LOST ARCHITECTURAL OPPRESSION:

A BRIEF ANALYSIS OF THE POORLY DOCUMENTED

ARCHITECTURE OF HACIENDAS IARC 575

INTERIOR ARCHITECTURE II Bonnie Jean Dominguez 02.19.2017 – 03.08.2017

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A typical Spanish hacienda, in colonial America, had three purposes: produce, provide

comfort to the owner, and to control its workers. This paper will explore how hacienda

architecture was a creation for control.

PRESERVATION OF HACIENDAS AND SPARSE ARCHITECTURAL DRAWINGS

In the search for material on the topic of haciendas, it was found that in regions like

Mexico, haciendas were not well preserved, were in ruins, or were remodeled to become

venues of entertainment. The literature available that specifically addresses hacienda

architecture is also few and far between, though much can be found on the topic of haciendas

as a place where unfair treatment and abuses of workers occurred. This paper will attempt to

connect the anthropological accounts of haciendas to the available information about the

architecture of this type of building.

In the book, The Hacienda in Mexico, by Daniel Nierman and Ernesto H. Vallejo (V & N),

the authors describe the rare architectural analysis of haciendas, and add their work to the

sparse collection:

The hacienda…has been the subject of several studies… [that are] historical, economic

and political. However the architecture of the hacienda has never been the focus of

attention... From the vast range of Mexican haciendas we decided to work one geographic

area, which we considered sufficient to establish the constants that one can assume, with

a certain validity, are true for all the others…The haciendas we studied are located in the

states of Hidalgo, Tlaxcala and San Luis Potosi. They are representative of centers of

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agricultural and livestock production, and were constructed and modified from the

sixteenth until the beginning of the twentieth century.1

Given the many drawings in The Hacienda in Mexico, of hacienda layouts and details, this

book will provide a plan to be analyzed. To address the users and the management of haciendas,

the very thorough account, A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico, by Herman W. Konrad, will be

used. This book refers to a collection of haciendas under the name of Santa Lucia, all managed

by the Jesuits, under the Roman Catholic Church. Other sources will accompany these throughout

the paper.

WHAT IS A HACIENDA?

According to V & N, a hacienda is a collection of buildings that are organized around a

series of open, uncovered spaces, called patios. These spaces and the surrounding buildings were

generally occupied and used as work areas for processing goods.2 On occasion, the utilitarian

purpose of the patios gave way to the purpose of celebrating religious holidays and other

celebrations.

There tends to be a clear delineation in the architecture that encourages workers to be

in places they are allowed, and discourages them from other places. Figure 1 is a diagram of the

basic layout of haciendas. It indicates that everything to the left of the dashed line is considered

1Ernesto H Vallejo., and Daniel Nierman. The Hacienda in Mexico (Austin: University of

Texas Press, 2003), xi.

2 Ibid., 23.

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available to the workers. Everything to the right is considered the domain of the owners of the

hacienda.

Away from utilitarian patios are those patios that can be found beyond the chapel and the big

house, which are the private patios for the use of the owners of the hacienda and their guests.

This private patio organizes the private rooms of said owners.3

Depending on the region, different haciendas specialized in animal husbandry, or crops.

The special components of each hacienda were defined by its particular specialization.

Figure 1 does not include all of the components that can be found on a hacienda. The

following is a list of typical rooms and spaces on haciendas:

1. Patio de campo

2. Worker’s quarter’s

3. Granary

4. Tinical

5. Stables

6. Tack room

7. Cow shed

8. Corral

9. Atrium

10. Chapel

11. Sacristy

12. Zaguan

13. Office

14. Patio

15. Dining room

16. Habitation

17. Kitchen

18. Orchard or garden4

From the seventeen plans provided by V & N, any space in the list above that is work

related will typically be found near the patio de campo, and therefore near the workers.

3 Ibid., 25 4 Ibid., 89

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WHO LIVED THERE?

To better understand the interior details of haciendas, it is important to understand

who lived in them and how, as well as how the haciendas were built and subsequently

managed.

According to the book, A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico: Santa Lucia, 1576-1767, by

Herman W. Konrad, major developments of the Santa Lucia hacienda collection were residence

complexes which included “offices, and residence[s] for the Jesuit administrators…residences

for slaves, and a chapel to serve the spiritual needs of all those associated with the hacienda.”5

From this, we understand that the architecture of the hacienda allowed the administrators to

5 Herman W. Konrad, A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico: Santa Lucia, 1576-1767 (Stanford: Stanford

University Press, 1980), 47.

Figure 1 This is the basic layout of the described typical hacienda.

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keep control over the slaves even at home. The architecture of Tepeatzingo, the hacienda

referred to in A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico: Santa Lucia, 1576-1767, reflects an enclosed

nature with an emphasis on religion. Reading further, the book states, “Here an austere and

monastic-looking stone structure arose, built with Indian labor.6 It is difficult to say whether the

meaning of “Indian labor” could be referring to slave labor in this instance, but from the

description of the spaces, it can be clearly understood that the meter thick walls that

sometimes reached heights of five meters were a series of enclosures to keep slaves in:

…Vaulted rooms with interior corridors…located around interior patios. Besides a main patio, it

contained a series of smaller sheep shearing patios or enclosures…subterranean storage rooms

were located beneath interior corridors.7

Figure 2 Revitalized as a modern venue for weddings, the interior patio of "Ex Hacienda Tepeatzingo" shows vestiges of the quote from Konrad. http://4sq.com/2nd1Lda

6 Ibid., 47

7 Ibid., 47, 48

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In the continued description of Tepeatzingo, the façade is described to have a wall of

niches within which were contained statues of saints, which went along with the obvious

inclusion of a chapel. The enclosing wall, along with the saintly figures, shows the duality of

thought that allowed the Jesuits to, “…not question the morality of their status as slave

owners.”

Figure 3 A view of the interior-side niches of Tepeatzingo that probably reflect the facade niches described by Konrad. http://bit.ly/2mzUR4D

The Jesuits did not question their slave owner status because the “father general” told

them that it was ethical, so long as they tended to the spiritual needs of the “perpetual

children.” The slaves found themselves under the self-righteous, patronizing care of holy men.8

Plenty of floor plans in V & N’s book show that the patio de campo (the patio for work) was an

enclosed space to keep the slaves from running away—especially black slaves that could be

8 Ibid., 246, 250

Figure 4 Interior view of the chapel at Tepeatzingo, where slaves and owners likely attended mass together. http://4sq.com/2mkAPul

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mistaken for free blacks, due to their knowledge of Spanish and local Spanish culture-created

conditions.9 This was mainly possible since the black slaves had been imported from Spain,

where they had already been exposed to the Spanish ways, were considered more valuable

because of this knowledge that the Indians did not have, and so were capable of managing and

cultivating land in the Spanish style.

There was a higher population of indigenous peoples in the Americas that were used as

laborers than black slaves. At Xochimancas, the “Indians” made up “76 percent” of the

hacienda labor force, compared to the “22 percent” of labor from black slaves.10 The Spanish

crown did not necessarily prefer this, since it was thought that “Africans were…more useful in

ranching and European agriculture than Indians. “11

9 Ibid., 249 10 Ibid., 250 11 Ibid., 246

Figure 5 shows that the worker's quarters, at the Tepalca hacienda, face inwards toward the patio de campo, with no individual exits to outside. This also shows that the office is located well to look out onto the workers as well as to ensure the security of the orchard. From (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)(pg 95), as edited by the author.

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Having described enclosed haciendas, it must be acknowledged that V & N’s book also

has floor plans that show many haciendas had open formats that did not behave as closed-door

cells. This was possible because of the relationships that the landowners created with the

“Indians.” Barry J. Lyons’ book, “Remembering the Hacienda: Religion, Authority, and Social

Change in Highland Ecuador,” describes the relationships that were created:

As a result of their limited capital and markets, haciendas could not pay sufficient wages

to attract and retain laborers; instead, they relied on a series of “binding mechanisms.”

These included monopolizing landownership to deprive peasants of alternatives (see

figure 6), granting laborers access to land and other resources they could use to subsist

on, indebting them, developing relationships of mutual service, and reinforcing all these

bonds through coercion.12

Lyons does not describe the methods of coercion, but depending on the hacienda

owner, the author of this paper imagines that the religious aspect of slavery must have been

effective in inciting guilt and enforcing the completion of labor, for fear of losing favor with

God. This guess is based off of personal experience being raised Catholic.

12 Barry J. Lyons, Remembering the Hacienda: Religion, Authority, and Social Change in Highland

Ecuador (Austin: The University of Texas Press, 2006), 12.

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The “binding mechanisms” bound the Indians to the hacienda, whether they lived on it

or lived in a neighboring town. This translated architecturally into unenclosed patios de campo

because the workers were “bound” to return out of necessity.

The passage by Lyons continues with a quote by Robert G. Keith that echoes the words

of Konrad, “Workers became psychologically as well as economically dependent on the

landlord, a symbolic ‘father’ who disbursed favors to his ‘children’ and ‘mediate[d] between

them and the outside world.’”13 This is important to note, as well as the lack of relationships

13 Ibid., 12 – where Lyons references Robert G. Keith, Haciendas and Plantations in Latin American History,

(New York: Holmes and Meier, 1997).

Figure 6 show the land holdings of the Santa Lucia collection of haciendas. This shows that if a laborer lived in the area, he or she would be hard pressed to find a different employer, and so not get entrapped by some "binding mechanism." Image from (Konrad 1980).

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between workers because “deprived of autonomy, [‘peasants’] competed with each other for

the landlord’s favor.”14 This competition between workers invites the author to speculate that

the competition possibly led to “tattle-telling.” Tattle-telling would enforce the

“father/landowner’s” ability to take away the worker’s ability to gather in open spaces and

form unions. 15

HOW CONTROL TIES IN WITH ARCHITECTURE

The landowner, or father, controlled the people by making them work six days a week.

On their day off, the workers had to attend Mass, religious instruction, and work a 45-minute

shift to prevent offenses against God. This was a manipulation that gave the ‘father’ the

knowledge that the slaves were all at home.16 Looking at figure 6, one can see that the office of

the hacienda is positioned to have a view of all the worker’s quarters, thus helping ensure the

presence of the slaves on the hacienda. The plan in figure 6 reduced the privacy of the slave’s

activities, and did not provide them with a private patio to enjoy. In contrast, the administrators

were afforded a private patio.

Another example of a psychological manipulation that was built into the architecture is

the enclosed nature of the textile mill. The mill was embedded into the hacienda among other

program elements. The female slaves that worked within the space had little chance of

14 Ibid., 12 15 Ibid., 13 16Herman W. Konrad, A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico: Santa Lucia, 1576-1767 (Standford:

Stanford University Press, 1980), 250.

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escaping, unintentionally ensuring that their constant attachment to the hacienda prevented

their husbands from running away.17

DIFFERENTIATING SPACES ARHCITETURALLY

Analyzing how the different users affect how the hacienda was designed to

accommodate them, will help show the incongruent relationship between the hours spent

working at the hacienda and the attention to detail of the space. Different spaces on the

hacienda are more lavish than others. This shows a different level in priority for artistic detail,

though durability in basic construction appears to be somewhat equal in method and material.

The façade treatment of Tetlapaya’s entry portal, against the façade of the worker’s

quarters, shows the difference in care and attention to detail that went into designing for

impressing the elite and that which went into caring for the workers. In figure 7, it is clear that

the portal of Tetlapaya was constructed of rumble and brick. It was then covered in adobe to

smooth the rough surface, to appear more dignified. The walls are then topped with a

decorative cornice, followed by a simple open pediment.

The two towers are decorated with one elliptical medallion each. The openings in the

façade are framed. Both the towers and the pediment are topped with robust finials. All these

are symbols of care and attention to detail that are absent in the worker’s quarters.

In figure 8, the worker’s quarters of Tetlapaya are presented in all their simplicity. Like

the façade of the portal we just looked at, they are made of rubble and brick. From there, there

17 Ibid., 250

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is no more similarity. There are no signs of the façade having been smoothed over with adobe.

The roofs are slanted, which according to V & N, could mean that they were “less

permanent.”18 There don’t appear to be any windows. Unlike the portal façade, there is no

decorative cornice or any finials to top the modest structures.

Unfortunately, the author was unable to find images of the interior of the housing for

the workers, so the following will be an analysis of the interiors that emphasized beauty and

leisure, and those that emphasized utility and austerity. (Bartlet 2015)

The chapel of the haciendas were typically the most ornamented spaces, featuring

highly detailed altars in the baroque style that were theatrical by their gilded and highly ornate

designs, like at Pozo del Carmen( figure 9.) These altars were set in halls that were corniced.

Some chapels even had decorative organic motifs on the vaulted ceilings. On the domes of

some of these chapels there are still layers of paint that vary from bright blues to yellows.

Within the domes there are sometimes paintings of stars or saints, and on the barrels there

were openings to let light, as seen in figure 10.

On the other hand, the working spaces are not decorated and have minimal lighting,

especially in the granaries and tinicals (which housed tanks for the production of a beverage

called pulque. These spaces typically had a single aperture for light, or very high and small

clearstories. The only attention to the stark interior were the apparently plastered interiors that

18 Ernesto H. Vallejo, and Daniel Nierman. The Hacienda in Mexico. (Austin: University of Texas Press,

2003), 70.

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smoothed the walls, and minimally allowed the interior walls to at least be more reflective of

light than they would have been without the plaster(figure 11.)

As stated before, the author was unable to find images of the interior of the housing for

the worker’s, so the analysis of the interior of the Big House (the owner’s house) will not be

able to be contrasted against those of the worker’s.

It is obvious is that the exterior facades of the courtyards that lead into the rooms of the

owners, had a designer that considered décor. Figure 12 shows smooth, square columns,

topped with circular arches. Between each column there appear to be delicate, wrought iron

fences. The wall on the left appears to be stamp-painted with a pattern of circles with crosses.

The crosses even have a subtle tramp l’oeil effect, with the crosses showing signs of shading

that create the appearance that the walls have disk cutouts, with individual crosses set in. To

add to the space, there are an abundance of plants enliven the stone floors. There is an arch

visible at the end of the hall that is well defined with pilasters on either end of the arch that

appear to be cut from the same stone of the colonnade.

In the dining room of Pozo del Carmen (figure 13,) there is an extensive use of

quadratura on the walls and ceilings that give the impression that there are large, carved and

baby-blue painted, wooden panels. Though the quadrature adds most of the attraction of the

room, the doors are framed with very wide carved pieces of wood, the floor is tiled with

hexagonal pieces of an unknown material and the ceiling is vaulted. In its state in the image,

though the dining room is quite degraded, the naturally well-lit space shows the potential

charm that it might have once had for its owners.

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a

Figure 7 Tetlapaya entry portal revealing construction material beneath falling adobe. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

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Figure 8 Tetlapaya worker's housing revealing material construction. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

Figure 8.1 The slanted roofs of the Tetlapaya worker housing are seen from as seen from a short distance. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

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Figure 9 Altar at Pozo del Carmen showing an altar that is considerably more modest than most Spanish counter parts, like the altar in the left image, in the New Cathedral in Salamanca, Spain. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003) http://bit.ly/2mA6HeW

Figure 10 Chapel domes of Tetlapaya (right) and Pozo del Carmen (left) showing artistic woodwork. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

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Figure 11 Granary showing no apertures for light. The only natural lighting is that which enters through the doors. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

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Figure 12 The portal to the main patio of hacienda Peotillos had many skilled workers of many disciplines, as seen by the various materials and treatments captured in the image. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

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Figure 13 Pozo del Carmen appears to have been inhabited by a squatter at the time the picture was taken, showing the little care that has been taken to preserve historically significant haciendas in Mexico. (Vallejo and Nierman 2003)

CONCLUSION

It is unfortunate that in books like Casa de Hacienda, by Benjamin Villegas, German

Tellez and Antonio Castaneda, there were no images of the interiors of worker’s homes, despite

the book being heavily illustrated. This is also another point of disappointment in the heavily

illustrated book by V & N, where only two stout looking exterior shots of the worker’s quarters

were captured, which would seem to misleadingly signify that these homes probably stood the

test of time and would be something anyone would think to document.

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What this paper determined was that there are a lot of disparate locations of

information on the topic of haciendas that are incomplete. Visual documentation of these

mixing pots of the Spanish and indigenous peoples are needed to better understand how

design was used in the oppression of various groups.

This paper was able to give some general presentations of the relationships of the users

of haciendas and the spaces that they occupied. And in passing, the author noted that when

haciendas were not allowed to decay, in modern times they have been remodeled to become

places of joy and spectacle, as resorts and places for events like weddings. What this shows is

that the large and small courtyards that make up the basic hacienda, are ideal stages for

gatherings of people to a purpose, and that the possible uses in oppression were probably

equally measured, but on the opposite end of the happiness spectrum.

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Bibliography

Bartlet, Paul Alexander. 2015. Haciendas of Mexico: An Artist's Record. January 23. Accessed March 6,

2017. http://gutenberg.polytechnic.edu.na/4/8/0/5/48053/48053-h/48053-h.htm#img-073-t.

Keith, Robert G. 1997. Haciendas and Plantations in Latin American History. New York: Holmes and

Meier.

Konrad, Herman W. 1980. A Jesuit Hacienda in Colonial Mexico: Santa Lucia, 1576-1767. Stanford:

Stanford University Press.

Lyons, Barry J. 2006. Remembering the Hacienda: Religion, Authority, and Social Change in Highland

Ecuador. Austin: The University of Texas Press.

Núñez, Ma. del Carmen López. 2003. Scripta Nova - REVISTA ELECTRÓNICA DE GEOGRAFÍA Y CIENCIAS

SOCIALES. August 1. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://www.ub.edu/geocrit/sn/sn-146(054).htm.

Sandoval, Verónica, and Marco Quiteño. 2014. El Redactor - Fotoreportaje – LA TIERRA DE LOS SIN

PATRÓN. November 16. Accessed March 6, 2017. http://www.ub.edu/geocrit/sn/sn-

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Tellez, German, Antonio Casteneda, and Benjamin Villegas. 1997. Casa de Hacienda: Architeture in the

Colombian Countryside. Bogota D.C.: Villegas Editores.

Vallejo , Ernesto H., and Daniel Nierman. 2003. The Hacienda in Mexico. Austin: University of Texas

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