Spanish and Portuguese Colonial Societies in the Americas

There exist three phases that led to the emergence of the Latin America. The first phase occurred between 1492 and 1570, where the colonial administrators established themselves. From 1570 to 1700, the colonial society and the Latin America’s economy reached its maturity. By 1600, most of the Indian empires in Latin America had been destroyed, and the colonial administrators introduced slavery into the region, which allowed Peru and Mexico to be the central points of Spanish settlement. Portugal and Spain were popularly known for being more urbanized as compared to the other parts of Western Europe, and they transferred their way of life to the New World, Latin America. These two nations attempted to modify themselves over in the mold of nobility from their colonies. They established large plantations in the colonies, created new colonial elites and instituted the natives population as the serf. Moreover, the Patriarchal society from the Old World which was driven towards the change of the New World, together with the state and the Church were identical to the system used in the Iberian Peninsula institutions.
Spain was the earliest European country to reach the Americas in 1492, and they located and conquered the lands owned by the great aboriginal people and all the mineral resources. They continued to immigrate in force, thus creating a far-flung, enduring network of new colonies. Colombus was the first Spaniard to discover the land of Americas, having hit upon the Hispaniola Island in 1492.

He personally wanted to conceptualize the Italian-Portuguese maritime tradition in the area, but the Spaniards immediately started moving towards their own traditions. There arose a dissension of purpose between Columbus with his relatives from Italy, and the Spanish administrators, which later ensued.
By 1494, the two countries came into an agreement by signing the Treaty of Tordesillas, which divided the non-European world between the two countries. The treaty gave Portugal a legal claim to the Brazilian region. By 1500, the Portuguese arrived at the Brazilian coast and took over the lands just as per their agreement with Spaniards. Before the arrival of the Portuguese, Brazil was just a fringe land, but under the Portuguese scheme, the region was established and became a profitable overseas venture in India and Africa.
The Caribbean Island was the arena for the establishment of many operations and structures, which grew to be central to the lives of the Spanish-American. Although Colombus, who discovered the Island, wanted to use a combination of the Italian and Portuguese maritime traditions on the island, the Spaniards ensured that they implemented their system faster before the Columbus idea was started. The royal government intervened directly and recruited the Spanish people to the posts of governorship in most areas and ensured that there were more large parties of colonists. This move highly promoted the Spanish ways. In 1496, Santo Doming discovered the southern coast of Hispaniola, which grew to be a real city, with more transient subordinate Spanish cities spreading over the entire island. The cities were aligned to gold mining areas, which became the determiners of the Spanish economy.
The Spaniards grabbed land from the natives and created haciendas and villages, while the Indians provided most labor to the haciendas. The agricultural produce harvested from the farms was used to feed the colonies since very few items could be exported. Churches and schools were established to train the priests and later offered education to all people. In Mexico and Peru, viceroys were employed to establish both administrative and military authorities over their dominions. Each Viceroyalty was divided into legal subdivisions called audiences. At the local level, the magistrates in the villages and towns enforced decrees, acted as tax collectors, and as judges. On the other hand, the Catholic Church was among the first religions to penetrate into the new colonies. The missionaries established settlements in different parts of the region and started converting the natives to their religion. Later, the churches were transitioned into full-fledged churches that were sponsored by the state. The Spanish government had some links with the Catholic Church. In this case, the Church and the state government joined forces to form ideological and political frameworks.
On the other hand, the Portuguese operated wholly within their nautical commercial tradition, by adopting different measures from those used by the Spanish administration. While the Spaniards expanded their territory in different parts of Americas, the Portuguese administration divided Brazil into sections of donotary captaincies. Each donotary captaincy was granted a donotarios, who was a prominent individual that was assumed to have the private resources to undertake the conquest and exploitation of the specific locations they were situated. The position was hereditary, and it had extensive administrative and judicial powers.
The primary objective for both nations was to establish colonies from which they could make quick and large profits. They tried to modify the societies in the new settlements but established themselves as the nation’s new elite. However, the emphasis to generate more profits was greater than their desire to come up with formal infrastructure. It is evident that they economically depended on their colonies as well as the raw material they supplied in their respective countries. As the god and sugar became less viable, the wealth in the colonies disappeared subsequently.
Miguel Hernandez is seen as a man from a minority group in Mexico, but he is seen to work his way through the system and ends up being among wealthy people in his society. Despite starting his business with little capital, he grows slowly until he is at a top level of buying a black slave. The amount of money he had and buying of slaves was almost similar to some of the Europeans in the country. Although the slave was sick, he still went ahead to buy the slave at 150 pesos, which is seen as a very high price for such a slave. However, his actions portray how rich he had become as compared to his fellow muleteers. His wealth did not affect his relationship with other people from minority groups such as the Indians, blacks, and the Mulattoes. He has even gone further to marry an Indian wife who was fluent in speaking Spanish but intelligent when negotiating contracts in business. Miguel Hernandez was seen as a bridge between the people o different social hierarchy. This is a story of a man who went against all the odds to succeed in life. Despite his success in life, he still associates with the poor black and Mulattoes and ensures that his children follow his way of respecting other people and appreciating who other people are within the society.
Francisca petitions the Portuguese administration to be granted her freedom, since she believes that she had been subjected to illegal slavery in the backcountry for a long time in the previous years. Despite assembling evidence and proving her case in the first petition, which she eventually won, she lost an appeal that was made by her owner before the chief justice. From the entire story, we see a girl who has been captured from another village by the Ferreira’s and Rayol’s and brought before the Portuguese authorities. The Ferreira’s and Rayol’s were considered to be trading in illegal private toiling teams. This team had no Jesuit chaplain with them to interview Francisca and determine under which circumstance she was captured. In this case, the team presented fake certificates of legitimate enslavement. The story rotates about an injustice that was done to a young woman who is denied justice by the Portuguese chief justice since he is poor and a slave. Despite being subjected to very harsh conditions as they were transported to the slave market in Brazil, she, fortunately, survives throughout the entire journey. Before she presented her petition for freedom before the Portuguese authorities, she had already been Anna de Fonte’s slave for twenty years. Francisca is seen to be more confident about the case as compared to her owner, since she presents herself before the judge just as the other witnesses, but her owner prefers to record a special statement due to her ladylike characteristic. Rom the case, one can indeed picture out the innocence of Francisca, but since the court was Portuguese-based, it only favored Anna de Fonte since she was a wealthy woman of Portuguese race. Francisca’s courage to present the petition before the tribunal is admirable since it requires a brave and courageous person to request a case against an employer.

Bibliography
Kennedy, Paul. The rise and fall of the great powers. Vintage, 2010.
Sweet, David. “Francisca: Indian Slave.” Struggle and (1981).
Super, John C. “Miguel Hernandez: Master of Mule Trains.” Struggle and Survival in Colonial America (1981): 298-310.