October 14, 2023 • 29 mins
Don Juan de Oñate was a man of La Frontera-- the frontier. Determined to bring the laws of the Spanish Crown to new territories, he wound up being condemned to exile by those same laws. He was the author both of glowing accounts of his own successes as well as some of the very testimony used to convict him after accusations of mistreatment of his fellow colonists and torture of the indigenous people of Acoma.
We examine Oñate from his expedition north from El Paso del Norte to his audacious claim of success in converting 33 Pueblos and tribes to the King's rule.
We trace his arduous journey to California, his conquest of the New Mexican territory, and the stringent trials he encountered as governor.
But that's not the whole story - we also unpack his enduring-- and conflicting-- legacies. We also explore recent-- and heated conflicts-- in Albuquerque, Alcalde, and Espanola around memorials to Oñate, conflicts which risk establishing New Mexico's newest, and worst tradition: Shooting incidents over the removal of statues.
From the heated debates surrounding his statues to the indelible impact on New Mexico, we leave no stone unturned. Prepare to challenge perceptions and unveil truths about this divisive historical figure.
Trigger Warning: Although we generally keep it PG at the Enchantment Chronicles, this episode does refer to executions and the mutilation and enslavement of indigenous people, as well as a describing some battle scenes.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Johnny (00:10):
Welcome to the Enchantment Chronicles with the
Men of Enchantment.
Today, we're going to talkabout Don Juan De Oñate Drew.
Drew (00:20):
Yeah, he's been in the news recently.
As New Mexico risksestablishing a new and terrible
tradition.
We had a protest turn violentfor the second time around one
of its statues In Albuquerque afew years ago.
A statue that was put up in2004 in front of the Albuquerque
(00:41):
Museum was being protested andthen some protestors made an
attempt to actually tear it downand an altercation ensued and
one of the counter protesters,after challenging them
physically, it wound up shootingsomeone, who thankfully didn't
(01:02):
die, and in this case, a statuethat originally was erected in
1998 at Alcalde, just north ofEspanola, was not being re
erected in front of the EspanolaCourthouse and there were
protestors celebrating that, andagain some violence ensued and
(01:24):
counter protesters shot andagain, thankfully did not kill
anyone.
Johnny (01:32):
So that's kind of where we are With that.
We thought it would be good totalk about Oñate To begin with.
Drew (01:39):
He was our first governor, so that's why there was this
spate of statues being erectedaround 1998.
That was the 400th anniversaryof the Oñate expedition, which
was not the first expeditionSpanish expedition into New
Mexico, but he had been selectedas our first governor.
Johnny (01:59):
Oñate was born in 1550 to a noble family, the Oñates,
son of Cristobal de Oñate, andhe was born down in New Spain
amongst the people of what inZacatecas.
Drew (02:16):
Yeah, in Zacatecas His father was actually a Basque who
had come to New Spain and therethere was continued sort of
indigenous resistance by groupsof the Spanish people labeled
that Chichimecas, I'm not sure.
It's not clear that they werein fact one people or so on.
(02:41):
But he was born at aninteresting time.
Shortly before around the timehe was born, the last Nuevas
were passed in 1542 and thosewere laws passed, agreed to by
(03:01):
the King of Spain, King Charlesof Spain, that would end the
hereditary encomienda.
In other words, if you became anoble, yeah, you could sort of
treat the indigenous people asyour serfs, but that would not
pass on to your sons.
Now it was pushed by a man whobecame a priest, bartolome de
las Casas.
(03:21):
His father had sailed withColumbus and he inherited a
plantation on Hispaniola.
But de las Casas was horrifiedby the treatment of the Indians
there and returned to Spain,pushed the Vatican to first
recognize that the indigenouspeople were in fact human beings
(03:41):
and there was actually a trialabout this and that they had
souls, and from there wassuccessful in passing the laws
that the last Nuevas, that endedthe hereditary encomienda
system.
So that was the end of theinherited servitude in the
Spanish Empire.
(04:02):
Officially On the frontier,things would be a little more
controversial, but that's whereOniate is born at this changing
time in Spain.
So he gets himself appointed tobecome the first governor in
1595, largely because he agreedto fund the expedition himself,
(04:23):
and a few years later he startsout for the territory that's
been awarded to him right.
Johnny (04:29):
That's right.
So he essentially bought hisway to the governorship.
Is that what?
It is yeah, so that was in 1595.
But it took a few years for himto get his stuff together and
recruit folks and he eventuallymade it to El Paso del Norte,
which was at that point, Ibelieve, part of Nuevo Mexico.
(04:52):
But that was what, early 1598he makes it to El Paso.
Drew (05:02):
Yes.
Johnny (05:03):
Yeah.
So he departed from SantaBarbara in Mexico and he finally
gets to El Paso with 560 males,129 soldiers, lots of women and
children and Indian servantswho weren't counted, but a bunch
(05:24):
of livestock, 7000 livestock,and a few monks, eight friars,
eight friars, yeah, and two laybrothers.
Drew (05:37):
And out of those 129 soldiers his eight year old son
was apparently given alieutenant's commission.
I don't know if that was a Joegirl, if that was part of, if
that was a payroll, but I don'tknow if his son counted as a
child or as a soldier in those129 soldiers.
But he does travel north andextends the Camino Real by
(06:05):
several hundred miles as hetravels north, the Camino Real,
and so he started what in fromEl Paso.
Johnny (06:15):
He takes off around March, april or so, from El Paso
.
When he heads north, he crossesthe river and at that point he
declares he lays claim to theterritory of New Mexico and
declares that every creature,spiritual and corporal, rational
and irrational, from thehighest share of to the lowliest
(06:36):
ant and the tiniest butterfly,are kingdom, are parts of the
kingdom of Spain, so subjects ofSpain.
Drew (06:43):
So he's claiming that's interesting Cherubs and subjects
and insects, yeah.
Johnny (06:52):
Yeah, why not take it off?
Take it all, but he they hadheaded north.
They cross the river and theyhead north towards what is now
north of Las Cruces, and thenthey pass through the Jornada
del Muerto, and where theytravel a few days before they
pop out near Soccorro.
Drew (07:13):
Yeah, the Jornado is where you kind of have to veer away
if you're least of your haulingwagons away from the Rio Grande
and and it's called the Hornadodel Merto, the journey of the
dead man, and later we'll hearabout some, some literal dead
men from that journey.
But in this case they managedto pass through the desert and
(07:36):
come north.
And he gives a report, the actof obedience and vassalage by
the Indians of Santo Domingo.
He has to report back to theking.
You know what does he find?
Does he find gold?
Does he find silver?
You know what?
How many souls has he converted?
So in one of his reports heswears that he told
(07:58):
representatives of 33 Pueblosand tribes that he had come from
the most powerful king on earth, the king of Spain, to bring
about the salvation of theirsouls.
And he said quote one couldeasily see and understand that
they were very pleased with thecoming of his lordship.
And quote so he's.
He's certainly givingoptimistic reports back to
(08:23):
Mexico and to New Spain at thetime, and and to the crown.
Johnny (08:31):
And, to be fair, hauling 7000 livestock.
That's a pretty big haul forthat time it's got.
It must have been a site.
Site to see.
Drew (08:44):
Yeah, mark Simmons wrote a biography of Onate and he
records some.
Sometimes that he encouragesthe group by.
You know he dives into a floodon horseback just to show
everybody that it can be doneand they get the, gets the
wagons across the flood.
So he's, he's certainly a bold,a bold leader of this
(09:12):
expedition.
And then he establishes thefirst and second capitals of New
Mexico, right, johnny?
Johnny (09:19):
That's right, yeah, up near Okay Owinge Okay Owinge?
Ok, he establishes the firstcapital, san Juan de los
Cuelleros, and that was acapital for a couple years.
And later he establishes and,and that was 1598.
And later, in 1599, heestablishes the second capital.
(09:41):
So was it San Gabriel?
San Gabriel which was nearbybut nobody really knows where,
at least what I've read.
Nobody really knows what whereeither are, but although there
has been some research withinthe last 30 years.
So was this on his way out toCalifornia or on the way back
(10:07):
into Cal from California?
Drew (10:09):
He camped in 1598.
And so he stopped at Acomafirst and then at El Morro.
But his, his nephew, zaldivar,leads a second group close to
(10:31):
Acoma, and there Zaldivar, ashis uncle had before, demanded
food and, according to theaccounts of soldiers named
Vivero, may have stolen twoturkeys and been killed.
There are other accounts,including Tony Hillerman's, that
say and they seem to be basedon some oral tradition that
(10:55):
Zaldivar demanded Acoma women asservants or what have you.
But in any event things turnviolent and Zaldivar, according
(11:16):
to Viagra's later account,actually is killed by Zutacapan.
That's not exactly clear.
And here I should say that thisis based on the Historia de la
Nueva Mexico which Viagra writeslater, in 1610, and he's
(11:40):
imitating Virgil's Aeneid, theLatin story of the founding of
Rome.
So the first two lines are thatof of arms I sing, and of that
heroic son, of his wondrousdeeds and of his victories won.
So he's, he's telling a verysympathetic account of Onate,
and in it there's a, there's abrutal battle.
(12:04):
But even in in his verysympathetic account, viagra in
Cantos 21-23, kind of capturesZudacopan's Acoma perspective.
He refers to him as a Lucifer,but he says quote that Zudacopan
(12:27):
told his fellow natives tell me, how could there be a greater
misfortune, a more terribledisgrace upon all of us than to
submit to the slavery andsubjugation offered us and be
obliged even to feed thesestrangers?
I swear by all the living godsthat not a man should remain
(12:48):
rather than submit to thistyranny.
And Viagra describes a threehour battle at which Viagra was
was not present.
We should emphasize this.
He's.
He's actually with Onate at thetime, but he says there's
fighting across the Mesa tops,the archbuses spit forth the
hidden missiles from their bayerbarrels, laying low a number of
(13:09):
the foe.
But Zudacopan himself struckthe brave Zaldavar a terrible
blow on the forehead andZaldavar fell, delivered onto
that eternal sleep to which weare all doomed someday.
And six, six banyards are theonly ones who survive.
They jump from the cliffs atsome point clearly not from the
(13:34):
top of the cliffs, that would.
That would be fatal but theyjump and manage to escape.
We don't know how many acrimonswere killed in that battle.
But Ognate gets worried.
He finds out his uncle's, hisnephew's been killed and he
resolves to punish the acrimonts.
but he decides to do itaccording to the law and so he
(13:57):
goes before the, the local monks, the Franciscan friars that he
brought with him, and asks forthem to declare a just war,
because the acrimons hadwillingly, according to Onate,
declared their subjugation tothe king.
Johnny (14:13):
And so that earlier battle was Zaldavar where he was
killed.
That was early December of 98,1598, right so?
And then it took them about amonth, month and a half, to to
get the appropriate declarationof war or whatever was necessary
(14:37):
, and then they headed back inlate January.
Does that sound about right?
Drew (14:42):
Yeah, and, and they're a brutal battle.
In the suit, you know, theAcoma Pueblo is, it seems almost
impregnable.
You know, they've got stones,they've got, they've actually
captured some of the breastplates and swords of the
previous battle and they canthrow stones down.
(15:06):
But Onate orders a frontalassault that manages to distract
them, while a few of his mensneak up the back way and manage
to get to the top of the mace,at which point their firepower
becomes overwhelming.
Johnny (15:23):
So, and that that battle was January 22nd of 1599.
I believe that's when itstarted, and there was some at
that point, 4,000 people livingon the acrimonpoblos and at that
battle, at least 1,000 warriors, of whom 500 died, and about
(15:44):
300 men and women and childrendied.
So around 800 to 1,000 peopleprobably died in that, in that
assault.
Yeah, of those remaining thatlived, who were taken prisoners,
they were shipped around, someshipped to Mexico City.
There were some other penaltiesthat were waged against folks.
Drew (16:10):
Yeah, Onate is the governor, so he's kind of the
judge in this case.
He's both the participant inthe combat and he's passing the
sentences.
And he sentences all Acoma menand the boys over 12 to face
amputation of their right feetand 20 years of servitude, 20
(16:30):
years of slavery.
The women and girls were to besentenced to 20 years of
servitude and two Hopi men whohappened to have been visiting
Acoma because there's traderoutes to all of these
communities and people haveinteractions but these Hopi men
just happened to be there, so hehad their right hands cut off
(16:52):
and he sent them back to theirpueblos in Arizona so that they
could pass warnings to them notto resist the Spanish.
Now, later, david Robertsreports that a historian it's
worth mentioning the first threeEnglish accounts of Onyates of
Acoma Pueblo, I'm sorry don'teven mention this massacre and
(17:14):
that may be because they justhad not been exposed to it or
maybe they didn't want toconfront that history.
But through the 1930s there's alot of accounts that just don't
mention this part and one recenthistorian tried to argue that
(17:35):
that sentence might not havebeen carried out, that in fact,
a lot of the time the Spanishhad this little play where they
would sentence natives to veryharsh penalties and the priests
would beg for their forgivenessand get them out of it.
But Onate himself wrote the saidsentence was carried out as
(17:55):
decreed in the Pueblo of SantoDomingo and other towns nearby
where the Indians whose handsand feet were to be cut off were
punished on different days.
And according to Lieutenant,former Lieutenant Governor of
Acoma, brian Vio, he said basedon our oral history, a lot of
(18:19):
Acoma elders from 30 years agowould have supported the idea of
Onyates sentence having beencarried out.
But he does go on.
There's a lot I can't tell youand I won't and that's kind of
par for the course that if youknow about the relationships
between the Pueblos and theEuropean settlers, the Pueblo
(18:43):
tradition definitely began toemphasize privacy and secrecy
when dealing with outsiders as adefense against persecution.
But that story becomes one ofthe primary things that's
introduced later at his trial.
But first he makes it back toCalifornia, right, johnny?
Johnny (19:06):
Yeah, so after this battle he kind of Nothing really
happens.
Well, I'm sure stuff happens,but after this battle he
eventually heads back.
He tries to make it back toCalifornia, or tries to make it
to California, does make it toCalifornia.
He left in 1604.
Again, he's leaving in late.
(19:28):
I don't know why, but he'sleaving in late, the late year,
heads back down through the Zuniand the Hopi Pueblos along the
Colorado River.
He makes it to the Gulf ofCalifornia in January 1605.
Hangs out for a little while,few days, and then he turns
right back around and comes back.
And he was establishing a routeout there for New Spain.
(19:54):
I think it was the first onethat established that route,
january 25th of 1605.
And then they turn back around,head back through New Mexico.
Where they stop and this Drewis where they stop at El Morro,
and he inscribes he had to havebeen there before.
(20:14):
Yeah he was, he gets itinscribed, or has it inscribed,
on April 16th, 1605, in English,here passed by the Governor
General, don Juan de Oñate, fromdiscovery of the South Sea, the
16th of April 1605.
Drew (20:34):
Yep, and that word in Spanish is I'm going to probably
abuse it, but at They'redescribing it as Governor
General, but it means theconqueror of New Lab, and so
he's giving himself credit forconquering the New Mexican
territory at that time andironically has it stamped onto
(20:58):
the rock face right over oldPetroglyphs.
So he's certainly getting hismark made there.
And if you go to El Morro itactually is a very striking
sight.
It's got inscriptions from USArmy expeditions and American
(21:24):
settlers, along with thousandyear old petred lifts, because
it was the only place for Ithink 60 miles where you could
count on there being standingwater.
The cliff there, the mesa therefunnels all the rainfall there
into a little pool in space andthat is a reliable source of
(21:45):
water year round.
It was a very important siteand, like I say, there is an
ancestral Sunni Pueblo on top,but that has been abandoned by
the time Odiate comes, soeventually he gets run out of
town.
Johnny (22:01):
You know that story, yeah.
Drew (22:06):
Some other settlers flee south.
He actually, somewhere in there, headed off to the Cibola.
He followed Coronado'sfootsteps out onto the eastern
east of New Mexico.
The plains, looking for morefortune because you know we're
not New Mexico at that point isnot turning out as lucrative in
(22:30):
terms of silver and gold as thecrown or onyate we're hoping.
But some others escaped southand there they describe onyate
including a friend's confriar asbeing so brutal that some of
the natives were having to eattree bark because all their food
(22:50):
was being appropriatedbasically by onyate.
And they describe him as givingglowing accounts of the land
when it was really poor andliving shamefully with women in
the colony, of adultery in otherwords.
And they described his that thenatives had been reduced to
such an extremity that he hadseen them eating branches of
(23:14):
trees, earth, charcoal and ashes.
But most naming was the accountof the Acoma brutality and so.
So around what?
Johnny (23:28):
1606, he gets called back, Recall to Mexico City
based on his conduct and theywant to have a hearing.
Right around that time he wasplanning Santa Fe.
I want to say it was 1605, 1606.
(23:49):
He then heads down south, backto Mexico City where he was
tried for various things and hewas ultimately convicted of
cruelty to natives and colonistsand he was just not a great guy
.
Drew (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, and you know there's a lot of arguments to be
made about historicalrelativism and there's and there
certainly is a history ofpeople trying to portray various
other empires as far morebrutal than your own.
But in this case the Spanishcrown themselves banished him
(24:33):
from New Mexico permanently andthey banished him from Mexico
City for four years.
So he kind of he goes back toSpain.
He was fined 6,000 due cuts inorder to pay for the cost of his
court case.
He does manage to get a job asa mine inspector in Spain in the
1620s, when he was more than 70years old.
(24:53):
He tried to get forgiven andrestored his title of governor
general of Alam Tado but he diesin 1625.
Meanwhile his loyal follower,Viagra, writes that account in
1610.
That gets published oh, it wasfive years from Mexico City, but
(25:15):
it gets published and kind ofintroduces this very romantic
notion of him.
So you know, and that notiongets adopted in English.
Like I say, the first threeEnglish books about the acama
don't mention this massacre.
An acama we should mention is,along with a couple of Hopi
(25:39):
settlements, it's a contenderfor the oldest continuously
inhabited town in what is nowthe United States, Even though
most people don't live there onthe mesa top.
Most acama live nearby invarious towns, but it has been
inhabited for probably athousand years, comfortably a
(26:00):
thousand years, I guess, I wouldsay.
So they have a rich traditionin history that's been passed
down continuously, even thoughtheir people were devastated.
You said that there were stillpeople living there in 1613,
right, Johnny?
According to the National ParkService.
Johnny (26:20):
This battle didn't end the city, the battle didn't end
the town in the Pueblo.
It was still, it's been goingfor, like you said, over
probably a thousand years.
At this point, people have beenliving up there.
Drew (26:35):
Yeah, so you flash forward a few years to 1998, the 400th
anniversary of the OnyateConquest, the first governorship
, and the town of Alcalde, northof north of Espanola,
establishes an Onyate center andthere's a mounted statue of him
(26:57):
.
But almost immediately anelectric saw is used to cut off
his right foot from his statueand that has to be replaced at a
cost of $10,000.
And so, eventually, the Onyatecenter doesn't turn out to be
quite a draw, and so, um, it waseventually pulled down for
(27:22):
safekeeping.
It was possibly going to be putup at the Espanola Courthouse,
and the county commissionersdecided to not put it back up,
citing safety concerns.
And that was when we had thatmost recent incident, where some
people were celebrating thefact that this statue was not
(27:44):
being put back up, and it turnedviolent, actually, between two
sets of people, not from thetown of Espanola or the county
even, and that's where we aretoday.
Johnny (28:01):
Yeah, it is kind of ironic that the Spanish crown
banished him, yet we're puttingout statues of him.
Drew (28:12):
Yeah Well, in fairness, the world did shift pretty
suddenly.
Columbus winds up going to facetrial for similar crimes and
was convicted as well.
So a lot of the people thatcame out here tended to be very
(28:33):
much frontiersmen, and some ofthem were fleeing persecution
and some of them had nocompunction about their own
treatment of other people.
And so you know, when you lookat the history of Onyate, you
(28:55):
can certainly see that the worldwas changing around him at that
time, and maybe that's why hehas such a complicated legacy.
Today he's our first governorhere in Nuevo Mexico, but he
(29:16):
also wanted to be sentenced andtried and convicted for his
crimes here.
Johnny (29:22):
Well, we hope you enjoyed this latest episode.
Until next time.
We will see you again next time.
Drew (29:36):
Thank you.
Welcome to the Enchantment Chronicles with the
Men of Enchantment.
Today, we're going to talkabout Don Juan De Oñate Drew.
Drew (00:20):
Yeah, he's been in the news recently.
As New Mexico risksestablishing a new and terrible
tradition.
We had a protest turn violentfor the second time around one
of its statues In Albuquerque afew years ago.
A statue that was put up in2004 in front of the Albuquerque
(00:41):
Museum was being protested andthen some protestors made an
attempt to actually tear it downand an altercation ensued and
one of the counter protesters,after challenging them
physically, it wound up shootingsomeone, who thankfully didn't
(01:02):
die, and in this case, a statuethat originally was erected in
1998 at Alcalde, just north ofEspanola, was not being re
erected in front of the EspanolaCourthouse and there were
protestors celebrating that, andagain some violence ensued and
(01:24):
counter protesters shot andagain, thankfully did not kill
anyone.
Johnny (01:32):
So that's kind of where we are With that.
We thought it would be good totalk about Oñate To begin with.
Drew (01:39):
He was our first governor, so that's why there was this
spate of statues being erectedaround 1998.
That was the 400th anniversaryof the Oñate expedition, which
was not the first expeditionSpanish expedition into New
Mexico, but he had been selectedas our first governor.
Johnny (01:59):
Oñate was born in 1550 to a noble family, the Oñates,
son of Cristobal de Oñate, andhe was born down in New Spain
amongst the people of what inZacatecas.
Drew (02:16):
Yeah, in Zacatecas His father was actually a Basque who
had come to New Spain and therethere was continued sort of
indigenous resistance by groupsof the Spanish people labeled
that Chichimecas, I'm not sure.
It's not clear that they werein fact one people or so on.
(02:41):
But he was born at aninteresting time.
Shortly before around the timehe was born, the last Nuevas
were passed in 1542 and thosewere laws passed, agreed to by
(03:01):
the King of Spain, King Charlesof Spain, that would end the
hereditary encomienda.
In other words, if you became anoble, yeah, you could sort of
treat the indigenous people asyour serfs, but that would not
pass on to your sons.
Now it was pushed by a man whobecame a priest, bartolome de
las Casas.
(03:21):
His father had sailed withColumbus and he inherited a
plantation on Hispaniola.
But de las Casas was horrifiedby the treatment of the Indians
there and returned to Spain,pushed the Vatican to first
recognize that the indigenouspeople were in fact human beings
(03:41):
and there was actually a trialabout this and that they had
souls, and from there wassuccessful in passing the laws
that the last Nuevas, that endedthe hereditary encomienda
system.
So that was the end of theinherited servitude in the
Spanish Empire.
(04:02):
Officially On the frontier,things would be a little more
controversial, but that's whereOniate is born at this changing
time in Spain.
So he gets himself appointed tobecome the first governor in
1595, largely because he agreedto fund the expedition himself,
(04:23):
and a few years later he startsout for the territory that's
been awarded to him right.
Johnny (04:29):
That's right.
So he essentially bought hisway to the governorship.
Is that what?
It is yeah, so that was in 1595.
But it took a few years for himto get his stuff together and
recruit folks and he eventuallymade it to El Paso del Norte,
which was at that point, Ibelieve, part of Nuevo Mexico.
(04:52):
But that was what, early 1598he makes it to El Paso.
Drew (05:02):
Yes.
Johnny (05:03):
Yeah.
So he departed from SantaBarbara in Mexico and he finally
gets to El Paso with 560 males,129 soldiers, lots of women and
children and Indian servantswho weren't counted, but a bunch
(05:24):
of livestock, 7000 livestock,and a few monks, eight friars,
eight friars, yeah, and two laybrothers.
Drew (05:37):
And out of those 129 soldiers his eight year old son
was apparently given alieutenant's commission.
I don't know if that was a Joegirl, if that was part of, if
that was a payroll, but I don'tknow if his son counted as a
child or as a soldier in those129 soldiers.
But he does travel north andextends the Camino Real by
(06:05):
several hundred miles as hetravels north, the Camino Real,
and so he started what in fromEl Paso.
Johnny (06:15):
He takes off around March, april or so, from El Paso
.
When he heads north, he crossesthe river and at that point he
declares he lays claim to theterritory of New Mexico and
declares that every creature,spiritual and corporal, rational
and irrational, from thehighest share of to the lowliest
(06:36):
ant and the tiniest butterfly,are kingdom, are parts of the
kingdom of Spain, so subjects ofSpain.
Drew (06:43):
So he's claiming that's interesting Cherubs and subjects
and insects, yeah.
Johnny (06:52):
Yeah, why not take it off?
Take it all, but he they hadheaded north.
They cross the river and theyhead north towards what is now
north of Las Cruces, and thenthey pass through the Jornada
del Muerto, and where theytravel a few days before they
pop out near Soccorro.
Drew (07:13):
Yeah, the Jornado is where you kind of have to veer away
if you're least of your haulingwagons away from the Rio Grande
and and it's called the Hornadodel Merto, the journey of the
dead man, and later we'll hearabout some, some literal dead
men from that journey.
But in this case they managedto pass through the desert and
(07:36):
come north.
And he gives a report, the actof obedience and vassalage by
the Indians of Santo Domingo.
He has to report back to theking.
You know what does he find?
Does he find gold?
Does he find silver?
You know what?
How many souls has he converted?
So in one of his reports heswears that he told
(07:58):
representatives of 33 Pueblosand tribes that he had come from
the most powerful king on earth, the king of Spain, to bring
about the salvation of theirsouls.
And he said quote one couldeasily see and understand that
they were very pleased with thecoming of his lordship.
And quote so he's.
He's certainly givingoptimistic reports back to
(08:23):
Mexico and to New Spain at thetime, and and to the crown.
Johnny (08:31):
And, to be fair, hauling 7000 livestock.
That's a pretty big haul forthat time it's got.
It must have been a site.
Site to see.
Drew (08:44):
Yeah, mark Simmons wrote a biography of Onate and he
records some.
Sometimes that he encouragesthe group by.
You know he dives into a floodon horseback just to show
everybody that it can be doneand they get the, gets the
wagons across the flood.
So he's, he's certainly a bold,a bold leader of this
(09:12):
expedition.
And then he establishes thefirst and second capitals of New
Mexico, right, johnny?
Johnny (09:19):
That's right, yeah, up near Okay Owinge Okay Owinge?
Ok, he establishes the firstcapital, san Juan de los
Cuelleros, and that was acapital for a couple years.
And later he establishes and,and that was 1598.
And later, in 1599, heestablishes the second capital.
(09:41):
So was it San Gabriel?
San Gabriel which was nearbybut nobody really knows where,
at least what I've read.
Nobody really knows what whereeither are, but although there
has been some research withinthe last 30 years.
So was this on his way out toCalifornia or on the way back
(10:07):
into Cal from California?
Drew (10:09):
He camped in 1598.
And so he stopped at Acomafirst and then at El Morro.
But his, his nephew, zaldivar,leads a second group close to
(10:31):
Acoma, and there Zaldivar, ashis uncle had before, demanded
food and, according to theaccounts of soldiers named
Vivero, may have stolen twoturkeys and been killed.
There are other accounts,including Tony Hillerman's, that
say and they seem to be basedon some oral tradition that
(10:55):
Zaldivar demanded Acoma women asservants or what have you.
But in any event things turnviolent and Zaldivar, according
(11:16):
to Viagra's later account,actually is killed by Zutacapan.
That's not exactly clear.
And here I should say that thisis based on the Historia de la
Nueva Mexico which Viagra writeslater, in 1610, and he's
(11:40):
imitating Virgil's Aeneid, theLatin story of the founding of
Rome.
So the first two lines are thatof of arms I sing, and of that
heroic son, of his wondrousdeeds and of his victories won.
So he's, he's telling a verysympathetic account of Onate,
and in it there's a, there's abrutal battle.
(12:04):
But even in in his verysympathetic account, viagra in
Cantos 21-23, kind of capturesZudacopan's Acoma perspective.
He refers to him as a Lucifer,but he says quote that Zudacopan
(12:27):
told his fellow natives tell me, how could there be a greater
misfortune, a more terribledisgrace upon all of us than to
submit to the slavery andsubjugation offered us and be
obliged even to feed thesestrangers?
I swear by all the living godsthat not a man should remain
(12:48):
rather than submit to thistyranny.
And Viagra describes a threehour battle at which Viagra was
was not present.
We should emphasize this.
He's.
He's actually with Onate at thetime, but he says there's
fighting across the Mesa tops,the archbuses spit forth the
hidden missiles from their bayerbarrels, laying low a number of
(13:09):
the foe.
But Zudacopan himself struckthe brave Zaldavar a terrible
blow on the forehead andZaldavar fell, delivered onto
that eternal sleep to which weare all doomed someday.
And six, six banyards are theonly ones who survive.
They jump from the cliffs atsome point clearly not from the
(13:34):
top of the cliffs, that would.
That would be fatal but theyjump and manage to escape.
We don't know how many acrimonswere killed in that battle.
But Ognate gets worried.
He finds out his uncle's, hisnephew's been killed and he
resolves to punish the acrimonts.
but he decides to do itaccording to the law and so he
(13:57):
goes before the, the local monks, the Franciscan friars that he
brought with him, and asks forthem to declare a just war,
because the acrimons hadwillingly, according to Onate,
declared their subjugation tothe king.
Johnny (14:13):
And so that earlier battle was Zaldavar where he was
killed.
That was early December of 98,1598, right so?
And then it took them about amonth, month and a half, to to
get the appropriate declarationof war or whatever was necessary
(14:37):
, and then they headed back inlate January.
Does that sound about right?
Drew (14:42):
Yeah, and, and they're a brutal battle.
In the suit, you know, theAcoma Pueblo is, it seems almost
impregnable.
You know, they've got stones,they've got, they've actually
captured some of the breastplates and swords of the
previous battle and they canthrow stones down.
(15:06):
But Onate orders a frontalassault that manages to distract
them, while a few of his mensneak up the back way and manage
to get to the top of the mace,at which point their firepower
becomes overwhelming.
Johnny (15:23):
So, and that that battle was January 22nd of 1599.
I believe that's when itstarted, and there was some at
that point, 4,000 people livingon the acrimonpoblos and at that
battle, at least 1,000 warriors, of whom 500 died, and about
(15:44):
300 men and women and childrendied.
So around 800 to 1,000 peopleprobably died in that, in that
assault.
Yeah, of those remaining thatlived, who were taken prisoners,
they were shipped around, someshipped to Mexico City.
There were some other penaltiesthat were waged against folks.
Drew (16:10):
Yeah, Onate is the governor, so he's kind of the
judge in this case.
He's both the participant inthe combat and he's passing the
sentences.
And he sentences all Acoma menand the boys over 12 to face
amputation of their right feetand 20 years of servitude, 20
(16:30):
years of slavery.
The women and girls were to besentenced to 20 years of
servitude and two Hopi men whohappened to have been visiting
Acoma because there's traderoutes to all of these
communities and people haveinteractions but these Hopi men
just happened to be there, so hehad their right hands cut off
(16:52):
and he sent them back to theirpueblos in Arizona so that they
could pass warnings to them notto resist the Spanish.
Now, later, david Robertsreports that a historian it's
worth mentioning the first threeEnglish accounts of Onyates of
Acoma Pueblo, I'm sorry don'teven mention this massacre and
(17:14):
that may be because they justhad not been exposed to it or
maybe they didn't want toconfront that history.
But through the 1930s there's alot of accounts that just don't
mention this part and one recenthistorian tried to argue that
(17:35):
that sentence might not havebeen carried out, that in fact,
a lot of the time the Spanishhad this little play where they
would sentence natives to veryharsh penalties and the priests
would beg for their forgivenessand get them out of it.
But Onate himself wrote the saidsentence was carried out as
(17:55):
decreed in the Pueblo of SantoDomingo and other towns nearby
where the Indians whose handsand feet were to be cut off were
punished on different days.
And according to Lieutenant,former Lieutenant Governor of
Acoma, brian Vio, he said basedon our oral history, a lot of
(18:19):
Acoma elders from 30 years agowould have supported the idea of
Onyates sentence having beencarried out.
But he does go on.
There's a lot I can't tell youand I won't and that's kind of
par for the course that if youknow about the relationships
between the Pueblos and theEuropean settlers, the Pueblo
(18:43):
tradition definitely began toemphasize privacy and secrecy
when dealing with outsiders as adefense against persecution.
But that story becomes one ofthe primary things that's
introduced later at his trial.
But first he makes it back toCalifornia, right, johnny?
Johnny (19:06):
Yeah, so after this battle he kind of Nothing really
happens.
Well, I'm sure stuff happens,but after this battle he
eventually heads back.
He tries to make it back toCalifornia, or tries to make it
to California, does make it toCalifornia.
He left in 1604.
Again, he's leaving in late.
(19:28):
I don't know why, but he'sleaving in late, the late year,
heads back down through the Zuniand the Hopi Pueblos along the
Colorado River.
He makes it to the Gulf ofCalifornia in January 1605.
Hangs out for a little while,few days, and then he turns
right back around and comes back.
And he was establishing a routeout there for New Spain.
(19:54):
I think it was the first onethat established that route,
january 25th of 1605.
And then they turn back around,head back through New Mexico.
Where they stop and this Drewis where they stop at El Morro,
and he inscribes he had to havebeen there before.
(20:14):
Yeah he was, he gets itinscribed, or has it inscribed,
on April 16th, 1605, in English,here passed by the Governor
General, don Juan de Oñate, fromdiscovery of the South Sea, the
16th of April 1605.
Drew (20:34):
Yep, and that word in Spanish is I'm going to probably
abuse it, but at They'redescribing it as Governor
General, but it means theconqueror of New Lab, and so
he's giving himself credit forconquering the New Mexican
territory at that time andironically has it stamped onto
(20:58):
the rock face right over oldPetroglyphs.
So he's certainly getting hismark made there.
And if you go to El Morro itactually is a very striking
sight.
It's got inscriptions from USArmy expeditions and American
(21:24):
settlers, along with thousandyear old petred lifts, because
it was the only place for Ithink 60 miles where you could
count on there being standingwater.
The cliff there, the mesa therefunnels all the rainfall there
into a little pool in space andthat is a reliable source of
(21:45):
water year round.
It was a very important siteand, like I say, there is an
ancestral Sunni Pueblo on top,but that has been abandoned by
the time Odiate comes, soeventually he gets run out of
town.
Johnny (22:01):
You know that story, yeah.
Drew (22:06):
Some other settlers flee south.
He actually, somewhere in there, headed off to the Cibola.
He followed Coronado'sfootsteps out onto the eastern
east of New Mexico.
The plains, looking for morefortune because you know we're
not New Mexico at that point isnot turning out as lucrative in
(22:30):
terms of silver and gold as thecrown or onyate we're hoping.
But some others escaped southand there they describe onyate
including a friend's confriar asbeing so brutal that some of
the natives were having to eattree bark because all their food
(22:50):
was being appropriatedbasically by onyate.
And they describe him as givingglowing accounts of the land
when it was really poor andliving shamefully with women in
the colony, of adultery in otherwords.
And they described his that thenatives had been reduced to
such an extremity that he hadseen them eating branches of
(23:14):
trees, earth, charcoal and ashes.
But most naming was the accountof the Acoma brutality and so.
So around what?
Johnny (23:28):
1606, he gets called back, Recall to Mexico City
based on his conduct and theywant to have a hearing.
Right around that time he wasplanning Santa Fe.
I want to say it was 1605, 1606.
(23:49):
He then heads down south, backto Mexico City where he was
tried for various things and hewas ultimately convicted of
cruelty to natives and colonistsand he was just not a great guy
.
Drew (24:08):
Yeah, yeah, and you know there's a lot of arguments to be
made about historicalrelativism and there's and there
certainly is a history ofpeople trying to portray various
other empires as far morebrutal than your own.
But in this case the Spanishcrown themselves banished him
(24:33):
from New Mexico permanently andthey banished him from Mexico
City for four years.
So he kind of he goes back toSpain.
He was fined 6,000 due cuts inorder to pay for the cost of his
court case.
He does manage to get a job asa mine inspector in Spain in the
1620s, when he was more than 70years old.
(24:53):
He tried to get forgiven andrestored his title of governor
general of Alam Tado but he diesin 1625.
Meanwhile his loyal follower,Viagra, writes that account in
1610.
That gets published oh, it wasfive years from Mexico City, but
(25:15):
it gets published and kind ofintroduces this very romantic
notion of him.
So you know, and that notiongets adopted in English.
Like I say, the first threeEnglish books about the acama
don't mention this massacre.
An acama we should mention is,along with a couple of Hopi
(25:39):
settlements, it's a contenderfor the oldest continuously
inhabited town in what is nowthe United States, Even though
most people don't live there onthe mesa top.
Most acama live nearby invarious towns, but it has been
inhabited for probably athousand years, comfortably a
(26:00):
thousand years, I guess, I wouldsay.
So they have a rich traditionin history that's been passed
down continuously, even thoughtheir people were devastated.
You said that there were stillpeople living there in 1613,
right, Johnny?
According to the National ParkService.
Johnny (26:20):
This battle didn't end the city, the battle didn't end
the town in the Pueblo.
It was still, it's been goingfor, like you said, over
probably a thousand years.
At this point, people have beenliving up there.
Drew (26:35):
Yeah, so you flash forward a few years to 1998, the 400th
anniversary of the OnyateConquest, the first governorship
, and the town of Alcalde, northof north of Espanola,
establishes an Onyate center andthere's a mounted statue of him
(26:57):
.
But almost immediately anelectric saw is used to cut off
his right foot from his statueand that has to be replaced at a
cost of $10,000.
And so, eventually, the Onyatecenter doesn't turn out to be
quite a draw, and so, um, it waseventually pulled down for
(27:22):
safekeeping.
It was possibly going to be putup at the Espanola Courthouse,
and the county commissionersdecided to not put it back up,
citing safety concerns.
And that was when we had thatmost recent incident, where some
people were celebrating thefact that this statue was not
(27:44):
being put back up, and it turnedviolent, actually, between two
sets of people, not from thetown of Espanola or the county
even, and that's where we aretoday.
Johnny (28:01):
Yeah, it is kind of ironic that the Spanish crown
banished him, yet we're puttingout statues of him.
Drew (28:12):
Yeah Well, in fairness, the world did shift pretty
suddenly.
Columbus winds up going to facetrial for similar crimes and
was convicted as well.
So a lot of the people thatcame out here tended to be very
(28:33):
much frontiersmen, and some ofthem were fleeing persecution
and some of them had nocompunction about their own
treatment of other people.
And so you know, when you lookat the history of Onyate, you
(28:55):
can certainly see that the worldwas changing around him at that
time, and maybe that's why hehas such a complicated legacy.
Today he's our first governorhere in Nuevo Mexico, but he
(29:16):
also wanted to be sentenced andtried and convicted for his
crimes here.
Johnny (29:22):
Well, we hope you enjoyed this latest episode.
Until next time.
We will see you again next time.
Drew (29:36):
Thank you.
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