Spanish-Guarani Relations in Early Colonial Paraguay 9781949098341, 9781951519582

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ANTHROPOLOGICAL PAPERS MUSEUM OF ANTHROPOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

No.9

Spanish-Guarani Relations in Early Colonial Paraguay

by ELMAN R. SERVICE

ANN ARBOR UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN PRESS, 1954

© 1954 by the Regents of the University of Michigan The Museum of Anthropology All rights reserved ISBN (print): 978-1-949098-34-1 ISBN (ebook): 978-1-951519-58-2 Browse all of our books at sites.lsa.umich.edu/archaeology-books. Order our books from the University of Michigan Press at www.press.umich.edu. For permissions, questions, or manuscript queries, contact Museum publications by email at [email protected] or visit the Museum website at lsa.umich.edu/ummaa.

Composition and Lithoprintlng by BRAUN-BRUM FIELD, Inc. Ann Arbor, Mich.

CONTENTS

Page Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . I. The Aboriginal and Historical Background The Aboriginal Culture of the Guarani Indians Historical Sketch of Spanish Colonization in Paraguay from 1537 to 1620 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . II.

The Exploratory Phase: 1537 to 1556 . . . . .

Irala 1 s Grants of Encomiendas in 1556 . The Founding of New Towns. The Role of Mestizos. . . . . .

V. The Colonial Phase:

13 13 18

Spanish-Guarani Relations from

III. The Transitional Phase

IV. The Colonial Phase:

1

30

40 42 49 53

The Originario Encomienda

58

The Mitayo Encomienda

71

The Size of Mitayo EncomiE)ndas Village Organization Labor and Subsistence Religious Instruction

71 77 82 89

VI. Conclusions . . .

92

Selected Bibliography

99

SPANISH-GU ARANI RELATIONS IN EARLY COLONIAL PARAGUAY

INTRODUC TION Paraguay is notable for the extent to which the racial and linguistic heritage of the native Guarani Indians remains to characterize the modern nation. Except for the basically pure Indian population of the Paraguayan Gran Chaco, the million or more people of Paraguay proper are mainly descended from the early Spanish colonists who intermarried In the absence of adequate descripwith Guarani women. tions of Paraguayan culture, the extent of the Guarani contribution to modern habits and customs is not known, but their language is still spoken more commonly than Spanish) The racial and social amalgamatio n of Spaniards and aborigines began very early in the colonial period. Since that time isolation, the slow pace of commercial and industrial development, and the economic ruin following the war against the Triple Alliance have tended to preserve essential features of the colonial patterns. It would seem, therefore, that any attempt to understand or explain the culture of modern Paraguay must take special account of the nature of the mutual adjustment between the Spanish colonists and the indigenous Guarani Indians during the early phases of their association. Spanish-Gua rani relations are usually described by modern historians as having been amicable from the period of Some authors also have pointed out their first contact.2 the importance of this factor in determining subsequent cultural developments in Paraguay. Arcos, for example, said: "The rule of Irala [the most important figure during the lMetraux, 1948, p. 77; Steward, 1945, p. 298; James, 1942, pp. 266-67. 2James, 1942, pp. 266-67; Gandfa, 1939, pp. 33-34, 47, 58-60; Washburn, 1871, 1:29, 57-58; Pereyra, 1920-27, 4:44; Rubio, 1942, p. 181.

2

SPANISH -G U ARANf RELATIONS

earliest colonial period] is significant on account of the relations which he established between the Spaniards and the Indians, which were of such a nature as in a large measure to determine the character of the later population of Paraguay." 3 Washburn stated: "It was a constant endeavor of Irala to level all distinctions between the Europeans and Natives, and this he effected in a great measure by encouraging his countrymen to take the brown daughters of the forest for wives, to learn their language· and conform to their customs in matters not of essential importance . . . . Thus the government and policy of Irala permanently fixed the character, social and political, of the people. " 4 Despite the fact that several authors have pointed out that early relations of Spaniards and aborigines in Paraguay were unusual and that they were important in determining the characteristic development of the later culture, there has been no adequate description of these relations with a view to explaining the acculturational situation in the colonial period. Several writers have noted the problems with which this study is concerned, and speculative answers have been given, but there is nowhere a work devoted to a fuller elucidation. Most of the few studies of Paraguayan history have focused attention on the men and events of the conquest and on subsequent political phenomena of the colonial period, but the social and cultural circumstances have been relatively ignored. Obviously, all modern peoples of Latin America are highly acculturated, ·whether one judges from the point of view of the changes in sixteenth-century Spanish culture due to contact with local indigenous groups, or from the standpoint of the modification of American Indian cultures due to Spanish domination. Probably the greatest present weakness in our studies of modern Latin American peoples is the general lack of information on the cultural changes which were concomitant with the mutual adjustments of the Iberian and native peoples. 5 Nearly all the Latin American countries possess a richly documented colonial history from which these important changes can be learned or inferred, 3Quoted in Moses, 1Jl98, p. 4Washburn, 1871, 1:57-58, ssteward, 1943' p. 22.

194.

IN EARLY COLONIAL PARAGUA Y

3

but so far the only beginnings which have been made in this field are a recent study of the Quechua in the colonial period in Peru by Kubler, 6 and La Farge's short essay on the Maya. 7 The study which these pages introduce can be considered an attempt to contribute toward an understand ing of the culture history of Paraguay by focusing attention on Spanish-G uarani relations during the critical, early coloniIn reviewing this situation the study will conal period. cern itself with three related aims: ( 1) to describe the nature of the Spanish-G uarani relations during their formative period, with particular emphasis on those aspects which seem unusual or unique in the Spanish colonies in the New World; (2) to appraise the total situation in an effort to determine those circumstan ces of the· conquest and colonizatio n which help to explain why these relations took unusual forms; and (3) to describe the Spanish-G uarani acculturation in terms of the influences of these circumstances and relations. The means of exploitatio n and control of indigenous population s which the Spaniards employed in different parts of the New World we_re sim:i.l_ar in their conception and They were, however, often modified by local conintent. ditions of geography , kinds of available wealth, and the The encomiend a, a system of type of native population . administra tion of conquered population s which had its historical roots in Spain, was the colonial institution which, more than any other, systematiz ed and patterned the relaFor this tionship between the conqueror s and the natives. inrelations dian Spanish-In of study reason the present Paraguay must be devoted mainly to an analysis of the enInasmuch as the laws regulating this institucomienda. tion were promulgat ed by the Spanish King and his Council of the Indies, they were usually formulated to apply to Any all of the Spanish possession s in the New World. important exceptions in the application of these rules in Paraguay, as compared to other areas, should, therefore, emphasize and make explicit those features which were unusual in the relationshi ps of Spaniards and Paraguaya n Indi