Źródła pisane w służbie archeologii. Przypadek Amazonii

Abstract

The emergence and development of the complex socio-political organism in the Amazonian lowlands has been the subject of archaeological debate on the relationship between human populations and the environment. The accumulation of new archaeological research and, as a consequence, the emergence of new information, led to the necessity of reinterpreting it in the context of other fields of humanities. Due to this constant inflow of data, the search for new directions of development has become compelling in archaeology. Methods that were once developed for a given region do not need to prove correct somewhere else. That is why it is so important for archaeology to be open to new areas of study. This is particularly true for the archaeology of Amazonia. A specific history of the archaeological studies in this region as well as the presence of living descendants of ancient populations involve applying cultural anthropology and its sub-discipline – ethnohistory. Historical sources provide invaluable information about the former settlement or the economy of the pre-Columbian Amazon societies. Their analysis can be an example of the possibilities of using the accounts as a source of knowledge on the culture and the peoples of Amazonia. It is not possible to conduct studies on archaeological communities of the region without the ethnological or historical accounts.