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In Chapter 3, Taylor demystifies the “Black Legend” of Spanish cruelty by highlighting both the atrocities and developments of Spanish conquest—a lucrative venture for bullish entrepreneurs and an onerous governance for the Spanish crown. Continuing his comparative perspective, Taylor examines the Spanish conquest through lens of the Native peoples as well as the Spanish. I, however, found his description of the Spanish motives especially interesting. He notes that while Spanish colonization was “a private enterprise . . . in the pursuit of profit,” it also served to extend the control of the Spanish crown and Catholic church by means of the requerimento (57). Though driven by seemingly disparate interests, the Spanish conquerers—in the Taylor’s presentation, at least—used their separate interests as motives and justifications for the atrocities of their conquests, particularly at Tenochtitlán. Describing Cortes’ visit to the enchanting city—I say “enchanting” because of Bernal Diaz’s description of it—Taylor writes that the Spanish explorers were “inflamed [with] desire to conquer, plunder” (53). Yet, they abhorred the gruesome rituals and idolatry of the Aztecs. So they employed their religious duty ‘to give light to those . . . in darkness’ as justification to eclipse the Aztec culture and society with their own customs (58). Perhaps no event described in Chapter 3 better reflects the Spanish cultural conquest than the construction of the cathedral in Mexico City. Tenochtitlán’s ruins became the cornerstones of a Christian temple, born on the backs of its own people.
I find it interesting that among the list of Spanish motives for conquest Taylor excludes racial prejudice. Granted, Taylor states in Chapter 5 that Europeans perceived the Native peoples as “socially and culturally inferior” rather than racially unequal (107). But I find it hard to believe that the confrontation of two foreign, ethnically homogenous groups would not provoke racial prejudice, although admittedly my this assertion is influenced by modern instances of racism.
Regardless, I think there is a better explanation for Taylor’s exclusion of racism in his list of Spanish motives. In her post last week, Caitlin noted Taylor’s argument for colonial social-hierarchy as the origin of racism in America. Racial oppression, she stated, was “created through the colonial process,” not pre-meditated. With this view in mind, Taylor’s description makes sense. As the Native peoples were assimilated—or coerced, depending on your view—into the Spanish colonies, they were exploited and worked on haciendas as sharecroppers. And as Taylor’s argument would suggest, a racial hierarchy (castas) evolved from the social hierarchy, with Natives and African slaves at the bottom and whiter peoples towards the top. So, whether an omission for the sake of his argument or a fine example of racism evolving out of classism, the absence of racial qualifications for the Spanish conquest seems best explained by Taylor’s previous argument. I think Caitlin would agree, but I look forward to hearing her response.
On a different note, we spent much of class last Thursday discussing common words and phrases used when describing the history of the American Native peoples. Many words—like “village,” as opposed to “city”—we concluded, fail to accurately convey the complexity and sophistication of Native civilization and culture. In fact, some words reflect cultural ignorance more than just historical inaccuracy. I think this recent blog is especially relevant to that conversation: