SHAPING PRECOLONIAL CONCEPTS IN THE ANDES: THEUSHNUFOR LLOCLLAYHUANCUPA (HUAROCHIRÍ, LIMA)

In precolonial Andean archaeology, specialists frequently deal with objects whose names and functions are unknown. Similarly, early colonial documents from the Andes often mention objects without describing their shapes or functions. How can we articulate these three features—names, shapes, and functions—for objects from precolonial and colonial periods? How can we define these objects while taking into account intra-Andean variability? This article addresses these questions using one section from a well-known document of the early seventeenth century, the Huarochirí Manuscript. This section includes a term extensively discussed in Andean archaeology:husnoorushnu, which has been translated and described in various ways by diverse scholars. Through analysis of the function, form, and translation of the Quechua termushnu, I explore a typological approach to articulate names, shapes, and functions and also propose a redefinition of the concept itself.

The Indigenous Andean Concept of Kawsay, the Politics of Knowledge and Development, and the Borderlands of Environmental Sustainability in Latin America

Kawsay in Colonial and Postcolonial BorderlandsThe personage of Huatya Curi, the “Baked Potato Gleaner,” figured prominently in an early colonial account of the landscape and religious mythology of the Andean people of Huarochirí, a province in the mountainous interior of Lima in the Viceroyalty of Peru. The Huarochirí manuscript, a sixteenth-century Quechua document, introduces Huatya Curi with these words: “Chay pacha cay huatya curi ñisca huacchalla micuspapas huatya cuspalla causaptinsi sutiachircan huatya curim ñispa …” ‘At that time Huatya Curi, a poor potato eater, was accustomed to living from gleaning baked potatoes, and for that reason people named him Huatya Curi …‘ (Salomon and Urioste 163; my trans.; see also Taylor 32–33). While poor, Huatya Curi was powerful; in the same passage he goes on to vanquish a mighty Andean lord, Tamta Ñamca. The demise of Tamta Ñamca sets the stage for the ascendance of Paria Caca, Huatya Curi's father, who emerges as the chief Andean deity. Huatya Curi's existence is earthly yet linked to his supernatural lineage.