Soledad y el Mar

A delightful song promoted by the algorithm for one's evening. Never was a big fan of Natalia Lafourcade, but exposure to her music in the distant past clearly established her brilliance as a singer.

Conditions of Encomienda Indians in Puerto Rico

 

Another mention of Diego Muriel digitized at PARES contains some very interesting information on the Indian laborers of  the royal Hacienda of Ribera de Toa in 1528. Established with indigenous Puerto Rico caciques and Indian laborers, the document provides some powerful testimony about the exploitative conditions in which Indians in the encomienda system toiled under. Reading between the lines, one can surmise that the "Taino" of Puerto Rico, at least in this hacienda, were scarcely acculturated into Spanish ways. The document lists the improved treatments to be given to the Indians, including ensuring their indoctrination in the Catholic faith and having access to Mass twice per week. One can probably conclude that before 1528, and perhaps after this year, they were not devout or deeply Catholic. In addition, the stipulation that Muriel see to it that the Indians understand marriage and cease the practice of males shifting to different women suggests the indigenous laborers were not following Spanish or Catholic norms of marriage and domestic organization. 

The other proposed methods to improve the treatment of the Indian workforce included the provision of meat, hammocks or blankets, and additional clothes. Perhaps the population was still wearing Indian-styled clothing of enaguas and whatever they received for use during worktime. Overall, this suggests an indigenous population that was probably maintaining older, precolonial practices in religion, spirituality, diet, and dress to whatever extent that was still possible in 1528. As Guitar revealed in her dissertation on Tainos of Hispaniola, the indigenous population in Puerto Rico was probably still practing their areytos, cohoba rituals, and the ballgame, too. Unfortunately for us, however, no one recorded more of the traditions, areytos, or customs of the Puerto Rican Indian that may have given us far more information on precolonial, pre-Hispanic history. But the thin or superficial conversion and Hispanization of the indigenous population definitely explains why their legacy is so strong in Puerto Rico and the Spanish Caribbean. 

Diego Muriel's Mestizo Son

The story of Diego Muriel is a disturbing one. Before marrying the cacica of Caguas, he fought for the rights to his mestizo son. The issue was the mother was a naboria india, held in an encomienda by Diego Garcia in San German. Diego Garcia only wanted to give Diego Muriel his son for a price, selling him like a slave. Diego Muriel took the case higher up in government to resolve it, and we sadly do not know the results. However, the fact that this occurred to begin with is suggestive of the few distinctions between naboria and enslaved Indians at this time (1528). Similar scenarios probably occurred elsewhere in the Spanish Antilles of this era, as white men sometimes had relationships with women they did not control. What is even more interesting is that this 1528 document seems to suggest that children in similar situations were often abused by the encomienda owners. 

Chronicles of Zara Yaqob and Baeda Maryam

After reading Derat's Le domaine des rois éthiopiens (1270-1527): Espace, pouvoir et monachisme, we were curious to read two of the major sources of her study. Indeed, the royal chronicles on the reigns of Zara Yaqob and his son, Baeda Maryam, are constant references for Derat. Derat uses them to help establish a timeline for the relationship between the Solomonic rulers and monastic networks in Amhara and Shoa. Unfortunately for us, since we cannot read Ge'ez, we must rely on Perruchon's dated 1893 French translation.  Perruchon did include a helpful introductory essay that helps contextualize the manuscript and ths second half of the 15th century in Ethiopian history. However, one cannot help but wonder why modern scholars have not revisited these royal chronicles and provided updated translation based on current research findings, new insights into translation and the study of Ge'ez and Amharic, or to translate the chronicles into new languages. 

Zara Yaqob's coronation

That said, these chronicles are, despite some repetition, profoundly useful documents for reconstructing, to a certain extent, what was actually happening in Ethiopia. For instance, Zara Yaqob, whose chronicler appears to have written during the reign of Lebna Dengel, appears to have been a man of a profoundly religious bent and perhaps more authoritarian than was the average. It is fascinating to read of this one man's attempt to centralize the royal administration of the empire entirely into his own hands, relying even on his daughters to fill administrative posts and avoid dealing with the traditional administrative elites. In addition, imposing the observance of the Saturday Sabbath, the cult of Mary, and building churches across the state certainly suggest Zara Yaqob was endeavoring to centralize the state and build a more unified society. Indeed, how else could one explain his willingness to stand up to the Stephanites, punish his own children for alleged paganism, and his own authorship of religious or spiritual texts? Perhaps Zara Yaqob was an equivalent of sorts to our Ali Ghaji of Borno.

His son, Baeda Maryam, was also an important ruler despite only reigning for 10 years. Baeda Maryam is interesting for reversing some of his own father's policies. Unlike his father, who appears to have been more interested in concentrating all power and authority into the monarchy, he actually restored the previous administrative system of the provinces. This presumably won him followers and supporters who were alienated or removed from office by Zara Yaqob. Furthermore, Baeda Maryam continued building churches, strengthened relations with Dabra Libanos, and campaigned against "pagans" and Adal. Thus, he seems to have continued or tried to continue some of his father's policies while reverting to the pre-Zara Yaqob order of earlier Solomonic dynasty. In that regard, it is interesting that Almeida's brief account of Zara Yaqob refers to Ethiopian traditions of the day recalling him as a tyrant. Zara Yaqob's "tyrannical" rule was defended based on his religious zeal and passion for justice, yet later Solomonic rulers appear to have followed in Baeda Maryam's footsteps. 

Revisiting the Funj Chronicle

Revisiting the Funj Chronicle as translated by P.M. Holt and incorporating later materials and recensions, one sees the main benefit of Holt's work as being of greater utility for post-Funj Sultanate history. Most of the detail in the actual chronicle an be found in the late 18th and 19th centuries, but Holt incorporated materials that extend into the Turco-Egyptian period. For our purposes, mainly interested in the history of the Funj Sultanate and earlier Nubian history, this is not the most helpful. However, after re-reading most of the text, one finds that it does correct some of the errors of MacMichael's translation while offering detailed footnotes and introductory material to contextualize the references. The later sections of the Chronicle are still a mess and hard to follow (too many conflicts within the Hamaj Regency or between the Hamaj Regents and the old Funj royal family, not to mention other wars, conspiracies and shaykhs) but this is definitely the best English translation.

It is interesting to think that the Funj Sultanate was essentially experiencing what would later happen to Borno by the 1760s. The loss of effective political authority of the Funj kings to the Hamaj Regents, from the family of Shaykh Muhammad Abu Likaylik, occurred by 1760-61. Borno experienced something similar in the 1800s with the rise of the al-Kanemi dynasty. An period of coexistence in Borno persisted until the 1840s, just as the Hamaj Regents kept the old royal dynasty around until the final collapse of the state in the 1820s Egyptian invasion. Although Muhammad al-Amin al-Kanemi's rise to effective power was explicitly related to his charisma, military leadership and status as a respected mallam, the Hamaj Regents did not seize power in the context of foreign invasions and threats that Borno endured from the "Fulani jihad." Nevertheless, according to our Funj Chronicle, the Funj rulers were abusive, corrupt, exploitative, and immoral. Similar accusations against the Sayfawa from pro-jihad writings may have been reappropriated by al-Kanemi's followers to justify their seizure of direct power. Interestingly, however, the Hamaj Regents never went as far as destroying the figurehead traditional kings yet Borno did so under al-Kanemi's son.

In addition to the Funj Sultanate experiencing the rise of delegated authority through the Hamaj Regency, the Egyptian invasion finds a parallel of sorts with Rabih's 1893 conquest of Borno. The rise of Rabih was, in part, an aftershock of Turco-Egyptian invasion of Sudan and the spread of new military technology and tactics in Sudanic Africa. These very same developments eventually led to the loss of independence of Borno near the end of the 19th century. Thus, events that ushered in the final dissolution of the Funj state also played a role in the fall of Borno. And people in Borno certainly were aware of the late Funj state, as figures like Heinrich Barth and other Europeans commented on the presence of Sinnar natives in the region. Surely they must have been aware of the political conflict with Sinnar and the danger of Turco-Egyptian invasion. Indeed, they had to worry about it from the direction of Tripoli. 

Last but certainly not least, the Funj Chronicle partly assists with the reconstruction of the Sinnar Sultanate's Sudanic context. Numerous references to Kordofan and occasional allusions to Taqali, Darfur, and Ethiopia establish that Sinnar was actively engaged in trade, diplomacy and military conflict with its neighbors. The 1744 battle with Iyasu II of Ethiopia, for instance, was won with the aid of Khamis of Darfur. Darfur shaykhs are claimed to have supported Badi Abu Shulukh against the Funj. While some of the prominent Islamic scholars and saints in the Funj state came from the Middle East, sources like the Tabaqat hint at the presence of Islamic scholars from the Sinnar state venturing to Wadai and Darfur. This Sudanic and African context for the Sultanate is most interesting, even though the necessary sources to reconstruct it are limited in the Funj Chronicle. 

History of the New World

Girolamo Benzoni's The History of the New World is a fascinating snapshot of various regions of the Spanish colonial empire in the mid-16th century. Despite his overwhelming anti-Spanish bias and lack of style, Benzoni visited the Antilles, Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Peru, Guatemala and parts of Central America. While much of the regions he visited were depopulated (like Hispaniola) or areas of recent conflict or abandonment, due to the violent greed of the Spanish), Benzoni's perspective is fascinating. For instance, his description of Taino customs of Hispaniola and Indians of Venezuela are, despite occasionally being derivative of early Spanish customs. His description of Indian customs in Hispaniola, for instance, suggests these practices were very much alive, despite the demographic collapse of the indigenous peoples. Benzoni's presence in Hispaniola also provides some descriptions of the real fear the Spanish felt with the large African maroon population on the island. Similarly, the attacks by African runaways in Panama against the Spanish indicates just how fragile this colonial empire was. Indigenous people did not sit idly by and kindly agree to give away all their land, resources and labor. Nor were enslaved Africans eagerly serving their white masters. The state of insecurity, depopulation (partly fueled by Indians abandoning settlements to avoid whites), and conflicts among the Spanish themselves are clearly illustrated by Benzoni's experiences. One only wishes Benzoni provided a little more detail about parts of his travels, such as the caravel carrying Indian slaves from South America to Puerto Rico and Hispaniola.

Cacique Juan de Humacao

Although finding the details of Juan de Humacao's life remains difficult, it is interesting to read about a literate cacique of Puerto Rico. Freed in 1526 after being enslaved by Juan de Ceron, Juan de Humacao, perhaps a nephew of the Humacao chief who fought with the Spanish in the 1510s, was recognized as a free man. It is interesting to see that even as late as 1526, when the indigenous Taino elite were presumably of less importance due to the population decline of Indians, the Spanish royal government felt compelled to ensure a local cacique was freed from bondage. Unfortunately, it is unclear what happened to this literate cacique after November 1526. According to Francisco Moscoso, the first Humacao in the Spanish sources was a victim of Spanish raids in 1512. Then, he, along with Daguao, another cacique, were at war with the Spanish in 1515. Later, presumably due to the death or disappearance of the original Humacao, a cacica, Isabel Cayagua, and her naborias, were given to the encomienda of Antonio Sedeno. So, presumably some time after 1515, Humacao perished or perhaps fled the island while Isabel Cayagua became the recognized cacica of Humacao. It would be fascinating if someone could uncover archival sources that include letters or writings by Juan de Humacao.