What was the ‘encomienda system’?
In the economies of the Spanish colonies, Indian labor was used to support plantation-based agriculture and extract precious metals and other resources. EX: sugar, silver
The Encomienda System was a labor system used by the Spanish colonizers in the Americas during the colonial period. It was established in the 1500s and was essentially a form of slavery. The Spanish crown granted wealthy colonizers (encomenderos) the right to demand tribute and forced labor from Indigenous people who lived on their lands. The encomienda system was justified on the basis that the Indigenous people were being protected by the Spanish settlers and, in exchange, they were expected to provide labor and goods.
The system was highly exploitative, and the Indigenous people who were subjected to it were often subjected to brutal working conditions, violence, and forced conversion to Christianity. Used mainly in Mexico, Central America and South America.
In this system, the encomenderos had complete control over their encomienda, the land, the people living on it, and the resources. This led to extreme oppression and abuses of the Indigenous people, which caused the decline of the population, through overwork, starvation, and diseases brought over by the Europeans.
Although the encomienda system was abolished in the late 1700s, it has left a lasting impact on the social, economic, and cultural history of the Americas, particularly in regards to the treatment of Indigenous people.
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