de las Casas & Spaniard Mistreatment of Indians

This study will explore the vital role played by Bartolome de las Casas (1474-1566) in defending the rights of the indigenous peoples of the New World. While it is not accurate to say that he was the "savior of the Indians from Spanish cruelty," he certainly played a role in limiting that cruelty, risking much in doing so. Historical controversy continues to swirl around his life and works centuries after his death. While some critics argue that he was not the radical reformer he is pictured as being by his admirers, it is nevertheless clear that considering the harsh colonial era in which he lived, in which indigenous peoples were conventionally seen as less than human, de las Casas was indeed a brave supporter and defender of those people. One of the most compelling aspects of de las Casas's story is the learning process he himself went through as he awakened to injustice against the Indians and sought a remedy for it. He did not enter the process as a saint or savior for the Indians and certainly made a number of serious moral errors as he moved toward his final stand as spokesman for the rights and humanity of those people.

De las Casas's writings exposing the mistreatment of Indians by the Spanish played a large part in the creation of "The Black Legend," which referred to the evil activities of the Spanish. An excerpt demonstrates the power and passion of his indictment of his own country and countrymen, which he described as "Being An Historical and true Account Of

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y Office" (Keen 59). He also attempted to explain cannibalism from a "rudimentary theory of cultural evolution" which saw "all humankind [as] one; all peoples, no matter how barbarous or savage they might be, were capable of advancing along the road to civilization" (Keen 60). It was the role of the Spanish not to abuse or exploit or enslave the Indians, but to gently help them, whom he saw as already very civilized, along the road to greater civilization. Scholtes writes of de las Casas's life as a missionary, historian, and theologian, and particularly of his struggle on behalf of the native peoples of the New World. De las Casas was a member of a relatively privileged family, son of a merchant, educated to be a lay Christian teacher and then became the first priest ordained in Spanish America. Before he became a spokesman for Indians, he profited substantially himself from the wages of slave labor under the encomienda system. As in many causes, the convert becomes the most passionate advocate. As Scholtes writes, de las Casas's first hand knowledge helped him to speak extensively and argumentatively about the conditions in which Indians lived under the encomienda system. He himself renounced possession of his own encomien

Category: History - D