Zemi, teotl, huaca: reconsidering materiality through three emic concepts in the New World

During Early Modern history, the representations of New World’s indigenous beliefs and practices were a process of assimilation within the Western concept of religion. This article assesses three indigenous emic concepts observed by missionaries: zemi, teotl and huaca. First, it analyses the Account of the Antiquities of the Indians by Ram n Pan , sent by Christopher Columbus to carry out ‘fieldwork’ among the Ta no Indians. Then, it focuses on how in New Spain Bernardino de Sahag n confronted another emic concept—teotl—and incorporated it into his Florentine Codex. Finally, it focuses on how Jos  de Acosta, in his Natural and Moral History of the Indies, adapted a theory of idolatry assimilating Andean huacas as ‘particular things’. From the comparison of these emic categories will emerge a sort of indigenous theory of materiality that could be valuable to religious studies when considering ‘other’ relational forms with extra-human beings.