The viceregal geometric model in the configuration of national political entities. The territory of Gachupines in Ocampo, Guanajuato

Abstract

The limits or frontiers which configure the politico-administrative divisions of state entities are a product of older historical processes and social constructions involving the participation of physical-natural configurations, legal rulings and actors exercising their power and control to lend sense and direction to the territorial process, which is transformed into a sphere of struggle and interests centered on maintaining territorial dominion. This involves thinking of social space-time according to two variables, formation and configuration, in order to explain how the political, social and natural actors acted upon space, producing places and so revealing dominance of territory.

Method. To understand the territorial process of the dividing line and the configuration of the states it is necessary to analyze: the legal rulings from the viceregal period; the policies and strategies that the congresses of the federal entities used to determine their jurisdiction; court cases from the viceroyalty up to Mexican independence; the history of the plans; the development of shape through time from the origin of the shape, and the use of geographic information systems to geo-reference archaic cartography on a modern map.

Results. Through an analysis of the territory of Gachupines can be observed that there are agents of socio-spatial change from the viceroyalty to the consolidation of Mexican states by determining the configuration of adjoining federal entities, the analysis of place lets us see the model, outline and territorial organization implemented during the viceroyalty, the nature of its frontiers and its persistence.

Conclusion. Geohistorical analysis is necessary to ensure a coherent sequence of territorial processes, where historical phenomena establish the pattern and causes of later historical events which emerge as a consequence and effect of the continuity and duration of the practices of the actors, as well as their projects and aspirations regarding place.