Perceptions of the Colonial Period and Blood Purity in Colombian Historical Fiction

Abstract

After Colombia gained its independence from Spain in the early nineteenth century, Colombian intellectuals looked back to the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries to find in the discovery, conquest, and colonization of their territories their own identity, apart from the Spanish tradition. Finding texts written in those centuries—which remained in colonial, clerical, and private archives—became a crucial activity to define the new Colombian identity. They not only defined the historical analysis of Colombian society, but also inspired their sociopolitical ideals through literature. Many nineteenth-century historical novels were inspired by the chronicles of the discovery, conquest, and colonization of the New World written during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Such texts include Las cartas de relación de Hernan Cortés and Brevísima relación de la destrucción de las Indias by Bartolomé de las Casas, and Noticias historiales de las conquistas de Tierra Firme en las Indias occidentales by Pedro Simón. They have been interpreted—and reinterpreted—over the course of two centuries in order to define—and redefine—the coordinates in which Colombian intellectuals envision their future. However, there is a pervasive social construct that seems to constantly trouble the Colombian social imaginary as a country for equals: the imaginary of blood purity. (The “social imaginary” is how a group of people conceptualize their society.) This imaginary was crucial for the self-perception of most of the enlightened Criollos during and after independence, and through it the epistemic violence of the Spanish Empire against individuals and communities perceived as non-white permeated Colombian social dynamics.