“Adverse possession” is the necessary condition for “Empire” to exist. It is the action of taking without consent, for the purpose of establishing both a sense of entitlement and legal rights, via normalized violence. It is a doctrine and a placemaking technology, a form of spatialization of power through a series of principles –including transubstantiation and maps– with seemingly ontological effects, while masquerading extermination through the dogmas of “property” and dominant forms of knowledge.

With a very long history, adverse possession has become an everyday practice. It is the foundation of settler colonialism and the very legal precept at its core. It still remains central to worldwide legislations particularly in the US and Europe and since the 16th century, “such taking possession without consent has been equally applicable to bodily violations of all kinds” (Mirzoeff, N. 2023, January 17). These historical forms of representation through the projection of desires, have continuously attempted to define entire continents, their inhabitants, their inhabitants’ knowledge, and even their inhabitants’ future. In that sense, Modernity has incessantly visualized the victories of colonialism as rape, establishing a tradition that continues to be in place and in different instances and modes experienced by everyone. In this chapter, indigo, silver and different forms of maps intersect to disclose the performative aspect of extermination and embodiment as power gets spatialized into place.