Enslavement

The Spaniards endured formidable discomforts in their quest for silver. Often, the food was scarce, the water contaminated, and the mines dangerous. The freezing weather presented a serious problem. Those who tried to warm themselves with charcoal sometimes suffered carbon monoxide poisoning.

Soon the Spanish found a way to minimize their inconvenience. As conquerors, they forced the native Indians into slavery. The Bolivian Times of La Paz stated: “It is said that eight million Indian slaves were consumed,” died, in Potosí’s mines during the colonial period. Cruelty, overwork, and disease caused a horrendous depopulation. No wonder that in 1550 a chronicler called Potosí “the mouth of hell”!

One of the principal aims of the Spanish conquerors was to establish their Catholic religion in the Americas. How, though, did these professed Christians justify their large-scale profiting from slavery? While some churchmen spoke out against the injustices, others rationalized slavery by claiming that the tyranny of the Spanish was less than the tyranny of the Incas. They claimed that the Indians were inferior and naturally inclined to vice—hence, better off working in the mines. Still others claimed that bringing the Indians to work the mines was a necessary step in converting them to Catholicism.

History shows, however, that the clergymen were among the richest people in Potosí. Historian Mariano Baptista says: “The Church as an institution, and its representatives individually, formed a privileged part of the circle of exploitation” of the Indians. This historian quotes a viceroy who in 1591 complained that the clergy “suck the blood of the Indians with more greed and ambition than laymen.”