Prehispanic Riverine Societies from the Lower Magdalena and Their Use Of Inland Navigation

Abstract

This article studies the origins of the way of life known as an amphibian culture on the Colombian Atlantic coast, its expression in forms of mixed subsistence associated with the indigenous tradition around the use of aquatic ecosystems and especially in the river navigation of the lower Magdalena. For this purpose, we have used documents and primary sources such as chronicles of the Indies, files from the General Archive of the Indies in Seville (AGI), archaeological field research, and compilations of historical documents on the Caribbean coast made by historians. We note that pre-Hispanic navigation was widely spread in this area since, besides the hostile terrestrial roads, nature offered fluvial paths, representing a travel alternative with significant advantages in different areas. This produced an eventual use and appropriation of this knowledge by the European colonizers of the XVI century, as in an environment where the ships and the knowledge of the western world did not seem to be enough, the canoes together with the indigenous labor force were more useful than the European ships, with disastrous consequences for a way of life that, nevertheless, still survives nowadays.