This social history of eighteenth-century Peru is one of the “Daily Life Series,” originally published in France and now translated into English. The editors hope that each volume will recreate “the manners, morals, and everyday life of a people living in another civilization, another age.”
Descola’s narrative is social history of a frothy sort. After a brief discussion of social classes and Spanish administration in Peru, the author describes Lima, that “paradise for women, purgatory for men and hell for borricos.” Lima, Descola believes, was second only to Madrid in the Spanish Empire for its elegance. Well planned, the City of Kings in 1786 was divided into four sections, totaling 350 streets, 8222 houses, and thirty-three barrios. Its greatest problems were beggars, dust from unpaved streets and dried dung of animals, and the traffic jams created by horse-drawn coaches, mule-drawn calesas, and flocks of sheep, goats, mules, and llamas. Fortunately a nearby spring provided potable water for the city and made it unnecessary to rely on the polluted Rimac. In their architecture and furnishings Limeños adapted European styles—plateresque, classical, baroque, and rococo—but because of the devastating earthquake of 1746, rococo dominated in the latter half of the eighteenth century, particularly in the ornate paneling and furnishings of some homes. Still, except for the palatial residences of the wealthy and a few convents and monasteries, housing was inadequate and uncomfortable. Limeños preferred the public display of elegant clothes during promenades and carriage rides to the private amenities of good food and a comfortable home.
If Descola can be trusted, food and diet in Peru have changed little since the eighteenth century with puchero, pazucla, anticuchos, cebiche, and turón as standard items. Then as now Peruvians imbibed pisco and chicha. For amusement the people of Lima enjoyed corridas at Acho, religious processions, drama at the Coliseo de Comedias, and the interminable tertulias. What the author terms American Vergilianism (physiocratic lyricism) and satire were the most popular literary forms, while visual art was derivative of Spanish styles. For life at the viceregal court Descola relies on the myths and realities of Amat’s affair with la Perricholi. Trade and economic life, the military, the university, weights and measures, coinage, and clerical life also receive attention.
Intended for popular consumption, this book will appall the scholar, especially since footnotes and bibliography give the work scholarly pretension. Descola has used travelers’ accounts and a few scholarly monographs to good advantage, but otherwise he relies heavily on Ricardo Palma’s Tradiciones for evidence and color. In fact one finds it surprising that some of Descola’s interpretations hold up, particularly those concerning the reception of the Enlight enment, the reading of prohibited books, and the role of the Inquisition. The book is replete with factual errors. Buenos Aires did not become a viceroyalty in 1718 (p. 75) ; 82.4° F. is not the coldest day of the year for Lima (p. 195); the satirist, picaresque poet Guviedes must be Caviedes (p. 233); Huamanco and Lucanos are doubtless Huamanga and Lucanas (p. 217); Viceroy Castelforte was Castelfuerte (p. 190); ad infinitum. Equally frustrating is the author’s failure to document information or quotations. In sum, this work in no way measures up to the other volumes in the Daily Life Series by Louis Baudin on the Incas and Jacques Soustelle on the Aztecs, nor can it be compared with Irving Leonard’s sensitively wrought Baroque Times in Old Mexico.
