Spanish Conquering of the Americas

The Spanish treatment of native peoples they encountered in conquest of the Americas can be summarized in one word: poor; However, good natured fun and friendly relations between cultures wasn’t of utmost importance to the Spaniards. Ultimately their goals in conquering the Americas were to convert the indigenous peoples to Christianity, to obtain riches, and to beat out rivals: England and France.

The Spanish obsession with discovery a source of wealth in the New World is apparent from their initial interest in America at all, touched upon vaguely in Christopher Columbus’s Journey of the First Voyage (1492), which documents Columbus’s first of four trips to what he thought were parts of the continent of Asia. This first trip landed Columbus and his men in the West Indies. In his journal, Columbus vividly describes the appearances of the native people in a way that somehow dehumanizes them. He writes, “They are very well made with handsome bodies, and very good countenances.” (Columbus pg 7.) Here, he describes them as “well made” (Columbus pg 7), as if put together intentionally and methodically rather than by the less predictable biological process. He pushes it even further in the next line of descriptive language when he compares the native americans to livestock, stating “their hair is short and coarse, almost like the hairs of a horsetail.” (Columbus pg 7.) The analogy is subtle, and could be passed off as a simple simile, but it is hard to overlook beside the comment on how these people are “well made.” (Columbus pg 7.) It is as if Columbus is trying to sell these people as a salesmen or auctioneer, examining their features objectively and convincing a seller of how productive and useful they might be, hence the parallels he draws between these people and livestock and manufactured goods. Columbus sees these people as inferior, subhuman even, and capable of serving as a source of labor in the form of slaves. He sees them as something that can be sold, a form of riches very different from the standard silver or gold.

It is this dehumanization that makes these people very easy for Columbus and other Spaniards to treat horrendously. They are not even seen as being human, therefore it is not seen as necessary to treat them as such. Bartolome de Las Casas describes these atrocities in A Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies (1552.) Las Casas, a Spanish conqueror who once waged military attacks against the indigenous peoples, eventually renounced slavery and its cruelties. In describing the treatment of the natives by the Spanish, Las Casas says “… they treated them not as beasts, which i cordially wished they would, but as the most abject dung and filth of the earth.” (Las Casas pg 12.) Here, Las Casas places