Maya History and Agency in Colonial Yucatan

Abstract

Conquistador. MATTHEW RESTALL. Boston MA: Beacon Press, 1998; xvi + 254 pp. The World: Yucatec Culture and Society, 1550-1850. MATTHEW RESTALL. Stanford CA: Stanford university Press, 1997; xiv + 441 pp. Over the last two decades students of Mesoamerica have increasingly turned their attention to theorizing indigenous agency and intentionality. This is perhaps most evident in the number of ethnohistorical studies that seek to recover native voices long excluded from the historical record and that offer a counterpoint to accounts which privilege Spanish expansionism at the expense of noting the active role Indians played in the development of colonial society. For the region, such revisionist historiography has been largely confined to reading agency between the lines of Spanish colonial documents. While this work has provided a valuable antidote to one-sided accounts of Spanish conquest, it remains at best only a partial and distorted view of indigenous protagonists. Here I review two recent books by Matthew Restall that add a much-needed complement to such work. conquistador and The world are both well-written ethnohistorical accounts of colonial society in the Yucatan peninsula of Mexico. In the introduction to The world Restall characterizes his larger goal (if the reader will permit such a conceit) as to the Maya (p. 10). Indeed, his research is based on some 1600 Mayan language documents and he extensively cites sources, thus representing voices by letting the speak for themselves. Yet it is important to note that this is representation in Raymond Williams' dual sense of the word: a re-presentation that attempts both to make present for the reader events that occurred in the past and to use those events to symbolize the larger processes of which they are a part- In both books Restall is very much present as our guide and interpreter, and it is as much his as voices that we hear throughout the texts. Ironically, although he is narratively giving voice to a particular subaltern population (the Yucatec Maya), his documentary evidence forces him to focus on a sample of mostly older and relatively wealthy individuals. Even given the corporate nature of communities, which Restall emphasizes, we are left with an unclear picture of the nuances of intra-community relations. But Restall seems well aware of the limitations of his data, and he is able to deftly tease from the documents a surprisingly rich view of everyday life. The world is a tour de force through 300 years of history spanning the Yucatan peninsula. Based largely on documents written by the in their native tongue, Restall is able to include revealing descriptions of mundane as well as extraordinary events. The book's four parts are organized topically, as are the chapters within them. Chapters are short and readable, and the organization is, for the most part, logical. Part I (Identity and Organization) introduces the book's thesis that the cah (indigenous community, pl. cahob) is the primary nexus of self-identity and political organization. Second in importance to the cah (and yet subordinated to it) are localized patrilineal groups known as chibalob (sing., chibal); cah leaders (batab) are drawn from prominent chibalob. Together, the cah and the chibal provided not only common references for self-identification but also act as vehicles for individual and collective political maneuvering within the colonial system. In Part 11 (Society and Culture) Restall is at his best in reconstructing quotidian experience and practical worldview. In chapters on gender, class, and religion, he reveals not only normative patterns but also subtle resistance to Spanish impositions. In this regard the chapter on sexuality is especially noteworthy. Organized around an anonymous 1774 petition to Spanish authorities protesting the reportedly lewd behavior of local priests, the chapter demonstrates the deftness of satire and punning while partially revealing autochthonous norms of acceptable behavior. …