The Essentials (IX): Fernán Guerra, the man who knew too much

5 commentsEsenciales, Estudios, ,

Location of the old manor houses in Teguise, Lanzarote. The streets of the so-called Gran Aldea witnessed the clashes among the neighbors and the henchmen of Inés Peraza and Diego García de Herrera (source: PROYECTO TARHA).

[…] the King […] had ordered him, among other words, to come another day, in the wee hours, to the quarter of the fat bell, through Xerez wicket, to speak with Their Highnesses, and that no one should see him nor take another person with him; […] and when he returned […] he said how His Highness had asked him for the conquest of this island, before a secretary of His; and that he had given it all in writing, and what population and places there were on the island, and the size of the island; and how many people would have to come from Castile, to conquer it and place it under the obedience of Their Highnesses on this island, and what ships would be necessary, and that everything was given in writing; and that […] His Highness had asked him if he knew any ship masters and that he would bring Him some […][1]RUMEU (1990, pp. 677-678). This translation by PROYECTO TARHA..

Let us clarify that this title, sort of a Hollywood one, is not that of the essential we want to show today, but the story contained in it, worthy of a screenplay, justifies this liberty.

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Using Stellarium in Archaeoastronomy

4 commentsArqueología histórica, Cultura indígena, , ,

Canopus’ heliacal rising simulation (circle right above the horizon) in 1478 seen from the coordinates of modern Las Palmas de Gran Canaria city. Simulation landscape does not correspond to the real location (source: PROYECTO TARHA).

In our previous post we showed two videosimulations of the solar eclipse that took place on April 29th, 1478. This time we shall discuss a piece of software used to perform those simulations: Stellarium.

Stellarium is multiplatform, free software which works as a planetarium. As such, we can use it to simulate the position of celestial bodies visible from any geographic location on Earth at a specific time and date, accurately enough even for astronomical events two or three millenniums before our Era, which makes it very valuable in the field of archaeoastronomy.

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The solar eclipse of 1478

2 commentsCultura colonial, Cultura indígena, ,

Visibility of the solar eclipse happened on July 29th, 1478. Yellow ovals determine the areas in which part of the eclipse took place below the horizon. The blue curve path “flies” over locations from where maximum occultation of the solar apparent surface could be observed (source: Xavier Jubier).

[…] They got into a fortress called the Ansita, which is in the parts of Tirajana. As the Governor knew it, he left with all the people on horseback and on foot that he could take, and went to the said fortress and surrounded it; and he had it surrounded in such a way they came to an agreement to save their lives and keep them from captivity and go to Castile, which were agreed. And the next day the faycán and the other Canarians came out of the fort, and brought them, and became Christians, on which day the Sun made a great eclipse, and afterwards it rained and a great wind blew; and over that island flew many birds that they had never seen before, which were cranes and storks and swallows, and many other birds they do not know their names.[1]MORALES (1978), p. 508. Translated and adapted from old Castilian by PROYECTO TARHA.

This curious passage, at the end of Chapter XXXVII in the Chronicle of the Catholic Monarchs written by Diego de Valera, shortly narrates the end of the conquest of Gran Canaria associating it with an astronomical phenomenon of undoubted transcendence for most of the ancient cultures: a total eclipse of the Sun.

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The Essentials (VIII): The Comedy of the Reception

Cultura indígena, Esenciales, , , ,

Comedia del Recibimiento. Cover of the 2005 edition by Professor Oswaldo Guerra Sánchez.

DORAMAS

Guanda demedre tamaranone tasuguiet besmia

mat acosomuset tam obenir marago, aspe anhianacha

aritamogante senefeque senefeque.

CURIOSITY

What does he say, sister?

WISDOM

He is inviting us to lunch; and he says

he will give us many potages, Canarian style, and he asks us

to sit down.[1]CAIRASCO (2005), p. 34. This translation by PROYECTO TARHA.

Although not being a core work to know the ancient history of the Canary Islands, joining this to our Essentials is justified by its literary and philological significance.

Composed between 1581-1582 by Canarian canon, musician, poet and playwright Bartolomé Cairasco de Figueroa (Real de Las Palmas, 1538-1610), so-called Comedia del Recibimiento (Comedy of the Reception) is a small stage play whose destiny was to be represented to welcome the new bishop of Canaria, Fernando de Rueda. In this play, six characters –five allegorical: Wisdom, Curiosity, Invention, Gáldar and Guía, the two latter representing the homonymous Grandcanarian locations, and one historical, Canarian warrior Doramas– introduce the Archipelago virtues to the Prelate.

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Footshapes at Teguise

Cultura indígena, Patrimonio indígena, ,

¡Tindaya no se toca! (Don’t touch Tindaya!) campaign logo showing a pair of footshapes (source: www.lacasademitia.es).

Footshapes are rock carvings showing what appear to be human feet plants. Although present in different cultures, on the Canary Islands they were an artistic expression of Maho indigenes common to both the islands of Lanzarote and Fuerteventura, whose exact function is enigmatic by now but does not seem unreasonable to think they were related to magical-religious rituals.

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The Essentials (VII): The Cabitos' Inquiry

Documentos públicos, Esenciales, , , , , ,
Teguise

A view of Teguise town (Lanzarote) in 2016 from Mount Guanapay. Named Gran Aldea (Great Village) by Europeans in the fifteenth century, it was the capital of the Seigneury of the Isles of Canaria and the scene of residents insurrection against Inés Peraza and Diego de Herrera’s rule that gave rise to Cabitos’ Inquiry (source: PROYECTO TARHA)..

[…] and we as people few and poor, miserable, ignorant, living on this island, poor having nothing to provide us or feed us but the skies and goat herds, and we have no other property or income to live on. For, Lord, if we pick bread one year, two years we do not pick it, and so we are living on this land, in our misery and poverty, and they take the above said tax from us […]. And about that all, the above said Lords Diego de Herrera and Doña Inés, his wife, are not contented […] every day they do us more harm, taking us out of our homes, making us abandon our wives and children, taking us by force against our wills to other islands of infidels where many of us died and still die and make us keep towers and fortresses […] not wanting neither to give nor to pay us any wage […] and we dare neither to tell them nor to repeat to the above said Lords nothing of such grievances they do to us because of the great fear of them we have until make it known to Your Highness, to whom we plead with loud voices, as very miserable and aggrieved people, that Your Highness remedy us with justice, for, Lord, we are isolated on the islands, on the said island of Lanzarote, which is far apart from the kingdoms of Spain, westwards in the sea. [1]Aznar Vallejo (1990, pp. 173-174) –adapted from old Castilian by PROYECTO TARHA–.

Promoters of this plead never imagined that their requests would give rise to the most important public file kept on the conquest of the Canaries.

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On tarjas and pintaderas (2/2)

2 commentsCultura indígena, Etnografía, Patrimonio indígena, , , , , , ,

The famous dragon-tree at Icod de los Vinos, Tenerife. This tree-like plant (Dracaena draco) was used by ancient Canarians to make the shields that some authors called “tarjas” (fuente: Wikimedia Commons).

In more or less plausible relationship with the pintaderas cited in the first part of this post, ethnohistorical sources mention the use of badges or emblems among Gran Canaria indigenes. Let us quote some relevant texts.

From Antonio Sedeño‘s account:[1]MORALES (1978, pp. 367, 369). Translated from old Castilian by PROYECTO TARHA.

[…]  they brought bucklers taller as a man, made of rough light wood from a tree called dragon. The sword they called Majido and the shield tarja; swords were thin and pointed; they brought their badges painted their way in white and ochre red over the bucklers, played the sword with great skill.

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On "tarjas" and "pintaderas" (1/2)

1 commentArqueología histórica, Cultura indígena, Etnografía, , , , ,

Partial view of the pintaderas studied by Professor René Verneau (source: VERNEAU (1883), pr. VI).

The indigenous artifacts known as pintaderas are some of the most remarkable objects of study and analysis to the Canarian archeology. These are small tools made of baked clay –terracotta– or wood, featuring geometric patterns of varying complexity –triangles, circles, rectangles, broken lines– being either incised, excised and/or printed on a round or polygonal flat surface called field, and generally provided with an appendix, often perforated by one or more holes.

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The Seven Partidas

Cultura colonial, Documentos públicos, , , , , ,
Alfonso X de Castilla

King Alfonso X of Castile depicted in a miniature included in the Cantigas de Santa María (source: Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes).

Barely having any relationship with the history of the Canary Islands, we could say today we are sneaking an intruder into this project. Not without a good reason, of course.

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The 520 splendours of the Moon

Cultura indígena, Etnografía, , , , , , , ,

Indigenous pitcher found at Agüimes (Gran Canaria), kept at El Museo Canario, catalogue number 260, featuring two shapes presumably depicting a sun and a solar eclipse (source: El Museo Canario).

To the Canarian historiography the legendary episode of the raid over the indigenous village of Agaldar (Gran Canaria) by Portuguese captain Diogo da Silva de Meneses is a well-known one.

After landing under cover of the night, the Luso-Castilian expedition, composed of about two hundred troops, tried unsuccessfully to raze the islander village at dawn getting trapped in turn by a threefold contingent of fighting men. Sieged inside a large facility surrounded by high walls of dry stone, the invaders remained locked there for two days and one night until the Guanarteme -chieftain- of Agaldar, uncle of the future Fernando Guanarteme, agreed to parley with Diogo da Silva. Chronicles tell that after berating the Portuguese his audacity and contravening the desire of his own warriors to end the lives of all the besieged, the indigenous leader pretended to fall into the hands of the Europeans to facilitate their release, who as a result of this supposedly pious act began to name him Guanarteme the Good.

But here we are not interested in describing the different versions of this story, from the shortest, most sober offered in the Cronica Ovetensis[1]MORALES (1978), pp. 116-119. to the novelistic rewriting by Leonardo Torriani,[2]TORRIANI (1959), pp. 120-126 but to draw attention to a curious datum provided by this Cremonese engineer in the baroque speech he makes the islander leader pronounce. This particular passage is as follows:

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