From Narrative Picture Writing Bands to Pseudo Cartographies. How Native Scribes Invented Powerful New Media after the Conquest

Summary

This is an abstract from the "After Cortés: Archaeological Legacies of the European Invasion in Mesoamerica" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Scholars have always believed that maps and cartographiies did exist in preconquest Mesoamerica. The large amount of early colonial Native maps seems to be evidence for such geographic media. But as yet, no pre-Hispanic lienzos and maps have become known. However, the earliest lienzos do show pre-Hispanic elements in their structure, iconography, and content, albeit in varying degrees. There are many indications that the authors were familiar with prototypes. With the creation of the Lienzo as a modern-looking new medium they were able to integrate mythical and real history known from the pre-Hispanic codices as a process in the flow of time. Transferred to the new medium they do not express any rupture that occurred when the Spaniards arrived and seized power; they rather integrate that event. In the paper, typical cases will be exemplified by the examples of the Codex Vienna, Lienzos Seler II/Coixtlahuaca II and Tlapiltepec from Oaxaca, and other documents. Their central theme is the pre-Hispanic legitimization of power, changing concepts and claims to territory while the media, structure, and style of the documents are subject to change, and reflect the reception habits at the time.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• After Cortés: Archaeological Legacies of the European Invasion in Mesoamerica   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 23446