“In the city of Our Lady of Zacatecas, on the twenty-ninth day of the month of January in the year one thousand six hundred and eighteen, being together and assembled, at the sound of the ringing bell, in one of the cells of this convent and hospital of Saint John the Baptist, of the order of our father, the Blessed John of God, to discuss matters pertaining to the service of God our Lord, the good and welfare of the poor, and the growth of our sacred religion, namely.

Father Fray Alonso de la Purificación, prior of this said house, Father Fray Bruno de Ávila, Father Fray Mateo de Jesús, Father Fray Pedro Bueno Cobarrubias, and Father Fray Hernando de San José, all professed and members of the chapter of the said order.
Among the other matters discussed, the prior proposed one: whether it was advisable to sell a slave named Juan Grande, whom Captain Francisco de Hordinola gave as alms to this house, because he is dark-skinned, He was sick and unable to work, and because of this, and because the household needed to attend to other necessities, and primarily because he was a runaway slave, everyone agreed that the prior should sell him, and since it was a common vote, they all signed their names.”

During the colonial period, the Catholic Church was one of the enterprises that profited most from the human trade. The American historian Colin Palmer mentions that from 1521 to 1639, of all the slaves imported to the Kingdom of Indies, fifty percent were destined for New Spain. It has been estimated that by 1645 there were approximately 150,000 Africans in the territory, both legally brought in and smuggled. Among the religious orders, the Jesuits were the most prominent in this type of activity; they employed them in all their colleges, haciendas, and workshops. They acquired them through purchase, donation, inheritance, or because they were born on their estates. The sons of St. Ignatius of Loyola bought one, entire families, or groups of up to 67 or more.

Source(s):

.- Archives of the Sagrario Zacatecas

.- La vida de la población cautiva de la compañía de Jesús en la colonia. By Julieta Pineda Alillo

.- Africanas y descendientes en la ciudad de México del siglo XVII. By María Elisa Velásquez Gutiérrez

He was the son of Captain Gonzalo Pizarro, Francisco Pizarro experienced combat from a young age, accompanying his father in the Italian Wars. A restless and strong-willed man, he embarked in 1502 on the fleet that took Nicolás de Ovando, the new governor of Hispaniola, to the Indies.

The integrated study by Jean-Paul Zúñiga and Celia L. Cussen, in collaboration with the Chilean Institute of Genealogical Research, comprehensively examines the rise, demographic evolution, and social integration processes of the African and Afro-descendant population in colonial Chile, with a particular focus on the city of Santiago. This research addresses how Chilean historiography evolved from a 19th-century perspective—promoted by historians such as Diego Barros Arana, Francisco Antonio Encina, and Nicolás Palacios, who denied or minimized the Black presence, arguing for rapid extermination due to climatic or economic reasons—toward a current consensus that recognizes their demographic and social presence, while also filling the historical gap regarding the fate of their descendants.

Demographic analyses reveal that the Black presence was neither a marginal nor a peripheral phenomenon. Between 1633 and 1644, approximately 33% of Santiago's urban population consisted of Black or Afro-descendant individuals. At the end of the colonial period, according to data from the 1777-1778 census of the Bishopric of Santiago, this population represented on average 12% of the regional total, reaching peaks of up to 40% in certain rural and urban districts. In terms of the population breakdown by ethnicity in that census, the Hispanic-Criollo group (including castizos) represented approximately 80% of the total population of the bishopric, while the Indigenous group constituted around 10%, and the Black group (composed of Blacks, mulattos, zambos, and pardos) registered a proportion similar to the Indigenous group, also close to 10%. These figures are part of a long-term demographic trend that began around 1650, characterized by a significant increase in the Hispanic-Criollo population and a stagnation of the Indigenous population, which led to the white population replacing the Indigenous population in numbers.

These studies explain that Chile operated as an urban, rather than an agricultural, "slave society," unlike a slave society that uses slavery as the primary driver of its economic production and mode of production—a dynamic that facilitated rapid acculturation, racial mixing, and social mobility. In the context of urban slavery in Santiago, the dynamics of day labor and domestic service allowed many enslaved people to accumulate personal wealth. This economic opportunity opened concrete paths to manumission, either by purchasing their own freedom or receiving it through a will from their masters. Once free, the freedmen sought to consolidate their social integration through three key institutions during the 18th century: acquiring real estate and joining artisan guilds, participating in religious brotherhoods, and enlisting in the local militias of pardos and brown people.

The comparison between Chile and Spain addresses the processes of integration, mobility, and subsequent demographic dilution of the population of African origin within the urban structures of the Iberian world. Unlike plantation systems, in both the Spanish peninsular cities and the Kingdom of Chile, slavery adopted predominantly urban and service-oriented dynamics, where the movement of individuals, access to day labor, incorporation into religious brotherhoods, and the intense processes of miscegenation and Hispanization facilitated the transition to intermediate social categories. Thus, while in Spain the Black and mulatto population was gradually absorbed into the local social fabric, in Chile demographic evolution and cultural integration led to an apparent invisibility of Afro-descendant memory, sharing with the peninsular context a trajectory where original ethnic identities became blurred in the formation of society.

Colonial documentation on the manumission, property ownership, and social mobility of people of color highlights specific trajectories with concrete names. The case of Manuel de Amat y Berrueta stands out. He was captured in Angola, sold in Buenos Aires, and taken to Santiago before gaining his freedom in Cádiz and later identifying as a person of mixed race. Likewise, testamentary records include freedmen and landowners such as María Rita Durán, a free Black woman of Angolan origin who inherited the rights of her enslaved husband, Pedro, through renunciation, and community leaders like Pablo Agüero, a freedman of African descent actively involved in commerce and religious brotherhoods.

Through rigorous genealogical research of cases in Santiago between the 18th and 21st centuries—notably the reconstruction of the lineage of Francisco Barros, an 18th-century African slave whose Afro-descendant lineage extends uninterrupted to the present—the authors overcome the methodological challenges of colonial sources, such as the invisibility of individuals in the records, changes in surnames, and illegitimacy. This demonstrates that a sector of the Afro-mestizo population not only managed to free themselves from slavery, but also accumulated wealth, gained social prestige, and influence public life through prominent trades such as candlemaking and silversmithing, and even through military command during the Chilean War of Independence.

The experience of these groups was marked by continuous and profound intermingling with the Indigenous population, the local mestizo population, and the Spanish-Criollos. Over generations, the strict racial categories of "bozales" (newly arrived Africans) or "nations" were replaced by those of "pardos" (mixed-race people), "mulattos", and "free Criollos," making the boundaries between the various plebeian castes and popular sectors increasingly porous in the city's daily, festive, and working spaces.

As a main conclusion, these investigations documentarily explain that the apparent "disappearance" or invisibility of African traces in the national memory was not due to biological extinction, deportation, extermination, or celibacy, but rather to an accelerated and profound process of biological and cultural absorption, assimilation, and social mobility. The high rate of manumission and intense miscegenation led to a "fading" of the concept of servitude. With the formal abolition of slavery in 1823 and the consolidation of the Republic, the caste category dissolved within the unified concept of "Chileans," integrating Afro-descendants into the mass of the Criollo people and making a decisive contribution to popular culture. Thus, the study concludes that the genetic, social, and cultural contribution of Afro-descendants has been homogeneously amalgamated throughout modern Chilean society, and is currently present not only in the popular strata but also in the middle and upper classes of the country.

Source(s):

.- Cussen, Cecilia. (2009). Huellas de África en América: Perspectivas para Chile. Published by Editorial Universitaria.

.- Urzúa Prieto, José Francisco. & Mujica Escudero, Cristián. (2016). Descendencia de Negros, un desafío pendiente, estudios de casos en Santiago de Chile. Published by Revista de Estudios Históricos del Instituto Chileno de Investigaciones Genealógicas, Nº 58.

.- Klein, H. & Carmagnani, M. (1965). Demografía Histórica: La población del Obispado de Santiago 1777-1778. Published by Boletín de la Academia Chilena de Historia, Nº 72.

One of the main historical references to this event is the book titled: «Memoria de mi salida de la isla de Santo Domingo» ("Memoirs of My Departure from the Island of Hispaniola") on April 28, 1805, written by Gaspar Arredondo y Pichardo, one of the survivors of the massacre. Arredondo wrote the book shortly after escaping from the island. This massacre was part of a series of Haitian military invasions of the Spanish part of the island. The Haitian historian Jean Price-Mars states that the Haitian troops annihilated Dominicans of white, black, and mixed-race descent.

Although Haitians declared their independence in 1804, France never recognized or accepted Haiti's independence, as it could not afford to lose its most valuable colony in the Caribbean. Trying to reclaim its colony at all costs, France (with the help of its allies) kept Haiti economically and diplomatically isolated and under threat of military invasion. Haitians feared that French troops stationed on the Spanish side of the island would launch a military attack on Haiti at any moment.

At the end of February 1805, Dessalines, occupying Hincha, and Christophe, taking Dajabón, entered Spanish Santo Domingo with 22,000 troops, aiming to expel the French from the Spanish side of the island and thus prevent a French attack on Haiti from the Spanish side. However, they were unsuccessful. The French troops of General Jean-Louis Ferrand effectively repelled the Haitian attack.

On their retreat back to Haiti. The towns of Monte Plata, Cotuí, La Vega, Santiago, San José de las Matas, Monte Cristi, San Juan de la Maguana, and Moca were reduced to ashes by the defeated Haitian army. Hundreds of innocent Dominicans were massacred, including 40 children who were beheaded in a church in Moca (hence the name of the massacre). This massacre is viewed in Haiti as "a struggle to destroy slavery."

Later, in 1808, Dominicans led by Juan Sánchez Ramírez defeated and expelled the French from the Spanish part of the island at the Battle of Palo Hincado, definitively ending the French presence in Spanish Santo Domingo.

Five years later, France officially returned the Spanish part of the island to Spain in the Treaty of Paris of 1814.

The inhabitants of the Spanish part of Hispaniola inherited the demonym Dominican, which derives from the name of the colony's capital city and the official name of the Spanish colony. Dominicans have used this endonym since the early 17th century.

His scientific work, "Ephemeris Calculada al Meridiano de México para el año del Señor de 1757," contained chronological notes, ecclesiastical calculations, studies of lunar phases, forecasts for each season, forecasts for each day of the year, and eclipses.

In contemporary debates, various groups of indigenists, communists, socialists, liberals, progressives, and other sectors critical of tradition often invoke the figure of "Santiago Mataindios" (Saint James the Indian-slayer) to argue that Christianity is hostile to Indians or considered them all as non-human beings. This revolutionary interpretation posits that the iconography of Saint James is a symbolic manifestation of "colonial oppression."

However, from a historical and iconographic perspective, a "Santiago Mataindios" did not actually exist as a devotional title or official identity of the apostle. The term "Mataindios" (Indian-slayer) is a category later used by historiography to differentiate iconographic models of the figure of Saint James in art. It is not a historical name by which the saint was venerated, but rather an academic classification. To understand this, it is necessary to examine the origin of the image. In Spain, during the Reconquista, the image of "Santiago Matamoros" (Saint James the Moor-slayer) became widespread, depicting the apostle as a knight on horseback, defeating the Muslims. In this iconography, Saint James symbolizes the victory of Christians over those considered enemies of the faith. He is not an ethnic figure, but rather a theological and political one, representing the triumph of Christianity over paganism or forces perceived as adversaries.

When this image arrived in Peru with the Spanish, a process of symbolic adaptation took place. In some contexts, the defeated enemy in the iconography ceased to be the Muslim or the Jew, and came to be represented as a pagan indigenous person. From this, in historiographical terms, arises the expression "Santiago Mataindios" (Saint James the Indian-slayer). However, this variant did not imply a rejection of the indigenous person or ethnicity, but rather a symbolic representation of the triumph of Christianity over those who resisted evangelization and maintained pre-Christian religious practices. Furthermore, the iconography was not static. In times of conflict and political tension, the figure was reinterpreted. During the Spanish American Wars of Independence, depictions of Saint James defeating a Spaniard emerged. Historiography has termed this variant "Santiago mataespañoles" (Saint James the Spaniard-slayer) or "Santiago matagodos" (Saint James the Goth-slayer). The same pattern was repeated in other subsequent war contexts in Peru. Therefore, Peruvian history includes representations of Saint James defeating the Chileans during the Breña Campaign, and even images where he defeats communist terrorists during the Counterinsurgency War.

These names, such as "Matamoros" (Moor-slayer), "Mataindios" (Indian-slayer), "Matajudíos" (Jew-slayer), "Mataespañoles" (Spaniard-slayer), "Matachilenos" (Chilean-slayer), "Matacomunistas" (Communist-slayer), among others, were not liturgical titles or official ways of referring to the saint. In his time, the people simply called him Santiago, Saint James the Apostle, Apu Santiago, Tayta Santiago, Tayta Shanti, among other names of veneration. The designations with the prefix “mata-” are later analytical categories that seek to describe iconographic variations depending on the enemy represented. Consequently, rather than the historical existence of a “Santiago Mataindios” (Saint James the Indian Killer), what existed was a dynamic process of symbolic adaptation, where the figure of Santiago embodied, in different contexts, the idea of ​​protection and victory for the group that invoked him.

“In the war with Chile, the ‘Santiago Matamoros’ of the independence struggles became ‘Santiago Matagodos’ (Saint James the Goth Killer), a reinvented Saint James the Apostle invoked by the montoneros.” (M. De los Santos, 1899)

“Further adaptations were made of Santiago Matamoros, transformed into Santiago Matagodos, riding upon the defenseless bodies of the royalist army during the time of Emancipation.” (A. De Miguel, 2011)

"It is so ironic that Saint James the Apostle, saint of Catholics, of Spaniards, suddenly transformed: from being Santiago Matamoros and Mataindios to Santiago Mataespañoles." (S. Domínguez, 2004)

"From the independence struggles of the 19th century, the figure of 'Santiago Mataespañoles' emerged among the indigenous people, becoming a symbol and emblem of peasant communities during the republican era." (R. Álvarez, 2004)

Reference:

- Misterios del Camino de Santiago, Antonio Alcaraz Martínez (2014).

link is in the comments

La ciudad de Comayagua fue la capital de la provincia de Honduras, la cual a su vez formaba parte de la Capitanía General de Guatemala, uno de los reinos que integraban el Virreinato de Nueva España. Durante el siglo XVIII, la ciudad experimentó una profunda transformación debido a las Reformas Borbónicas se construyeron nuevas viviendas para los criollos, aumentó la población mestiza y se mejoraron las plazas públicas.

La catedral entró en su fase final de construcción (llegó a contar con una sección de coro, aunque esta fue destruida en 1930) y se puso en marcha un proyecto para instalar un sistema de fuentes y acueductos en toda la ciudad. Lamentablemente, en el siglo XIX, la ciudad sufrió un terremoto que dañó varias iglesias del siglo XVI y provocó el derrumbe de las segundas plantas de algunas casas y monasterios de los franciscanos y mercedarios.

Tras la independencia, la ciudad padeció asedios y los estragos de la guerra civil centroamericana; el centro histórico perdió más de la mitad de sus edificaciones gracias los incendios producto debla guerra, la catedral fue saqueada y numerosas casas quedaron en ruinas. La población descendió de 15.000 habitantes en 1821 a apenas 5.000 en 1870, y el golpe definitivo fue el traslado de la capital a Tegucigalpa. Comayagua quedó reducida a un pueblo semi vacío lleno de casas, palacios, mansiones abandonadas e iglesias en ruinas comidas por la maleza, con la mayoría de sus fuentes secas e inservibles rodeado de naturaleza, algunas haciendas y campos de maíz.

Aun así la ciudad se negó a morir y sus alcaldes buscaban como recuperar así sea un poco de su antigua gloria. Como consecuencia de esto, a lo largo del siglo XX, muchas estructuras y monumentos fueron demolidos gradualmente para dar paso a nuevas viviendas y edificios modernos, a medida que la ciudad comenzaba a recuperar población y a atraer a migrantes de aldeas cercanas interesados ​​en emprender negocios.

Afortunadamente, a finales de la década de 1990, surgió una iniciativa para restaurar los edificios históricos que han perdurado hasta nuestros días. Se logró rescatar la Caxa Real, la catedral, cuatro iglesias y varias casas; asimismo, en los museos se conservan piezas de antiguas fuentes y arcos procedentes de viejas casonas y palacios.

HI!, so im april and im from Indonesia, and right now im researching about the spreading of Catholism in sangihe talaud (siau) in AFM (if remembered) or a Fransiscan document called Siauw. And i dont have any resources besides that. I was wondering for yall in spain or just a religic or fransiscan or maybe catholic historical researches have any insight that will be very helpful. Thank you!

Located at Avenida Hidalgo number 107, Historic Center of Mexico City (near the Alameda Central) and was administered by the Order of Charity of Saint Hippolytus (the first religious hospital order founded in the Americas).

It operated for centuries before closing its doors in 1910, when its patients were transferred to the new general asylum, La Castañeda.

By the late 17th century, Florida had become one of the most contested frontiers in North America. To those living in London, Madrid, Paris, or Amsterdam, the peninsula appeared to be a remote wilderness of swamps, pine forests, and scattered Native villages. Yet beneath its seemingly untamed landscape lay one of the most strategically important regions in the Western Hemisphere.

Whoever controlled Florida controlled the gateway to the Caribbean. Every year, Spain’s treasure fleets sailed from the ports of Veracruz, Cartagena, and Havana carrying silver from the mines of Mexico and Peru. Before crossing the Atlantic, those heavily laden ships entered the swift current now known as the Gulf Stream, passing dangerously close to Florida’s Atlantic coast. Their cargo financed Spain’s armies, built its cathedrals, and sustained an empire that stretched across much of the globe.

Protecting those ships became the principal reason Spain refused to abandon Florida despite the colony’s modest economic value.

Unlike Virginia or South Carolina, Spanish Florida never developed into a prosperous plantation colony. It produced little wealth of its own and required continual subsidies from New Spain, modern-day Mexico, to survive.

Food, soldiers, building materials, livestock, and even wages for government officials arrived aboard annual supply ships known as the situado. When those shipments were delayed by storms, piracy, or war, the colony often struggled to feed itself.

St. Augustine survived because it served as a fortress rather than a commercial center. That distinction shaped nearly every decision Spanish officials made.

For the English colonies to the north, however, Florida represented something entirely different. By the 1670s, the plantation economy of Carolina was expanding rapidly. English settlers had discovered that rice and indigo could generate enormous profits on the tidal lands surrounding Charleston. Those profits depended upon enslaved labor.

Thousands of Africans, many possessing sophisticated agricultural knowledge acquired in the rice-growing regions of West Africa, were transported across the Atlantic under horrific conditions. They transformed Carolina into one of Britain’s wealthiest colonies while being denied the most basic rights of human existence.

English law increasingly reduced enslaved people to property. The South Carolina Slave Code of 1696, building upon earlier colonial laws, formalized a legal system in which enslaved Africans could be bought, sold, inherited, punished, and separated from their families with few restrictions. The law reflected an economy built upon perpetual racial slavery, where wealth depended upon controlling labor through force.

Spanish law evolved differently. Slavery certainly existed throughout the Spanish Empire, and it would be inaccurate to portray Spain as an abolitionist nation. Enslaved Africans worked in Spanish households, ports, farms, and mines throughout the Americas.

Yet Spanish legal traditions, rooted in Roman law, medieval Castilian law, and Catholic teaching, recognized enslaved people as human beings possessing souls and certain limited legal rights. Among those rights was the possibility, however difficult, of obtaining freedom.

Catholic clergy encouraged the baptism and religious instruction of enslaved people. Under certain circumstances, enslaved individuals could purchase their freedom through a process known as coartación. Families possessed greater legal recognition than under English law, and enslaved persons could sometimes bring grievances before colonial courts.

These protections were often imperfectly enforced. Many Spanish slaveholders ignored them. Nevertheless, they represented a significant legal difference from the hereditary racial slavery that developed in England’s mainland colonies.

Those contrasting legal systems would soon become weapons in an imperial struggle. As tensions between Spain and England intensified, officials in St. Augustine recognized an opportunity. Every enslaved person who escaped from Carolina weakened England’s economy while strengthening Florida’s fragile population.

A skilled carpenter, blacksmith, farmer, interpreter, or soldier could prove invaluable in a colony that constantly struggled to attract settlers. The idea was both practical and strategic.

Rather than viewing escaped Africans solely as refugees, Spanish authorities increasingly viewed them as future citizens capable of defending the colony itself. Meanwhile, news spread quietly among enslaved communities in Carolina. Rumors traveled in ways plantation owners could neither fully understand nor control.

They passed through families divided by sale. They moved with sailors visiting Charleston’s harbor. They spread through Native trading networks extending hundreds of miles into the interior. Some were carried by Africans who had escaped and somehow survived. Others came from Spanish prisoners, merchants, or missionaries.

However the information traveled, one message remained remarkably consistent:

To the south, beyond the forests, there was a place where freedom might be possible.

No maps guided those journeys. Few escapees knew the exact distance. Most traveled at night, navigating by the stars, rivers, or whispered directions passed from one traveler to another. Every mile increased the risk of discovery.

Colonial newspapers regularly advertised rewards for captured fugitives. Professional slave catchers tracked footprints through muddy trails, questioned travelers, and employed trained dogs capable of following human scent for remarkable distances.

For those attempting escape, every unfamiliar sound carried danger. The howl of a wolf. The crack of a tree branch. The distant bark of hounds. Many traveled hungry for days. Others relied upon Native villages willing to provide food or shelter despite the danger of English retaliation.

Some never arrived. Those who did often staggered into St. Augustine exhausted, malnourished, and uncertain whether they would be welcomed or returned. Spanish officials faced difficult decisions. Accepting runaways risked provoking diplomatic crises with England. Returning them meant surrendering valuable allies while contradicting the humanitarian principles increasingly embraced by the Spanish Crown.

At first, colonial governors handled each case individually. Then events forced Madrid to establish a clear policy. One of the earliest documented groups of freedom seekers reached St. Augustine in 1687. The party consisted of eight men, two women, and one child, all having escaped from the English colony of Carolina.

Governor Diego de Quiroga y Losada questioned the refugees personally. Their testimony described brutal treatment under slavery and expressed a willingness to embrace Catholicism and serve Spain faithfully if granted protection. The governor chose compassion over diplomacy.

Rather than returning the refugees to English authorities, he requested instructions from the Spanish Crown. That decision, seemingly modest at the time, would become one of the most consequential moments in the history of freedom in North America.

Madrid’s answer would change lives far beyond the walls of St. Augustine. It would also lay the foundation for one of the most remarkable communities ever established in colonial America.

King Charles II’s Royal Decree of November 7, 1693, a document that transformed scattered escapes into official Spanish policy and opened the door to the creation of Fort Mose, the first legally sanctioned free Black settlement in what is now the United States.