IsisCB Explore

Article ID: CBB464564179

Amalgamated Histories: Tracing Quicksilver's Legacy Through Environmental and Political Bodies in Andean and Amazonian Gold Mining (2023)

Sebastián Rubiano-Galvis (Author)
Jimena Diaz Leiva (Author)
Ruth Goldstein (Author)

Ambix: Journal of the Society for the History of Alchemy and Chemistry
Volume: 70
Issue: 1
Pages: 54-76
Publication date: 2023
Language: English

DOI: 10.1080/00026980.2023.2189387

URI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00026980.2023.2189387

Outside Links

WorldCat

Google Scholar

JSTOR

Environmental policy Controversies and disputes Mercury (element) Environmental pollution Mines and mining Gold Peru Colombia Amazon River Region (South America) Andes UNESCO

This article argues that the centuries-long history of mercury-gold amalgamation is crucial to contemporary debates surrounding global mercury pollution from artisanal and small-scale gold mining. Drawing on historical findings that examine Spanish colonial and Indigenous metallurgical knowledge as well as ethnographic and scientific research, we resituate the history of mercury amalgamation in Latin America, focusing on the Colombian Andes and the Peruvian Amazon – two regions where mercury pollution from artisanal and small-scale gold mining provokes international concern. We identify the policy pitfalls caused by overlooking the untold histories of the amalgamation process along with the European contribution to global mercury emissions rooted in these histories. By critically examining the curation of presentist narratives in UNESCO's memorialisation of Almadén's mercury mines as a World Heritage Site, narratives that also underpin initiatives by the United Nations to bring about a “mercury-free world,” we demonstrate how such ahistorical framings contribute to the criminalisation of artisanal and small-scale gold miners, not only in Perú and Colombia but also worldwide. Our findings present an important first step in highlighting the histories of mercury and gold in the hands of artisanal and small-scale gold miners in Latin America.

...More

Citation URI

data.isiscb.org/p/isis/citation/CBB464564179

This citation is part of the Isis database.

Citations Indexes

Similar Citations

Book Robins, Nicholas A.; (2011)
Mercury, Mining, and Empire: The Human and Ecological Cost of Colonial Silver Mining in the Andes (/p/isis/citation/CBB001212498/)

Article Peter Oakley; (2023)
Making Mercury’s Histories: Mercury in Gold Mining’s Past and Present (/p/isis/citation/CBB767264594/)

Article Donna Bilak; George Vrtis; (2023)
Environmental Alchemy: Mercury-Gold Amalgamation Mining and the Transformation of the Earth (/p/isis/citation/CBB544660599/)

Book Orlando Bentancor; (2017)
The Matter of Empire: Metaphysics and Mining in Colonial Peru (/p/isis/citation/CBB039254450/)

Article Guerrero, Saúl; (2012)
Chemistry as a Tool for Historical Research: Identifying Paths of Historical Mercury Pollution in the Hispanic New World (/p/isis/citation/CBB001252044/)

Book Fabiana Li; (2015)
Unearthing Conflict: Corporate Mining, Activism, and Expertise in Peru (/p/isis/citation/CBB165149143/)

Article Barreto, Ivan Farias; (2013)
O uso da folha de coca em comunidades tradicionais: perspectivas em saúde, sociedade e cultura (/p/isis/citation/CBB001420658/)

Article Xavier Duran; Holmes Páez; Camilo Torres; (June 2020)
The arrival of wagons to the Andes: Construction of the Cambao Wagon Road in 1880s Colombia (/p/isis/citation/CBB293952199/)

Article Liang, Honggang; He, Zhiguo; Sun, Shuyun; (2007)
China's Earliest Taoist Alchemical Artifact: Initial Study on the Gold-Mercury Alloy Unearthed from the No. 2 Western Han Tomb in Shuangbaoshan, Mianyang, Sichuan Province (/p/isis/citation/CBB000933464/)

Article Vincenzo Carlotta; Matteo Martelli; (2023)
Metals as Living Bodies. Founts of Mercury, Amalgams, and Chrysocolla (/p/isis/citation/CBB926056627/)

Article Donna Bilak; (2023)
Living Then and Now with Gold and Mercury (/p/isis/citation/CBB738541204/)

Article Matthew E. Biwer; Willy Yépez Álvarez; Stefanie L. Bautista; Justin Jennings; (2022)
Hallucinogens, alcohol and shifting leadership strategies in the ancient Peruvian Andes (/p/isis/citation/CBB959512602/)

Book John W. Verano; (2016)
Holes in the Head: The Art and Archaeology of Trepanation in Ancient Peru (/p/isis/citation/CBB000212329/)

Article Kevin Lane; David Beresford-Jones; Luis Coll; Erik Marsh; Rob Scaife; Catriel Greco; Oliver Huaman Oros; Alexander Herrera; Jennifer Grant; Charles French; (2022)
Pre-Hispanic anthropogenic wetlands in the upper Ica drainage, south-central Andes: dating and context (/p/isis/citation/CBB461818088/)

Article Carey, Mark; (2014)
Climate, Medicine, and Peruvian Health Resorts (/p/isis/citation/CBB001421215/)

Book Roberts, Elizabeth F. S.; (2012)
God's Laboratory: Assisted Reproduction in the Andes (/p/isis/citation/CBB001213115/)

Thesis Raina, Uta; (2007)
Intellectual Imperialism in the Andes: German Anthropologists andArchaeologists in Peru, 1870--1930 (/p/isis/citation/CBB001561524/)

Article Juana R. Vega Delgado; (2017)
Queering Engineers? Using History to Re-think the Associations Between Masculinity and Irrigation Engineering in Peru (/p/isis/citation/CBB335465134/)

Book Simone Schleper; (2019)
Planning for the Planet: Environmental Expertise and the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources, 1960–1980 (/p/isis/citation/CBB601917974/)

Article Jorge Alejandro Laris Pardo; (2022)
El misterio de los azogues que vio Sebastián López Ruiz (/p/isis/citation/CBB492393752/)