Cruzando la Cerca: indigenous mounded landscapes in Nicaragua

Abstract

This chapter presents a discussion on the process of reconstructing past landscapes, with a case study from southern Central America. Geurds argues that the strictly impressionistic, Western definition of landscape is often an uncomfortable fit for archaeological analyses. Such tension easily becomes palpable when early-16th-century Spanish descriptions designate parts of present-day Nicaragua as a garden of paradise. Archaeological cases where forms of public architecture favour a view of the intentional creation of landscapes invoke notions of cosmological ordering and forge a strong link between the concept of monumentality and landscape. Geurds argues that in this context, landscape becomes a planned endeavour that rests significantly on a notion of human agency.