Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Guide to the
Andean Collection
Contents
Inventory
Part I, 1538-1878
19
Oversize, 1544-1926
39
CREATOR
Ospina, Pastor.
TITLE
PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION
ARRANGEMENT
SUMMARY
PROVENANCE
PREFERRED CITATION
FOR FURTHER
INFORMATION
Part I, 1538-1878
Part I is 8.5 linear feet; the majority is comprised of both originals and copies of Peruvian materials.
They include manuscripts and printed works which can be used to study the history of Peru from
the prehispanic period to the middle of the nineteenth century. The materials document the cultural
history of the Andean people before the Spanish conquest; colonial civil administration; the role of
the Catholic church in colonial society; the Bourbon reforms; the war of Independence; the anarchy
of the early republican period; and the war of the Confederation Peru-Bolivia.
On the history of the Andean people before the Spanish conquest, Part I includes copies, complete
and partial, of various accounts written by chroniclers in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
There are texts by the chroniclers Juan de Polo de Ondegardo, Juan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti,
Antonio de la Calancha and Fernando de Montesinos.
The materials related to the colonial period are numerous and varied, and document the central area
of the Peruvian viceroyalty (currently Peru and Bolivia) and its other areas such as Quito, New
Granada, Chile and Rio de la Plata. To study the colonial civil administration during the
seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the reports written by the viceroys are valuable sources. There
are also account books and legal writs which can be used to analyze the economic and political role
of the Church in the colonial milieu, in particular the role of the Jesuit and the Mercedarian orders.
The Bourbon reforms which took place in the Peruvian viceroyalty are especially well-documented
in the numerous royal and viceregal decrees, issued mostly in the second half of the eighteenth
century.
Concerning the war of Independence period, there are letters, reports and administrative texts by
prominent personages such as Simn Bolvar, Jos de San Martn, Juan de Berindoaga and Antonio
Jos de Sucre. The turbulent initial years of the republican period can be reconstructed from the
correspondence by generals Agustn Gamarra and Antonio Gutirrez de la Fuente. Finally, there are
several letters and military reports on the war of the Confederation Peru-Bolivia, an ambitious
political plan to create a union between the two countries led by the General Andrs de Santa Cruz.
Part I, 1538-1878
Description
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Colombia
Part I, 1538-1878
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Part I, 1538-1878
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(p. 5)
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Part I, 1538-1878
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Aug 7
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Sep 19
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162-163
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Venezuela
Part II is 5.75 linear feet, and contains original texts and copies of documents from the Andean
nations of South America. While Peruvian materials make up the majority of the collection, there
are also items from Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Venezuela. The materials trace the
history of the Andean region from the early years of Spanish conquest to the later national period
(1544-1926). The collection is particularly strong for the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries
and consists of official state documents such as royal decrees, legal proceedings, reports, account
books, treasury records, petitions and geographic relations; church documents; ecclesiastical texts;
correspondence; accounts of events; political writings; poetry; scrapbooks; and photographs.
The collection lends itself to a myriad of research topics for the colonial period, including
pre-Colombian civilizations; regional history; civil administration; the role of the church in colonial
society; the Bourbon reforms; and the colonial mining industry. For the study of pre-Colombian
cultures, a text by the Jesuit, Antonio Julian, offers detailed descriptions of the "demonic" religious
practices of the native peoples, and argues the Spanish conquest did not have a negative impact on
the indigenous inhabitants.
Regional/micro history is documented in two detailed eighteenth century "relaciones geograficas"
(geographic relations) describing the Caupolican and Apolobamba regions of modern Bolivia and
the Abancay area of Peru, and in an interesting report describing the types of trees found in the
Partido of Conchucos (Tarma) and their uses. There is an outstanding description of Lima, written
by an unknown author, which includes graphic descriptions of the city's racial groups, social
customs, and pastimes, and an 1812 census of Callao, which provides demographic details about
household size and composition, as well as occupational data. A 1698 text details the damages
suffered from an earthquake in the towns of Latacunga, Riobamba and Ambato, Ecuador. There is
also very interesting documentation of a lawsuit by Alvaro Medaa over the ownership of the ship
Nuestra Seora de la Candelaria, which contains details of voyages in the South Seas made by this
discoverer of the Solomon Islands.
Colonial civil administration can be traced through a "relacin" (report) on the state of the Kingdom
of Peru, prepared for the viceroy in 1667. A number of royal decrees demonstrate the Spanish
state's increasing need for revenues, and document the other concerns of the Spanish monarchy
during the first half of the eighteenth century. Treasury records include account books from Cuzco
(1572-1573) and Cuenca (1783-1827); detailed statements of the Viceroyalty of Peru's income and
expenditures for 1787 and 1788; and a chart made in 1797 listing employees of the viceroyalty with
salaries greater than four hundred pesos. A series of acts of the Lima cabildo and its successor, the
ayuntamiento constitutional, present information about municipal administration. Rebellion against
civil administration can be studied through copies of texts about an encomienda belonging to Juan
de Espinosa that also deal with the Gonzaro Pizarro revolt (1544-1548). There are several
documents related to the Tupac Amaru Rebellion, in particular, a text authored by Jos Raphael
Sauaraura provides a first hand account of the rebellion and offers a defense of the bishop of Cuzco
during the revolt.
The integral role played by the Catholic Church in colonial life is well documented. The various
manifestations of this centrality can be traced through documents dealing with the Jesuit order's
right to establish a residence for their order in Huancavelica; texts relating to a dispute over the
control of the Indian "doctrina" of Ayabaca; materials from litigation between two religious orders
to force interest payments on the principal of a loan imposed on an Ecuadorian hacienda; an opinion
concerning the establishment of a convent of nuns governed under the rules of poverty of Saint
Clare; papers relating to the Hospital of San Lazaro in Lima, which contain the statutes of the
related cofradia (lay religious brotherhood); and documents from a lawsuit filed by members of the
Augustinian order to remove their provincial from his office
The "Bourbon reforms" aimed to bring about the economic, social, political and military
modernization of Spain and its colonies. Useful manuscripts concern institutions that arose out of
Bourbon reforms. These include one relating to the Peruvian economic society, the Sociedad de
Amantes del Pais, and another dealing with establishment of the Colegio de Abogados de Lima (the
Lima law school.) The military aspects of the Bourbon reforms can be studied through documents
relating to attempts to create a new militia company in Tarma, Peru, and a defensive plan for Lima
and Callao prepared in 1807. A text dealing with the planting of trees in Huamanga demonstrates
the increased influence of European ideas on the thinking of this era.
The mining industry provided much of the wealth of the Spanish empire. Texts on the mining
enterprise include a copy of a report by Diego Caldern y Salcedo on the discovery and problems of
the Potos mines; a copy of an appeal to the king from the guild of "azogueros" concerning
production costs; a text by Francisco Serra y Canals explaining the practices of the silver mining
industry and a hand drawn plan of the Huancavelica mercury mine.
The collection also contains a wide variety of documentation from the various Andean nations
related to the independence period. Materials from Colombia include a letter written by Antonio
Jos de Sucre to Manuela Esteva concerning the Battle of Ayacucho; a letter by the ardent royalist,
Manuel Urrutia, describing conditions after Simn Bolvar's victory at Boyac; and an account by
Elias Prieto Villate presenting participant and eyewitness recollections of the Battles of Vargas and
Boyac. Documents from a trial related to an 1809 uprising in Quito describe the beginnings of the
independence movement in Ecuador. The movement in Peru can be studied from texts concerning a
new exaction of Indian tribute (1812-1813), a principal cause of a rebellion in highland Peru that is
viewed as a precursor to the independence movements led by Jos de San Martn and Bolvar. The
records of a junta of notables outline their determination of the best means to pay for increased
defensive costs owing to the movement. The Peruvian perspective on Bolvar's rule, immediately
after independence, is documented in an essay, and in extracts from newspapers and
correspondence (1826-1827). From Venezuela, a document signed by Simn Bolvar urges British
officials not to intervene in Spain's disputes with its Latin American colonies. Correspondence of
Bolvar and a letter by Manuel Urdaeta discuss the military situation and battles of the Venezuelan
independence movement.
Items in the collection sometimes span the independence period and the early national period.
Examples of this include the Francisco Ribas correspondence, which consists of letters by a number
of independence leaders, written between 1818 and 1854, discussing political, personal, military
and other matters. A scrapbook of South American letters and other documents collected by, and
bound for, Isabel Alderson, a member of a leading English merchant family residing in Caracas in
the eighteenth century, contains similar correspondence and some handwritten observations
concerning the authors of the letters.
The materials for the study of the later national period are limited, but of some interest. The
Ripart-Montclar correspondence contains a series of detailed, personal letters, written by the French
charg d'affaires in Lima, to his sister between 1869 and 1871. These letters document a critical
period in Peruvian history between the decline of that nation's guano boom and the War of the
Pacific, and contain Ripart-Montclar's personal opinions and insights about Peruvian society. The
correspondence also contains many references to the political unrest in France, as well as the
Franco-Prussian War. Also of interest is a photo album from the 1920s that presents a number of
images showing the conditions of the Venezuelan oil fields during the years the industry developed
and contributed to the economic development of the modern nation.
Box
Folder
Bolivia
"Suceso portentoso acaecido en el asiento mineral
de Porco distrito de Potos." n.d.
x-ref
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Chile
Colombia
Ecuador
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Peru
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205a
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207-209
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258 - 259
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Venezuela
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Oversize, 1544-1926
Oversize, 1544-1926
Description
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10
Bolivia
"Suceso portentoso acaecido en el asiento mineral
de Porco distrito de Potos." n.d.
Peru
Venezuela
Royal passport. 1778-1779