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The 'Spanish colonization of the Americas' began with the arrival in the Western Hemisphere of Christopher Columbus (Cristóbal Colón) in 1492. From early small settlements in the Caribbean, the Spanish gradually expanded their range over four centuries to include Central America, most of South America, Mexico, the South of what today is Southern United States, the Western part of what today is Central United States, the Southwestern part of what today is British Columbia in Canada, and even reaching Alaska^[1]. At the beginning of the 19th century, the Spanish possessions in America began a series of independence movements, which culminated in Spain's loss of all of its colonies on the mainland of North, Central and South America by 1825. The remaining Spanish colonies of Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines were occupied by the United States following the Spanish-American War, ending Spanish rule in the Americas.

Contents

Christopher Columbus

Early Caribbean settlement

Effect on native health

Columbus Conquers Haiti

Spanish colonies Expand

Caribbean

South America

Central America

North America

Independence

References

Further reading

See also

External links

Christopher Columbus

Main articles: History of Spain, Christopher Columbus

The Spanish Crown's search for a route across the Atlantic Ocean occurred in the context of a rivalry with Portugual to establish trade routes to Asia. Portuguese explorers had recently been establishing new routes north along the West African coast, and it seemed likely that the Portuguese caravels would shortly reach the rich trading areas of Asia by traveling east. Christopher Columbus was able to convince the recently crowned monarchs of the Kingdom of Castille and the Kingdom of Aragon, Isabella and Ferdinand, to finance his novel idea: to reach the trading partners in Asia by traveling directly west across the Atlantic Ocean. There was no idea in that era of the actual size of the globe, and the expectation was that Asia could be reachable directly with the small sailing ships of the day.
Columbus's voyages were also taking place at the end of seven centuries of the ''Reconquista'', in which the last Moorish kingdom on the Iberian Peninsula (in Granada) was finally brought under direct Christian control. The Native Americans, similar to the remaining Moors in Spain, were for a time considered without rights as long as they were not converted to Catholicism.
Columbus was made governor of the new territories and made several more journeys across the Atlantic Ocean. He profited from the labour of native slaves, whom he forced to mine gold; he also attempted to sell some slaves to Spain. While generally regarded as an excellent navigator, he was a poor administrator and was stripped of the governorship in 1500.

Early Caribbean settlement

The first Spanish settlements in the Americas occurred the islands of the Caribbean Sea. On his fourth and final voyage in 1502, Columbus encountered a large canoe off the coast of what is now Honduras filled with trade goods. He boarded the canoe and rifled through the cargo which included cacao beans, copper and flint axes, copper bells, pottery, and colorful cotton garments. He took one prisoner and what he wanted from the cargo and let the canoe continue. This was the first contact of the Spanish with the civilizations of Central America.
In 1513, Vasco Núñez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama, and led the first European expedition to see the Pacific Ocean from the west coast of the New World. In an action with enduring historical import, Balboa claimed the Pacific Ocean and all the lands adjoining it for the Spanish Crown. It was 1517 before another expedition from Cuba visited Central America, landing on the coast of the Yucatán in search of slaves. This was followed by a phase of conquest. The Spaniards, just having finished a war against the Muslim Moors in the Iberian peninsula, began toppling the local American civilizations, and attempted to impose Christianity.
It is important to distinguish between the Spanish conquest of Mexico and the Spanish conquest of Yucatán. Although the Yucatán Peninsula is part of the modern-day country of Mexico, the ''Spanish conquest of Mexico'' refers to the conquest of the Mexica/Aztec empire by Hernán Cortés from 1519–21. It is April 22, 1519, the day Hernán Cortés landed ashore and founded the city of Veracruz, that marks the beginning of almost 303 years of Spanish hegemony over the region. The ''Spanish conquest of Yucatán'', on the other hand, refers to the conquest of the Maya states from 1511–1697.

Effect on native health

European diseases (smallpox, influenza, measles and typhus), to which the native populations had no resistance, and systems of forced labor (such as the encomienda, and the mining industry's mita), decimated the native population. The diseases usually preceded the Spanish invaders, and the resulting population loss (between 30 and 90 percent in some cases) severely weakened the native civilizations' ability to resist the invaders.[1]

Columbus Conquers Haiti

On his immediate discovery of the Arawak people he met right after arriving on their land after his first voyage, Columbus got the impression that he could conquer these people easily saying in his journal, "I could conquer the whole of them with fifty men and govern them as I please," and he proceeded to do just that.
He kidnapped some ten to twenty-five Indians and took them back to Spain. Only about seven or eight survived this journey but with the parrots, gold trinkets and other exotic loot Columbus displayed to the Spanish government he was able to persuade them into providing him with seventeen ships nearly 1,500 men, cannons crossbows, guns, cavalry, and attack dogs for voyage #2.
He returned to Haiti and the Arawaks in 1493 demanding food, gold, spun cotton and whatever else they could get from the Indians including sex with their women. Cooperation was ensured by a punishment system: any minor offense by an Arawak would result in a Spaniard cutting off his ears or nose only to be sent back to the village as living, breathing, bleeding example of the work expected and the brutality the Spaniards were capable of.
The Arawaks began to resist by refusing to plant for the Spanish, abandoning captured towns, etc. but over time this rebellion grew physically violent. Nonetheless the Indian "sticks and stones" were no match to the guns and harmless to the armor the Spanish possessed and wore. Columbus used this resistance by the Indians as an excuse to wage war and on March 24, 1495 the famed explorer set out to conquer this race that he thought so "inferior" and "stupid."
Naturally the Spanish won and according to Kirkpatrick Sale, who quotes Ferdinand Columbus's biography of his father: "The soldiers mowed down dozens with point-blank volleys, loosed the dogs to rip open limbs and bellies, chased fleeing Indians into the bush to skewer them on sword and pike and 'with God's aid soon gained complete victory, killing many Indians and capturing others who were also killed.
This led to a massive Spanish slave trade, in which Columbus brought back some 500 "specimens" to work as slaves in Spain while another 500 stayed as slaves for the crew left in the Americas.
Still, Columbus could not find the gold he was looking for all along. And refusing to call it slavery, Columbus resorted to this "forced labor." Indians were forced to mine for gold, raise Spanish food, and even carry the Spanish everywhere they went. And beyond these cruel acts the Spanish disrupted the ecosystem and culture. Forcing Indians to work in mines led to widespread malnutrition and the intrusion of rabbits and livestock caused further ecological disasters. Disease riddled the Americas as well.
Indians were so tired of this slavery that they would resort to methods of suicide such as self impalement, consumption of poison, jumped off cliffs, or hanged themselves. Worst of all, Arawak mothers would resort to aborting their children themselves or even killing their own children with their bare hands just so their offspring wouldn't have to endure the hard labor they did.
Before Columbus's arrival it was assumed there were about 8,000,000 people living in Haiti. By the time he was done, there was around 3,000,000. In addition to the 5 million casualties of this genocide, as it is called by some, Columbus is expected to have carried a total of 5,000 slaves across the Atlantic; more than any single person in history.
Lies My Teacher Told Me, , James, Loewen, Simon & Schuster, ,
[NOTE: The ''Lies My Teacher Told Me'' book referenced here's edition is a "First Touchstone Edition 1996." Page numbers in the citation may differ for varying editions.]

Spanish colonies Expand

Areas in the Americas under Spanish control included most of South and Central America, Mexico, parts of the Caribbean and much of the United States (see ''Spanish Main'').
The initial years saw a struggle between the Conquistadores and the royal authority. The Conquistadores soldiers and officers were given vast territories and Indian labourers (''Encomiendas and Repartimientos'') in place of payment or loot. Rebellions were frequent (See Lope de Aguirre, Gonzalo Pizarro). The Spanish Crown resorted to several systems of government, including Adelantados, Captaincy General, Viceroyalties, Lieutenant General-Governors and others.

Caribbean

Spain claimed all islands in the Caribbean Sea, although it did not settle all of them. It established settlements in the Windward and Leeward Islands and:

★ Antigua and Barbuda

★ Cuba

★ Hispaniola

★ Jamaica

★ Puerto Rico
Jamaica, most of the Windward and Leeward islands, and the western third of Hispaniola (now Haiti) would ultimately be lost to other European powers. Spain, however, retained control of Cuba, eastern Hispaniola (now the Dominican Republic) and Puerto Rico until the 19th century, and they remain Spanish-speaking today.

South America

★ Argentina - Buenos Aires founded in 1536. Re-founded in 1580 as it was forcefully abandoned in 1541; ''de facto'' independent in 1810, officially declared in 1816.

★ Bolivia - La Paz founded in 1548. Independent in 1825.

★ Chile - In 1541, the Spanish conquered the Incas in Perú, opening the way to the South, however, Spain could only advanced as far as the Itata River, where they met the fierce Araucanians. Chile won its independence from Spain in 1818

★ Colombia - In 1510, Spaniards founded Darien, the first permanent European settlement on the mainland of the Americas. In 1538, they established the colony of New Granada. Independence in 1810.

★ Ecuador - Conquistador Francisco Pizarro conquered the land in 1532; left Spain in 1809 to form Greater Colombia.

★ Paraguay - Asunción was founded in 1537. Independent from 1811.

★ Peru - Conquered from the Incas in 1531 by Francisco Pizarro. Peru won its independence from Spain in 1821.

★ Uruguay - Taken by Spain from Portugal in 1778. Part of Brazil from 1821-1825. Independence in 1825.

★ Venezuela - Caracas was founded in 1567. Left Spain 1811 to form Greater Colombia.

Central America

★ Costa Rica

★ El Salvador - Founded 1525 by Diego de Alvarado

★ Guatemala

★ Honduras

★ Nicaragua - Founded in 1524 by Francisco Hernández de Córdoba
These above countries became independent from Spain in 1821 during Mexico's war of independence.

★ Panama - As part of Colombia, independent in 1821. Declared independence from Colombia in 1903.

North America

★ New Spain: all or parts of present-day Mexico, Texas, California (Alta California and Baja California), Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma and New Mexico. In the 1819 Adams-Onís Treaty Spain traded its claims in the Pacific Northwest north of the 42nd parallel (today's northern border of California) to the USA, in exchange for the USA's giving up of its claims south of that line. The Treaty also established border lines along the Arkansas River and the Red River.

★ Spanish Florida: Modern-day Florida including parts of modern-day Alabama and Mississippi.

★ Louisiana, consisting of all or parts of the present-day U.S. States of Louisiana, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska, Minnesota, North Dakota, South Dakota, Wyoming, Montana, Colorado, Idaho: Spain owned this territory from 1762–1800 and based its administration in New Orleans. The north and interior was only sparsely settled by French inhabitants and new immigrants. Nomadic Indians, newly horsed, made up most of the new residents on the Great Plains where Spanish control was confined to the south. A system of forts and frontier posts, inherited from the French, protected Spanish interests along the Mississippi as far north as Michigan.

Independence

During the Peninsular War, when Spain itself was occupied by Napoleonic troops, several assemblies were established by the ''criollos'' to rule the lands in the name of Ferdinand VII of Spain. Meanwhile, on July 16, 1809 the first declaration of independence from Spanish rule was signed at La Paz (in modern Bolivia), which began a movement for independence that soon spread across the Spanish colonies. This experience of self-government, the influence of liberalism, and the ideas of the French and American Revolutions influenced the ''Libertadores''. All of the colonies except Cuba and Puerto Rico eventually freed themselves, often with help from the British Empire, which sought to break the Spanish monopoly on trade in the region.
In 1898, the United States won the Spanish-American War and occupied Cuba, Puerto Rico and the Philippines, ending Spanish rule in the Americas. Spanish settlement of the region continued, however, as the early 20th century saw a stream of immigration of poor people and political exiles from Spain to the former colonies, especially Cuba, Mexico and Argentina. After the 1970s, the flow became reversed as Latin Americans began settling in Spain. In the 1990s, Spanish companies like Repsol and Telefonica invested in South America, often buying newly privatized companies.
Currently, the Ibero-American countries, along with Spain and Portugal, have organized themselves as the ''Comunidad Iberoamericana de Naciones''.

References

1. Sources about the presence of Spaniards in Alaska, British Columbia and Oregon: Study of the ''Instituto Cervantes'', Study of the ''Fundació d'Estudis Històrics de Catalunya''. In fact, New Spain formally ruled the Southwestern part of what today is the British Columbia (Source)

Further reading

★ David A. Brading, ''The First America: The Spanish Monarchy, Creole Patriots, and the Liberal State, I492-1867'' Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993

See also

★ Atlantic world

★ Black Legend

★ Inter caetera

★ New Spain

★ Global Empire

★ Old Spanish Trail (trade route)

★ Population history of American indigenous peoples

★ Spanish conquest of Yucatán

★ Spanish conquest of Mexico

★ Spanish conquest of Peru

★ Viceroyalty of Peru

★ Spanish Empire

★ Habsburg Spain

★ Valladolid debate

★ Smallpox Epidemics in the New World

★ History of the west coast of North America

External links

★ Spanish Exploration and Conquest of North America

★ Dr. Robert Jackson's Missions of South America

★ Spanish Colonial Missions Initiatve NPS/INAH