Civil Congregations of the Indians in New Spain, 1598-1606

Abstract

One consistent strand of Hispanic imperial policy was the repeated attempt to civilize the native Indians by urbanizing them.1 Plans to this end were early announced and with varying results were tried from time to time throughout the colonial empire.2 The program of civil congregations in New Spain from 1598 to 1605 was a relatively late example of these persistent efforts to translate the ideal of urbanization into social fact. Administratively the project differed from previous attempts in the area. Appointees of the viceroy rather than ecclesiastics or encomenderos were selected as the agents to perform the chore. It was an enterprise of the civil bureaucracy, and was patterned on an earlier (1569-1571) plan which had proved workable in Peru under the famed Viceroy Francisco de Toledo.3 He had reorganized or created native hamlets according to a standard plan.4 The object there, as in New Spain a generation later, was