The Colonial Origins of Indigenous Archaeologies

Abstract

Abstract A review of several colonial stereotypes of South American Indigenous peoples that influenced the archaeological research on them is proposed here from the perspective of Historical Anthropology studies. Officials of the Spanish Crown, missionaries, and travelers described nomadic peoples from the Pampa and Chaco through a series of negative concepts that, for centuries, have overshadowed the understanding of their social and political organization. At the same time, in an attempt to control the territories under their rule, they created a defensive system for their cities, known as frontera (frontier), which functioned as a separation strip between their own spaces and the so-called tierra adentro (interior lands), the space under Indigenous sovereignty. The multiple interactions that took place in those two spaces were also tainted by prejudice and misunderstanding.