Ethnic Militias and Insurgency in the Arizpe Intendancy

Background

During the 16th century, the Spaniards who arrived at the territory currently known as Mexico brought with them military practices inherited from the long struggle to reconquer Spain from the Moors. One of these was the host, or hueste, a group of warriors who, voluntarily and without pay, enlisted under the command of a militia leader to carry out an expedition of conquest. This type of venture was an indication that the Spanish Crown lacked the material means to carry out the enterprises of conquest and therefore left them in private hands. The hueste was commanded by an adelantado or caudillo, a military leader who had made capitulaciones, an agreement with the corresponding royal authority, and was therefore authorized to recruit men of war for exploration and conquest expeditions, which were financed primarily by the leader and by what the rest of the members of the hueste might be able to provide (Dougnac, 1994: 55–70; Navarro, 1964: 47–48).

The military services provided by these individuals were rewarded by the crown with booty, lands, titles of nobility, exemptions, privileges, and lordship over the conquered population. Thus, military services became a medium through which peasants and other non-landholders could ascend the social hierarchy, obtain land, and become hidalgos or noblemen (Rouquoi, 2000).

These practices of bestowing favors in exchange for military services to the Spanish Crown have been documented in the historiography of the Spanish conquest of Mexico-Tenochtitlán. The Tlaxcaltecas, for example, allied themselves with Hernán Cortés to defeat the Aztec capital and obtain privileges and exemptions from the Spanish monarch for their military services (Gibson, 1954: 593–597). This alliance set the standard for what ensued: the native tribes that supported the Spaniards militarily were singled out from the others and were allowed to carry weapons,¹ use horses, and were exempt from paying taxes and being subject to repartimiento, a royal stipulation that forced indigenous peoples to provide temporary workers to the Spaniards.

The importance of this policy is amply documented in the Spanish advance into peripheral areas of the densely populated zones in the Mexico valley, as was the case with the campaigns of Hernán Cortés toward the southern Pacific coast and Nuño de Guzmán toward the west and northwest, where Tlaxcaltecas, Mexicas, Tarascos, and other conquered indigenous peoples provided large contingents of auxiliary warriors to the Spaniards, who took advantage of the spoils of war, such as the ability to capture slaves (Álvarez, 2009: 38–39, 42–44, 53).

In a similar way, the support of the indigenous auxiliary forces was essential to the war against the Chichimecas, indigenous hunter-gatherers who inhabited the territories north of the city of Mexico-Tenochtitlán, whose attacks made it impossible to mine the silver veins discovered in Zacatecas in 1546. During this war, the Otomí allies received privileges for their support: land in the new settlements and the tools to work it, the power to elect authorities, permission to enslave the captured Chichimecas, use of weapons, horses, and exemptions from taxes and repartimiento. Their caciques or chiefs were named captain generals and granted military jurisdiction in the Chichimeca provinces, and were distinguished with noble titles, uniforms, use of war ornaments, and the privilege of inheriting their appointment (Powell, 1977: 82–83, 166).

This system of war that relied on the support of auxiliary indigenous forces was a system of exception typical of the advancement of the war’s frontier, and its reason for being diminished as Spanish dominion was consolidated. Thus, as the Hispanic presence continued to advance toward the north, the “pacified” territories to the south were governed by the “normal” monarchic authorities: mayors, town councils, corregidores, etc., while the hueste, the auxiliary Indians and other frontier institutions, such as religious orders, followed the advancement of the Spaniards toward the north (Calvo, 2000: 21–44).

Even after the Spaniards defeated the nomadic warriors, several inaccessible territories—such as the mountainous areas—became a haven for natives that remained insubordinated, who sporadically attacked towns under Spanish dominion; such was...