Research master thesis | Archaeology (research) (MA/MSc)
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The Historia General de las cosas de Nueva España is a 16th Century colonial document written in New Spain (modern-day Mexico). It describes many aspects of the lives of indigenous people that...Show moreThe Historia General de las cosas de Nueva España is a 16th Century colonial document written in New Spain (modern-day Mexico). It describes many aspects of the lives of indigenous people that lived in Central Mexico called the Mexica-Nahua. The descriptions are of such detail that they are often a primary source for archaeologists to correlate their material data with. However, this is often done without questioning the validity of the data or putting the conditions of 16th Century Mexico in a proper context. The rituals described in this document have a particular violent character, giving much attention to human sacrifices that were made to indigenous deities. However, these rituals were not witnessed first-hand by its author, Bernardino de Sahagún. The largest ceremonial structure built by the Mexica-Nahua was what is now called the Templo Mayor. This was a large pyramid that stood in the centre of the Capital that lies under modern-day Mexico City. There have been many publications about this temple that contain interpretations of the rituals that were performed here. Many of these interpretations come from a literal interpretation of the Historia General. This interpretation affects the manner in which the precolonial past is represented by archaeologists. These archaeologists put their object of analysis into a context that is subsequently shaped by these same scholars to conform to an already existing representation of the precolonial past. Ethnographic fieldwork shows that the ritual experience of the practitioners is not fully analysed by these archaeologists. This is however salient in the reconstruction of past rituals because these can often be analysed according to frameworks that do not concern themselves with the practitioner, but more with the organizational context in relation to e.g. a centralized state. The literary analysis of the Historia General, the critical evaluation of ritual reconstructions at the Templo Mayor, and the incorporation of ethnography show that the violent picture scholars and the general public have of precolonial Mexica-Nahua society is largely based on a distorted view that results from a lack of proper contextualization as opposed to hard evidence.Show less
