Ross Jamieson
Simon Fraser University, Archaeology, Faculty Member
La excavación de basurales de dos casas de barrios periféricos de la ciudad colonial de Riobamba, en la Audiencia de Quito (hoy Ecuador), ha incluido el análisis de restos botánicos y de fauna con el fin de lograr un mejor entendimiento... more
La excavación de basurales de dos casas de barrios periféricos de la ciudad colonial de Riobamba, en la Audiencia de Quito (hoy Ecuador), ha incluido el análisis de restos botánicos y de fauna con el fin de lograr un mejor entendimiento de las relaciones existentes entre raza, clase social y cultura material en una ciudad andina del siglo XVIII. A pesar de que las autoridades locales del siglo XVI intentaron mantener barrios exclusivos para la gente indígena, para el siglo XVIII, estos mismos barrios se transformaron en lugares racialmente mestizos. Pese a una naturaleza híbrida de los materiales culturales en estos contextos, la pobreza, un estatus de artesanos y la clasificación racial de «indios» fueron factores determinantes en la vida de quienes poblaron la parroquia San Blas en siglo XVIII. Gran parte de la arqueología histórica se enfoca al nivel de unidades domésticas en la escala de análisis y, aun para entornos urbanos, es importante también considerar a la parroquia, o vecindario, como una importante unidad de análisis.
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A series of seven statues commissioned by the mayor of the Canton of Colta in 2007 represent an emerging aspect of public art in the Andes: municipal statuary sponsored by Indigenous communities. The figures chosen for these statues... more
A series of seven statues commissioned by the mayor of the Canton of Colta in 2007 represent an emerging aspect of public art in the Andes: municipal statuary sponsored by Indigenous communities. The figures chosen for these statues represent Colta to the world, and embody a postcolonial heritage in which figures from Juan de Velasco’s eighteenth century Historia del Reino de Quito mix with local twentieth century heroes, in a medium directly descended from the Andean urbanism of the Liberal nineteenth century.
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This volume marks the very welcome appearance of a Spanish translation of Coffee, Society and Power in Latin America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), originally edited by William Roseberry, Lowell Gudmundson, and Mario Samper... more
This volume marks the very welcome appearance of a Spanish translation of Coffee, Society and Power in Latin America (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1995), originally edited by William Roseberry, Lowell Gudmundson, and Mario Samper Kutschbach. For the 2001 Spanish translation Mario Samper K. is listed as lead editor and coordinator of the translation. Mario Samper K. and the National University of Costa Rica should be congratulated for their efforts in producing a Spanish version of this important book.
This volume is a study of the power relationships inherent in domestic architecture and household material culture that were essential to the maintenance of the Spanish colonial empire. Using the household spatial patterning, furnishings,... more
This volume is a study of the power relationships inherent in domestic architecture and household material culture that were essential to the maintenance of the Spanish colonial empire. Using the household spatial patterning, furnishings, and personal belongings of residents of the highland city of Cuenca, Ecuador, during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the book examines gender, ethnic, and status relations in the colonial Andean world.
From 1780 to 1782 as many as 100,000 people died in the Tupac Amaru rebellion in what is now southern highland Peru and northwestern Bolivia. This was a defining moment in Andean history, comparable in its scope and severity to the 1791... more
From 1780 to 1782 as many as 100,000 people died in the Tupac Amaru rebellion in what is now southern highland Peru and northwestern Bolivia. This was a defining moment in Andean history, comparable in its scope and severity to the 1791 to 1804 Haitian Revolution in the Caribbean.
I would like to speak to you today about some simple dichotomies: Male vs. female, public vs. private, rich vs. poor, and white vs. not. These are the dichotomies that archaeologists who work on Spanish colonial sites spend most of their... more
I would like to speak to you today about some simple dichotomies: Male vs. female, public vs. private, rich vs. poor, and white vs. not. These are the dichotomies that archaeologists who work on Spanish colonial sites spend most of their time arguing about. I think we can all agree that these categories existed, in some sense, in the Spanish colonies. My problems thus become the following. Are these simple dichotomies, or are there grey areas in between?
La ciudad de Cuenca, en la sierra del sur del Ecuador, fue sucesivamente un centro Cañari e Inca antes de convertirse oficialmente en una ciudad española, en 1557. En 1821, la ciudad y su campo circundante se convirtieron en parte de la... more
La ciudad de Cuenca, en la sierra del sur del Ecuador, fue sucesivamente un centro Cañari e Inca antes de convertirse oficialmente en una ciudad española, en 1557. En 1821, la ciudad y su campo circundante se convirtieron en parte de la recientemente formada República de Nueva Granada y, eventualmente, en una parte de la nación de Ecuador.
Fifty-three ceramic samples were collected in the area of the colonial city of Riobamba, Ecuador (today Sicalpa/Cajabamba). Neutron activation analysis was used to attempt to establish elemental compositions, and from these gain... more
Fifty-three ceramic samples were collected in the area of the colonial city of Riobamba, Ecuador (today Sicalpa/Cajabamba). Neutron activation analysis was used to attempt to establish elemental compositions, and from these gain information on the manufacturing locations of these samples. Colonial samples imported from Panama were separable by their high Cs contents, and can be sorted into glazed and unglazed industries based on As and Cs. High As concentrations in several sherds indicate an origin near Cuenca, in the Southern Highlands of Ecuador, for both colonial and Inca samples. Inca and colonial Quito samples from the north of the country are identifiable through high Na combined with low Sc and Cr concentrations. Locally produced Puruhá, unglazed colonial and majolica samples form a group indicative of local Riobamba elemental composition.
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Archaeological excavation of two late-18th century household middens in the San Blas parish of the colonial city of Riobamba resulted in the recovery of samples of archaeobotanical remains dating to the period before the AD 1797... more
Archaeological excavation of two late-18th century household middens in the San Blas parish of the colonial city of Riobamba resulted in the recovery of samples of archaeobotanical remains dating to the period before the AD 1797 destruction of the city in an earthquake. These seed remains were dominated by barley (Hordeum vulgare) and quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa). The dominance of these two grains in samples from artisans’ households in this marginal neighborhood suggests that we should question the assumption that imported Old World domesticates were associated with more elite houses during the
Spanish colonial period in the Andes.
Spanish colonial period in the Andes.
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Excavation of a midden in the city of Cuenca, Ecuador, revealed faunal remains from a 17th-century elite urban family residence. This faunal data, combined with archival research on the Peñas/Ruiz family, demonstrates that the family... more
Excavation of a midden in the city of Cuenca, Ecuador, revealed faunal remains from a 17th-century elite urban family residence. This faunal data, combined with archival research on the Peñas/Ruiz family, demonstrates that the family raised sheep, cattle, and pigs for sale to the urban market in Cuenca. The absence of camelid and guinea pig remains in this faunal assemblage demonstrates that Eurasian ungulates were favored meat animals at this urban, Andean colonial-elite site.
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Sixty-one ceramic samples collected in Cuenca, Ecuador, were analysed by neutron activation analysis in an attempt to establish their elemental compositions. The bulk of the samples were manufactured in the region of Cuenca, with others... more
Sixty-one ceramic samples collected in Cuenca, Ecuador, were analysed by neutron activation analysis in an attempt to establish their elemental compositions. The bulk of the samples were manufactured in the region of Cuenca, with others imported from Quito in the northern highlands of Ecuador, from Panama Vieja in Panama, and from Seville in Spain. Relative to the Cuenca ceramics, the Spanish samples were separable primarily by their high Ca contents; the Panamanian ceramics by their high Cs contents; and the Quito ceramics by their high Na contents. The ceramics made within the region surrounding Cuenca are much more difficult to separate, with Ba and other elements being potentially important.
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The rich prehistoric archaeological record in Andean South America has obscured the importance of post-conquest historic sites in the region. Archaeologists researching the former Spanish colonies have long turned to the US ‘Borderlands’... more
The rich prehistoric archaeological record in Andean South America has obscured the importance of post-conquest historic sites in the region. Archaeologists researching the former Spanish colonies have long turned to the US ‘Borderlands’ and the Caribbean for models defining the archaeology of Spanish colonialism. Recently, however, Andean archaeologists have begun to create new emphases on the archaeology of colonialism and archaeologies of the later Andean republics. This region was a core area of Spanish overseas expansion in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, with much of the precious metal wealth of the empire produced in Andean mines. Today archaeologists in the Andean republics of Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, and the foreign researchers who also work in the region, are overcoming geographic, financial and linguistic barriers to create a unified Andean historical archaeology.
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Page 176. CHAPTER SEVEN Dona Luisa and Her Two Houses Ross W. Jamieson Luisa Maldonado de San Juan died in 1664 in the town of Cuenca in the southern highlands of the Spanish colonial Audiencia of Quito (map 7.1). ...
People use domestic material culture to create an image of themselves that they project to others who live in, or visit, their homes. This was as true in the Spanish colonial city as it is in any city today. If, therefore, we wish to... more
People use domestic material culture to create an image of themselves that they project to others who live in, or visit, their homes. This was as true in the Spanish colonial city as it is in any city today. If, therefore, we wish to investigate status and ethnicity in the Spanish colonies, domestic material culture is an excellent source of information on how people imagined their own place, and that of others, in society. The first step toward this is the reconstruction of the material culture of urban colonial
houses. There are two main bodies of evidence available to accomplish this.
The first is descriptions of household goods in the notarial archives of the colonies, and the second is the physical remains of household refuse found in archaeological contexts in cities. Each body of evidence can make unique contributions to our understanding of social relations in the colonial city, but
each also has unique limitations.I use the interplay between colonial notarial documents and archaeological remains to help define the role of material culture in the study of caste relations in Cuenca, Ecuador. The Spanish colonial régimen de castas was a system that categorized people by caste, using a complex mixture of legal status, ethnicity, racial (or physical) categorization, and economic roles.
houses. There are two main bodies of evidence available to accomplish this.
The first is descriptions of household goods in the notarial archives of the colonies, and the second is the physical remains of household refuse found in archaeological contexts in cities. Each body of evidence can make unique contributions to our understanding of social relations in the colonial city, but
each also has unique limitations.I use the interplay between colonial notarial documents and archaeological remains to help define the role of material culture in the study of caste relations in Cuenca, Ecuador. The Spanish colonial régimen de castas was a system that categorized people by caste, using a complex mixture of legal status, ethnicity, racial (or physical) categorization, and economic roles.
Research Interests:
Research Interests:
As one of the most common artifact categories found on Spanish colonial sites, the wheel-made, tin-glazed pottery known as majolica is an important chronological and social indicator for archaeologists. Initially imported from Europe,... more
As one of the most common artifact categories found on Spanish colonial sites, the wheel-made, tin-glazed pottery known as majolica is an important chronological and social indicator for archaeologists. Initially imported from Europe, several manufacturing centers for majolica were set up in the New World by the late sixteenth century. The study of colonial majolica in the Viceroyalty of Peru, which encompassed much of South America, has received less attention than ceramic production and trade in the colonial Caribbean and Mesoamerica. Prior to 1650 the Viceroyalty of Peru was supplied with majolica largely produced in the city of Panama Vieja, on the Pacific. Panama Vieja majolica has been recovered from throughout the Andes, as far south as Argentina. Majolica made in Panama Vieja provides an important chronological indicator of early colonial archaeological
contexts in the region. The reproduction oflberian-style majolica for use on elite tables was symbolically important to the imposition of Spanish rule, and thus Panamanian majolicas also provide an important indicator of elite status on Andean colonial
sites.
contexts in the region. The reproduction oflberian-style majolica for use on elite tables was symbolically important to the imposition of Spanish rule, and thus Panamanian majolicas also provide an important indicator of elite status on Andean colonial
sites.
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To explore the concept of identity in colonial Ecuador is to examine a multiplicity of ideas and ideologies. As a historical archaeologist trained in North America I bring with me my training in Americanist anthropology and archaeology.... more
To explore the concept of identity in colonial Ecuador is to examine a multiplicity of ideas and ideologies. As a historical archaeologist trained in North America I bring with me my training in Americanist anthropology and archaeology. As Eric Wolf points out, the anthropologist works within a discipline that was forged in colonialism, and yet at the same time anthropology has been an important critical voice in its examination of the colonial project. Working on the colonial period in the Andes means that I face an extensive ...