Antonio de Espejo and the Mexican Inquisition 1571-1586

AFTER the Tribunal of the Holy Office of the Inquisition was established in Mexico in 1571, one of its functionaries, Antonio de Espejo, became a wealthy cattle rancher and entrepreneur in the Bajío (lowlands) region north of Mexico City, an area which today stretches from San Juan del Río through Querétaro to Aguascalientes. During November 1582 until September 1583, Espejo made a reconnaissance of New Mexico and he became a strong contender for the royal contract to colonize New Mexico as the Spanish king and the Mexican viceroy began to screen suitable applicants. It is probable that Antonio de Espejo would have been awarded the New Mexico patent had he not fled central Mexico for the north in the spring of 1581, because there was a warrant out for his arrest on a murder charge. As a Familiar of the Inquisition Espejo attempted to claim immunity from criminal persecution. His uncle and legal representative, Francisco de Santiago, handled his affairs during the civil trial and as the Inquisition investigated the murder charges, because Espejo had already gone to the Nueva Vizcaya frontier.

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The World of the Pueblos

From Stonehenge to Samarkand ◽

10.1093/oso/9780195160918.003.0013 ◽

2006 ◽

Author(s):

Brian Fagan

Keyword(s):

New Mexico ◽

Native Americans ◽

Mexico City ◽

New Spain ◽

Eighth Century ◽

American Southwest ◽

Chaco Canyon ◽

American Government ◽

The North ◽

Sparse Population

The search for El Dorado, the fabled land of gold, brought Spanish conquistadors north from New Spain into the harsh deserts of the North American Southwest. They were searching for the Seven Lost Cities of Cibola, cities said to have been founded as long ago as the eighth century by a legendary bishop who had fled west from Lisbon, Portugal, in fear of the Moors and Islam. When a Franciscan friar, Fray Marcos of Niza, returned to Mexico City from a preliminary expedition in 1539 with stories of a “faire citie with many houses builded in order” and gold and silver in abundance, the viceroy of New Spain quickly organized a major expedition under Francisco Coronado. The expedition ranged widely over the Southwest and far into the interior plains from 1540 to 1542. The disappointed Spaniards found no gold, however, just crowded pueblos “looking as if [they] had been crumpled all up together.” Coronado and his men visited Zuñi pueblos, as well as Pecos in what is now northern New Mexico, where the pueblo was “square, situated on a rock, with a large court or yard in the middle, containing the steam rooms. The houses are all alike, four stories high. One can go over the whole village without there being a street to hinder.” Coronado returned to Mexico City empty-handed from a seemingly desolate and unproductive land. The pueblos were largely forgotten until a sparse population of Catholic friars and then colonists moved northward into the arid lands about a century later. By the early nineteenth century, the great pueblos of Chaco Canyon and Mesa Verde were but vague memories, except to the Native Americans who claimed ancestry from them, and were never visited by outsiders. In 1823, José Antonio Vizcarra, governor of the Mexican province of New Mexico, rode through Chaco Canyon with a small military party during a campaign against the local Navajo. He was in a hurry and contented himself with the observation that the great houses were built by unknown people. Sixteen years later, an American government expedition against the Navajo descended into the Chaco Canyon drainage and sighted “a conspicuous ruin” on a low hill.

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