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SALVAGING RECURRING THEMES OF HISTORICAL MEMORY IN THE COHUIXCA PROVINCE OF TEPECOACUILCO (COHUIXCATLACAPAN), GUERRERO, MEXICO, 1460 TO 1580

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 June 2017

Amos Megged
Amos Megged*
Affiliation:
Department of General History, University of Haifa, Abba Hushi Avenue, Mount Carmel, Haifa 31999, Israel
*
E-mail correspondence to: [email protected]
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Abstract

This article aims to fill in some of the lacunae that still exist regarding the Cohuixca ethnicity of the northeastern part of the State of Guerrero. To do so, it introduces a qualitative methodological approach into ethnohistory, which discerns pervasive patterns of special understanding that guided indigenous testimony in the colonial Spanish courtroom. It emphasizes that early colonial Cohuixca testimonies were deeply influenced by what are called, in Western terms, cadastral maps or cartographic histories or, in Nahuatl, amoxtli tlalamatl altepeamatl (“land papers,” titles of each town and district) in the former Cohuixca province of Tepecoacuilco (Cohuixcatlacapan), these geographical elements being heavily reinforced by oral retelling. Therefore, in order to establish a seemingly coherent plot of the past that would overcome fragmentation and chaos, the indigenous witnesses appearing in our sources relied heavily on unique visual schemata that assisted them in assembling the mental shreds and remnants of past experiences to restore them within the traditional framework and formulae of information transmission only modestly affected by the Spanish conquest.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ancient Mesoamerica , Volume 28 , Issue 2 , Fall 2017 , pp. 383 - 401
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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