine Crow was not fully accepting even the material
form of mainstream white domestic life. He had moved
his family to an allotment. He had adopted an Ameri-
can house form with mass-produced finishes and store-
bought stoves for cooking and heating, but the way the
house was designed and used remained thoroughly Crow.
Like the tipi, the house had a single front door that faced
east. The front room, furnished with a "Monarch" stove,

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2017 01:17:27 UTC
…
The Social Life of Pre‐ Sunrise Things: Indigenous
Mesoamerican Archaeology
Author(s): Byron Hamann
Source: Current Anthropology, Vol. 43, No. 3 (June 2002), pp.
351-382
Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of
Wenner-Gren Foundation for
Anthropological Research
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/339526 .
Accessed: 23/02/2014 11:33
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351
C u r r e n t A n t h r o p o l o g y Volume 43, Number 3, June
2002

� 2002 by The Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological
Research. All rights reserved 0011-3204/2002/4303-0001$3.00
The Social Life of
Pre-Sunrise Things
Indigenous Mesoamerican
Archaeology1
by Byron Hamann
Centuries before the creation of archaeology as a scientific
disci-
pline in the modern West, indigenous people in Mesoamerica
de-
veloped their own interpretations for the physical remains of
their past. This study draws on archaeological, ethnographic,
and
historical sources to explore a tradition of indigenous
Mesoamer-
ican archaeology. By resorting to the culture-area concept of
Mesoamerica, an interpretive structure of the long term is out-
lined. This framework is used to explore the social life of
objects
and places from “the past” in three paired locations: the Classic
site of Teotihuacan and the 16th-century Mexica Aztec capital
of
Tenochtitlán; the Classic site of Yucuñudahui and the 16th-cen-
tury Mixtec community of Chachoapan; and the Postclassic site
of Chichen Itza and the 20th-century Yucatec Maya community
of Chan Kom. Shifting between wide and narrow perspectives in
time and space, this study considers archaeology as a social
prac-
tice, inventions and revisions of tradition, and the productivity
of regional generalizations and structures of the long term.

b y r o n h a m a n n is a graduate student in the Departments of
History and Anthropology at the University of Chicago
(Chicago,
Ill. 60637, U.S.A. [[email protected]]). Born in
1972, he received his B.A. from Brown University (1994) and
M.A.’s from Vanderbilt University (1998) and the University of
Chicago (2000). His research interests include early modern Eu-
rope, pre-Columbian and early modern Mesoamerica, writing,
epigraphy, and archive, and the role of the Inquisition in social
transformations on both sides of the Atlantic in the 16th cen-
tury. Among his publications are (with John Monaghan)
“Reading
as Social Practice and Cultural Construction” (Indiana Journal
of
Hispanic Literatures 13:131–40) and (with Liza Bakewell),
Meso-
lore: Exploring Mesoamerican Culture (CD-ROM/internet
hybrid,
Brown University [www.mesolore.com], 2001). The present
paper
was submitted 8 xii 00 and accepted 14 x 01.
1. My interest in pan-Mesoamerican interpretations of the
remains
of the past was first sparked by John Pohl, who in a July 1996
interview pointed out that Postclassic Aztec and Mixtec ideas
about
the origins of their societies involved literal emergences out of
the
ruins of the Classic period; I thank him as a catalyst for this
study
(see Bakewell and Hamann 2001:Debates/History and
Propaganda/
John Pohl). Further thanks are offered to Chris Beekman,
Elizabeth
Hill Boone, Edward Fischer, Arthur Joyce, Michael Lind,

Geoffrey
McCafferty, John Monaghan, and Scott R. Hutson for their com-
ments and suggestions on earlier versions of this study; to Tom
Cummins, Manuela Carneiro da Cunha, Carmen Maria
Fernandez,
Patrick Hajovsky, Tamar Herzog, Matt Hunter, Claudio
Lomnitz,
and Kathleen Morrison for comments on its manifestation as a
University of Chicago M.A. thesis; and to Ron Spores for
answering
questions about the excavations at Chachoapan and
Yucuñudahui.
A version of this article was presented at the 1998 Mixtec
Gateway
And Tolteca potsherds are there to be seen. And Tol-
teca bowls, Tolteca ollas are taken from the earth.
And many times Tolteca jewels—arm bands, es-
teemed green stones, fine turquoise, emerald-green
jade—are taken from the earth.
— b e r n a r d i n o d e s a h a g ú n , General History of
the Things of New Spain
For over 3,000 years, detritus from complex societies has
sedimented Mesoamerica’s landscapes. These material
remains from “the past” have been utilized and inter-
preted in a number of different “presents.” Consider the
social lives of Olmec artifacts, and consider the afterlife
of antiquities in Aztec society. Formative Olmec jades
(1500–300 b.c.) were disinterred and recarved by the
Classic Maya (a.d. 250–900). They were depicted in the
murals of Classic Teotihuacan (a.d. 150–650), and they
were one of many types of ancient artifacts collected and
cached by the Late Postclassic Aztec (a.d. 1350–1520).
As illustrated in the opening quotation, the Aztecs also

gathered ceramics and ornaments (and even noted the
potsherds!) from Early Postclassic Toltec ruins (a.d.
1000–1300). They collected stone masks and ceramics
from Classic Teotihuacan, and they traveled to Teoti-
huacan itself for religious observances. According to one
16th-century source, the ruler of Tenochtitlan performed
sacrifices at Teotihuacan every 20 days. Dozens of anal -
ogous reutilizations are known.2
In some cases—the renovation of Olmec sites by Post-
classic settlers, the preservation of Postclassic knives by
1950s Cuicatecs—the meanings of these reused objects
and places are not documented, but many other resur-
rections are accompanied by explanations. These tell us
why such detritus exists and why it is significant “now.”
Such ruined sites and unearthed artifacts are not simply
conference organized by Nancy Troike in Las Vegas, Nevada; I
thank Lloyd Anderson, Monica Bellas, Bruce Byland, Maarten
Jan-
sen, Gabina Aurora Pérez Jiménez, Lisa Sousa, and Kevin
Terraciano
for their comments and critiques. The current text has benefited
greatly from the advice of Benjamin S. Orlove and four
anonymous
referees. Finally, this project was initially developed through
dis-
cussions on power, resistance, and Oaxacan archaeology with
Ar-
thur Joyce and Scott R. Hutson. I am indebted to them both.
[Sup-
plementary material appears in the electronic edition of this
issue
on the journal’s web page
(http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/CA/
home.html).]

2. Umberger (1987:62–62) provides an overview of
Mesoamerican
reuses of the past, in addition to focused discussions of Aztec
reuses
of the material remains of Teotihuacan, Tula, and Xochicalco.
Re-
uses of Olmec artifacts are discussed in Proskouriakoff (1968),
Schele and Miller (1986:150–51), and Miller (1973:154–55).
Aztec
archaeology is discussed in Matos Moctezuma (1990:100–105);
Az-
tec visits to Teotihuacan are discussed in Paso y Troncoso
(1905–6:
221–22) and critiqued in Boone (2000:391). Oaxacan
archaeologies
are discussed in Caso, Bernal, and Acosta (1967:447–71),
Spores
(1983:155), Pohl, Monaghan, and Stiver (1997:212, 225), and
Orr
(1997:115–17). For Cuicatec reuse of Postclassic knives, see
Holland
and Weitlaner (1960). For Lacandon visits to Classic Maya
sites, see
Tozzer (1907:83), McGee (1990:57), and Boremanse
(1993:326–28).
For Tepehuanec performances in Late Formative-to-Classic
ruins,
see Mason (1912).
2014 11:33:56 AM

352 F c u r r e n t a n t h r o p o l o g y Volume 43, Number 3,
June 2002
F i g . 1. Mesoamerica and the locations of Tenochti-
tlan, Chachoapan, and Chan Kom.
reused: they are also reinterpreted. The following pages
explore this tradition of “indigenous Mesoamerican
archaeology.”
For the purposes of this study, I consider archaeology
as a practice in which the physical remains of “the past”
are reused and reinterpreted by later societies. Such a
definition is more focused than a Foucauldian “archae-
ology” of discourse: I follow Abu El-Haj (1998) in distin-
guishing archaeologies that produce “new material cul-
ture” and thus transform the physical and social spaces
of their present. Such materially grounded archaeology
is an extremely common human practice. Its various in-
carnations are the subjects of dozens of studies. Most
considerations of the “anthropology of archaeology” fo-
cus on the legitimating strategies of nation-states (Abu
El-Haj 1998, Diáz-Andreu and Champion 1995, Gath-
ercole and Layton 1990, Kohl and Fawcett 1995, Schmidt
and Patterson 1995, Trigger 1980). Other studies, how -
ever, consider subaltern discourses of archaeology within
nation-states (Dietler 1994, Fischer and Brown 1996,
Smith 2000, Williams 1991), and still others disinter ar -
chaeological traditions not linked to those of the modern
West (Alcock 2001; Allen 1988:54–59; Baines 1989; Bar-
kan 1999; Cummins 1988:84–122; Davis 1997; Mayor
2000; Nercessian 1983). It is to this final category of
archaeological inquiry that I hope to contribute.
After a brief review of theoretical assumptions, this
study approaches indigenous Mesoamerican archaeology

from two perspectives. I begin with the wide screen of
a “structure of the long term.” Discussion ranges freely
across time and space: from the 15th to the 20th century
and from Mexico to Honduras (the 1943 culture-area con-
struction of “Mesoamerica”). Within this temporal-spa-
tial construct, I trace continuities in indigenous beliefs
that link artifacts from “the past” to social life in “the
present.” Ancient artifacts are repeatedly interpreted as
relics from a previous age of creation, a flawed era sub-
sequently destroyed to make way for the properly ordered
“present.” Of course, the definition of a “proper” social
order changes over time and space, and so the second
part of the study narrows its gauge to consider the way
in which this general structure of the long term was
instantiated in three specific contexts: the 16th-century
Mexica Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, the 16th-century
Mixtec community of Chachoapan, and the early 20th-
century Maya community of Chan Kom (fig. 1). Al-
though unified by the theme of indigenous archaeology,
these three discussions vary in source material and ar-
gument focus: from pictorial books to alphabetic texts,
from social reification to social transformation. Finally,
I conclude with a wide screen once again, surveying
broad questions of invention and tradition. Discussion
returns to the community of Chan Kom and then shifts
to uncover a second structure of the long term: the in-
digenous archaeology of the West.
Theoretical Orientations
This study is premised on the spatial-temporal frame-
work of “Mesoamerica.” In one sense, this concept was
invented in 1943, in the twilight of the trait-based cul-
ture-area approach in anthropology (Kirchhoff 1943; cf.
Graham 1993; Joyce 1998:147). But that “Mesoamerica”

is a 20th-century neologism does not mean—as Bartlett
notes for the analogous category of “Europe”—that it is
“a purely metaphorical creation” (1993:269). “Meso-
america” foregrounds the legacies of pre-European ex-
changes and intellectual traditions; it undermines na-
tionalist histories and boundaries (Monaghan 2000b:
2–3). True, reference to this category can essentialize
(Graham 1981:viii) and exclude (Graham 1993), but it
can also historicize and incorporate: the framework of
Mesoamerica requires that particularist interpretations
be grounded in a broad temporal and spatial context. It
is thus similar in many ways to the aforementioned cat-
egory of “Europe” (and its counterpart, “the West”). Like
“Mesoamerica,” these are generalizing spatial-temporal
categories; like “Mesoamerica,” they have come under
recent critique. But they remain productive—even es-
sential—for understanding the genealogies of the con-
temporary world.3 The following pages demonstrate the
continued productiveness of the category of Meso-
america. In particular, I focus on the capacity of this
framework to interconnect and illuminate practices and
images that might otherwise appear insignificant, iso-
lated, incomprehensible.
My second theoretical assumption—closely related to
the first—is the significance of structures of the long
term. Spatial-temporal generalizations like Mesoamerica
and Europe do not gain their interpretive strength from
lists of recurrent cultural traits. Rather, they become use-
ful when they focus on enduring structures of social
meanings, structures that order social life in fundamen-
3. Chakrabarty emphasizes that a critical understanding of
Europe
as a construct does not mean that this category can therefore be
ignored: “Analysis does not make it go away” (2000:28).

Ginzburg
(1986) and Trouillot (1991) demonstrate—in discussions of
Freud
and anthropology, respectively—the lacunae that arise when
broad
temporal and spatial frameworks are not central to analysis of
prac-
tices in “the West.” See also Bartlett (1993), Sahlins (1996).
2014 11:33:56 AM
h a m a n n The Social Life of Pre-Sunrise Things F 353
tal ways (cf. Trouillot 1991). The analytic productiveness
of structures of the long term is revealed in Marshall
Sahlins’s 1996 essay on the West, “The Sadness of Sweet-
ness.” Sahlins considers the enduring centrality of
Adamic original sin across 2,000 years of Western social
thought. His arguments both generalize and specify. He
surveys a temporal and geographic scope far broader than
my 500-year treatment of Mesoamerica, but at the same
time he details the transformations of original sin as it
shapes Christian theology, Renaissance huma nism, En-
lightenment political economy, and 20th-century an-
thropology. The persistence—and productiveness—of
original sin is linked to its status as a condition of pos-
sibility for a “cultural scheme of universal dimensions.”
Original sin is placed at the foundations of Christian-
Western social orders (Sahlins 1996:424). I argue that in-
digenous Mesoamerican archaeology is part of an anal -
ogous “cultural scheme of universal dimensions.” Where

Sahlins focuses on Western elaborations of “original
sin,” I focus on Mesoamerican elaborations of “original
destruction” and “original debt.” These concepts provide
the conditions of possibility for basic Mesoamerican un-
derstandings of time and space, human social life, and
the ties linking humans to natural and supernatural
worlds.
These themes—the relations of time, space, humans,
the supernatural—point to a third theoretical model: the
social life of things. The social life of material objects,
as discussed by Appadurai (1986), Kopytoff (1986), and
Davis (1997), has two basic aspects. First, as objects (and
buildings, as Davis shows) are used and reused and finally
destroyed, their forms and meanings are transformed.
Entire classes of objects may be reused and reinterpreted
in similar ways during the course of their social life: “A
particular relic may have a specific biography, but whole
types of relic, and indeed the class of thing called ‘relic’
itself, may have a larger historical ebb and flow, in the
course of which its meaning may shift significantly” (Ap-
padurai 1986:34; cf. Kopytoff 1986:64–68). My discussion
of the social life of archaeological remains focuses on
only one (if widespread) meaning shift in a class of “relics
from the past”: their interpretation as survivals from a
previous age of creation. And this “survival” needs to be
considered beyond merely material endurance. A second
valence of the concept of “social life” is that material
things may be alive, may have the power to act in the
world as humans do (Appadurai 1986:4; Davis 1997).
Such a conceptualization of the animate nature of objects
and locations—including archaeological remains—is
found throughout Mesoamerica.4 I argue below that the
animate nature of ancient things may help explain why
4. Mesoamerican images may be extensions of the “selves” of

hu-
mans (Stuart 1996, Houston and Stuart 1998). Objects,
buildings,
and topographic features may have desires and souls (Freidel,
Schele, and Parker 1993:173–256; Monaghan 1995:99–104;
1998b;
Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934:147; Stuart 1995:242–49;
Watanabe
1992:74–96). Archaeological artifacts may come to life—even
ar-
tifacts from a previous creation may be animate (Basauri
1930:24;
Byland and Pohl 1994:114–18; Gann 1925:99–100; Redfield and
Villa
Rojas 1934:120–21; Tedlock 1993:37–39).
they were incorporated into the daily life of Meso-
american communities; it may help explain the concep-
tual potency of the cohabitation of people in the present
with materials from the past.5
This cohabitation leads to my final theoretical frame.
The social lives of objects and places cannot be separated
from the social lives of humans, and one aspect of this
cohabitation is the role of objects and places in human
pedagogy. Following Bourdieu (1977:94–95), I distinguish
two forms of pedagogic action: explicit and implicit. In
explicit pedagogy, objects and places are used as “mne-
monic pegs,” prompts for telling stories that explain the
relevance of the past for present social life. Members of
a society are directly taught the meanings of specific
places and things (Tilley 1994:33; cf. Bourdieu 1977:94).6
For example, the Mesoamerican analyses that follow are
possible because explicit discourses about objects and
locations from the past were produced and recorded. But

such moments of explication are relatively infrequent in
the flow of daily life. Meaning-coded things also impact
human cognition as implicit, silent (if physically struc-
turing) backgrounds for day-to-day existence. Bourdieu’s
discussion of habitus is perhaps the best-known treat-
ment of the role of places and objects in shaping human
consciousness—or, in Bourdieu’s terms, of the link be-
tween a “whole symbolically structured environment”
and “anonymous, pervasive pedagogic action” (Bourdieu
1977:87–89; see also Alcock 2001, Basso 1996). Bourdieu
repeatedly emphasizes the importance of the spaces of
daily life—such as houses and apartments—in implicit
pedagogy (Bourdieu 1979:77–90, 133–53). Significantly,
these are the very spaces in which the material past was
embedded at all three of the communities I will discuss
in detail: Tenochtitlan, Chachoapan, and Chan Kom.
Mesoamerica, structures of the long term, the social
life of things, pedagogy: these are conceptual categories
from the modern West. But, in concluding this theoret-
ical overview, it is important to point out that indigenous
people in Mesoamerica have themselves been very much
aware of the relations between the social lives of things,
the social lives of humans, and physical-spatial pedagogy.
5. I am thinking of day-to-day temporality not in a routinized
cap-
italist sense (De Certeau 1984) but from a Mesoamerican
perspec-
tive in which solar cycling is interconnected with notions of
place
and production, self and community (Hanks 1990:352–99;
Tedlock
1992:88–131; Watanabe 1992:26–53,62; Monaghan 1998a).
6. Maurice Halbwachs, Susan Alcock, and Keith Basso all
provide

rich discussions of the intersections between consciousness,
soci-
ality, and space. Halbwachs’s concept of collective memory
argues
that “material traces, texts, and traditions” (and even cities, as
in
his study of Jerusalem) may be mobilized as present-serving
sources
for narrativized recollection—including the “recollection” of
past
events which did not occur at all (Halbwachs 1992:119). Alcock
draws on Halbwachs in writing about the creation of “memory
theaters” in Roman-occupied Greece, spaces in which ancient
ob-
jects, buildings, and texts were brought together in order “to
remind
communities at large of just who they were by drawing on who
they had been” (Alcock 2001). And Basso’s ethnography of the
West-
ern Apache “moralized landscape” illustrates how walking
through
a landscape can evoke the ancient events which took place
within
it, how simply naming a place can remind listeners of its
associated
narratives (Basso 1996).
2014 11:33:56 AM
354 F c u r r e n t a n t h r o p o l o g y Volume 43, Number 3,
June 2002

Watanabe’s discussion of “existential sovereignty”—the
formation of Chimalteco Maya sociality as rooted in and
emergent from actions and interactions in a specific
place—finds parallels throughout Mesoamerica (Wata-
nabe 1992:12, 20; Carlsen 1997:50–57; Carrasco 1987;
Tax 1937; cf. Basso 1996:34–35). Such place-based iden-
tity formation involves more than simply the link to a
physical-geographic location “on the ground.” Com-
munities often define themselves through participation
in the social lives of localized, physicalized supernatu-
rals. These include the forces that animate regional to-
pography, the deities that inhabit community-owned re-
ligious images, and the spirits of locally buried ancestors
(McAnany 1995; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934:107–8).
Thus Watanabe discusses the role of images of saints
(housed in the local church) and witz (local mountain
deities) in the formation of a “spatially exclusive” Chi -
malteco identity (Watanabe 1992:79). Along similar
lines, Monaghan (1995:9) suggests that, given the im-
portance of local supernaturals for creating Mesoamer-
ican community identity, such “communities” may be
more accurately considered as “congregations.” Indeed,
as a community changes over time, its patron deities
change as well: physical images of new gods appear dur-
ing periods of social transformation (Monaghan 1995:
307–55; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934:109). In Mesoam-
erican social theory, then, the social lives of objects and
locations, the supernatural forces they house, and the
social identity of communities are all closely linked—
and this is an association that can be traced back cen-
turies (Houston and Stuart 1996). One implication of
these ideas is that the objects and locations mobilized
in indigenous Mesoamerican archaeology may have been
more than mere physical propaganda for elite-supporting
narratives about the past. Humans and ancient objects

did not simply co-occur in the same space. They coin-
habited the same space; they were both part of daily life.
In light of Mesoamerican beliefs about location-based
socialization, the cohabitations of the past with the pre-
sent may have been understood as actively shaping com-
munity identity and social existence.
Before the First Sunrise: A Structure of the
Long Term
The deep history of complex societies in Mesoamerica
has produced a landscape filled with the physical re-
mains of previous inhabitants—their monumental ar-
chitecture, their carved stones, their potsherds, their jew -
elry. It is therefore not surprising that the interpretation
of the past and its physical remains has an extensive
intellectual history in Mesoamerica. A central concern
in these interpretations has been the nature of the dif-
ferences between past and present. What were the in-
habitants of the past like? How did they build such gi-
gantic monuments? Why are these beings no longer
alive? Why are their works in ruins? What is the cos-
mological relationship between “their” past and “our”
present, and what caused the transition from one to the
other?
Mesoamericans have offered a number of basic re-
sponses to these questions. First, there are many differ -
ences—physical, social, and spiritual—between the in-
habitants of the past and the people of the present. For
16th-century Aztecs, Cholulans, Tlaxcalans, and Yuca-
tec Maya and for 20th-century Nuyooteco Mixtecs, Tar-
ascans, and Huastec and Yucatec Maya, the inhabitants
of the past were giants (Durán 1994[1581]:8–9; Dı́az del
Castillo 1956[1580]:158; Tozzer 1941:172; Monaghan

1995:32; Carrasco 1957:39; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934:
331; Alcorn 1984:60). Elsewhere—as in several parts of
20th-century Yucatán—the inhabitants of the past were
dwarfs with magical powers (Tozzer 1907:153; Redfield
and Villa Rojas 1934:330–31). Perhaps the most extreme
example of primordial bodily difference occurs in the
beliefs of Nuyooteco Mixtecs, for whom the inhabitants
of the past did not die (Monaghan 1995:32; cf. Graulich
1997:57–58).
In addition to gross differences in bodies and their na-
ture, the inhabitants of the past often lived in “uncivi-
lized” ways. According to 20th-century Chinantecs and
Nuyooteco Mixtecs, the inhabitants of the previous cre-
ation ate their food raw; more specifically, Nuyooteco
Mixtecs say that they did not even practice agriculture
(Rupp and Rupp 1994:18; Monaghan 1995:32). For the
Aztecs, the inhabitants of the four previous ages of cre-
ation each lived on a different staple crop—acorns, piñon
nuts, aquatic seeds, and teocintli. Only with the arrival
of humans and the present age of creation did maize
become the central staple (Gardner 1986:23–24). Accord-
ing to 20th-century Huastec Maya, the inhabitants of the
past did not even eat food: they merely smelled it and
then wastefully threw it away (Alcorn 1984:60). Accord-
ing to contemporary Chinantecs, the inhabitants of the
past had no clothes (Rupp and Rupp 1994:14). Nuyooteco
Mixtecs say that the inhabitants of the past did not live
in communities and practiced incest (Monaghan 1995:
32, 49–50). For the Chinantla Maya, the inhabitants of
the past had no government (Reina 1966:1). Finally, ac-
cording to 16th-century Quiché Maya and 20th-century
Chinantla Maya and Nuyooteco Mixtecs, the inhabitants
of the past did not know how to honor the gods (Tedlock
1996:66–74; Reina 1966:1; Monaghan 1995:33).

These strange nonhuman beings no longer exist be-
cause of another difference between the past and the
present: the nature of the primordial sky. For 20th-cen-
tury Mixtecs, Chinantecs, Mitleño Zapotecs, and Yu-
catec Maya, the past was a time of darkness in which
no sun shone (Dyk 1959:3; Monaghan 1995:32; Rupp and
Rupp 1994:13; Parsons 1936:1, 216, 220; Tozzer 1907:
153; Redfield and Villa Rojas 1934:331). For 16th-century
Aztecs, Mixtecs, and Quiché Maya, the sun of the pre-
vious age was different from the sun that now shines in
the sky of the present (Gardner 1986; Tedlock 1996:
77–88; and see below). But whether absent or present in
a different form, the nature of the sun in the previous
age was a crucial difference between past and present
and played a crucial role in the transition between the
2014 11:33:56 AM
h a m a n n The Social Life of Pre-Sunrise Things F 355
two. The dawning of the sun of the “current” age de-
stroyed the previous creation and its inhabitants, often
petrifying them in the light of a First Sunrise (Tozzer
1907:153; Parsons 1936:216; Dyk 1949:4; Carrasco 1957:
39; Monaghan 1995:32; see also Redfield and Villa Rojas
1934:331; but see Taube 1986). This petrifaction and
mass destruction left behind traces in the ground, and
these traces have been used in indigenous Mesoamerican
archaeologies to provide tangible support for narratives
of ancient cataclysm.

Petrified body parts provide one source of evidence.
The fossilized bones of Pleistocene megafauna have been
interpreted as the remains of primordial giants by 16th-
century Aztecs, 20th-century Nuyooteco Mixtecs, and
possibly 16th-century Yucatec Maya and Tlaxcalans as
well (Durán 1994[1581]:17; Monaghan 1995:32; Tozzer
1941:110, 172; Dı́az del Castillo 1956[1580]:158).7 Whole
body parts of these pre-Sunrise beings have also survived.
In the Valley of Oaxaca, the carved Danzante stones at
the Classic site of Monte Albán have been interpreted
as the petrified bodies of giants by 20th-century Zapotecs
(Orr 1997:116). Twentieth-century Mixtecs have offered
similar interpretations for pre-Columbian carved stone
heads (Byland and Pohl 1994:114–18; Monaghan 1995:
32).
In addition to bodily remains, ruined buildings provide
architectural evidence for the existence of a previous age.
In some cases—as for Tarascans and Chinantla, Ixil, and
Huastec Maya—the mere presence of ruins motivates
their attribution to vanished architects (Carrasco 1957:
39; Reina 1966:2; Shaw 1971:124–26; Alcorn 1984:60). In
other traditions, however, it is not merely the existence
of ruins but specific features of those ruins that prompt
their attribution to ancient beings. Mesoamericans have
often asked why ancient ruins were so massive in
scale—seemingly too large for normal humans to have
been able to build. In 16th-century central Mexico, the
monumentality of the Classic pyramids at Teotihuacan
and Cholula was …
Imperialism, Colonialism and Cartography

Authors(s): Jeffrey C. Stone
Source: Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers,
Vol. 13, No. 1 (1988), pp. 57-
64
Published by: The Royal Geographical Society (with the
Institute of British Geographers)
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