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PDF hosted at the Radboud Repository of the Radboud University Nijmegen The following full text is a publisher's version. For additional information about this publication click this link. http://hdl.handle.net/2066/145879 Please be advised that this information was generated on 2021-10-09 and may be subject to change. Rik Hoekstra •TTV ІІ Г»Ж />ТіГ»Еі Merging The Transformation of Society in the Valley of Puebla, 1570-1640 TWO WORLDS MERGING The Transformation of Society in the Valley of Puebla 1570-1640 TWO WORLDS MERGING The Transformation of Society in the Valley of Puebla 1570-1640 Een wetenschappelijke proeve op het gebied van de Letteren Proefschrift ter verkrijging van de graad van doctor aan de Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen, volgens besluit van het College van Decanen in het openbaar te verdedigen op dinsdag 11 mei 1993 des namiddags te 3.30 uur precies door Frederik Galenus Hoekstra geboren op 28 januari 1961 te Delft Promotores: Prof. Dr. P. J. A. N. Rietbergen Prof. Dr. H. de Schepper Table of Contents Preface Introduction 1 Períodization S Summary of contents 10 Chapter 1: Cent Anáhuac: the World of the Indians 13 Ecology and economy IS Settlement patteras 20 Arrangements of authority 24 Authority and tribute 30 Rights and obligations in life: teucyotl, tlahtocayotl, and tequitl 34 A European model 40 The house 45 Conclusion 47 Chapter 2: The Shaken Foundation 49 The first changes 51 Missionaries in the altepetl 55 Spanish groups and interests 58 Institutional revolution and social consequences 59 The creation of the pueblos de indios 65 Congregations: the first programme 68 Demographic development 70 A new order, new problems 80 Chapter 3: A New Division of Land 89 Ecological complementarity versus socio-juridical dilemma 92 The formation of labores 102 Congregations: the second programme 108 Conclusion 118 Chapter 4: The Practice of Regional Economy and Administration: The Repartimiento de Trabajo and the Repartimiento de Comercio 121 The establishment of the repartimiento de trabajo 126 The structure of the agrarian repartimiento 131 The gañanía 141 The repartimiento de comercios 148 Conclusion 157 The gañanía 141 The repartimiento de comercios 148 Conclusion 157 Chapter 5: The Lost Paradise of the Franciscans 161 The franciscans under fire 163 The position of the Franciscans within the pueblos 166 The Spanish appreciation of Indian Christianity 171 The framework of Christianity in the pueblos 174 Church expenditure and the rise of the cofradías 178 The practice of Christianity in the pueblos 186 Conclusion 192 Chapter 6: Shifting Powers in the Pueblos 195 Institutional frameworks and practical implementation 198 Rivalling pueblos and caciques 205 Damaged Herrschaft 216 Conclusion 224 Conclusion 227 The aftermath of conquest 227 The real transformation: the genesis of the colony 232 Notes 241 Abbreviations 262 Bibliography 263 Glossary 280 Samenvatting 283 Tables, Maps, Graphs and Figures Tables 1.1 Tribute obligations in Tepeaca 38 2.1 Number of tributarios in the valley of Puebla, 1570-1640 73 2.2 Indices of the number of tributarios in the valley of Puebla, 1570-1640 73 Maps 1 The Valley of Puebla 7 2 Sixteenth-Century Political Division in the Valley of Puebla 63 4 Contracted Indian Workers in Cholula (1590-1599) 77 3 Hacienda Formation in the Valley of Puebla (1575-1620) 101 4 Destination of Repartimiento Labourers in the Valley of Puebla (ca. 1600) 136 Graphs 2 Demographic Development 74 2.a 1570-1620 2.b 1620-1643 3.a Number of landsales in the Valley of Puebla (1575-1610) 91 3.b Number of Mercedes in the Valley of Puebla (1572-1620) 91 Figures 2.1 Administrative Organization in New Spain (from ca. 1570) 82 Preface This study originates in the surprise about the scarcity of modem historiography of late sixteenth and early seventeenth-century Mexican history. As with many historians and social scientists my interest sprang from the question how a society evolves, which for me is to say, how the several 'sectors' of society interrelate. In the case of early Mexican history the question was how two different cultures influenced each other. Naturally, questions of such a general nature can not be answered in one study; in the course of the investigations and the elaboration of the material it has become ever more clear to me, as before to many others, that one element of society is not determining for the whole of society nor that the evolution society follows one steady course. Therefore, I think that historical and social science research would gain much if society and its evolution would be considered and studied more as an whole than is usually the case. This is what I have attempted to do and I hope my efforts will contribute make this insight clear. It is not easy to point at the exact starting point of this study, it lay some where at the final period of my study of History in Leiden, where my interest in Latin America was inspired by Dr. Adriaan van Oss, and after his sudden death in 1984 by Professor Slicher van Bath. With him I kept close contact throughout the writing of this book, and his influence is visible in many places. The project itself was made possible by research grants in 1987-1988, 1989 and 1990-1991 of the Netherlands Organisation for the Advancement of Pure Research (NWO) and the Netherlands Foundation for the Advancement of Tropical Research (WOTRO). The Unger van Brero Fund financed a correction of the translation, which was carried out by Drs. Marie-Anne van der Veer. In the course of the research I received a lot of support of CEDLA, which gave me the institutional backing, without which the project would have been a lot more difficult to accomplish. Mtro. Ricardo Rendón and Dr. Bernardo García Martinez were my cordial hosts during my stays in Mexico. Parts of the text were read by the members of the discussion group OLA. I had discussed many of the ideas expressed in this book with Dr. Arij Ou wen eel. As in many cases, those who contributed most to the efforts put into a project like this are mentioned last. My parents supported me without relenting. They even visited me while I was doing archival work in Mexico and my father read all of the manuscript, usually even the first, very rough version. Last of all I dedicate this book to Nellie, for all help, support and trust. Algunos dirán [...] que los indios too simples y humildes, que DO reina malicia ni soberbia en ello·, y que no tienen codicia; otros al contrario que están muy ricos y que son vagabundo« y que no quieren sembrar. No crea a los unos ni a los otros, sino trátese con ellos como con cualquiera otra nación sin hacer reg tas especiales, teniendo respecto a los medios de terceros, porque pocos hay en citas partes se muevan sin algún interés, ora sea de bienes temporalee o espirituales, o pasión o ambición, ora sea vicio o virtud. Pocas veces he visto tratarse las materas con libertad evangélica, y donde nacen muchas murmuraciones y proposiciones que si se entendiesen en particular no serla causa de tanto desasosiego como algunas veces se sigue. Don Antonio de Mendoza, first viceroy of New Spain, ca. 1550 For Nellie Introduction The traditional way of looking at the social developments of the first century after the conquest is strongly marked by the idea that Indian society had to give way to Spanish social and economic pressure, especially as far as landownership was concerned. In this way, the evolution of society in the early colonial period was determining for relations between Spaniards and Indians later on. However, recent research has made it clear that in the eighteenth century the Indians usually had enough land to subsist; therefore we may raise the question whether they lost most and best of their land in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. In this light it is important to reconsider this formative period of colonial society, not only considering the recent literature, but also and principally by consulting published sources and the rich, unpublished archival material. This is the aim of this study.1 Mexican society had an agrarian nature, both before and after the Spanish invasion. It goes without saying that rights to land were of great importance to both prehispanic and colonial society. However, in his book on the agrarian history of Western Europe, the historian Slicher van Bath explains that there are several types of agrarian societies which have different characteristics. Therefore, the statement that a society is agrarian, can have no more than a very general significance and although the rights to land are indeed of great importance to the social organization, they by no means exclusively determine its structure. Both the current theories on the organization of the Indian societies and the traditional interpretation of the changes after the conquest by the Spaniards are based on the distribution of landownership. Without meaning to doubt the importance of the claims on land, in my opinion a treatment of the social organization on the basis of ownership rights is problematic. If we consider the concept of ownership, it will become evident to what extent this holds good.2 Ownership is pre-eminently a legal concept, which in modern western relations expresses the right to dispose of a good or an object. The concept of ownership is derived from Roman Law, and as such it had much influence throughout the Middle Ages. Nonetheless, it is not possible, though not unusual, to use this interpretation in the context of the past without considerable restrictions.