400 Years after Columbus: The Study of Costa Rica’s pre-Columbian Past and its Staging in the International Exhibitions at the End of the 19th Century

Abstract

One of the most significant commemorative events in memory of the IV Centenary of the Discovery of America was the Historical-American Exhibition in Madrid (1892). Only a year later, in 1893, the World’s Columbian Exposition opened its doors in the city of Chicago, thus enabling the United States to lay its claim to being, just as much as the rest of America, a legitimate bearer of Columbus’ legacy. As these events show, the last decades of the 19^th century were characterized by the growing tension between the opposing global turns of Hispanism and Pan-Americanism. Considering this, the article seeks to investigate a case seldom studied: that of Costa Rica. In the aforementioned exhibitions, the Central American country exhibited a large number of objects from the National Museum of Costa Rica and certain private collections, which crossed the continental borders within few months of difference to be shown in two different spaces. Emphasizing the spreading of knowledge and the mobility of objects, this article focuses on the change of relationships between the exhibitions and the National Museum, and the introduction of new disciplines such as archaeology and anthropology.