“The Influence of the Horse on Indian Cultures of Lowland South America” is by Ronald Gregsen, and it is basically the history of the horse in South America. The Spanish always claimed that “after God they owed the victory [in Spanish Peru] to the horses”, but the horse completely changed many Andean cultures (Gregsen 33). Upon their arrival, the Europeans founds many wild horses running around in the interior of South America, but horses are not indigenous to South America. It is believed that the wild horses were from Argentina where they escaped from the Spanish.

The horse not only changed transportation and mobility, but it also revolutionized many Andean societies. One example of this revolution is with the Mapuche, a small tribe in central Chile, in which the horse allowed them to raid the Spanish and other enemies with much more success and gave them a cavalry which was the key to their success. The horse also revolutionized many Andean cultures because it led to the creation of a caste system and nomadism for many tribes due to the lack of pastureland.

The horse revolutionized many Andean cultures militarily, socially, and politically, but what revolutionized it the most was…….. the cow and chicken!!?! The horse allowed for much easier raiding and many tribes became somewhat wealthy from raiding Spanish towns and stealing their chickens and cows.

Encomenderos were usually soldiers that were rewarded for their services in the Americas with an encomienda, but people were often rewarded encomiendas for allying with the other regime, as in the case of Francisco Noguerol. Throughout the civil war in Peru, soldiers switched sides based on which conquistador could give them a better encomienda. In Good Faith and Truthful Ignorance, Noguerol came to Peru to escape from his wife, which I thought was pretty funny, but he  first sided with Almagro, who was killed by Pizarro’s men. Pizarro then began giving encomiendas to former Almagrists in order to “weaken the potential threat posed by the son of his executed enemy” (Cook 14). A few years later, Noguerol allied himself with the Spanish Crown because he not only realized the Pizarrist cause was hopeless, but he could also profit more from the Spanish crown.

After reading Good Faith and Truthful Ignorance, the encomienda system reminded me more and more of a feudal system in which a lord can not control a group of people, maybe because he was 2,000 miles away, so he gives that land and the inhabitants to a vassal, or encomendero. The indigenous people were basically the same as the peasants who payed tribute to their vassals and lord in order for protection and other services.

The Extirpation was a Spanish group with the goal of ensuring that all Catholic laws were upheld in the Spanish colony of Peru. The Extirpation was very similar to the Inquisition, but it was an overall failure compared to the “successful” Inquisition in Spain. The punishments were similar between the two groups in that both tried to embarrass or hurt the pride of the guilty, but the Extirpation changed its punishments to better suit Andean cultures, such as “passage through the streets half-naked on the back of a llama” (Griffiths 22).

One reason for the failure of the Extirpation was the lack of leadership. In the beginnings of the Extirpation, it was somewhat successful due to three individuals who were passionate towards “rooting out and punishing native religious deviance,” but when a new archbishop came into office, the Extirpation began going downhill due to his lack of effort and funding towards the “bastard child” (Griffiths 20).

Another reason for failure was the Spanish mindset which believed that every Andean was not only inferior but also religiously wrong. The Extirpation took testimonies from enemies of the accused in order to help “prove” that the accused Andean was “wrong”, but the Inquistion did not do this because they knew that the testimony of the defendant’s enemy was going to claim that the defendant was guilty.

The biggest reason for failure was the shear fact that Andean religious practices blended with Christianity were everywhere, and it was very hard with poor leadership and only a few men to stop it. If the Extirpation were as strict as the Inquisition, then basically every indigenous person would have been punished, but the leack of manpower and leadership caused the Extirpation to be a failure.

For example, urban slaves in the Spanish New World were usually educated in a skill or craft, could sue their masters for mistreatment fairly easily, and were overall treated quite well for a slave. On the other hand, remember those poor indigenous slave miners who worked in the poorest of working conditions imaginable.

While proofreading this, I kinda felt like I was somewhat defending American slavery for not being cruel, but that was not my intention whatsoever. Slavery was an awful thing whether it be in Spanish America or English America.

]]> http://kwingat1.wordpress.com/2009/10/18/slavery/feed/ 3 kwingat1 http://kwingat1.wordpress.com/2009/10/01/19/ http://kwingat1.wordpress.com/2009/10/01/19/#comments Thu, 01 Oct 2009 20:30:16 +0000 kwingat1 http://kwingat1.wordpress.com/?p=19 ]]> Herzog’s film, Aguirre the Wrath of God, was based on a true story in which a group of Spanish conquistadors under the command of Ursua attempted to find the city of El Dorado. During the expedition,  a group of conspirators led by Aguirre assassinate Ursua and decide to rebel against Spain. In Herzog’s film, everyone in Aguirre’s gang is slowly picked off by Indians, but in reality, Aguirre and his gang ransacked Spanish towns until they were surrounded and killed by Spanish forces.

The two different stories shows that Herzog was showing the effects of greed, paranoia, and insanity in poor circumstances. Herzog said that “this film is not really a narrative of actual happenings or a portrait of actual people. At any level, it is a film about what lies behind landscapes, faces, situations, and works.” Before reading Holloway’s article, I assumed that Aguirre the Wrath of God was supposed to do show how greed and the lust for power caused many conquistadors to go insane, but the article shows that under his circumstances Aguirre was not insane at all, at least not in the sanity standards of the 16th century. Today, people instantly criticize him for being insane because he led a rebellion against Ursua and Spain. Ursua was known to be very harsh and cruel and the mission was going downhill under his direction, and if you want to call Aguirre insane for killing someone, then basically everyone in Spanish Latin America would have been insane. In all, I think the movie did want to show how greedy and sometimes insane the conquistadors were, but that was not its main theme.

By the way, what was up with the scenes where the camera just stared at a river for like two minutes straight. There was another scene like that where it just focused in on the guy playing the pan flute. I couldn’t tell if Herzog were trying to make the indigenous people look stupid and annoying or if he just wanted to show off their pan flute skills.

There are examples of double mistaken identity in nearly every aspect of  the two groups’ culture. For example, the Incas were accustom to worshiping the Gods of the group who conquered them, but they could still worship their same Gods as long as the conqueror’s Gods were held higher. The Spanish like the Inca converted everyone they conquered to follow Christianity, but they expected for their God to be the only God that is worshiped. The Incas thought that Christianity had many Gods such as the Virgin Mary and saints, so they worshiped the saints along with their old Gods.

High school history always told the story of a few conquistadors who conquered everything they saw.  I was always told that the few Spanish were able to defeat huge empires such as the Inca due to their superior technology, mainly guns. But that was not the case at all. In fact, many of the technologies such as cannons were useless due to the terrain in the Andes. Guns were also nearly useless due to the fact that it took so long to reload a single shot. Today, archaeologists have discovered that nearly all of the deaths in the skirmishes between the Spanish and the Incas were due to skull fractures from a club, the main weapon used by the Inca. The main reason for the Spanish success was their ability to obtain indigenous allies. The indigenous allies did the majority of the fighting for the Spanish and served as a guide in the rough terrain of the Andes mountains.

Karl Marx

In this quote, Karl Marx is basically arguing that your environment determines who you are as a person. This quote can be held true for both the individual and a society at whole. An individual or society’s environment affects what agriculture can be grown, what clothing should be worn, and in many societies what  Gods should be worshiped. Andean societies were a perfect example of a society that was created out of their environment.

Due to the many harsh and diverse climates in the Andes Mountains, Andean cultures were very dependent upon their environment. This high dependence led to the creation of many of their gods, such as their mountain god. The environment also affected their entire trade system. Because of the many different ecosystems in the Andes, different things had to be produced in different regions. This led to the development of the Ayllu, which was a trade system based on need, not currency.

I agree with Marx’s theory to a certain point, but I also think that there is a huge human aspect that goes into determining who a person or society truely is. Sure Marx’s theory fits many older civilizations, but today his theory is outdated. For example, ancient civilizations such as the Incas were highly dependent upon their environment for basically every aspect of their lives. Today,  people in “developed countries” depend much less on their natural environment but much more on the social aspect of one’s environment.

The movie we watched on Mummies made me think whether or not it was right for archaeologists to dig up human bodies and ancient artifacts of another culture. Sure, its better for archaeologists to use the artifacts to learn and spread the knowledge rather than a looter to sell the artifacts to some rich collector, but they are both still wrong in a sense. The Incans, and every other culture, spent a great deal of time doing rituals for the burial and building the tomb in itself, so they must have believed that the body was sacred even after death. Who are we to think that we can go around digging up other people’s tombs for “education.” Imagine how any Western culture would feel if archaeologists began digging up some of their “old” gravesites for examination. I don’t think it would sit well with them, so why is it alright to do it to any other culture,even if its not still around.

After reading Benson’s Ritual Sacrifice in Ancient Peru, I have a much greater understanding of Andean culture. Although the book cleared up many misunderstandings of ancient Andean cultures, it also brought up many questions. Considering the frequency of sacrifice and war, I was impressed by the fact that there were still very largely populated cities in the Andes that were bigger than many European cities at that time period. It was also interesting that many tribes sacrificed the best looking people that they could find, especially young children. By sacrificing the best looking people before they could have children, ancient Andeans must not have been the most attractive people in the world.

The mollusk shells were interesting in that they were used for blood letting, but the most fascinating thing about them was that the Spondylus shells were found around 50 meters deep in the Pacific Ocean. How did they manage to go that deep underwater just by holding their breath? They probably used weights to make them sink faster, but 50 meters is about 200 feet. I get a headache from going to the bottom of a 12 foot pool, and they went 200 feet underwater. That’s crazy.