About the Author: My name is Angelica Medina. I am currently a student at the Franciscan University of Steubenville studying philosophy. I have always had a deep passion for history and how Catholic philosophical ideas tie into it. I was born in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, and moved to Canada when I was a little girl. I have lived in our capital of Ottawa ever since we moved, and have grown to love this country. Both my experiences living in Venezuela and Canada, as well as my deep love for the Catholic faith, have shaped me into the woman I am today.
The Black Legend. An ominous and foreboding term that sounds as though it were taken straight from a novel. Rather than fantastical narratives of pirate ships or hidden treasure, the Black Legend refers to a narrative of what UNESCO calls an “iniquitous exploitation of the new world” by the hands of the Spanish conquistadors. There is a narrative that Spain, unlike the more sensible European colonial powers at the time, was particularly cruel and savage owing to their Spanishness. As a modern audience we scoff at the Spaniards and their barbaric behaviour towards the indigenous peoples of the Americas. To defend the Spaniards would be equivalent to defending slave drivers, mass murderers, and other abhorrent perpetrators of crimes against humanity. However, as we all know, it is the victor who writes history.
The Encyclopedia Britannica notes that the term “Black Legend” was first coined by the Spanish historian Julián Juderías in his book La Leyenda Negra published in 1914. According to an article published by Duke University Press, Juderías introduced the idea that Spanish history was being fragmented like light passing through a prism by envious colonial powers for centuries. While no historian worth his salt would deny the atrocities done to the indigenous people, there was and is a tendency to minimize the good that Spain had done. Spaniards of the 16th century were not distant figures that bear no resemblance to us. They had come off the heels of one of the worst plagues in the world and expected only devastation in their foreseeable future.
In the late 1300s there was a plague so deadly and vile that it almost caused the collapse of the entire European continent. History knows this disaster as the Black Death. It had two variants, the Bubonic plague and the Pneumonic plague. The survival rate was less than two percent of those who contracted it, decimating any village it reached. The plague entered Europe from infected fleas that would transmit it to rats through bites. The common peasant house was made with a straw roof, in which rats would have their nets. The sequel was ghastly. If one had become infected with the Bubonic variant, that person would experience high fevers accompanied with swollen lymph nodes that turned black. That person would be expected to live for one more day. As for the Pneumonic variant, it affected the lungs. By modern accounts, it is estimated that between 25 and 50 million Europeans died owing to the plague. It gutted the European economy.
Another blow to the European economy was the decline of the usage of the Silk Road. Since the Roman Empire, the Silk Road had been a trading network that reached from Europe to Asia. It stimulated the economy, and employed many people, for no one person would make the trip. Rather, it took a plethora of people to exchange and buy. In 1453, the army of the Ottoman Empire breached the walls of Constantinople. As a result, they took control of the Silk Road. With high tolls and tariffs, Europe could no longer depend on the Silk Road to stimulate their economy. Death and poverty were everywhere as far as the eye could see. These conditions led men to traverse the ocean, in what they believed were sea-monster-infested waters, to find a solution.
Columbus knew that the Earth was round, so he proposed to many European monarchs to explore going west to trade with India. While most dismissed him, Queen Isabella agreed to fund Columbus and thus, investing in him with her jewels, he was off. Once Columbus reached what is now the Bahamas, he thought he found islands surrounding India; hence, he identified the indigenous as “Indians.” Over the years, many Spanish conquistadors would sail the ocean to the New World and establish their presence there. Spain, through conquest, took over the already-established Aztec and Mayan Empires. They would maintain the indigenous societal systems, pueblos, while removing their leaders; in other words, cutting off the head and keeping the body. American historian Thomas Kidd noted that the Spanish colonials focused on large farms to take advantage of the rich soil. Queen Isabella rejected the slavery of indigenous people, and instead mandated the Spanish encomienda system under which the unconverted native provided labour in exchange for protection, education, and healthcare.
During the conquest, the Catholic Church sent missionaries to spread Christianity. The Franciscan missionaries and the Spanish governing bodies established a new moral and civil way of living. With that said, the Church and State collaborated with one another, but were not one and the same. The Church, specifically the Franciscans, contributed to colonies in both a spiritual and physical way. In Fray Serra’s 1776 letter to Viceroy Bucareli y Ursua, he diplomatically entrusted the viceroy to help fund the Franciscan efforts to evangelize. In his letter to the viceroy, he described some of the effects of the missions: a granary and harvesters that could feed the “mouths” that “far outnumbered the workers.” This was a distribution of goods that helped the local communities form around the missions in California. Serra was efficient in using his goods to the benefit of the mission as well as his flock. He wanted the indigenous people in what is now modern day California to be properly integrated into society. Antonio Valeriano points out that in Nican Mophua—the oldest text of the apparitions of Our Lady of Guadalupe (c. 1550)—we see that there were professionals like doctors among the Spaniards who also treated the indigenous. Many primary sources of the Spanish colonies, such as the Nican Mophua and the letters of Fray Serra, testified that there was peace which resulted in faith beginning to flourish for the indigenous inhabitants and Spaniards alike. There were also revisions of the encomienda laws. In 1542, as a response to the abuses being carried out by conquistadors far from the king’s view, Charles V limited the inheritance of encomiendas to two generations. This peace was not utopian, rather, consistently worked on by many exemplary figures of authority in the Church and also the state.
As a modern audience, we know the great sin of colonization that the Spaniards committed. “Into this land of meek outcasts there came some Spaniards who immediately behaved like ravening wild beasts, wolves, tigers, or lions that had been starved for many days.” And so the words of a Spanish Dominican friar run through the halls of history. In 1542, Bartolome de Las Casas wrote the Brief Account of the Devastation of the Indies. Many scholars, especially those who hold the belief that there was a concerted effort to defame Spain, agree that this is the beginning of the Black Legend. Despite Las Casas advocating for a better colonial society, it was used against his country.
Unlike the other colonies, Spain was at its peak. They had wealth, the most territory in the New World, and strong moral principles. They alone could boast that they had powerful voices against the evil actions of imperial conquest. They were the only imperial power to codify rights for the indigenous peoples of the Americas and Asia:
We ordain and command that from henceforward for no cause of war nor any other whatsoever, though it be under title of rebellion, nor by ransom nor in other manner can an Indian be made a slave, and we will that they be treated as our vassals of the Crown of Castile since such they are.
Why did slavery occur if the standard was against it? From the beginning, Queen Isabella rejected the enslavement of indigenous who accepted Christianity in large numbers. With that said, in practice, the New World had a serf system as the encomienda system. The serf system, feudalism, was a contractual system where land was given by the king for services in either government or military work. The Catholic Encyclopedia states that feudalism means that the government gives land to individuals rather than professionals paid in money. This results in a king becoming a landowner and the landowner having sovereignty in his land. It seems as though it was the norm to enslave non-Christans. This was not the case. In the time of the conquistadors, to be part of society was to share your faith. With the idea that everyone was a child of God, there was the possibility of anyone accepting the faith. A precious and grave responsibility resulted from the inter-connection of the Faith and civil society that crimes against believing indigenous converts were viewed as monstrous behaviour and were denounced as such in the writings of Las Casas. He strongly reprobated the Spaniards who sinned against their brothers in the Faith.
Under Charles V, there were debates in Valladolid that brought forth Las Casas’ account of Hispaniola. Owing to the public debates, other colonial powers began discrediting the Spaniards for being overly cruel. Although convicted of the same crimes as Spain, other colonial powers such as England began spewing defamatory remarks in order to destroy the integrity of the Spanish Empire. Spain’s admitting to the atrocities that took place in the New World and their pursuit to right these wrongs was what led to the downfall of their image. Ultimately, the cruelty of the Spaniards in the New World was caused by the fall of man, not because of their Spanish origin.
To err is to be human. Although the Spaniards in the New World committed abhorrent atrocities, the Spanish crown pioneered the humane treatment of the indigenous. While no system is perfect, Spain was the first country to codify a moral way to treat the people of the new world. Spain’s enemies worked to ensure that Spain would be viewed negatively throughout history by promulgating false narratives or isolated acts of barbarity. The truth of these matters are rarely black and white, and the history of colonial Spain deserves to be given an unbiased analysis.
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