In this volume, Kathleen Deagan and Jose Maria Cruxent present detailed technical documentation of their ten-year archaeological excavation of La Isabela, America's first colony. The artefacts and material remains of the town offer rich material for comparative research into Euro-American cultural and material development during the crucial transition from the medieval era to the Renaissance. The period when La Isabela was in existence witnessed great innovation and change in many areas of technology. The archaeological evidence of La Isabela's architecture, weaponry, numismatics, pottery and metallurgy can be precisely dated, helping to chart the sequence of this change and revealing much that is new about late medieval technology. The authors' archaeological research also provides a foundation for their insights into the reasons for the demise of La Isabela.
In studying the past, archaeologists have focused on the material remains of our ancestors. Prehistorians generally have only artifacts to study and rely on the diverse material record for their understanding of past societies and their behavior. Those involved in studying historically documented cultures not only have extensive material remains but also contemporary texts, images, and a range of investigative technologies to enable them to build a broader and more reflexive picture of how past societies, communities, and individuals operated and behaved. Increasingly, historical archaeology refers not to a particular period, place, or a method, but rather an approach that interrogates the tensions between artifacts and texts irrespective of context. In short, historical archaeology provides direct evidence for how humans have shaped the world we live in today. Historical archaeology is a branch of global archaeology that has grown in the last 40 years from its North American base into an increasingly global community of archaeologists each studying their area of the world in a historical context. Where historical archaeology started as part of the study of the post-Columbian societies of the United States and Canada, it has now expanded to interface with the post-medieval archaeologies of Europe and the diverse post-imperial experiences of Africa, Latin America, and Australasia. The 36 essays in the International Handbook of Historical Archaeology have been specially commissioned from the leading researchers in their fields, creating a wide-ranging digest of the increasingly global field of historical archaeology. The volume is divided into two sections, the first reviewing the key themes, issues, and approaches of historical archaeology today, and the second containing a series of case studies charting the development and current state of historical archaeological practice around the world. This key reference work captures the energy and diversity of this global discipline today.
Material Encounters and Indigenous Transformations in the Early Colonial Americas brings together 15 archaeological case studies that offer new perspectives on colonial period interactions in the Caribbean and surrounding areas through a specific focus on material culture and indigenous agency.
This comprehensive study of the historical archaeology of the Caribbean provides sociopolitical context for the ongoing development of national identities; points to the future by suggesting different trajectories that historical archaeology and its practitioners may take in the Caribbean arena; and elucidates the problems and issues faced worldwide by researchers working in colonial and post-colonial societies.
In 1493 Christopher Columbus led a fleet of 17 ships and more than 1200 men to found a royal trading colony in America. Columbus had high hopes for his settlement, which he named La Isabela after the queen of Spain, but just five years later it was in ruins. It remains important, however, as the first site of European settlement in America and the first place of sustained interaction between Europeans and the indigenous Tainos. Kathleen Deagan and Jose Maria Cruxent tell the story of this historic enterprise. Drawing on their ten-year archaeological investigation of the site of La Isabela, along with research into Columbus-era documents, they contrast Spanish expectations of America with the actual events and living conditions at America's first European town. Deagan and Cruxent argue that La Isabela failed not because Columbus was a poor planner but because his vision of America was grounded in European experience and could not be sustained in the face of the realities of American life. Explaining that the original Spanish economic and social frameworks for colonization had to be altered in America in response to the American landscape and the non-elite Spanish and Taino people who occupied it, they shed light on larger questions of American colonialism and the development of Euro-American cultural identity.
