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Early Modern (1450 CE - 1800 CE)

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Extract from Garcilaso de la Vega, Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru

This is an extract from the chronicles of Garcilaso de la Vega (1539–1616), the son of a Spanish conquistador and an Inca noble woman, who grew up in Peru but left there as a young man and spent the rest of his life in Spain.

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Extract from Garcilaso de la Vega, Royal Commentaries of the Incas and General History of Peru

This is an extract from the chronicles of Garcilaso de la Vega (1539–1616), the son of a Spanish conquistador and an Inca noble woman, who grew up in Peru but left there as a young man and spent the rest of his life in Spain.

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Pedro de Cieza de León, Crónicas

This is an extract from the chronicles of Pedro de Cieza de León (1520–1554), a Spanish soldier and writer who compiled a history of Peru during his seventeen years there.

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Report from the General Inspection of the Chupaychu

This is a report from a Spanish inspector dating from 1549, written by a European scribe, based on an Andean’s reading of a khipu, the collections of cords on which Incas recorded information.

A series of long, multi-colored strings hanging from another string. The hanging strings have knots at varying places along each string.
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Inca Khipu

Andean peoples, including the Incas, recorded information on khipus (also spelled quipu), collections of colored and knotted cords such as this one.

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Juan de Betanzos, Narrative of the Incas

This extract comes from Juan de Betanzos’ Narrative of the Incas, which was written in the sixteenth century but not published until 1880. Betanzos (1510-1576) was among the early conquistadors, and served as a military leader and official.

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Portón de Campo

This stone structure, also known as the Puerta de la Ciudadela, belonged to the historic defensive walls of Colonia del Sacramento. Although the city is located in modern-day Uruguay, at the time of construction (1745), it was occupied by the Portuguese under Governor Vasconcellos.

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Eighteenth-Century Uruguayan Home

On display here are several objects from the Museo Casa de Nacarello, a small museum in Colonia, Uruguay that aims to recreate daily life in an eighteenth-century home.

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Ruins of the Convento de San Francisco

These structures are all that remain from a convent built near the coast of modern-day Uruguay in the 1690s. It is located in Colonia del Sacramento, a city that switched back and forth from Spanish rule to Portuguese rule several times during the seventeenth through the nineteenth centuries.

People standing in a semi circle looking at the name of the website, Mapping the Republic of Letters in bold and cursive font
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Mapping the Republic of Letters

Browsing the site, users are able to gain a deeper appreciation for how data visualisation can help academics examine previously well-known and well-utilised primary sources in new, innovative ways.