Until the early 1800’s, Spain created an empire that lasted around three hundred years and was considered “the most powerful country in Europe” (Mini Q). During the late 18th century, the Spanish colonies had an uncompromising social structure to which people were placed in different classes based on their heritage. The Creoles, people born in the colonies but of pure Spanish blood, lead the fight in the struggle for independence because of the economic and social conditions as well as the attempt to gain political power. The Creoles wanted to somehow get political power, but they were being rejected of it; however, they were gaining nobility. They owned the “largest and richest mines and haciendas” (Hook Exercise), but even with wealth, the Creoles “held few high-ranking jobs in the government” (Hook Exercise); hence, those jobs went to the peninsulares. They were also the “least oppressed” (Modern World History) of those who were born in the Latin America as well as the most educated, for they adopted the Enlightenment ideas. Also, when the monarchy collapsed, the Creoles wouldn’t let the “political vacuum to remain unfilled, their lives and …show more content…
property unprotected” (Doc.F), so they wanted to take lead of the fight for independence to gain the political power that they desired. There were also some economic issues occurring at the time that was causing multiple issues, for Spain followed mercantilism as well as imposing monopoly over colonial trade. Also, the drought in 1808-09 caused the food prices to triple, for it “produced a great mortality among Mexico’s livestock and decimated the harvest” (Doc. D). The unfortunate crisis made mining and manufacturing falter as well as declining in employment. The economic system in America was absurd, for “an amount of iron costing five or six dollars in Europe costs one hundred dollars in America” (Doc. C); thus, the Creoles wanted to lead the fight for independence to get rid of and fix the economic system. The social conditions also played a role into why the Creoles wanted to lead the fight towards independence, for Spain had this absurd social structure where people were categorized based on their ancestry.
The peninsulares were people who were born in Spain and migrated to the colonies which tended to be the wealthiest. Then came the Creoles (pure Spanish blood that were born in America), the mestizos (mixed with Spanish and Indian ancestry), the mulattos (mixed African and Spanish blood) and free blacks, the Indians, and at the bottom were the slaves (African descents). Also, the lower classes cause an uprising which frightened the Creoles because they feared that they would lose “property, control of the land, and their lives” (Modern World History), so they wanted to lead the fight for independence as well as support
it. Although the Creoles were denied political power and were among the higher class, they wanted to lead the fight for independence.
This paper will be exploring the book The Vanguard of the Atlantic World by James Sanders. This book focuses upon the early 1800 to the 1900 and explores the development of South American political system as well expresses some issues that some Latino counties had with Europe and North America. Thus, Sanders focus is on how Latin America political system changes throughout this certain time and how does the surrounding countries have an effect as well on Latin political system. Therefore, the previous statement leads into some insight on what the thesis of the book is. Sanders thesis is, “Latin American’s believed they represented the future because they had adopted Republicanism and democracy while Europe was in the past dealing with monarchs
In the first section, Monroy describes the Indian and the Iberian cultures and illustrates the role each played during missionization, as the Indians adapted ?to the demands of Iberian imperialism.?(5) He stresses the differen...
Creoles struggle loyalty to their motherland and birth country. In Document A Simon Bolivar stated that creoles are in a complicated situation. They are trying to decide which side they should support. In Document B it showed how unfair creoles were treated even though by blood, peninsulares and creoles are the same. The creoles had a lot less power and worst jobs. The
“The Conquest of New Spain” is the first hand account of Bernal Diaz (translated by J.M. Cohen) who writes about his personal accounts of the conquest of Mexico by himself and other conquistadors beginning in 1517. Unlike other authors who wrote about their first hand accounts, Diaz offers a more positive outlook of the conquest and the conquistadors motives as they moved through mainland Mexico. The beginning chapters go into detail about the expeditions of some Spanish conquistadors such as Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba, Juan de Grijalva and Hernando Cotes. This book, though, focuses mainly on Diaz’s travels with Hernando Cortes. Bernal Diaz’s uses the idea of the “Just War Theory” as his argument for why the conquests were justifiable
The Conquest of New Spain Cortés came not to the New World to conquer by force, but by manipulation. Bernal Daz del Castillo, in the "Conquest of New Spain," describes how Cortés and his soldiers manipulated the Aztec people and their king Montezuma from the time they traveled from Iztapalaopa to the time when Montezuma took Cortés to the top of the great Cue and showed him the whole of Mexico and its countryside, and the three causeways which led into Mexico. Castillo's purpose for recording the mission was to keep an account of the wealth of Montezuma and Mexico, the traditions, and the economic potential that could benefit Cortés' upcoming conquest. However, through these recordings, we are able to see and understand Cortés' strategy in making Mexico "New Spain." He came as a wolf in sheep's clothing and manipulated Montezuma through his apparent innocence.
The Spanish rule had effectively started to take over in 1598 when a man by the name of Juan de Onante began his invasion on the indigenous people. Onante was able to set up the first Spanish colony which consisted of soldiers and women and children. The land that he invaded was inhabited by the Natives but when they had the first colony the Spanish began to segregate the natives into two groups the “Barbaros” and the “Pueblos”. The Spanish colonization had over 100 communities spreading over hundreds of miles. Although, they were lumped into ‘...
Early in the nineteenth century rebellion against European authority broke out in Latin America. First, slaves on the island of Haiti revolted against their French masters. Led by former slave Toussaint L'Overture the Haitians defeated France making Haiti the...
Believing the creoles were much better than the Peninsulares, because the Creoles was born in Latin America. They were being childish, and paranoid in document c Juan Pablo believes “Americanos, being those most concerned with affairs of America….” they do not believe the Spanish have no feelings towards creoles country. They are just invaders/foreigners. The natives were the first to declare independence, but when the Creoles realize they had a chance, they joined the natives. Another reason was to keep an eye on the natives to make sure the natives gain power. In document A Simon Bolivar states “Thus our position is most extraordinary and complicated” stating the Creoles is the best pure Spanish that lived in America, but it's complicated
In chapter two, Menchaca discusses Spain's racial formation within Mexican society. After the conquest of Mexico, Spain began to control and implement their way of life within the indigenous communities of Mexico. Many ingenious tribes of Mexico adapted to the social, political, and economic changes brought by the Spanish. The Spanish had developed a new way of structuring society solely based on race. This new structure was a caste system that divided people into different racial categories. For example, Peninsulares (pure blood Spanish) were on the top of the class structure, then criollos (Spanish born in the New World), Mestizos (Mixture of Indigenous and Spanish), Castizo (Mixture of Spanish and Mestizo), African slaves, Indians (Indigenous
The vitality of New Spain in the eighteenth century is best explained by the awaking of the Mexican identity, especially among creoles. During the eighteenth century New Spain and its now native born citizens came to life so to speak. The creoles would come to embrace and treasure the fact that the culture of New Spain and completely transformed from traditional Spanish culture. The first immediately noticeable difference was the language, the loss of the Castilian lisp and being enriched by Indian words and diminutives. Basically the whole cultural identity would be transformed from diet, dress, literature, art and music. The Creoles would shun the older customs and would identify as Americanos or Mexicanos and not as Spaniards. Their demand
Creoles were native born whites that had grown resentful of the Peninsulars in the 1700s. The Creoles and Peninsulars had a power struggle in the caste system in the Spanish American society. The Creoles owned the land and most of the population lived under the landowners. The Creoles wanted to keep the people of mixed race down, and opposed successful mixed race people climbing the social ladder and gaining any power. These people had many reasons to rebel against the Creoles, one of which was due to the fact that the Creoles had little interest in changing a social hierarchy they dominated. Fast-forwarding to Mexico in the 1800s, the Creoles dominated the town council of Mexico City, known as a cabildo. The cabildo, run by the Creoles, saw
Star²ng with Christopher Columbus in 1492 (who was incidentally Italian), the Spanish were the dominant group of se±lers in the New World for over a century. Abundant natural resources, like silver, and Na²ve American labor provided Spain with immense wealth. With the excep²on of Brazil, the Spanish expanded throughout the Caribbean, Central and South America and even into the southern and western parts of today’s United States. However, because the sheer amount of wealth generated from the New World, other European countries eventually developed their own interests in se±lement. The English began some explora²on in the late 1500s, but their ³rst permanent se±lement was not un²l Jamestown in 1607. The English se±lers shared some characteris²cs as the Spanish: economic wealth and religiosity.
country’s history. In this essay I will out outline the themes of nationality within Spanish
Spain’s colonization was marked by unprovoked brutality in the search for gold, thinly veiled by the claims of a desire for the ‘savages’ and ‘heathens’ of the land to convert to Catholicism. The conquistadors methods of, (as Ferdinand and Isabella put it.) “Discovering and subduing” the “islands and continent in the ocean” were harsh and inhumane. The Spanish didn’t see or treat the Indians as humans. They treated the Indian killings as a sport. They forced them to conform to the Spanish way of life, and they coerced them to the level of chattel. These methods of dehumanization carried over into the way that the English treated the Indians as well; paving the way for the enslavement of African Americans in the ‘land of the free, and home of
Reflecting back on the statement historian Jaime E. Rodriguez gave on the impact that independence had on the people of Latin America. “The emancipation of [Latin America] did not merely consist of separation from the mother country, as in the case of the United States. It also destroyed a vast and responsive social, political, and economic system that functioned well despite many imperfections.” I believe that the eagerness to get rid of slaves