Spanish Colonies

EARLY ENCOUNTERS, 1492-1734 Spanish Colonies

Content Warning: This resource addresses sexual assault and physical violence.

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Background

The spread of Catholicism was the stated goal of the Spanish conquest of the New World, but the Spanish also wanted to proft from their new territories. Once the treasure of Native civilizations was looted, colonists turned to mining and plantation farming, and needed to fnd cheap labor to maximize their profts. In her early instructions for the governance of the colonies, Queen Isabella I of Spain required all Native people to pay tribute to the crown or its representatives. Out of this directive, the encomienda system was born.

In this system, encomenderos were awarded the control of all of the Native people who lived in a defned territory, usually in recognition of special services to the crown. For example, conquistador Hernán Cortés was awarded an encomienda territory that included 115,000 Native inhabitants. Cortés’s power over his people was absolute. He could demand tribute in the form of crops or currency. He could force them to construct forts and towns, or work the mines or plantations. He could sexually exploit the women, and even sell the people who worked for him to other encomenderos. In time, the horrors of life on the encomiendas would spark outrage back in Spain.

About the Image

Bartholomé de las Casas arrived in the New World in 1502 as part of one of the frst waves of the Spanish invasion of the Americas. He was rewarded with an encomienda for his services to the crown. Over time, he grew horrifed by the outrageous abuse sufered by Native people under the encomienda system, and in 1515, he gave up his own encomienda and began a campaign to end the system. This illustration comes

from a book he published in 1542. A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies is de las Casas’s frsthand account of the abuses he witnessed, and the illustrations that accompanied the text were intended to horrify readers. This particular illustration centers the sufering of women and children, and hints at the sexual exploitation Native women experienced at the hands of their oppressors.

Bartholomé de las Casas’s work outraged readers back in Spain and prompted the Spanish government to pass the New Laws in 1542. The New Laws aimed to free all Native people from the encomienda system within a generation. This was not a defnitive end to the exploitation of Native people in the Spanish colonies, but it was an important step in addressing their oppression.

Vocabulary

• conquistador: The name for the Spanish or Portuguese military leaders who conquered Central and South America in the 1500s. • encomenderos: The name for people who controlled encomiendas. • encomienda: A grant by the Spanish king or queen that allowed a person to demand tribute and forced labor from the Native people in a defned territory. • tribute: Payment made to a ruler.

Discussion Questions

• What does this image reveal about the lives of Native people under the encomienda system? • In what ways were women uniquely vulnerable to the abuses of the encomienda system? • Why were images like this circulated in Spain? What was the outcome of the campaign to end the encomienda system?