Friar Bartolome De Las Casas Analysis

Matthew Restall, a Professor of Latin American History, Women’s Studies, and Anthropology at Pennsylvania State University. He also serves the Director of the university’s Latin Studies. Throughout “Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest,” he discusses many false truths that have been passed down through history. For instance, he discusses, “The Myth of Exceptional Men.” “The Myth of Spanish Army,” and “The Myth of Completion.” For the sake of time, I will discuss three myths that correlate with class lectures and serve as the topic of this paper, “The Myth of Exceptional Men,” “The Myth of the King’s Army,” and the “Myth of the White Conquistador.” It should be noted that Restall speaks to his audience assuring us that his “...his purpose is not to degenerate this technique of historical writing completely...Nor do I mean to create a narrative in which individual action is utterly subordinated to the larger structural forces and causes of social change.” (4). He states that his intentions are to react to more than just the works of Columbus, Pizzaro, and Cortez.

Convinced of the superiority of Catholicism to all other religions, Spain insisted that the primary goal of colonization was to save the Indians from heathenism and prevent them from falling under the sway of Protestantism. The aim was neither to exterminate nor to remove the Indians, but to transform them into obedient Christian subjects of the crown. To the Spanish colonizers, the large native populations of the Americas were not only souls to be saved but also a labor force to be organized to extract gold and silver that would enrich their mother country. Las Casas’ writings and the abuses they exposed contributed to the spread of the Black Legend-the image of Spain as a uniquely brutal and exploitative colonizer. This would provide of a potent justification for other European powers to challenge Spain’s predominance in the New World.

For decades, the history of Latin America has been shrouded in a cover of Spanish glory and myth that misleads and complicates the views of historians everywhere. Myths such as the relationship between natives and conquistadors, and the individuality of the conquistadors themselves stand as only a few examples of how this history may have become broken and distorted. However, in Seven Myths of the Spanish Conquest Matthew Restall goes to great lengths to dispel these myths and provide a more accurate history of Latin American, in a readable and enjoyable book.

In A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, Bartolomé de Las Casas vividly describes the brutality wrought on the natives in the Americas by the Europeans primarily for the purpose of proclaiming and spreading the Christian faith. Las Casas originally intended this account to reach the royal administration of Spain; however, it soon found its way into the hands of many international readers, especially after translation. Bartolomé de Las Casas illustrates an extremely graphic and grim reality to his readers using literary methods such as characterization, imagery, amplification, authorial intrusion and the invocation of providence while trying to appeal to the sympathies of his audience about such atrocities.

Las Casas viewed the indigenous people in a good light, having said that they were humble and peaceful. He also stated that, for the most part, they were the type of people who wanted to mind to their own business and not get concerned with others. He was a spokesperson for the indigenous people in the new world, feeling the pain that these Spanish intruders forced upon them. The Spaniards didn’t share the same view, they were very cruel and unjust in the way that they treated the indigenous people. They had no respect for their culture or for what the indigenous people had created. Even so the indigenous

When Jesus Came, The Corn Mothers Went Away gives an in-depth history of the Pueblo Indians before and after the Spanish conquest. It describes the forced changes the Spanish brought to the Indians, and also the changes brought to the Spaniards who came to “civilize” the Indians. The author's thesis is that the Pueblo Indians and other Indians were treated cruelly by the Spanish, who justified their crime by claiming they were civilizing an

Bartolome de Las Casas was very empathetic to the plight of the Native Americans; this earned him the name “Protector of the Indians”. In his writings, De las Casas spoke highly of them praising their skills in architecture, painting and needlework. He even went as far as calling out Sepulvede for slandering the Native Americans by calling them barbarians. He pointed out that they had friendships, customs and laws to govern their people. But, while De las Casas definitely treated them with respect and dignity, as a friar, he wanted to convert them to

1) How does de las Casas describe the Native Americans he encountered? Bartolome de las Casas was one of the few Spaniards who traveled to the New World and wrote a sympathetic and humanitarian perspective of native Americans. Through his encounters Bartolome wrote extensive qualities that the native American possessed, for example Bartolome wrote, these people are the most obedient and faithful, they are by nature the humblest, patient who hold no grudges, also he stated that these people had no desire for possessions. Also, some of the least desirable qualities that Bartolome wrote “because they are so weak and complaisant, they are less able to endure heavy labor and soon die no matter what malady”. Bartolome also wrote that the Indians were extremely clean, with intelligent minds, who are open to accepting the Catholic faith.

A. Bartolome de las Casa was an early Spanish historian and Dominican missionary who was the first man to show the wrong doings and oppression of the European people towards the native people in the Americas. Bartolome was also an accomplished writer and had published many works, one includes a book called Historia de las Indias, which reflects on the accounts of the treatment and oppression of the natives in the Americas (Bartolome de Las Casas). Why Bartolome is so important during the period of Spanish exploration is because he was one of the first people to fight for the rights of the natives in America. He went to Spanish Parliament in Barcelona to fight for the rights of the natives. He purposed to Parliament that the colonist and natives

Bartolome de Las Casas, was a friar and latter a Dominican, who is considered by many as one of the few authors who does justice to the native people of the New World. Casas has a particular purpose on his writings, that being letting the King of Spain at that time Charles V know, of the miseries that were being done to the native people of the New World. De Las Casas does not condemn the arrival of the Spanish in this new land, nor does he condemn the conversion of these gentle and innocent people to Christianity, however, he condemns the measures taken to convert these people into Christianity. He is one of the few writers that extends in different places, and it is certain that he was one of the few who travelled all around the New World.

Daniel Castro examines the work of Las Casas. He discusses the humanitarian element Las Casas is known for but mainly highlights the rarely exposed ambivalent political and economic imperialistic motives behind his “humanitarianism” and his will to convert the Indigenous people. Castro focuses on the apostle and destructor dichotomy of Las Casas. Castro states that while Las Casas was fighting to defend indigenous rights, he was also actively and willingly participated in aiding Spanish’s destruction of the natives; “Las Casas’s work with and for the Indians is more paternalistic than paternal, more sympathetic than empathetic”. Castro emphasizes the Dominican’s actions as justification and aid to achieving the possession of the new land and their resources. He discredits the idea of Las Casas being an apostle by counter arguing that an apostle is an individual who “performs active person to person evangelizing to convert unbelievers to his/hers own faith, and proclaims that Las Casas rarely had direct contact with the indigenous people (pp. 3).

But obviously Casas’s stance was opposite to the Spaniards. The Spaniards saw themselves as rescuers of those “barbarian natives”. They saw themselves as the greatest nation that came to the new world to save those indigenous from their kings and devilish beliefs ant that their only goal was to spread the Catholic faith through the indigenous people.

during that time. The reasoning for defending the Indians was because they were at a prior

The conquest of the Americas is one of the most important events in modern history. The invasion, which took centuries to complete, created a trans-atlantic world. The people that began the conquest were Spaniards, inhabitants of the Iberian Peninsula, primarily from the Christian kingdoms of Castille and Aragon. Following the initial discovery By Cristobal Colon in 1492, Spaniards conquered most of modern South and Central America, as well as the Caribbean. They did this in the words of Bernal Diaz de Castillo, a conquistador that took part in the invasion of Mexico; “we came here to serve God and the king and also to get rich” . As the Spanish noblemen himself states, most colonists decided to engage in the conquest because of multiple reasons. Chiefly a devotion to the Catholic Church and its mission to convert all ‘heathens’ . A love of country, expressed in a desire to expand the empire, both materially and ideologically. And perhaps most importantly these young men were guided by a desire for profit and social advancement, the like of which would of impossible in Motherland Spain . In this essay I will consider the motives that led to the conquest and destruction of the Aztec and Inca peoples of modern Mexico and Peru. In particular this paper will look at why the conquest was possible, both physically and idiotically. Also I will look at how the conquest received, both in distant Spain and by the conquered peoples themselves.

The accountant of the conquest, and the making of what is today Latin America is a debatable subject in the field of humanities, especially in the field history. The most widespread approaches of this history are that of violence, war, oppression, possession of territories, and foundation of new colonies. In Frontier of Possessions, Tamar Herzog, a historian, professor of Latin American presents an account of the conquest from a different perspective, one that proposes that the acquisition of the territory of the New World by Spain and Portugal was a result of “interactions of many actors that caused territorial division in both Iberia and the Americas” (Herzog, 6). Hence, I conquer that one of the reasons of the conquest was the desire