LATE POSTCLASSIC TO COLONIAL TRANSFORMATIONS OF THE LANDSCAPE IN THE IZALCOS REGION OF WESTERN EL SALVADOR

Abstract

AbstractThe Izalcos Pipil were pre-Hispanic residents of the Río Ceniza Valley of western El Salvador and had clear linguistic ties to the Aztecs and other Nahuas of central Mexico. Both archaeological and documentary data are presented that show strong evidence that the Izalcos Pipil also maintained Nahua social and political institutions. The Izalcos Pipil emphasized characteristics of Nahua social practices that depend on dynamic mobility on the landscape to articulate discrete cultural elements, and these characteristics are observable in Izalcos inter- and intrasite settlement organization and the distribution of Nahua settlement in southern Mesoamerica. The degree of mobility on the landscape was shown in the internal organization of sites, architectural arrangements, and the relationships among sites and is indicated in historical documents. Pipil concepts, institutions, and boundaries provided the foundation for the Spanish colonial political economy. This region became a jewel in the Spanish Crown in part because of prodigious cacao production that the Izalcos Pipil established long before Spanish contact. The degree of nucleation before and after conquest did not change dramatically, but the analysis of mobility showed that even though some elements of patterning appeared superficially the same, underlying causes were fundamentally different. The most important conquest-induced change was the transition to capitalism, which created a static, disarticulated landscape of nucleated settlements, enclosures, and private property that discouraged human movement. The tensions between these two contrasting systems of landscape use heightened with the passage of time.