158 UNIT 2 COLONIAL MESOAMERICA
(continued)
too warmly, married too young. Behaviors such as these caused people to become weak and
easily susceptible to illness. Indirectly, these elders were blaming the Spaniards, who had intro-
duced domestic animals like sheep and pigs, wool (for warmer clothing and blankets), and pre-
viously unknown garments such as shirts and coats. Similarly, Catholic priests, trying to prevent
premarital sex, encouraged the Mesoamericans to marry in their midteens. The ancestors’ way
of life had been more rigorous and virtuous. In contrast to the Spanish idea that the Indians were
being punished for the “sins of the ancestors,” these Indians blamed their decline on the adop-
tion of Spanish ways.
Some native documents provide particularly vivid descriptions of epidemics and their effects
on the population. The Mayan Book of Chilam Balam of Chumayel,from the Yucatán Peninsula,
speaks as follows:There was no sickness then;
They had no aching bones then;
They had no high fever then;
They had no pustule fever [smallpox] then;
They had no burning chests then;
They had no abdominal pains then;
They had no consumption then;
They had no headaches then;
The course of humanity was orderly then;
The foreigners made it otherwise
When they arrived here.
They brought shameful things
When they came. (Roys 1933:22)In the Annals of the Cakchiquelsan epidemic that struck in 1519 is described in equally vivid
terms:It happened that during the twenty-fifth year [1519] the plague began, oh, my sons! First they
became ill of a cough, they suffered from nosebleeds and illness of the bladder. It was truly
terrible, the number of dead there were in that period.... Little by little heavy shadows and
black night enveloped our fathers and grandfathers and us also, oh, my sons! when the
plague raged.... Great was the stench of the dead. After our fathers and grandfathers suc-
cumbed, half of the people fled to the fields. The dogs and the vultures devoured the bod-
ies. The mortality was terrible. Your grandfathers died, and with them died the son of the king
and his brothers and kinsmen. So it was that we became orphans, oh, my sons! So we be-
came when we were young. All of us were thus. We were born to die! (Recinos 1980:119–120).The status of native people under Spanish colonial rule was inherently prob-
lematic. At first treated unambiguously as potential slaves—Columbus being the first
to enslave Indians—under Isabella’s orders they were soon declared citizens of the
Spanish Crown with corresponding legal rights. However, since the Crown had the
right to tax its subjects and also had somehow to reward conquerors for their service,