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The Indian Massacre of the Capuchins in Trinidad in 1699: A Factor in Trinidad’s Economic Stagnation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

David M. Traboulay*
Affiliation:
Staten Island Community College, City University of New York

Extract

Recognising the failure to assimilate the Trinidad Indians to Spanish culture, the king of Spain in 1686 asked the Capuchin Order to undertake a mission to Trinidad so that the “Indians may learn to live a quiet and civilized life.” Eight Capuchin priests under Fr. Thomas de Barcelona arrived in 1687 and founded four missions; two in Naparima, one in San Fernando, and one in Savana Grande. They built their villages following a uniform plan: “A perfect square is traced on the ground and all the Indian ajoupas are built on three sides, north, south, and west of the streets … the eastern side of the mission is taken up by the church, the mission house and other buildings for the use of the priests.”

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1976 

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References

1 Ottley, C. R., Spanish Trinidad (Trinidad: Longman, 1971), p. 28.Google Scholar

2 Ibid., p. 31.

3 Ibid., p. 32.

4 Ibid.

5 Buissink, P. J., ed., The Arena Massacre, Trinidad. Documents relating to the massacre. General Archives of the Indies, Seville, Audiencia of Santo Domingo, 582 (Trinidad, 1938), pp. 2636.Google Scholar

6 Ibid., pp. 37–38.

7 Ibid., p. 54.

8 Ibid., p. 7.

9 Ibid., p. 15.

10 Anguiano, Mateo de, Misión apostólica. Pueblo de los Arenales (Madrid, 1702), pp. 116.Google Scholar

11 Ottley, op. cit., p. 41.

12 Cothonay, P. Bertrand, Trinidad, journal d’un missionaire dominicain (Paris, 1898), pp. 359368.Google Scholar

13 Ibid.

14 Archives of the Parish Church of San Rafael. Uncatalogued and unpaginated.