Antonio de Mendoza, Marquis of Mondéjar, Count of Tendilla (1495 –
Alcala la RealAlcalá la Real is a city located in the province of Jaén, Spain. According to the 2006 census , the city has a population of 22,129 inhabitants.-Geography:...
, (Jaén); July 21, 1552,
LimaLima is the capital and largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, on a coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. It forms a contiguous urban area with the seaport of Callao...
), was the first viceroy of
New SpainThe Viceroyalty of New Spain , was the political unit of Spanish territories in North and Central America, and Asia-Pacific. The territory included the present-day California, Southwestern United States, Mexico, Central America , the Caribbean, and the Philippines. It was ruled by a viceroy from...
, serving from April 17, 1535 to November 25, 1550, and the third viceroy of
PeruPeru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.Peruvian territory was home to the Norte Chico...
, from September 23, 1551 to July 21, 1552. Married to Maria Ana Trujillo de Mendoza.
Mendoza came from a distinguished family of military officers and statesmen. After three high-ranking noblemen declined the appointment as viceroy of New Spain, it was accepted by don Antonio, who had served capably in the Court and as Spanish ambassador to Hungary.
He became viceroy in 1535 and governed for 15 years, longer than any subsequent viceroy.
Antonio de Mendoza, Marquis of Mondéjar, Count of Tendilla (1495 –
Alcala la RealAlcalá la Real is a city located in the province of Jaén, Spain. According to the 2006 census , the city has a population of 22,129 inhabitants.-Geography:...
, (Jaén); July 21, 1552,
LimaLima is the capital and largest city of Peru. It is located in the valleys of the Chillón, Rímac and Lurín rivers, on a coast overlooking the Pacific Ocean. It forms a contiguous urban area with the seaport of Callao...
), was the first viceroy of
New SpainThe Viceroyalty of New Spain , was the political unit of Spanish territories in North and Central America, and Asia-Pacific. The territory included the present-day California, Southwestern United States, Mexico, Central America , the Caribbean, and the Philippines. It was ruled by a viceroy from...
, serving from April 17, 1535 to November 25, 1550, and the third viceroy of
PeruPeru , officially the Republic of Peru , is a country in western South America. It is bordered on the north by Ecuador and Colombia, on the east by Brazil, on the southeast by Bolivia, on the south by Chile, and on the west by the Pacific Ocean.Peruvian territory was home to the Norte Chico...
, from September 23, 1551 to July 21, 1552. Married to Maria Ana Trujillo de Mendoza.
Early life
Mendoza came from a distinguished family of military officers and statesmen. After three high-ranking noblemen declined the appointment as viceroy of New Spain, it was accepted by don Antonio, who had served capably in the Court and as Spanish ambassador to Hungary.
Viceroy of New Spain
He became viceroy in 1535 and governed for 15 years, longer than any subsequent viceroy. On his arrival in New Spain, he found a recently conquered colony beset with Indian uprisings and rivalry among the conquerors. His difficult assignment was to govern in the king's name without making an enemy of
Hernán CortésHernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro, 1st Marqués del Valle de Oaxaca was a Spanish conquistador who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec empire and brought large portions of mainland Mexico under the King of Castile, in the early 16th century...
, whom Emperor
Charles VCharles V was ruler of the Holy Roman Empire from 1519 and, as Charles I of Spain, of the Spanish realms from 1516 until his abdication in 1556...
(King Charles I of Spain) and the Council of the Indies judged too rough to be made a duke and given any higher post than the Captaincy-General of New Spain, a post for which he was well suited. He was also directed to increase royal revenues and regulate the affairs of the Indians.
As viceroy, Mendoza commissioned the expedition of
Francisco Vásquez de CoronadoFrancisco Vázquez de Coronado y Luján was a Spanish conquistador, who visited New Mexico and other parts of what are now the southwestern United States between 1540 and 1542...
to explore and establish settlements in the northern lands of New Spain in 1540-42, the expedition of
Juan Rodríguez CabrilloJuan Rodríguez Cabrillo , João Rodrigues Cabrilho in Portuguese, was a Portuguese explorer noted for his exploration of the west coast of North America on behalf of Spain. Cabrillo was the first European explorer to navigate the coast of present day California in the United States...
to explore the western coastline of
Alta CaliforniaAlta California was formed when Spain separated the Dominican Missions from the Franciscan Missions in approximately 1769 with the founding of the first Alta California mission in San Diego...
in 1542-43, and the expedition of
Ruy López de VillalobosRuy López de Villalobos was a Spanish explorer who sailed the Pacific from Mexico to establish a permanent foothold for Spain in the East Indies, which was near the Line of Demarcation between Spain, and Portugal specified by the Treaty of Saragossa in 1529.-Expedition to the Philippine...
to the
PhilippinesThe Philippines officially known as the Republic of the Philippines, is a country in Southeast Asia with Manila as its capital city. It comprises 7,107 islands in the western Pacific Ocean....
in 1542-43. The
Codex MendozaThe Codex Mendoza is an Aztec codex, created about twenty years after the Spanish conquest of Mexico with the intent that it be seen by Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain...
is named for him. He probably commissioned it.
Don Antonio and Bishop
Juan de ZumárragaJuan de Zumárraga was a Spanish Basque Franciscan prelate and first bishop of Mexico.Zumárraga was born in Durango in the Biscay province in the Basque Country. He entered the Franciscan Order, and in 1527 was custodian of the convent of Abrojo, where he received Charles V...
were key in the formation of two institutions of
MexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
: the
Colegio de Santa CruzThe Real Colegio de Santa Cruz in Tlatelolco, Mexico, was the first European school of higher learning in the Americas. Built by the Franciscan order at the initiative of Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza and Bishop Juan de Zumárraga on the site of an Aztec school for the children of nobles , it was...
at
TlatelolcoTlatelolco may refer to:*Tlatelolco , a pre-Columbian Aztec citystate.*Tlatelolco , an area within modern Mexico City.*Tlatelolco , an archaeological site in Mexico City....
(1536), where the sons of
AztecThe Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the Late post-Classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Often the term...
nobles studied the imposed
LatinLatin is an Italic language originally spoken in Latium and Ancient Rome. Through the Roman conquest, Latin spread throughout the Mediterranean and a large part of Europe...
,
rhetoricRhetoric is one of the arts of using language as a means to persuade. Along with grammar and logic or dialectic, rhetoric is one of the three ancient arts of discourse. From ancient Greece to the late 19th Century, it was a central part of Western education, filling the need to train public...
,
philosophyPhilosophy is the study of general and fundamental problems concerning matters such as existence, knowledge, values, reason, mind, and language. Philosophy is distinguished from other ways of addressing these questions by its critical, generally systematic approach and its reliance on reasoned...
and
musicMusic is an art form whose medium is sound. Common elements of music are pitch , rhythm , dynamics, and the sonic qualities of timbre and texture...
, and the
Royal and Pontifical University of MexicoThe National Autonomous University of Mexico is a public university based primarily in Mexico City and generally considered to be the largest one-campus university in the Americas in terms of student population...
(1552), modeled on the
University of SalamancaThe University of Salamanca , located in the town of Salamanca, west of Madrid, is the oldest university in Spain , and one of the oldest in Europe. It was founded by Alfonso IX of León in 1218 as a "General School"...
, which trained young men for the imposed Church. These institutions were the first and second universities respectively to be established in the
AmericasThe Americas, or America, are lands in the Western hemisphere or New World, comprising the continents of North America and South America with their associated islands and regions. America may be ambiguous in English, as it is more commonly used to refer to the United States of America...
, although it should be noted that the indigenous peoples of the Aztec Empire had an education system in place before the colonization of their land. In 1536 he began the minting of silver and copper coins, known as
macuquinas. Also under his instructions, the first
printing pressA printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a medium , thereby transferring an image. The mechanical systems involved were first assembled in Germany by the goldsmith Johannes Gutenberg around 1440, based on existing screw-presses used to press...
in the New World was brought to Mexico in 1539, by printer Juan Pablos (Giovanni Paoli). The first book printed in Mexico:
La Escala Espiritual de San Juan ClímacoThe Ladder of Divine Ascent, or Ladder of Paradise , is an important ascetical treatise for monasticism in Eastern Christianity written by John Climacus in ca...
. On May 18, 1541 don Antonio founded the city of Valladolid (now
MoreliaMorelia is the capital of the Mexican state of Michoacán. The city is situated at an elevation of 1,921 meters above sea level in the region of the Guayangareo Valley, surrounded by the Punhuato and Quinceo Hills....
,
MichoacánMichoacán formally Michoacán de Ocampo , is one of the 31 constituent states of Mexico. It borders the states of Colima and Jalisco to the west, Guanajuato and Querétaro to the north, México to the east, Guerrero to the south-east, and the Pacific Ocean to the south.Michoacán has an area of...
).
In 1542 an
insurrectionAn insurgency is an armed rebellion against a constituted authority when those taking part in the rebellion are not recognised as belligerents.[Oxford English Dictionary second edition 1989 "insurgent B. n...]
of the
IndiansThe indigenous peoples of the Americas are the pre-Columbian inhabitants of the Americas, their descendants, and many ethnic groups who identify with those peoples...
, called the
Mixtón RebellionThe Mixtón War was fought between Spanish invaders and several Chichimeca native tribes. The Spanish victory in 1541 allowed the invaders to break through into the Chichimecan territory....
, was suppressed. On March 25, 1544 Viceroy Mendoza promulgated the
New LawsThe New Laws of 1542 , also known as the "New Laws of the Indies for the Good Treatment and Presevation of the Indians" were created to prevent the exploitation of the indigenous people by the encomenderos, or landowners, by strictly limiting their power, during the Spanish colonization of the...
, inspired by the great reformer Frey
Bartolomé de las CasasBartolomé de las Casas, O.P. , was a 16th-century Spanish Dominican priest, writer and the first resident Bishop of Chiapas. As a settler in the New World he witnessed, and was driven to oppose, the torture and genocide of the Native Americans by the Spanish colonists...
and intended to ease the plight of Indians under the system of forced labor. Mendoza was both unable and unwilling to enforce these laws in the face of rigorous opposition from the holders of the
encomiendaThe encomienda is a trusteeship labor system that was employed by the Spanish crown during the Spanish colonization of the Americas and the Philippines. In the encomienda, the crown granted a person a specified number of natives for whom they were to take responsibility. The receiver of the grant...
grants. When news reached Mexico of the civil war that had broken out in Peru over similar reforms, thought to undermine the rigorous encomienda system, he had the laws suspended and then revoked.
Nevertheless, Mendoza was sympathetic to the Indians and did much to improve their lot. In 1547 he convened an
ecclesiastical conferenceAn Ecclesiastical conference is a meetings of Roman Catholic clerics for the purpose of discussing, in general, matters pertaining to their state of life in particular, questions of moral theology and liturgy....
to treat of the condition of the Indians, with las Casas in attendance. He fixed a maximum number of hours they could be employed in the mines, ordered payment for the labor of free Indians, and protected Indian lands from appropriation by the Spanish.
In 1548 he suppressed an uprising of the Zapotecs.
During his term of office, Mendoza is credited with consolidating the sovereignty of the Crown throughout the Spanish conquests in New Spain and limiting the power and ambition of the first
conquistadorConquistador is the term widely used to refer to the Spanish soldiers, explorers, and adventurers who brought much of the Americas under the control of Spain in the 15th through the 17th centuries following Europe's discovery of the New World by Christopher Columbus in 1492...
s.
An able and honest viceroy, he governed with justice, efficiency and some compassion. Much of the political and economic policies he established endured throughout the entire colonial period. He promoted the construction of hospitals and schools and encouraged improvements in agriculture, ranching and mining. His administration did much to bring stability and peace to New Spain.
He was succeeded as viceroy of New Spain by
Luis de VelascoLuís de Velasco was the second viceroy of New Spain during the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the mid-sixteenth century....
.
Viceroy of Peru
On July 4, 1549 in
BrusselsBrussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the de facto capital city of the European Union and the largest urban area in Belgium...
, Emperor Charles V named Mendoza viceroy of Peru. He traveled overland from Mexico to Panama, and then by boat to Peru. He arrived and took up his new office on November 25, 1550. However, he soon became ill, and died in 1552. His tomb is in the Cathedral of Lima, along with that of the Spanish conqueror of Peru,
Francisco PizarroFrancisco Pizarro González, 1st Marqués de los Atabillos was a Spanish conquistador, conqueror of the Incan Empire and founder of Lima, the modern-day capital of Peru. Pizarro was born in Trujillo, Extremadura, modern Spain. Sources differ in the birth year they assign to him: 1471, 1475–1478, or...
.
Mendocino County,
CaliforniaCalifornia is the most populous state in the United States, and the third largest by area. California is the second most populous sub-national entity in the Americas, behind only São Paulo, Brazil...
, is named in his honor.
External links