Los valles andinos del Nuevo Reino de Granada: cartografías, baquianos y políticas del trópico americano

Abstract

This article examines the economic, military and political perception of the rivers and mountains of the northern Andes during the Conquest and the first decades of colonial life in the New Kingdom of Granada. Drawing on sources and studies related to early modern geographical and cartographic culture, the paper highlights three colonial expectations for the geophysical and social system of Andean interior. First, it shows how the news about the existence of minerals and indigenous population in the tropical valleys fostered an idea of available wealth that would become popular in European cosmographic works. The second part approaches the baquiano perception in which the territory was evaluated based on military experiences and possibilities of mobility and connection. Finally, the epilogue presents the political economy of nature that local authorities proposed to order and manage the kingdom based on a schematic division between hot-lowlands and cold-highlands.

Keywords

• Tropics
• history of knowledge
• Andean cartography
• Baquiano
• rivers and mountains