Silent whispers. Of what remains of Castelo Velho. Untranslatable topographies of dust

Abstract

This text results from the exercise of returning to the archaeological site of Castelo Velho through the fragments of its writing and which was exclusively produced by Susana Soares Lopes between 1993 and 2014. This exercise appears by an ambivalent movement. The first one, historiographical, is defined by the text’s historical rhythm and follows its chronological sequence; the second one, of a genealogical kind and manifesting itself through the intervals of the words as the reading of its incidents, aims at the dismantling of the text’s figurative continuum. Finally, it was a revisit of the documents that contributed to the site’s own transformation into a monument, in which it was sought to reflect on Castelo Velho’s ruins of meaning while exploring the limits of enunciation inherent to the archaeological discourse on a site that resists, infinitely, as evidence of an absolute contingency.