The chiefdom of San Juan Bautista de Végueta. 16th-17th centuries

Abstract

The study of the colonial cacicazgos is very important because it helps us to understand the strategies carried out by the curacas or caciques in order to maintain their privileges. The cacicazgo was an institution that functioned in colonial times as an imitation of the one that functioned in Tahuantinsuyo with the Incas, with the aim of controlling the aboriginal population. The Spanish conquerors took advantage in their own way, conditioning the operation for their benefit. In the old zone of Chimú influence, it was where the first population transfers were practiced according to the interests of the encomenderos until the lawyer Lope García de Castro (1564-1569). It was from 1570, with the government of Viceroy Francisco de Toledo (1569-1581), that the foundation of Indian towns with the so-called reductions began to be implemented throughout the viceroyalty. As of those years, the general transfer of the populations to the territories that had previously been chosen, either on vacant land or owned by curacas, began again. The transfer of the population to the chosen location was with the objective of being able to count on the indigenous workforce with greater security and thus they could not evade, since these places were walled or fenced with adobes or sticks. In order to have unconditional personnel, in some cases, main caciques were appointed and, in other cases, the legitimate descendants of regional curacas were respected and, in other cases, related to the Incas. Some generated reactions against them because they acted as usurpers, although other communities accepted that the caciques were related by marriage. Where there was a reduction town, there was a priest leading his parishioners and, according to his interests, he coincided with the encomenderos and the caciques.