men in America. He was most likely preceded several centuries before by
Scandinavian populations (Ingstad & Ingstad 2001). Yet, the impact that
Columbus’ ‘discovery’ of America had for Europe was far more important
from an economic, political, and cultural point of view. It meant the
Europeans’ encounter of a completely new world unknown to them which
they were ready to exploit. 1492 was not only the year Columbus, funded by
Isabella, the queen of the Spanish kingdom of Castille, reached America. It
was also the year Castille ended the war against the Islamic kingdom of
Granada, when King Boabdil (Abu Abd Allah Muhammad) capitulated and
left the palace of La Alhambra and crossed south over the Gibraltar strait. It
was only then that Isabella gave Columbus her support. Following the
pattern of land seizure established in Castille for centuries, the new territor-
ies of America were soon taken for the crown. Over the three following
centuries a period of exploration and warfare against the native populations
continued and that resulted in the appropriation of more than half of
the continent.
Some of theWrst Spanish and Portuguese explorers wrote accounts of the
customs, history,Xora and fauna they encountered in sixteenth-century
America. The rate of social change meant that much of what was described
there has been subsequently converted into archaeology, and nowadays is
considered to be a key source for the history of America before the earliest
years of the conquest and of European colonization. Some of these accounts
included descriptions of ruins, usually contrasting the grandiose buildings
with the impoverished populations the explorers had encountered. Examples
are Friar Bartolome ́de las Casas (2003 (1542)) and Friar Diego de Landa
(1978 (1566)) (for Brazil see Funari 1999: 18). Don Diego Garcia de Palacio
found the Mayan city of Copan and wrote to the king of Spain about it in
1576 (see Alcina Franch 1995: table 1, and Lo ́pez-Oco ́n 1992). The conquest
of the American territory meant much destruction and plunder of the kind
unfortunately so recurrent in human history (see many examples in Chapters
5 to 10 given from more recent examples of the impact of colonialism in other
areas from Egypt to Benin). Some of this destruction was oYcially authorized,
such as that given to the Count of Osorio in 1533, when he was allowed to
open ancient burials on the condition that he paid theWfth part of what he
found in taxes (Alcina Franch 1995: 21). Sometimes locals assisted with the
destruction, as was the case of a village on the Moche northern coast of Peru,
where in 1550 the local cacique provided some information regarding a
huaca, i.e. a burial tomb, on the condition that part of what was found
reverted to the local village (ibid.22).
Yet, parallel to the plunder and destruction, another type of appropriation
took place: from the earliest years of the conquest, tax oYcials catalogued many
Antiquities and Political Prestige 39