Cultivated Landscapes of Middle America on the Eve of Conquest

by Whitmore, Thomas M.; Turner, B. L.

• ISBN13: 9780199244539
• ISBN10: 0199244537
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-04-25
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

The human-environment conditions in the Americas on the eve of the sixteenth-century European conquest have of late attracted growing interest in both academic and public circles. Focusing on Middle America, this book completes a trilogy which has made the most comprehensive survey ever achieved of pre-Colombian agriculture and culture throughout the continents. It addresses the question of what lands were permanently occupied; how they were used; and what the environmental and social implications of this use were. The answers to these questions are central to such wide-ranging themes as indigenous land rights, the conservation and preservation 'ethic' of these native people, and the global carbon cycle. The kind, scale, and location of land use is documented and mapped in detail. The book not only demonstrates the sophistication of the agricultural landscapes and their local integration, but also investigates the omissions and land degradation of the native agriculturalists. Drawing on this wealth of data the authors make a stimulating contribution to the debate about resource, land, and population in the Americas.

Author Biography

Dr Whitmore is director of undergraduate studies in the Department of Geography, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill: secretary/treasurer of the Cultural Ecology Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers. Professor Turner is a former Guggenheim Fellow, Senior Fellow of the Green Center for the Study of Science and Society, member of the National Academy of Sciences, and American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Delivered the Clarendon Lectures in Geography and Environmental Studies on 'Integrated Land Change Science: The Yucatan Case' in Oxford, November 2000.

Table of Contents

List of Figure	xv
List of Mops	xvii
List of Tables	xviii
On the Eve of Conquest: The Context and Background to the Problem	1	(39)
Understanding the Text	4	(2)
Middle American Environments: The Setting for Cultivation	6	(13)
Types of Cultivation	19	(3)
Geographical Units	22	(13)
Reprise	35	(5)
The Context of Cultivation: Social and Economic Organization and the General Nature of Cropping	40	(36)
Demand, Labor, and Land Tenure	41	(7)
Tools, Production Strategies, and Storage	48	(15)
Defining Cultivated Plants of Middle America	63	(8)
Context in Retrospect	71	(5)
Arboriculture and Horticulture	76	(35)
Types of Arboriculture and Horticulture	77	(2)
Agroforestry	79	(7)
Orchards and Orchard-Gardens	86	(17)
Gardens	103	(3)
Arboriculture and Horticulture in Retrospect	106	(5)
Rainfed Cultivation	111	(22)
Swidden Cultivation	114	(9)
Temporal Cultivation	123	(5)
Conuco Cultivation	128	(1)
Rainfed Cultivation in Retrospect	129	(4)
Terrace Cultivation	133	(32)
Types and Functions of Terraces	134	(2)
Sloping-field Terraces	136	(9)
Bench Terraces	145	(9)
Cross-channel Terraces	154	(7)
Terraces in Retrospect	161	(4)
Floodwater and Irrigated Cultivation	165	(30)
Types and Functions of Irrigation	166	(4)
Subsurface Irrigation	170	(1)
Floodwater Farming and Irrigation	171	(3)
Canal Irrigation	174	(17)
Wetland Irrigation	191	(2)
Irrigation in Retrospect	193	(2)
Wetland Cultivation	195	(33)
Types and Functions of Wetland Cultivation	196	(3)
Recessional and Subsurface Cultivation	199	(8)
Intensive Wetland Systems	207	(13)
Chinampas	220	(5)
Wetland Cultivation in Retrospect	225	(3)
Inventing Histories? Themes and Indications	228	(23)
Myths and Legends	228	(7)
Land-use Dynamism before the Conquest	235	(2)
Hinterlands, Mosaics, and Landscapes of Cultivation	237	(6)
Missing Invention	243	(1)
Missing the Mark	244	(2)
Reprise	246	(5)
Bibliography	251	(40)
Index	291