machine re-constructed

THE TAPHONOMY OF NARRATIVES - IN SEARCH OF FICTIONAL BLOODby Robert Michel Charest

“The elimination of the body by murder and its secret burial always leaves its trace, if only by the gap left by its absence, an absence as physical as any presence.”

- Victor Buchli and Gavin Lucas, Archaeology of the Contemporary Past.

Places or objects seldom in themselves narrate events, even if they preserve and conceal memories of them. Sites such as this one, once the scene of meaningful events, can reveal and make present absence through a materialising “archaeological” act; bringing it into being.

The site is situated on Ile-de-la-Visitation, a small island on Rivière-des-Prairies in Montreal’s Paroisse du Sault-au-Récollet. Champlain celebrated Montreal’s fi rst mass in the company of Frère Le Caron and Frère Jamay in 1615 at this very site. More specifi cally I am interested in the “crime scene” of Père Nicholas Viel’s mysterious death in 1625. Père Viel was a Black Robe, aRécollet missionary of the Franciscan Order, stationed for two years “à la traite” (at the fur trade) in the notorious Nations des Ours Huron tribe.

The death of Père Nicholas Viel remains a fog for investigators, as no body or murder weapon were recovered; witnesses as well as the perpetrator(s) have long fl ed and decayed. Heck! Nobody knows what the perpetrators or the victim looked like. Did Viel drown accidentally on his way to Quebec city or was he whacked by the Hurons ? The mystery remains. The site itself, over the centuries, has endured enormous transformation: from natural erosion, the construction of the Papineau-Leblanc bridge and the building of an electrical power-generating dam downstream - all of which have greatly modifi ed the morphology of the immediate site as well as the water table levels.

Nonetheless, amidst all the speculation, Père Hugolin, a 20th-century Récollet, has published his findings in Notes bibliographiques pour servir à l’histoire des Récollets du Canada. This theologian-sleuth claims beyond reasonable doubt that Père Viel and his Huron acolyte Ahuntsic were shamelessly and cowardly murdered by les noyeux, a couple of Huron thugs. If the “community” remained silent until about 1635 in regards to Père Viel’s death, shortly thereafter rumors spread rapidly within the Order. Père Hugolin writes: “l’eau ne pénètre pas les poumons d’un homme qui ne respire plus,” claiming that once knocked unconscious by the thugs, Viel’s body was probably thrown into the rapid waters; even post-mortem perhaps. Several crosses have marked the site over the years. One near the crime scene remains today, it stands blood red.

In archaeological forensics, taphonomy (Gk taphos = tomb) deals with interpreting the “life” of a physical artifact in both relative time (chronostratigraphy) and space (stratigraphy). TAZ (Taphonomically Active Zone) is the scene itself, or the part of the site where the “remains” and their context have mutually infected each other; at times blurring the meaning of the artifact. Taphonomic time is not chronological per se, it is relative to the condition of the remains. Taphonomy attempts to open time between the perimortem (time of event measured in minutes or seconds) and the recovery (measured in hours or days). This taphonomic time, measured in relative years or millenniums, is just posterior to the antemortem (time prior to the event measured in years or days).

Père Nicholas Viel’s death has occurred in the recent past, incontradistinction to paleonthological archaeology, hencontradistinction to paleonthological archaeology, hencontradistinction to paleonthological archaeology, hencontradistinction to paleonthological archaeology, hence, the site remains relatively physical but the TAZ and remremains relatively physical but the TAZ and remremains relatively physical but the TAZ and remremains relatively physical but the TAZ and remains are fi ctional and narrative. The architectural investigationand narrative. The architectural investigationand narrative. The architectural investigationand narrative. The architectural investigation attempts to map, mark and reconcile the site’s ‘crime’ scene and its event through a taphonomy of narratives in search of fi ctional blood. “The machine visits me, several times a day, we remain acquaintances, we are not friends, I do not know its name, we play in passing; I guess it lives near by.” -Creator ’s twisted mind.

This machina di scientia coniectura is inscribed in a tradition resembling the metaphorical games and props of the 15th-century cardinal and philosopher Nicholas Cusanus. Cusanus invented a “board game” to “illustrate” his metaphysical dialogue in the Ludo Globi (the Game of Spheres). Moreover, in De Visione Dei, Cusanus depicts the ubiquitous vision of God in contradistinction to our “perspectival” and limited “way of seeing”: through the use of a painting - the Icon of God. It is not Truth which is revealed here, It is not of this world, but a speculative narrative striving for - a diminutive - truth (the only one our human condition can access) via a kind of poetic conjecture. The Machina di scientia coniectura serves as a grounding, in a metaphorical sense, to reconnect scene and site; its modus operandi may be phantasm - or not. Only its remains remain, though some of its mechanical features are distinguishable and can still be manipulated.

When the remains of an other are speculative texts of an oral account, archaeology becomes conjectural. The metaphoricallyal. The metaphoricallyal. The metaphoricallyal. The metaphorically“scientifi c” machine grounds the myt“scientifi c” machine grounds the myt“scientifi c” machine grounds the myt“scientifi c” machine grounds the myth (fi ctional truth) byextracting blood from the “crime scene” extracting blood from the “crime scene” extracting blood from the “crime scene” and analysing the siteconditions (slope, stratifi cation, fl ow rate of water, erosion ande of water, erosion ande of water, erosion andchemistry). The dried-up blood imprischemistry). The dried-up blood imprischemistry). The dried-up blood imprischemistry). The dried-up blood imprisoned within the soil of dried-up river beds is analogous to the “frozen” speech ofwritten text, while the water which once fl owed and containedsuspended fluid blood depicts the flowing speech oowing speech oowing speech oowing speech of oral communication.

The machine’s spirit is borne by the architect, who must manually puncture the soil’s skin and “prime” the machine; its “veins” then will swell-up by siphoning the soil’s red tincture - a mixture of water from the current table and the scene’s blood sediments. Thus, once it is re-animated, the machine becomes mobile as it samples and forensically scrutinises the scene’s sacred soil: opening and mapping the taphonomic time and space, thus coupling the scene and its event.