Throughout history, civilizations have relied on social hierarchies to maintain order and a stable social structure. During the Early Modern period European empires were established and expanded. In order to maintain order and facilitate their rule, complex social hierarchies were created. The Sistema de Castas was a complex social hierarchy established in the Americas by the Spanish Conquistadors. It was used as a way to assert Spaniard dominance by placing them at the top of the social hierarchy. The Sistema de Castas shaped the current social structure and view of ethnicity and race of the Americas. The Americas were ‘discovered’ by Christopher Columbus in 1492. From 1492 to the 1800s, Spanish explorers conquered and settled most …show more content…
Casta paintings depicted different racial mixtures from the union of Spaniards, Indians and Blacks. It was organized in a series of sixteen individual canvases or one canvas divided into sixteen sections. It portrayed a mother, father and a child. It often included dress style and material culture and sometimes flora and fauna, native to the New World. Casta paintings attempted to display the supremacy of the Spaniards by placing them at the top of the paintings. As the amount of Indian and African ancestry increases the position gradually lowers with Negros being at the very bottom. The paintings show more about Mexico’s and Spain’s aspirations than they do about real colonial life because it shows it in idealized terms where everyone has a definite position in society. While in reality, the casta system allowed more …show more content…
The term Pardo/a was created for individuals with a complex racial mix.This facilitated the movement in and out of social categories and made it difficult for government officials to enforce the rules that applied to each Casta. In spite of Mestizos and Pardos being the main ones moving up the social hierarchy, there are a few cases of Mulattos that were able to move up in the social hierarchy and attain the honorary title of Don. “The fluid nature of the Castas did allow for a few persons of African descent to attain a socioeconomically elevated status ... Mulatto Pedro Huizar, for example, was able to become a Don (Spanish nobleman) at Mission San Jose and thus change his status to espanol in 1793 ... As Huizar's changed racial status shows, racial lines became so blurred through biological and occupational miscegenation that they became useless to Spanish census takers and other Iberian officials by 1800”. Overtime, in Spanish American colonies it became possible to purchase whiteness with money or skills. White became more of a title or a symbol of status than it was related to ancestry because even those without a majorly white ancestry could obtain it. This also shows that the Spanish officials thought that if anyone was particularly skilled at something they could not be have black or indian blood because white was the only race that could produce such skilled
Castas depicted marginal statuses in Europe and were structured to identify the groups that were not classified as “Spanish”. Names such as “Mestizo”, “Mulatto” or “Spaniard” did not only describe the physical appearance of an individual but rather these names functioned as a racial label among the “physical, social and moral qualities”. These paintings
After the discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492, the powerful Old World scrambled to colonize it. The three major nations involved in this were Spain, France, and England. Spain took more to the south in the Central American and Mexico areas while France went north in the Canada region. The English came to America and settled in both the New England and Chesapeake area. Although the people in these regions originated from the same area, the regions as a whole evolved into different societies because of the settlers’ purpose for coming to America and the obstacles faced in both nature and with the natives.
The history of Africans in Mexico is an oft-neglected facet of the cultural complexities of that country. In 1519, Hernando Cortes brought 6 African slaves with him to Mexico; these individuals served the conquest as personal servants, carriers, and laborers.[1] In the years to come, slavery would become a critical component of the colonial economy with approximately 2,000 slaves arriving each year 1580-1650; it is estimated that a total of 200,000 Africans were brought to Mexico during the colonial period.[2] Given this large number of slaves, the lengthy period of their importation, and the inevitable mixing of races, which took place throughout the colony, the historical and cultural significance of bozales, criollos, mulattoes, and zambos is far-reaching. The colonial period provides an excellent starting place for an examination of the significance of these groups not only because the institution of African slavery was introduced to New Spain at that time, but also because the regular influx of native Africans combined with the close attention paid to color-based castas in official records allows historians to trace the influence of African culture more readily during that period.
Spain, as one of the most powerful nations in the old world, had a great influence on many events in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. The Spanish also had an influence on many other empires/nations' fate. One of the empires that suffered a grave fate at the hands of the Spanish was the Aztec empire. The Aztec empire was not the oldest Mesoamerican empire and it was formed from an agreement between three city-states. The Aztec's class system had the emperor on top, then the priests, and everyone else below them. The priests were responsible for keeping the gods happy. The sacrifice of goods and people was a commonplace in the Aztec culture, and it was often the goods/people of other nations that were taken for sacrifices. As one can imagine,
Christopher Columbus discovered the America’s for Spain in 1492. The explorers and settlers that settled in Central and South America were mostly Spanish and Portuguese. The English took notice of the Spanish success in the America’s, so they decided to explore the upper part of the America’s, North America, in the late 1500’s.
According to Anthony T. Browder in from The Browder File: 22 Essays on the African-American Experience, “The Portuguese were the first to enslave Afrikans and they were the first to call them Negroes. When the Spanish became involved in the slave trade, they also used the word Negro to describe Afrikans. The word Negro is an adjective to describe the color Black in Portuguese and Spanish, but during the slave trade it became a noun used to describe a race of people” (qtd. in Trinicenter, par. 1). It is ironic that the word Negro ...
During the late 16th century and into the 17th century, European nations rapidly colonized the newly discovered Americas. England in particular sent out numerous groups to the eastern coast of North America to two regions; the Chesapeake and the New
The Sociedad de Castas is hierarchy system based on race implanted by the Spanish during their rule in Latin America. This system degraded the indigenous and other non- European population. In order for the system to last, the Spanish separated tribe members and force natives to re-education schools; where they learn to adapt European customs. This system allowed Spaniards, born in Europe, to control all the land.
“Racial purity, a requirement for elite status in Spain and its American colonies, proved less essential to upward mobility on the frontier than in core areas of the empire.
Without intention, in 1492 Christopher Columbus initiated an event that is perhaps the most important historical turning point in modern times to the American Continents. . “For thousands of years before 1492, human societies in America had developed in isolation from the rest of the world. ”(P. 4) Christopher Columbus and other European voyagers ended all this beginning in 1492 as they searched for treasure and attempted to spread Christianity. For the first time, people from Europe, Africa, and the Americas were in regular contact. Columbus was searching for one thing and discovered something entirely different.
The caudillo system came to be a common form of government in Latin America for several reasons. The first, and most apparent, reason for the establishment of the caudillo system, was the weak, precarious, and unstable governments left in place after independence was achieved. These countries, once colonies, had been under the rule of Spain, which meant that all government control came from an outside source that was imposed upon the inhabitants. Local armies, the only organized group prepared to take control, assumed power once the Spaniards were defeated. The transition from a military government to a government controlled by a "hero" from the army, the caudillo, was both logical and easy.
The Spaniards arrived at the Americas prior to the English. The Spanish mainly wanted to explore in the first place because after the Black Death, the population increased, and thus, so did the frequency of commerce. There was a sudden new interest in new products and the new strong monarchs who sponsored the journeys wanted to be more affluent. Therefore, explorers such as Christopher Columbus attempted to go west to target Asia. However, he ended up on Cuba and called the natives Indians. The Spanish soon started to consider the Americas less of a blockage and could now see it as a source of resources. In 1518, Cortes arrived into Mexico with his group of conquistadors, or conquerors, which is a proper name because the men after gold exterminated native areas using their military skills, brutality and greed to turn the Southern America into a vast Spanish empire. The smallpox the Spanish unknowingly carried also helped wipe many people out. When they saw the religious ceremonies of the Aztecs that produced many skulls, they thought of these people as savages and not entirely human. This of coarse was quite hypocritical because the Spanish have killed before during the Inquisition for their faith. It was this contempt that made them think it was all right to slaughter the natives. Spanish colonies were established when conquistadors had gotten a license to finance the expedition from the crown to fixture encomiendas. These encomiendas were basically Indian villages that became a source of labor. The Spanish dreamed of becoming wealthier from South America, but they also wanted a profitable agricultural economy and to spread their Catholic religion (the Pueblo Indians converted to Christianity), which became very important in the 1540s.
The casta paintings were a series of paintings that represent different racial mixtures between the Spaniards and Indians or mestizos, Spaniards and Blacks or mulattos, and Blacks and Indians or zambos. Often, the structure of a casta paintings was that it consisted of a large painting with many individual squares with smaller paintings. The purpose of the casta paintings was to establish a racial hierarchy. For instance, those from wealthier backgrounds were placed on top, and those who were impoverished were placed lower in the painting. Often, the paintings would have depict typical clothing for different social classes, reveal details of architectural space and home life, and present meticulous depictions of everyday objects. Essentially,
The Spanish culture is rich in history. They demonstrate a sense of family, religion and community in order to maintain their heritage. My paper will review briefly the Spanish culture and evaluate the contrast and similarities between them and African Americans. This flow chart will range with differences and similarities on religion, socialization and there place in the future of our country. This journey allowed me to learn a great deal.
Honour was a principle that members of colonial society protected fiercely but whether one’s bloodline automatically inherited respect was debatable. The diverse society of ten required the judicial system to settle when these interests collided. During the colonial period, the defining characteristic of Latin American society was its highly stratified society. The rights afforded to the different social classes differed greatly depending on which class they belong. Those with pure Spanish blood were the elites of the society. Beneath them on the social hierarchy lay the plebians, people with mixed racial backgrounds including creoles and mulattoes. Next were the “indios” (indigenous