ROBERT H. JACKSON - Missions on the Frontiers of Spanish America

ROBERT H. JACKSON

Missions on the Frontiers of Spanish America

This article examines missions as a colonial institution on the fringes of SpanishAmerica. The Spanish Crown employed the mission as a cost-effective form ofconverting to Catholicism native peoples living on the frontiers of Spanish America,and incorporating them into the new colonial social and economic order. The articlecompares missions in northern Mexico, the Ro de la Plata region, and eastern Bolivia.

IntroductionIn 1986, director Roland Joff created the film The Mission, which purportedto illustrate the consequences of the 1750 Treaty of Madrid between Spain andPortugal that defined the boundaries between the territories of the two colonialpowers in South America. The treaty incorporated a provision for the transfer ofseven of the thirty Jesuit missions in Paraguay located east of the Uruguay Riverto Portugal. Guaran residents of the seven missions revolted in opposition to thetransfer of their communities to Portugal, and Spanish and Portuguese troopscombined to suppress the uprising.1 The film loosely interpreted the Guaranuprising in the 1750s, but from a neo-utopian perspective reminiscent of theview of the Jesuit missions of Paraguay presented in Voltaires novel Candide.Joffs view of the mission was one of Jesuit purveyors of the true faith andcivilisation, to native peoples who were there but were not actors in their ownhistory. Joffs vision is akin to an older church self-history that emphasised theheroic civilising role of the missionaries and the savagery of the natives.2

1. For a discussion of the Guaran uprising, see Barbara Ganson, The Guaran Under SpanishRule in the Rio de la Plata (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003), chap. 4; Robert H.Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America: A Comparative Study of the Impact ofEnvironmental, Economic, Political, and Socio-Cultural Variations on the Missions in the Rio dela Plata Region and on the Northern Frontier of New Spain (Scottsdale, AZ: Pentacle Press, 2005).2. Examples of this genre include the writing of Peter Masten Dunne, SJ, such as Black Robes inLower California (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1952), and ZephyrinEngelhardt, OFM, the author of many books, including The Missions and Missionaries ofCalifornia, 4 vols. (Santa Barbara, CA: Mission Santa Barbara, 1929). The works on the Jesuitmissions of Paraguay by Guillermo Furlong Cardiff, SJ, such as Misiones y sus pueblos deGuaranes (Buenos Aires: Tip. Editora, 1962), presented a more sophisticated and balanced viewof the history of the missions.

Robert H. Jackson is an independent scholar from Mexico City.

Journal of Religious HistoryVol. 33, No. 3, September 2009

328 2009 The AuthorJournal compilation 2009 Association for the Journal of Religious History

In the past several decades, a new generation of scholars has re-examined thehistorical development of the mission, incorporating new ethnohistoric per-spectives that emphasises the role of the native residents of the missions andexamines the role of the mission as a frontier institution placed within thecontext of larger Spanish colonial policies in the New World. Moreover, mostrecent studies have been written by scholars trained in Latin American history,and have linked the history of the mission more closely to the history of thecore areas of Latin America, such as central Mexico and the Andean region.Furthermore, scholars have also approached the study of missions from acomparative perspective.

Recent publications have taken the study of the mission from the local orregional level to present a larger perspective on the evolution of the institution.A 1995 collection of essays titled The New Latin American Mission History3

brought together original studies of frontiers located in North and SouthAmerica, and focused on ethnohistory, economics, and demographics in a waythat emphasised the role of native peoples in the shaping of their own historicalexperiences. Subsequent publications have summarised the continuing devel-opment of the literature on the topic, and have expanded on the comparativeapproach to the missions.4 Outstanding ethnohistoric interpretations focus onnative responses to the mission programs, including accommodation and resis-tance, and processes of socialcultural change and the extent of religiousconversion.5 Other areas of inquiry include mission economics and nativedemographic patterns.6 The picture that now emerges is of a flexible institutionthat from the perspective of Spanish policy, achieved varying degrees of

3. Erick Langer and Robert H. Jackson, eds. The New Latin American Mission History (Lincoln:University of Nebraska Press, 1995).4. Susan Deeds, Pushing the Borders of Latin American Mission History, Latin AmericanResearch Review 39, no. 2 (2004): 21120; Erick Langer and Robert H. Jackson, Colonial andRepublican Missions Compared: The Cases of Alta California and Southeastern Bolivia, Com-parative Studies in Society and History 30 (1988): 286311; Daniel Reff, The Jesuit MissionFrontier in Comparative Perspective: The Reductions of the Rio de la Plata and the Missions ofNorthwestern Mexico, 15881700, in Contested Ground: Comparative Frontiers on the Northernand Southern Edges of the Spanish Empire, edited by Donna Guy and Thomas Sheridan (Tucson:University of Arizona Press, 1998), 1638; Jackson, From Savages to Subjects; Jackson, Missionsand Frontiers of Spanish America.5. Examples include David Block, Mission Culture on the Upper Amazon: Native Tradition,Jesuit Enterprise & Secular Policy in Moxos, 16601880 (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press,1994); Robert H. Jackson and Edward Castillo, Indians, Franciscans, and Spanish Colonization:The Impact of the Mission System on California Indians (Albuquerque: University of New MexicoPress, 1995); Randall Milliken, A time of Little Choice: The The Disintegration of Tribal Culturein the San Francisco Bay Area, 17691810 (Menlo Park, CA: Ballena Press, 1995); James Saeger,The Chaco Mission Frontier: the Guaycuruan experience (Tucson: University of Arizona Press,2000); Ganson, The Guaran; Deeds, Defiance and Deference in Mexicos Colonial North; seeJuan Luis Hernandez, Tumultos y motines. La conflictividad social en los pueblos Guaranesde la regin misionera (17681799), Memoria Americana 8 (1999): 83100; Guillermo Wilde,La actitud Guaran ante la expulsin de los Jesuitas: Ritualidad, reciprocidad y espacio social,Memoria Americana 8 (1999): 14172; Guillermo Wilde, Los guaranes despus de la expulsinde los jesuitas: dinamicas politicas y transacciones simbolicos, Revista Complutense de Historiade America 27 (2001): 69106; John Worth, The Timucuan Chiefdoms of Spanish Florida, 2 vols.(Gainesville: University Presses of Florida, 1998); Maria Wade, The Native Americans of the TexasEdwards Plateau, 15821799 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2003).6. Examples include Rafael Carbonell de Masy, Estrategias de desarrollo rural en los pueblosGuaranes (16091767) (Barcelona: MAPFRE, 1992); Rafael Carbonell de Masy, SJ, TeresaBlumers, and Norberto Lveinton, La reduccin jesutica de Santos Cosme y Damin: Su historia,

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success among native peoples who were hunters and gatherers, village dwellerswho practiced agriculture, and more sophisticated tribal societies. Eachmission frontier presented challenges to the missionaries, and in manyinstances, native peoples defined limits to the implementation of the missionprograms. The missionaries also encountered problems in dealing with civiland military officials who did not share their level of dedication to their cause,and at times behaved in ways that shocked the morals of the clerics. Civilofficials, soldiers, and settlers also had their own interests that often conflictedwith the goals laid out by the missionaries. Conflicts flared up, for example,over questions of the exploitation of native labour, land, and water rights.Moreover, native peoples often failed to cooperate to the extent that the mis-sionaries hoped, and often exhibited a bad habit of wishing to preserve theirown culture, social practices, and religious beliefs that had served them formany years prior to the arrival of the missionaries and their Spanish or Portu-guese allies.

The mission was the quintessential Spanish frontier institution, designed tosubjugate native groups living on the fringes of Spanish America and toimplement social, cultural, and religious change among the native populationsat less cost to the Crown. The government of Portugal did not support the goalof religious conversion of native peoples in Brazil to the same extent as didSpain.7 This entailed settlement in permanent villages, changes in many socialpractices, including marriage, a new labour regime, and adherence to a newreligion. In Brazil, the equivalent institution became a labour camp for Portu-guese settlers to recruit workers.

The Spanish and Portuguese brought with them a form of Catholicismforged during the reconquista, the seven-century sporadic war to reclaim Iberiafrom Muslim domination (7111492). Iberian Catholicism was militant andsaw as its mission the conversion of all non-Catholics.8 Moreover, IberianCatholicism evolved in a multi-ethnic and multi-religious society. As theCatholic kingdoms on the peninsula emerged as the dominant political force,Iberian Catholicism became increasingly intolerant, and governments andChurch leaders became concerned to maintain religious orthodoxy, as largenumbers of Jews and Muslims became new Christians, often by force. In thelate fourteenth and the fifteenth centuries, there were anti-Jewish pogroms inCatholic Iberia, particularly in Castile, and officials suspected that many newlyconverted Jews and Muslims covertly practiced their old beliefs. In 1483,Isabel of Castile created the first national Inquisition, designed specifically to

su econmia y su arquitectura (16331797) (Asuncion: Markografik, 2003); Robert H. Jackson,Indian Population Decline: The Missions of Northwestern New Spain, 16871840 (Albuquerque:University of New Mexico Press, 1994).7. Isabel dos Guimaraes Sa, Conversion in Portuguese America, in The Spiritual Conversion ofthe Americas, edited by James Muldoon (Gainesville, FL: University Presses of America, 1994),192214.8. Robert Burns, The Crusader Kingdom of Valencia, 2 vols. (Cambridge: Yale University Press,1967).

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pablobradburyHighlightThe Catholicism brought to the Americas by the Spanish and Portuguese was forged during the reconquista => 'militant and saw as its mission the conversion of all non-Catholics'

insure that the forced converts did not secretly practice their own beliefs and tomake sure that Jewish and Muslim religious practices did not contaminate theone and true faith. Iberian Catholicism also had a strong mystical belief inMarianism; it was Iberian clerics who promoted the doctrine of the ImmaculateConception adopted at the Council of Trent that ended in 1565.

This was the faith that the Spanish and Portuguese brought to the Americas,and the government assumed that the native populations would have to becomeCatholics. Moreover, the papacy conceded extensive authority over the Churchin the Americas to the Crown of Castile, known as the real patronato. Thepapacy theoretically was responsible for organising missions to non-Catholics,but in the late fifteenth-century, the popes did not have the resources to fundmissions and were distracted by convoluted politics of the Italian peninsula.The papacy granted the Crown of Castile the right to nominate clerics forpositions in the Church, to create new ecclesiastical jurisdictions, such asparishes, to collect the tithe to finance the Church, and to keep a portion of themonies collected. The Crown was also given authority to censor papal bulls, ordecrees on doctrine and other issues related to the operation of the Church. Inreturn, the Crown assumed responsibility for evangelisation of the nativepeoples in the Americas.

In Mesoamerica and in the Andes region, the Spanish encountered nativepeoples living in hierarchical and stratified state systems, in which nativepeoples paid tribute and provided labour for the benefit of the state. TheSpanish harnessed and modified the existing tribute and labour system toproduce income and labourers for their own purposes. In the coastal region ofBrazil, the natives lived in tribal societies; the Portuguese had to use coercionto get men to provide labour, and used the mission communities called aldeiasto congregate natives into nucleated communities under the supervision of amissionary, where they could be required to work for the Crown or for settlers.9

On the fringes of Spanish America, native peoples were either sedentaryfarmers living in clan-based tribal societies who often practiced seasonalmigration to exploit wild food sources, or were nomadic hunters and gatherersliving in small bands exploiting food resources generally in well-defined ter-ritories. Military conquest of these peoples proved to be elusive or overlyexpensive. Therefore, colonial officials turned to missionaries to organisecommunities, based on the blueprint of the politically autonomous pueblos deindos in Mesoamerica and the Andean region, where natives would be congre-gated, converted to Catholicism, and subjected to a program that attempted totransform the natives into sedentary farmers who paid tribute and providedlabour. In cases where natives already lived in permanent communities, such asin the case of the Pueblo peoples of New Mexico, the missionaries establishedthe mission on the fringe of the existing community. These communities wereknown by different names, including doctrina, misin, and reduccin, and

9. John Hemming, Red Gold: The Conquest of the Brazillian Indians, 15001760 (Cambridge:Harvard University Press, 1978) provides a useful overview of the history of Portuguese-nativerelations in Brazil.



pablobradburyHighlightIberian Catholicism also strongly held mystical belief in Marianism

pablobradburyHighlightThis Iberian Catholicism was the one at the time of Iberian arrival at the Americas

--Vatican had handed extensive authority over to the Spanish Crown => right to nominate clerics, to create new ecclesiastical jurisdictions, to collect tithes, to keep a portion of collections, to censor papal bulls or decrees on doctrine, to assume responsibility for the evangelisation of native Americans

pablobradburyHighlightOn the fringes of Spanish America, natives were often sedentary clan-based tribal societies practicing seasonal migrations or nomadic hunter gatherers

--military conquest in these parts were elusive or overly expensive, so authorities often turned to missionaries to organise communities

came into existence only through royal fiat and received varying levels offinancial support from the Crown.10

Members of religious orders staffed and managed the missions, and gener-ally were independent of secular authority, which frequently became a sourceof tension between local bishops and the missionaries. Missionaries claimedexemption from the payment of tithes and Episcopal mandates, and, in someinstances, received authority to confirm, normally a privilege of the bishops.The mission was to be a short-term measure, and when the natives weredeemed ready to assume their role in the new colonial order, missions were tobe turned over to Episcopal authority. Royal legislation in the 1570s limited theauthority of the missionaries to a decade, but many missions operated for aslong as a century or more. In the late seventeenth century, the papacy organiseda special bureaucracy to help manage the growing number of missions in theAmericas and other areas in the world, known as the Congregation of Propa-ganda Fide. The bureaucrats of Propaganda Fide in turn attempted to institutemeasures to provide future missionaries with training to serve on the missions,such as the organisation of Apostolic Colleges by the Franciscans that managedgroups of missions and provided the missionary personnel to staff the mis-sions. The Jesuits and Franciscans were the most important missionary ordersin Spanish America, but Dominicans, Augustinians, and Mercedarians alsostaffed missions.

The Crown established missions across the northern tier of territories innorthern Mexico, as well as Florida. There were also missions along thefrontier of Spanish South America from the Venezuelan llanos (plains) tosouthern Chile, and in the Ro de la Plata region. These missions experienceddifferent levels of success, as defined by the goals of both royal officials and theCrown. Missionaries faced difficulties in areas where they had to compete withlocal settlers, many of whom demanded native labour for mines, farms, andranches. One example of this was Nueva Vizcaya in northern Mexico, whereJesuit and Franciscan missionaries administered communities that were essen-tially labour camps, and were accused by native peoples of being organisers ofexploitation.11 There were frequent uprisings and flight by the natives. Whenmissions operated in relative isolation or with limited settler pressure on nativelabour, land, or water rights, such as in the Jesuit missions of Paraguay, themissionaries achieved more success in creating stable native communities.

The Karankawas, a native group that lived on the Gulf Coast of Texas,frustrated the Franciscan missionaries who attempted to congregate them onseveral missions (Rosario in 1754 and Refugio in 1793) established in thesecond half of the eighteenth century. The Karankawas lived in bands ofextended families, and practiced a well-defined pattern of seasonal migrationbetween village sites on the coast and inland. The natives knew the bays and

10. For a general discussion of the origins of missions see Robert H. Jackson, From Savages toSubjects: Missions in the History of the American Southwest (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2000),particularly the introduction.11. See Susan Deeds, Defiance and Deference in Mexicos Colonial North: Indians underSpanish Rule in Nueva Vizcaya (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2003).



pablobradburyHighlightMissions independent in a few ways

--independent of secular authority; claimed exemption from tithes and Episcopal mandates

--supposed to be a short term measure => natives were to be integrated into the colonial order and handed over to Episcopal authority when "ready", but while missions were meant to only last up to ten years, many operated for as long as a century

--Propaganda Fide organised by the papacy in late 17th century => special bureaucracy to help manage and provide future missionaries with training

inlets of their territory far better than did the Spanish, and easily evadedcapture when the Spanish military attempted to return fugitives to the missions.At the same time, the Franciscans frequently complained that the military wasnot active enough in forcing the natives to return to the missions, whichcertainly was a cause of friction between the military and missionaries. Thenatives themselves frequently left the missions when they wanted to, did notreturn for extended periods of time, and continued to practice seasonal migra-tion to exploit different food resources. There are records of the baptism ofchildren of natives already baptised at the mission months and even more thana year after their birth, indicating that the parents had not seen fit to return tothe mission for a period of time.12 The missionaries generally blamed the badcharacter of the natives for their failure to fully cooperate in the ways that themissionaries themselves expected them to do. The lack of cooperation wasoften the greatest from the groups that experienced the greatest degree ofdislocation and change following the arrival of the Spaniards and the estab-lishment of missions, including small bands of nomadic hunters and gatherers,or groups such as the Karankawas who practiced seasonal migrations to exploitdifferent food resources. In arid regions, on the other hand, such as BajaCalifornia in northern Mexico, the missionaries tried to control the watersources, and established missions at the most important springs.

The transition to life under Spanish colonial control and in the missionsoften was easier for native groups that practiced a form of agriculture, includ-ing swidden agriculture that required the periodic relocation of village siteswhen field fertility dropped. These societies, such as the Pueblo peoples ofNew Mexico or the Guaran, Chiquitos, and Mojos of the lowlands on theeastern frontier of Spanish territories, often embraced and benefited fromalliances with the Spanish and the missionaries, although the excesses of theSpanish colonial system also drove some of these groups to rebellion, asoccurred in New Mexico in 1680 and parts of Nueva Vizcaya in the sameperiod.13

The Chiquitos mission frontier of eastern Bolivia was one instance of wheremissionaries and native peoples found a generally acceptable balance betweenthe expectations of the Jesuits and colonial authorities and the interests of thenative peoples. The Jesuits established the Chiquitos missions beginning in1691 on the eastern frontier of Alto Peru (modern Bolivia), a part of the largerJesuit province of Paraguay. The Jesuits established the first mission, namedSan Francisco Xavier, in the Chiquitos region in 1691, and eventually estab-lished a total of ten missions. In the 1690s, the Black Robes founded fourmissions: San Francisco Xavier (1691), San Rafael (1695), San Jos (1697),

12. Robert H. Jackson, Una frustrada evangelizacin: las limitaciones del cambio social, cul-tural y religioso en los Pueblos Errantes de las misiones del Desierto Central de Baja Californiay la regin de la costa del Golfo de Texas [A Frustrated Evangelization: The Limitations to Social,Cultural and Religious Change among the Wandering Peoples of the Missions of the CentralDesert of Baja California and the Texas Gulf Coast], Fronteras de la Historia (Bogota, Colombia)6 (2001): 740.13. On the uprisings and the context for the uprisings in Nueva Vizcaya see Deeds, Defiance andDeference in Mexicos Colonial North.



pablobradburyHighlight

pablobradburyHighlightMore sedentary groups that practiced a form of agriculture (incl. Guarani) more receptive to the benefits of reductions than nomadic groups

and San Juan Bautista (1699). However, there was some instability in themission program resulting from shortages of missionaries during the War ofSpanish Succession (17011713). The Jesuits temporarily abandoned San JuanBautista in 1709, but then re-established the mission with a resident priest in1716. It is more likely to have existed as a visita, a community visited peri-odically by a priest, until an increase in the number of Jesuits allowed for thestationing of a resident priest in 1716. At the same time, the Jesuits foundedConcepcin in 1709.14 There was a second expansion in the number of mis-sions in the 1720s. In 1721, the Black Robes established San Miguel and SanIgnacio de Zamucos three years later. The latter mission operated until 1744,when the Jesuit leadership decided to abandon it. However, four years later, in1748, they established a new San Ignacio mission at a different location, closerto the other Chiquitos missions.15

The final expansion came between 1754 and 1760, with the addition ofthree new missions to the Chiquitos chain. The first was Santiago, establishedin 1754, with natives transferred to the new community from San Jos andSan Juan Bautista missions. In the following year, the Black Robes foundedSanta Ana, and in 1760, Santo Corazn de Jesus. The Jesuits relocatedneophytes from San Miguel and San Juan Bautista to form the last namedcommunity.16

During most of the Jesuit tenure, the Chiquitos missions were active con-gregaciones, with non-Christian recruits resettled on the missions periodicallyas a result of expeditions comprised primarily of mission residents sent out bythe Jesuits to locate new converts. Table 1 summarises information on thenumber of non-Christians resettled on the missions as a result of the excur-sions, as they called the expeditions to locate new converts. The 1735 report forSan Miguel mission describes one such expedition. On 1 July 1735, a group of112 natives left the mission to visit a group called the Guarapes. They returnedon December 12 of the same year, with 282 people to be settled on themission.17 Mission censuses distinguished between residents already consid-ered to be Christians and recently congregated peoples undergoing religiousinstruction. In 1713, for example, Joseph Ignacio de la Mata, SJ enumerated apopulation of 1,677 Christians and 119 neophytes receiving instruction at SanFrancisco Xavier.18 In the same year, San Jos mission had a population of1,392 Christians and 428 undergoing instruction.19 In 1734, the Jesuits

14. Roberto Tomicha Charupa, La primera evangelizacin en las reducciones de Chiquitos,Bolivia (16911767) (Cochabamba: Editorial Verbo Divino, 2002), 517.15. Charupa, La primera evangelizacin en las reducciones de Chiquitos, Bolivia (16911767),53637, 547, 549.16. Charupa, La primera evangelizacin en las reducciones de Chiquitos, Bolivia (16911767),55759.17. Anua del Pueblo de San Miguel. Ao de 1735, Biblioteca Nacional, Archivo General de laNacion, Buenos Aires (hereinafter cited as BN, AGN), 6468/12 (n.d.).18. Joseph Ignacio de la Mata, San Francisco Xavier, December 10, 1713, Estado del Pueblo deS[a]n Fran[cis]co Xavier de las Misiones de Chiquitos, BN, AGN 6127/8.19. Juan Bautista Cea, S.J., San Jos, 20 October, 1713, Estado del Pueblo de S[a]n Jos deIndios Chiquitos, BN, AGN 6127/10.



reported the baptism of sixteen adults, new converts, at San Juan Bautistamission.20

The Chiquitos missions had multi-ethnic populations, as did many missionsestablished on other frontiers, such as the California establishments. In 1745,for example, the population of the Chiquitos missions totalled 14,706. Themajority, some 9,625 natives or 65% of the total, spoke Chiquita, but therewere neophytes living on the missions that spoke other languages. There were1,617 Arawak speakers (11%), 649 Chapacura speakers (4.4%), 1,341 Otuquispeakers (9.1%), 1,160 Zamuca speakers (7.9%), and 314 Guaran speakers(2.1%).21 The populations of each individual mission consisted of clans drawnfrom different native communities, and with the periodic resettlement of newconverts, the populations became even more ethnically diverse.

The Jesuit missions of Paraguay (parts of modern Paraguay, Argentina, andBrazil) perhaps were the closest to fulfilling the policy goals of royal authori-ties and the Jesuits themselves. The Spanish introduced an Iberian model ofmunicipal government to the native communities of the more advanced soci-eties, such as those in central Mexico or the Andean region that the nativesthemselves modified to fit their own political traditions. The new systemincluded a town council and various officials. In California, for example,governor Pedro Fages mandated the organisation of annual elections in the

20. No Author, No Date, Annua de la Doctrina de San Juan Bautista en las Misiones de losChiquitos. Ao de 1734, BN, AGN 6468/14.21. Tomicha Charupa, Primera evangelizacin, 278.

Table 1 Numbers of non-Christians settled on selected Chiquitos missions, in selected years.Blank cells = not applicable

Year San Javier Concepcin San Rafael San Miguel Santiago

17111717 24 161718 6911730 142 91731 142 189 92 921732 501733 1761735 2821738 241739 45 2001743 2301758 311759 191760 1001761 531762 3221763 45

Source: Roberto Tomicha Charupa, La primera evangelizacin en las reducciones de Chi-quitos, Bolivia (16911767) (Cochabamba, 2002), 54447, 55051, 55355.



pablobradburyHighlightParaguayan missions perhaps the most successful in terms of fulfilling policy goals of the royal authorities and the Jesuits themselves

Franciscan missions to fill the new municipal positions against the strongopposition of the missionaries. In the Paraguay missions, the Jesuits andGuaran melded the existing clan system to the new municipal governmentsystem. The Guaran clan chiefs, known as caciques by the Spanish, continuedto exercise authority over the members of their clans, and documents as late asthe early 1840s indicate that the caciques retained their authority and privilegedstatus in the ex-missions. The Jesuits also assigned each clan chief a block ofhousing in the mission village for the members of their clan. The caciques inturn exercised collective authority through the cabildo. Detailed censuses ofthe mission reported the population by cacicasgo, or the socialpolitical juris-diction of each cacique.22

The authority and agency of the Guaran caciques became evident in theresistance to the Treaty of Madrid (1750), which attempted to establish bound-aries between Spanish and Portuguese territory in South America. Under theterms of the treaty, Spain agreed to transfer to Portugal the territory east of theUruguay River, which included the sites of seven of the missions. The Guarancaciques of the seven missions affected by the treaty first appealed to royalauthority, and then organised resistance to the transfer, resistance crushed in1756 by a joint SpanishPortuguese military expedition.23 Spain reclaimedcontrol over the territory east of the Uruguay River in 1762, but the lesson ofthe resistance organised by the caciques had not been lost on Spanish officials.Following the expulsion of the Jesuits in 1768, Spanish officials visited theParaguay missions to insure the loyalty of the caciques.24

One of the more difficult tasks in discussing the history of missions is todiscern levels of social, cultural, and particularly religious change among thenative peoples brought to live on the missions. Native peoples brought to liveon the missions outwardly adopted cultural and social norms introduced by themissionaries, such as monogamous marriages and work ethic, although labourdemands became a cause of friction, and in some instances, open rebellion.One difficulty was the introduction of a new gender division of labour thatentailed role reversals. Spanish settlers pressured government officials toprovide labour from the mission populations, but the aldeia in PortugueseBrazil functioned more as a labour reserve. The Spanish introduced new crops,new farming techniques, and livestock and other domesticated animals, andnew forms of preparing food. One concern was adherence to European stan-dards of moral decency, and missionaries clothed natives to the extent possible.The material culture of native peoples changed with the introduction of metal,glass, leather among other new materials for producing goods, but at the sametime, there was considerable persistence in traditional material culture, and thecomposition of the population often determined levels of cultural retention. Inother words, a larger number of natives only recently settled on the missions

22. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 25660.23. On the Guaran resistance to the Treaty of Madrid see Ganson, The Guaran Under SpanishRule, chap. 4.24. On the Guaran resistance to the Treaty of Madrid see Ganson, The Guaran Under SpanishRule, chap. 5; Wilde, La actitud Guaran ante la expulsion de los Jesuitas.



pablobradburyHighlightIn Jesuit Paraguay missions, the Jesuits attempted to meld the existing clan system to the new municipal government system

--Guarani chiefs retained authority and privilege => each clan chief assigned a block of housing in the mission village, these chiefs in turn exercised collective authority through the cabildo

pablobradburyHighlightAuthority and agency of Guarani caciques evident in resistance to the Treaty of Madrid (1750)

--Spain agreed to transfer to Portugal territory east of the Uruguay River, and the resistance was crushed by joint Spanish-Portuguese force => lesson of rebellion not lost on Spanish officials

pablobradburyHighlightDifficult to discern the levels of social, cultural and religious change among native peoples

--usually outwardly adopted cultural and social norms introduced by the missionaries - e.g. monogamy and work ethic

--however labour demands and gender role reversals (Guarani women were the ones who farmed while the men hunted) caused friction

generally translated into the retention of traditional material culture. Nativesliving on the missions also used new materials in the manufacture of traditionalitems, such as making arrowheads from china plates.25

More difficult to measure is the level and extent of religious conversion,syncretism, and the covert survival of traditional religious practices out of theview of the missionaries. Language was one obstacle to conversion, and morespecifically, the culturally embedded meanings of religious concepts, such asthe resurrection of Christ. Although missionaries translated confessionals andother religious texts into native languages, they left key religious concepts inSpanish, Portuguese, or Latin, since there were no analogous concepts in nativelanguages.26 A second issue was the persistence of traditional religious beliefs,which was particularly problematic on those missions that were still activecongregations with influxes of large numbers of pagans. The missionariespromoted a triumphal vision of religious conversion, but reality was often quitedifferent. One indication was the covert creation of symbols related to tradi-tional religious beliefs on mission buildings, such as a pelican and beetleuncovered on walls at San Juan Capistrano mission.27 Dances and other nativereligious rituals, as well as shamanism, survived in the missions, often to thechagrin of the missionaries.28 A campaign to extirpate the kachina religion inthe New Mexico missions in the mid-seventeenth century was a major causefor the 1680 uprising. On the other hand, some native groups developed a senseof being different from natives not living on missions, and as the response tothe terms of the 1750 Treaty of Madrid shows, the Guaran strongly identifiedwith the mission communities.

Demographic patterns were one important factor that determined the long-term extent of social, cultural, and religious change, particularly in thoseinstances where incorporation into mission communities resulted in drasticpopulation losses, and in some instances virtual biological and cultural extinc-tion. In particular, small bands of huntergatherers proved to be demographi-cally fragile. One response of missionaries to communities with chronicallyhigh death rates that resulted in demographic instability was to relocate pagansto repopulate the missions. This in turn created mixed populations of nativeshaving undergone varying levels of social, cultural, and religious change,which in turn created ideal conditions for the persistence of traditional socialpractices and religion. Other mission populations experienced periodic mor-tality crises, but survived and even experienced population growth. Detailedcase studies of demographic patterns on missions on different frontiers illus-trate the dynamic of demographic survival or extinction. The first example isLos Santos Mrtires del Japn, one of the Jesuit missions of Paraguay.

The development of the Los Santos Mrtires del Japn mission site had adirect bearing on demographic patterns on the mission. The mission occupiedthree sites during its history. The Jesuits initially founded the new community

25. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 24056.26. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 242.27. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 41.28. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 24649.



pablobradburyHighlightMost difficult is measuring the level of religious conversion and syncretism

-- language an obstacle => though confessionals were translated to native religions, where there was no analogous concept words were left in Spanish/Portuguese/Latin

--persistence of traditional religious beliefs was problematic for the missionaries =>covert creation of symbols related to traditional beliefs on mission buildings (e.g. pelicans, beetles) have been uncovered; other rituals and shamanism survived to the chagrin of the missionaries

in the region east of the Uruguay River in 1628. They relocated the mission toa new site in the late 1630s in response to raids by slave traders from So Pauloknown as bandeirantes, just west of the Uruguay River between Concepcinand Santa Mara la Mayor missions. The Jesuits relocated the mission to a newand final site in 1704.29

The decision to relocate Los Santos Mrtires del Japn mission in 1704 wasmost likely related to heightened tensions between Spain and Portugal duringthe War of Spanish Succession (17011713). Portugal was allied to Englandduring the conflict. The new site can best be described as having been chosenfor defence. The Jesuits selected the crest of a strategically located hill thatcould help defend the missions or serve as a place of refuge in case ofPortuguese attack. The Black Robes established two other missions at strategiclocations during the course of the war: Trinidad and Santo ngel Custodio.

The Jesuits expended considerable labour in developing the mission at thenew site. The main group of buildings that included the church and cloisterwere constructed on an artificial terrace protected by a wall. At its deepestpoint, the terrace measured six meters deep. A contemporary diagram alsoshows the presence of bodies of water (aguadas) very close to the housing ofthe Guaran residents of the missions. Mosquitoes most likely bred in thesebodies of water, and may have spread a variety of diseases, such as malaria oryellow fever.30 If this hypothesis is correct, chronic maladies spread by mos-quitoes might account for several patterns that were unique to Los SantosMrtires del Japn, such as a gender imbalance with more men than women,and high mortality, and even net population loss in non-epidemic years. Acomparison of crude death rates at nearby Santa Mara la Mayor in non-epidemic years shows an average of 36.8 per thousand population at SantaMara as compared with 58.0 at Los Santos Mrtires del Japn. In the year1756, for example, the crude death rate was an estimated 38.0 at Santa Mara,and 101.7 at Los Santos Mrtires del Japn (see table 2).

The population of the mission grew during the course of the seventeenth-century, following the relocation of the community to a site west of theUruguay River in the late 1630s. In 1643, 1,040 Guaran lived on the mission,and the numbers increased to 1,980 in 1682, 2,371 in 1691, and 2,124 in 1702,two years before the relocation of the missions to its final site in 1704. In 1731,the population totalled 3,874, just prior to the first of three epidemic outbreaksduring the decade. At the end of 1739, and following the three epidemics, thepopulation declined to 2,777 (see fig. 1).31

29. In a report prepared in March of 1706, Salvador de Rojas noted Los Santos Mrtires delJapn had been relocated, and a temporary church had been built and dedicated: Salvador de Rojas,San Luis, March 7, 1706, Angelis Collection, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 29-7-79, no. 93.30. A team of scholars affiliated with the Universidad Nacional de Misiones has conductedarchaeological, architectural, and historical research on Los Santos Mrtires mission. See, forexample, Ruth Poujade, et al., Recuperacin de Santos Mrtires del Japn, 20012002. Thisreport is available on the Internet at: http://www.enciclopediademisiones.com. Arq. Graciela deKuna developed a diagram of the mission complex that identified the bodies of water near thehousing of the Guaran.31. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, appendix 2.



Table 2 The vital rates of Los Santos Mrtires del Japn Mission in selected years

Year Population Families Baptisms Burials CBR CDR AFS

1702 3,536 897 289 259 82.4 73.9 3.91724 3,343 795 190 155 57.4 46.9 4.21733 3,665 901 202 491 51.1 124.2 4.11736 3,396 861 188 199 55.0 58.3 3.91739 2,777 723 132 545 40.9 184.2 3.81740 2,829 682 170 95 61.2 34.2 4.21741 2,833 701 192 160 67.9 56.6 4.01744 2,834 699 184 201 64.5 70.5 4.11745 2,847 710 170 141 60.0 49.8 4.01746 2,930 723 220 134 77.3 47.4 4.11747 2,974 734 214 143 73.0 34.1 4.11753 3,235 812 188 144 58.9 45.1 4.01756 3,217 737 205 341 61.1 101.7 4.41759 3,218 763 187 198 57.9 61.3 4.21762 3,225 760 169 182 51.8 55.9 4.21763 3,099 729 167 185 51.8 59.2 4.31764 2,220 324 173 1,129 54.1 364.3 6.91765 1,688 365 83 561 37.4 25.2 4.61767 1,662 430 115 128 67.6 75.3 3.91802 609 13 38 20.5 59.9

Estimated. AFS, average family size; CBR, crude birth rate; CDR, crude death rate.Source: Ernesto Maeder, La poblacin de las misiones de Guaranes (16411682). Reubi-cacion de los pueblos y consecuencias demogrficas, Estudos Ibero-Americanos 15, no. 1(June 1989), 4980; Ernesto Maeder, Fuentes Jesuiticas de informacion demogrfricamisional para los siglos XVll y XVlll, in Fuentes utiles para los estudios de la poblacinAmericana: Simposio del 49 Congreso Internacional de Americanistas, Quito 1997, coor-dinated by Dora Celton (Quito: Abya-Yala, 1998), 4557; Guillermo Furlong Cardiff, SJ,Misiones y sus pueblos de Guaranes (Buenos Aires: Tip Editora, 1962), 17579, 674;Thomas Whigham, Paraguays Pueblos de Indios: Echoes of a Missionary Past, in The NewLatin American Mission History, edited by Erick Langer and Robert H. Jackson (Lincoln:University of Nebraska Press, 1995), 168; Pablo Hernndez, SJ, Organizacin social de lasDoctrinas Guaranes de la Compaa de Jess, 2 vols. (Barcelona: EDUSC, 1913), 2:61617; Julio Quevedo, Guerreiros jesuitas na utopia de Prata (Sao Paulo: Gustavo Gil Editorial,2000), 96; Individual annual censuses of the Jesuit missions for 1711, 1714. 1724, 1731,1733, 1735, 1736, 1738, 1739, 1740, 1741, 1744, and 1745, 1746, 1747, 1757, 1760, 1762,1763, 1764, 1765, and 1767 titled Catologo de la numeracin annual de las Doctrinas delRo Paran Ao; Catologo de la numeracin annual de las Doctrinas del Ro Uruguay; AGN,Sala lX 7-2-1, 6-9-6, 6-9-7, 6-10-6; Empadronamiento de las Treinta Pueblos de Misiones,por el Coronel Don Marcos de Larrazabal, 1772, AGN, Sala 9-18-8-4; Individual MissionsCensus for 1801 found in AGN, Sala 9-17-3-6; for 1702 Catologo de la Numeracin de lasDoctrinas del Ro Paran, Catologo de la Numeracin de las Doctrinas del Ro Uruguay,Manuel Gondra Collection, MG 592, Benson Latin American Collection, General Librariesof the University of Texas at Austin; Edgar and Alfredo Poenitz, Misiones, ProvinciaGuarantica: Defensa y Disolucion (Posadas: Editorial UNAM, 1993), 5455; Pedro VivesAzancot, Entre el esplendor y la decadencia: La poblacin de misiones (17501759),Revista de Indias 42, no. 169170 (JulioDiciembre, 1982): 54144; Ernesto Maeder andRamon Gutierrez, Atlas histrico y urbano de la regin del noreste argentino: Pueblos deindios y misiones jesuticas (siglos XVlXX) (Resistencias, 1994).



The population of Los Santos Mrtires del Japn mission experienced a netdecline of 1,097 between 1731 and 1739, but then recovered through the 1740sand early 1750s. Crude birth rates exceed death rates, and the number ofGuaran living on the mission increased from 2,777 in 1739 to 3,176 in 1751and 2,981 in 1753. In 1756, the death rate reached 101.7 and was the highestrecorded in all of the missions. In 1759, and again in the years 1762 and 1763,death rates were slightly higher than birth rates, and the population fluctuated.It was 3,328 in 1760 and 3,099 in 1763. Smallpox spread through the missionsin 1764 and 1765, and claimed the lives of hundreds of Guaran at Los SantosMrtires del Japn (see Fig. 1). At the time of the epidemic, 381 refugees fromthe eastern missions still lived there. In 1764, the contagion claimed the livesof 808 Guaran native to Los Santos Mrtires del Japn, and another 149fugitives from Santo ngel Custodio. Another 421 natives of the mission diedof smallpox in 1765. The number of refugees from Santo ngel Custodio stillnumbered 330 in 1765, but the report on smallpox mortality in 1765 did notspecify how many of the refugees died at Los Santos Mrtires del Japn.Altogether, smallpox claimed the lives of 560 refugees living on differentmissions. At the end of 1765, there were only 1,688 Guaran native to themission still living at Los Santos Mrtires del Japn, and 1,662 two years laterin 1767 on the eve of the expulsion of the Jesuits.

Following the expulsion of the Jesuits and their replacement by Dominicansunder the control of civil administrators, the population of Los Santos Mrtiresdel Japn declined due to epidemics, as well as outmigration. Post-expulsioncensuses reported the number of residents of the mission who were absent, and

Figure 1 Ruins of Los Santos Mrtires del Japn misin, Misiones, Argentina.



show evidence of epidemic mortality. In 1772, the population of the missiontotalled 1,724, up from the number reported in 1767, but then dropped insubsequent years. It was 1,321 in 1785, 892 in 1793, and 605 in 1802. Thecommunity of the ex-mission survived following the Jesuit expulsion in 1768,and descendents of the mission residents still live near the site.

The second case study is the Chiquitos missions. The populations of theChiquitos missions were high fertility and high mortality populations, althoughdeath rates also tended to be lower than death rates in the Paraguay missionsbecause of the relative geographic isolation of the Chiquitos mission frontier.As noted above, in some years, the Jesuits baptised non-Christians relocated tothe missions, and in the censuses distinguished between the baptisms of adultsand young children. In the 1750s and 1760s, the missionaries stationed at SanJuan Bautista reported the baptisms of 94 adults. However, the Black Robes didnot distinguish between baptisms of newborn children and young childrensettled on the missions with their parents. Therefore, the birth rates recordedhere for the years in which new neophytes moved to the missions may beinflated. At the same time, birth rates were lower in the Chiquitos missions thanin the Paraguay missions. One factor contributing to the lower birth rates wasa gender imbalance in the populations of most of the Chiquitos missions. At theolder establishments, which included San Francisco Xavier, Concepcin, SanRafael, San Jos, and San Juan Bautista, women and girls constituted less thanhalf of the total populations in most years for which censuses exist (table 3).This meant that there was a smaller pool of potential mothers in relation to thesize of the total population. In most years, births and the baptisms of newlycongregated non-Christians exceeded deaths, and the populations of the Chiq-uitos missions experienced slow to moderate rates of growth. Epidemicsslowed but did not stop growth. The population of San Francisco Xaviermission grew from 1,690 in 1718 to 2,342 in 1739, and 3,302 in 1765. The rateof growth was about 1% per year, based on the years for which data on thenumbers of baptisms and burials exist (see table 4).

There were periodic epidemics during the entire Jesuit tenure in the region.One of the earliest occurred in the years 1697 and 1698, shortly following theestablishment of San Rafael mission. There were other outbreaks in 1702 andin the years 17051707. One document records a trip that Francisco de Herbas,SJ made to native villages east of the missions in 1708 and 1709. The Jesuitrecorded that the epidemic that had spread through the missions the yearsbefore also reached non-Christian native communities.32 An outbreak in 1722at San Rafael resulted in recently congregated clans fleeing the mission.33

Flight from epidemics was a common response, particularly among nativesonly recently congregated on missions. Smallpox reportedly spread through theregion in 1738, and most likely into the following year.34 Information containedin the existing censuses show that there were epidemics in the following years:1735, 1739, 1742, 1744, 1746, 1749, 1761, and 17641765. Nevertheless, the

32. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 36869.33. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 369.34. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, 369.



Tab

le3

Fem

ales

asa

perc

enta

geof

tota

lpo

pula

tion

inth

eC

hiqu

itos

mis

sion

s,in

sele

cted

year

s.B

lank

cell

s=

noda

ta

Yea

rS

anJa

vier

Con

cepc

in

San

Raf

ael

San

Jos

San

Mig

uel

San

Juan

San

Igna

cio

San

taA

naS

anti

ago

San

toC

oraz

nde

Jesu

s

1734

50.3

1735

50.1

49.8

42.6

1736

48.2

1738

48.4

1739

50.0

49.1

46.6

51.8

50.1

48.4

47.7

1742

50.1

47.9

47.7

51.9

50.4

50.6

52.2

1743

49.9

46.8

48.6

45.5

50.2

50.5

52.0

1744

50.1

47.1

47.0

52.6

49.9

50.3

51.8

1745

46.5

47.1

46.7

50.8

48.7

49.2

1746

45.6

47.3

47.4

51.2

49.1

47.6

1747

48.4

47.7

47.7

51.4

49.3

48.3

1748

48.8

48.1

49.1

52.1

50.6

46.7

48.7

1749

48.8

48.6

48.8

52.0

51.0

47.3

50.1

1750

48.6

48.8

49.2

51.8

50.0

48.2

50.0

1755

48.0

48.2

47.3

49.0

50.9

49.8

51.3

51.9

51.4

1756

48.1

48.0

48.1

47.8

50.9

49.7

51.3

53.4

51.0

1757

47.9

47.8

48.2

47.8

51.1

51.9

51.4

53.1

51.1

1758

48.2

48.1

48.7

47.9

52.3

52.0

50.9

57.4

51.2

1760

47.8

47.2

48.3

49.6

51.3

49.6

51.5

51.5

50.5

1761

48.2

46.4

48.9

49.5

50.0

48.9

50.1

51.6

51.0

51.4

1764

48.3

46.9

48.9

48.6

49.7

49.6

51.3

51.6

52.1

51.8

1765

48.4

47.2

48.9

50.8

50.7

49.3

51.4

51.8

51.9

52.0

1767

48.7

47.2

49.8

48.4

47.6

49.1

58.6

52.1

51.9

51.9

1768

48.5

49.0

48.8

48.4

52.9

52.3

48.1

50.7

53.0

51.3

Sou

rce:

Cen

suse

sof

the

Chi

quit

osM

issi

ons

foun

din

Arc

hivo

Gen

eral

dela

Nac

in,

Bue

nos

Air

es,

Bib

liot

eca

Nac

iona

l,61

27/1

4an

d64

67/1

01.



Chiquitos mission populations survived, and the mission communities per-sisted following the expulsion of the Jesuits.

The final example is of several missions on the north Coahuila frontier onthe Ro Grande River, populated by bands of huntergatherers collectively

Table 4 The vital rates of San Francisco Xavier. Blank cells = no data

Year Families Population Baptisms Burials CBR CDR AFS

Parvulos Adults

1735 605 2,345 109 94 46.8 40.3 3.91738 114 491739 560 2,364 112 191 45.4 78.2 4.21740 564 2,481 120 2 65 50.8 27.5 4.41741 1301742 558 2,378 134 3 100 57.2 42.7 4.31743 546 2,416 131 138 55.1 58.0 4.41744 556 2,403 127 140 52.6 58.0 4.31745 552 2,293 115 138 47.9 57.4 4.21746 582 2,314 125 71 54.5 31.0 4.01747 612 2,435 115 144 49.7 62.2 4.01748 620 2,497 153 91 62.8 37.4 4.01749 622 2,480 115 130 46.1 52.1 4.01750 633 2,550 156 86 62.9 34.7 4.01751 72 28.21752 2,323 721753 2161754 1561755 606 2,578 158 92 62.9 36.6 4.31756 615 2,639 165 104 64.0 40.3 4.31757 631 2,728 156 57 59.1 21.6 4.31758 642 2,799 154 83 56.5 30.4 4.41759 1701760 656 2,978 171 101 58.8 34.7 4.51761 666 3,065 191 104 64.1 34.9 4.61762 158 51.61763 1941764 703 3,256 176 113 55.1 35.4 4.61765 728 3,302 198 142 60.8 43.6 4.51766 164 49.71767 3,201 173 21768 147 45.9

Estimated. AFS, average family size; CBR, crude birth rate; CDR, crude death rate.Source: San Francisco Xavier Baptismal Register, San Javier Parish Archive, San Javier,Bolivia; Censuses of the Chiquitos Missions found in Archivo General de la Nacin, BuenosAires, Biblioteca Nacional, 6127/14 and 6467/101; Pedro Querejazu, ed., Las misionesjesuiticas de Chiquitos (La Paz: Fundacin BHN, 1995), 29095, 336; Ernesto Maeder, Lasmisiones de Chiquitos: Su evolucin demogrfica la etapa jesutica y pos-jesuticas (17101767 y 17681830), in Iglesia, misiones y religiosidad colonial, edited by Marcelo ArduzRuiz and Enrique Normando Cruz (Jujuy: Centro de Estudios Indgenas y Coloniales, 2000),1136.



known as Coahuiltecos, who were very different in terms of social and politicalorganisation from the natives living on the Paraguay and Chiquitos missions.Between 1699 and 1703, the Franciscans established three missions nearSan Juan Bautista presidio not too far from the Ro Grande River: San JuanBautista, San Bernardo, and San Francisco Solano (see Figs. 2, 3). The mis-sionaries relocated the missions several times, and in 1718 transferred SanFrancisco Solano to the San Antonio River and renamed the establishmentSan Antonio de Valero. The populations of the remaining missions San JuanBautista and San Bernardo fluctuated with the pace of congregation of newrecruits. In 1727, for example, the population of San Juan Bautista countedthirty non-Christians, and San Bernardo thirty-five. A decade later, in 1738, thenumbers of non-Christians numbered sixty and 347, respectfully, at San JuanBautista and San Bernardo (Table 5).35 Similarly, the populations of the twomissions declined in the second half of the eighteenth century, and only 125remained in 1797. The instability and demographic decline of the missionpopulations can be shown in another way. In 1777, Agustn Morfi, OFM,reported that the missionaries had baptised 1,618 and buried 1,073 since thefounding of the mission in 1702, with a net difference of 545. However, thepopulation of the mission was only eighty at the time of Morfis inspection and

35. Felix Almaraz, Crossroads of Empire: The Church and State on the Ro Grande Frontier ofCoahuila and Texas, 17001821 (San Antonio: Center for Archaeological Research, University ofTexas at San Antonio, 1979), 5153.

Figure 2 Ruins of San Berbardo misin, Guerrero, Coahuila.



report, clearly indicating that many neophytes had chosen to not remain on themissions. The missionaries at San Juan Bautista baptised 1,434 nativesbetween 1699 and 1761, but again the population of the mission was smallcompared with the total number of natives baptised.36 By the end of the

36. Robert Weddle, San Juan Bautista: Gateway to Spanish Texas (Austin: University of TexasPress, 1968), 271; Robert H. Jackson, Congregation and Depopulation: Demographic Patterns inthe Texas Missions, Journal of South Texas 17, no. 2 (Fall 2004), 638.

Figure 3 A second view of the ruins of San Bernardo misin showing the unfinished churchbegun around 1760.

Table 5 Population of San Juan Bautista and San Bernardo missions in selected years. Blankcells = no data

Year San JuanBautista

SanBernardo

Year San JuanBautista

SanBernardo

1699 150 1761 222 3701702 400 1762 216 3771705 144 1764 169 3251706 153 115 1772 2161727 240 200 1777 107 1651738 298 563 1781 1551740 436 460 1790 63 1031756 224 297 1798 44 74

Source: Robert H. Jackson, Congregation and Depopulation: Demographic Patterns in theTexas Missions, Journal of South Texas 17, no. 2 (Fall 2004), 35; Cecilia Sheridan, Anoni-mos y desterrados: La contienda por el sitio que llman de Quauyla siglos XVlXVlll(Mexico, DF: CIESAS, 2000), 291.



eighteenth century, the Coahuiltecos faced virtual cultural and biologicalextinction, and is an example of a fragile population disintegrating whenincorporated into the missions. Within a century of the establishment of themissions, the bands had largely disappeared.

The drastic population decline of groups such as the Coahuiltecos was onefactor contributing to the demise of the mission system in the late eighteenthand early nineteenth centuries. Enlightenment ideas contributed to an increasedquestioning of the role of the Church in Iberia and the Americas, and of themission increasingly viewed by reform-minded government officials as a colo-nial anachronism that should be reformed or phased out to more fully integratenatives into society. The small size of some mission populations became aconvenient excuse for closing them down, as occurred in the case of the fivemissions in the San Antonio, Texas area in 1794. The government ordered theclosing of San Antonio de Valero mission and the partial secularisation of theremaining four missions.37

The changing ideological climate affected the missions in other ways. TheSociety of Jesus became an early target of the growing anti-clericalism inEurope. One reason was the distinct organisation of the order and because theyanswered directly to the Pope. The Society of Jesus was a truly internationalgroup that recruited members without regard for national borders, and did notcreate an internal subdivision with units in each country, as did other orderssuch as the Franciscans. Portugal expelled the Jesuits in 1759, thus removingthe order that had been most active in missionary work in Brazil. Francefollowed suit in 1764 and Spain several years later in 1767/1768. Royal offi-cials and the leaders of the remaining missionary orders had to scramble to findreplacements, and in some instances turned older missions over to Episcopalauthority.

The onset of independence in Spanish America spelled the final end of thesurviving missions. Liberals who inherited the mantle of anti-clericalism chal-lenged the continued reliance on missions on the frontiers, and phased theinstitution out. In 1813, the liberal Spanish Cortes decreed the secularisation ofexisting missions, although the return to power of Ferdinand VII in the follow-ing year prevented the implementation of the measures. Mexican liberalscrafted a new secularisation law in 1833 that ordered the closing of themissions in places like California.38

The pattern in the Ro de la Plata region, on the other hand, was different inseveral respects. Following the expulsion of the Jesuits, royal officials assumeddirect supervision over the missions, and the missionaries that replaced theBlack Robes only carried out a spiritual function. The missionaries no longerhad control over the temporalities or the mission economies and resources. Thewars associated with the French Revolution and the rise to power of Napoleon

37. For a discussion of the demise of the mission as a frontier institution, see Jackson, Missionsand Frontiers of Spanish America, chap. 6.38. Robert H. Jackson, The Impact of Liberal Policy on Mexicos Northern Frontier: MissionSecularization and the Development of Alta California, 18121846, Colonial Latin AmericanHistorical Review 2, no. 2 (1993): 195225.



Bonaparte in France resulted in further warfare in the region that ostensibly hadended with the signing of the Treaty of San Ildefonso in 1777, which replacedthe Treaty of Madrid abrogated in 1762 by Spain. During one of the wars, in1801, a Portuguese militia force occupied the territory east of the UruguayRiver. Continued warfare between 1810 and 1830 in the Ro de la Plata resultedin the physical destruction of many of the missions and the dispersion of theGuaran population.39

The independence of Latin America, however, did not end the history of themission as a frontier institution. By the 1840s, if not earlier, the colonial-eramissions had largely ceased to operate, and the native populations eithercontinued to reside on the ex-missions or dispersed. A new group of missionscame into existence towards the end of the nineteenth century in places like theChaco region and the eastern sections of Bolivia inhabited by the Chiriguano.These new missions in South America continued to operate into the twentiethcentury and as late as 1949.40 These new missions, however, were different inmany regards to the earlier colonial institution. The missionaries did notreceive the same level of government support and did not exercise control overthe mission economies. The Bolivian government tolerated but did notempower the Franciscans. Moreover, the missionaries did not enjoy authorityover the natives who chose to live on the missions, and who often came andwent as they pleased. Many Chiriguanos, for example, worked on sugar plan-tations in northern Argentina. Finally, the government did not even try tobalance the conflicting interests of the Franciscans and the ranchers. Themissionaries complained of encroachments by and conflicts with the ranchers,but the Bolivian government did little to ameliorate the problem.

The mission was an important frontier institution, particularly during thecolonial period. It served the policy objectives of the Spanish government tocolonise frontier regions at minimal expense, but also reflected a fundamentalcontradiction in Spains policies in the Americas between protecting and con-verting the native peoples and promoting colonisation and economic develop-ment. Portugal, on the other hand, provided considerably less support to theevangelisation of the native populations. The mission programs did not alwaysdo well by the native peoples the missionaries ostensibly came to save. Theunderlying paternalism and cultural chauvinism of the missionaries colouredtheir responses to the natives, and often set the tone for the implementation ofthe objective of religious conversion and socialcultural transformation alongthe lines envisioned by the missionaries.

39. Jackson, Missions and Frontiers of Spanish America, chap. 6.40. Erick Langer and Robert H. Jackson, Colonial and Republican Missions Compared: TheCases of Alta California and Southeastern Bolivia, Comparative Studies in Society and History30 (1988): 286311; Erick Langer, Liberal Policy and Frontier Missions: Bolivia and ArgentinaCompared, Andes 9 (1998): 197213; Erick Langer, Missions and the Frontier Economy: TheCase of the Franciscan Missions among the Chiriguanos, 18451930, in Latin American MissionHistory, edited by Langer and Jackson, 4976; Erick Langer, Franciscan Missions and ChiriguanoWorkers: Colonization, Acculturation, and Indian Labor in Southeastern Bolivia, The Americas43, no. 3 (January 1987): 30522; Erick Langer, Mission Land Tenure on the SoutheasternBolivian Frontier, 18451949, The Americas 50, no. 3 (January 1994): 399418.



ROBERT H. JACKSON - Missions on the Frontiers of Spanish America

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