Historical Archaeology - Introduction

ANT 412 - Historical Archaeology

European Exploration and Colonialism

New Spain

Spanish-American Half-Reale of 1770

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Introduction Rather than summarize details of the Spanish colonies, this section will outline some of the major principles that are relevant to the archaeology of the Spanish Empire (as well as the other European empires).

Last update: 16 August 2004

Mercantilism
Renaissance and early modern European polities abandoned mediaeval feudalism and subscribed to the economic philosophy of mercantilism. For a nation to be prosperous, according to this philosophy, it had to have a positive balance of trade as measured in gold and silver. In other words, more gold and silver had to go in than went out.

This philosophy contributed to the growth of European empires as monarchs attempted to gain sources of wealth (especially the gold and silver mines of the New World, but later also gold and silver from Africa, India and China).

Mercantilism evolved into capitalism as "laissez-faire" (free-market) policies largely replaced the extreme regulation of mercantilist economies after about 1800 (although "protectionism" if various forms continued to exist).

Colonialism
The establishment of permanent colonies by European states, however, came to have a quite different significance as Europe became more-and-more industrialized. Conquered territories came to provide raw materials, in addition to gold and silver, for these growing industries. Furthermore, the economy of the mother country benefited from the establishment of "captive" overseas markets in the colonies. Mercantilism thus encouraged the establishment and growth of colonies, and colonies became integral to the mercantile system.

This was a sort of mutualistic (but not equally beneficial) relationship between the colonies and the mother country. The colonies produced (cheap) goods and raw materials that the mother country needed, sometimes with the use of slave labour. The mother country produced (expensive) manufactured goods both for internal use and for export. The colonies would then buy all their manufactured goods from the mother country (they were usually not free legally to shop around among various sources). This put the colonies in a dependent relationship whereby they were always having to produce more in order to pay their debts in the mother country. The most notorious example is India, where the British prohibited the inhabitants from spinning cotton; instead, they were required to export raw cotton to England, where factories in cities like Liverpool and Manchester made it into cloth, and then to buy the English-made cloth.

Colonies were able to manufacture some simple goods themselves, so furniture-makers and blacksmiths became common colonial occupations, but status goods, in particular, came from the mother country. This included fine china, silverware (although the doctrine of mercantilism discouraged the use of silver for luxury items), and the best or most fashionable clothing and furniture. Imported goods thus became tools in the establishment and maintenance of social hierarchy in the colonies.

Spain, for example, prohibited any ships other than Spanish ones from entering the ports of its colonies (England had similar rules in its Navigation Laws of 1650 and 1651), and prohibited foreigners from importing goods or exporting gold without a special licence (for which the Crown, of course, took a fee). Local manufacture was prohibited in some colonies to ensure markets for Spanish goods. Trade was strictly regulated and for much of the time was channelled through the single Spanish port of Seville. There were numerous taxes and duties to profit the Crown, including taxes on bullion and the "seignorage" on the minting of bullion into coin.

Typically, colonial administrators attempted to duplicate the social hierarchy of the mother country locally. For example, second sons or other less promising offspring of European aristocrats would receive land grants in the colonies, where they were expected to establish estates or plantations (the haciendas of New Spain). They would support and be supported by the colonial governor, administration, and garrison.

See also Concise Encyclopedia of Economics,

Archaeological Contributions
So that's the theory, but what does archaeology contribute?

Not only does archaeology reveal evidence for the imported goods and merchant ships that formed the backbone of the colonial economic system, it can also help reveal what was really going on in the system.

For example, although historical sources do refer to smuggling and piracy, they probably underrepresent their importance in the colonies. Theoretically, most of the time, English colonies should have English manufactured goods, Dutch colonies dutch-made ones, French colonies French-made ones, and Spanish colonies Spanish-made ones. Archaeological excavations, however, can reveal the true extent of imports from other sources, and thus provide hints as to how colonial residents resisted an economic system that was designed to work to their detriment.

The archaeological evidence can also help to show both how the artifically established colonial elites adapted to their situation and how non-elite colonists attempted to improve their status. Rather than continuing to "buy in" to the plan that they should run large agricultural estates, for example, the transplanted elites sometimes transformed themselves into successful businessmen, sometimes subdividing their estates and selling or renting property that quickly got built up into urban centres with houses, factories and shops. Meanwhile, some shopkeepers, tavern-keepers, and other small businessmen manipulated the use of imported status markers to join the elite too. Archaeology is well placed to document the establishment and development of local industries in the colonies. Even though the really high-status goods still came from overseas, the production of many goods locally that formerly were only available from abroad both made it possible for less wealthy people to acquire them and shifted some of the wealth from the mother country to the colonies (i.e., local elites were profiting from the industry, instead of just the elites in England, France, or Holland).

As is discussed in some of your readings, one of the results of this, in the case of the British-American colonies, is that a fairly low degree of status differentiation in the 17th anc early 18th centuries led, in the second half of the 18th century, to much more marked social hierarchy. Georgian architecture, formal dinner services, expensive clothing, and ostentatious coaches served to distinguish the upper class (including those descended from those transplanted aristocrats as well as successful business people) from the mainly poor masses.

In addition, archaeology contributes to the study of the growth of capitalism out of mercantilism. It documents increasing diversity in the sources of manufactured goods, the growth of local industries, the growth of large labour forces, and the largely undocumented lifestyles of labourers.

In New Spain, colonies never became as industrialized as in British North America (in part, because of Spanish legislation that usually prohibited colonial manufacture), and so the agricultural plantations (haciendas) remained the backbone of the economy, and the social hierarchy was extended through the use of the native people as peasants as well as the use, in some colonies, of slaves. Archaeology can help to document the use of Spanish material culture to mark elite status and the survival of some aspects of prehispanic culture among the predominantly native lower classes.

See also Colonies of Colonies in Spanish America, The Spanish Treasure Fleet System, University of West Florida Spanish Presidios,

References
Hall, M. (2000). Archaeology and the Modern World. Colonial Transcripts in South Africa and the Chesapeake.

Heckscher, Eli F. (1955). Mercantilism. revised, second edition, edited by Ernst F. Söderlund. George Allen and Unwin, London, 2 volumes.

Johnson, M. (1996). An Archaeology of Capitalism.

Magnusson, Lars (1994). Mercantilism: The Shaping of an Economic Language. London: Routledge.

McCusker, John J. (2001). Mercantilism and the Economic History of the Early Modern Atlantic World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Munro, John H.A. (1973). Wool, Cloth, and Gold: The Struggle for Bullion in Anglo-Burgundian Trade. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. (Good background on mercantilism and on how monetary instruments were manipulated [through coin debasement, for example] to control balance of trade).

Introduction		Rather than summarize details of the Spanish colonies, this section will outline some of the major principles that are relevant to the archaeology of the Spanish Empire (as well as the other European empires).
Last update: 16 August 2004
Mercantilism		Renaissance and early modern European polities abandoned mediaeval feudalism and subscribed to the economic philosophy of mercantilism. For a nation to be prosperous, according to this philosophy, it had to have a positive balance of trade as measured in gold and silver. In other words, more gold and silver had to go in than went out. This philosophy contributed to the growth of European empires as monarchs attempted to gain sources of wealth (especially the gold and silver mines of the New World, but later also gold and silver from Africa, India and China). Mercantilism evolved into capitalism as "laissez-faire" (free-market) policies largely replaced the extreme regulation of mercantilist economies after about 1800 (although "protectionism" if various forms continued to exist).

Colonialism		The establishment of permanent colonies by European states, however, came to have a quite different significance as Europe became more-and-more industrialized. Conquered territories came to provide raw materials, in addition to gold and silver, for these growing industries. Furthermore, the economy of the mother country benefited from the establishment of "captive" overseas markets in the colonies. Mercantilism thus encouraged the establishment and growth of colonies, and colonies became integral to the mercantile system. This was a sort of mutualistic (but not equally beneficial) relationship between the colonies and the mother country. The colonies produced (cheap) goods and raw materials that the mother country needed, sometimes with the use of slave labour. The mother country produced (expensive) manufactured goods both for internal use and for export. The colonies would then buy all their manufactured goods from the mother country (they were usually not free legally to shop around among various sources). This put the colonies in a dependent relationship whereby they were always having to produce more in order to pay their debts in the mother country. The most notorious example is India, where the British prohibited the inhabitants from spinning cotton; instead, they were required to export raw cotton to England, where factories in cities like Liverpool and Manchester made it into cloth, and then to buy the English-made cloth. Colonies were able to manufacture some simple goods themselves, so furniture-makers and blacksmiths became common colonial occupations, but status goods, in particular, came from the mother country. This included fine china, silverware (although the doctrine of mercantilism discouraged the use of silver for luxury items), and the best or most fashionable clothing and furniture. Imported goods thus became tools in the establishment and maintenance of social hierarchy in the colonies. Spain, for example, prohibited any ships other than Spanish ones from entering the ports of its colonies (England had similar rules in its Navigation Laws of 1650 and 1651), and prohibited foreigners from importing goods or exporting gold without a special licence (for which the Crown, of course, took a fee). Local manufacture was prohibited in some colonies to ensure markets for Spanish goods. Trade was strictly regulated and for much of the time was channelled through the single Spanish port of Seville. There were numerous taxes and duties to profit the Crown, including taxes on bullion and the "seignorage" on the minting of bullion into coin. Typically, colonial administrators attempted to duplicate the social hierarchy of the mother country locally. For example, second sons or other less promising offspring of European aristocrats would receive land grants in the colonies, where they were expected to establish estates or plantations (the haciendas of New Spain). They would support and be supported by the colonial governor, administration, and garrison. See also Concise Encyclopedia of Economics,

Archaeological Contributions		So that's the theory, but what does archaeology contribute? Not only does archaeology reveal evidence for the imported goods and merchant ships that formed the backbone of the colonial economic system, it can also help reveal what was really going on in the system. For example, although historical sources do refer to smuggling and piracy, they probably underrepresent their importance in the colonies. Theoretically, most of the time, English colonies should have English manufactured goods, Dutch colonies dutch-made ones, French colonies French-made ones, and Spanish colonies Spanish-made ones. Archaeological excavations, however, can reveal the true extent of imports from other sources, and thus provide hints as to how colonial residents resisted an economic system that was designed to work to their detriment. The archaeological evidence can also help to show both how the artifically established colonial elites adapted to their situation and how non-elite colonists attempted to improve their status. Rather than continuing to "buy in" to the plan that they should run large agricultural estates, for example, the transplanted elites sometimes transformed themselves into successful businessmen, sometimes subdividing their estates and selling or renting property that quickly got built up into urban centres with houses, factories and shops. Meanwhile, some shopkeepers, tavern-keepers, and other small businessmen manipulated the use of imported status markers to join the elite too. Archaeology is well placed to document the establishment and development of local industries in the colonies. Even though the really high-status goods still came from overseas, the production of many goods locally that formerly were only available from abroad both made it possible for less wealthy people to acquire them and shifted some of the wealth from the mother country to the colonies (i.e., local elites were profiting from the industry, instead of just the elites in England, France, or Holland). As is discussed in some of your readings, one of the results of this, in the case of the British-American colonies, is that a fairly low degree of status differentiation in the 17th anc early 18th centuries led, in the second half of the 18th century, to much more marked social hierarchy. Georgian architecture, formal dinner services, expensive clothing, and ostentatious coaches served to distinguish the upper class (including those descended from those transplanted aristocrats as well as successful business people) from the mainly poor masses. In addition, archaeology contributes to the study of the growth of capitalism out of mercantilism. It documents increasing diversity in the sources of manufactured goods, the growth of local industries, the growth of large labour forces, and the largely undocumented lifestyles of labourers. In New Spain, colonies never became as industrialized as in British North America (in part, because of Spanish legislation that usually prohibited colonial manufacture), and so the agricultural plantations (haciendas) remained the backbone of the economy, and the social hierarchy was extended through the use of the native people as peasants as well as the use, in some colonies, of slaves. Archaeology can help to document the use of Spanish material culture to mark elite status and the survival of some aspects of prehispanic culture among the predominantly native lower classes. See also Colonies of Colonies in Spanish America, The Spanish Treasure Fleet System, University of West Florida Spanish Presidios,

References		Hall, M. (2000). Archaeology and the Modern World. Colonial Transcripts in South Africa and the Chesapeake. Heckscher, Eli F. (1955). Mercantilism. revised, second edition, edited by Ernst F. Söderlund. George Allen and Unwin, London, 2 volumes. Johnson, M. (1996). An Archaeology of Capitalism. Magnusson, Lars (1994). Mercantilism: The Shaping of an Economic Language. London: Routledge. McCusker, John J. (2001). Mercantilism and the Economic History of the Early Modern Atlantic World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Munro, John H.A. (1973). Wool, Cloth, and Gold: The Struggle for Bullion in Anglo-Burgundian Trade. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. (Good background on mercantilism and on how monetary instruments were manipulated [through coin debasement, for example] to control balance of trade).