Antecedentes indígenas del urbanismo colonial en dos regiones de Colombia: los Andes orientales y el Valle de Aburrá. Una visión desde la arqueología

This paper evaluates traditional wisdom related to the introduction of central places and settlement hierarchies by the Spaniards in what today is Colombia. It isargued that both processes have a long prehispanic tradition. It is also argued that the arrival of the Spaniards and the colonial system actually implied less centralized settlements as well as a strategy of resistance that led incligenous populations to live in scattered dwellings away from the colonial power. This paper is based upon research in the Eastern Highlands(Fúquene and the Leiva Valley) and the Aburrá Valley, in Antioquia.