Palafox and His Critics

THERE HAS BEEN all too little written in this country about seventeenth-century Spanish colonial history. For some observers that period does not have the color or the excitement of the sixteenth century or the stirring enthusiasm of the eighteenth; yet, it is inaccurate to characterize it as the long noonday nap. To allow the seventeenth century to remain neglected is to deny to students in colonial history valuable insight into social and institutional developments. Indeed the seventeenth century was a period of desperate travail for the Spanish empire. The great tumultos of 1624 and 1692 in Mexico City, whatever their cause, produced color and excitement along with a new self-consciousness which perhaps foreshadowed the independence movements of the nineteenth century.1 Colonial Mexico must not be regarded as a somnolent giant awaiting the cry of Hidalgo. Rather, the events of the seventeenth century in Mexico and in particular the role of the Church deserve deeper study. Fractious battles between religious and secular clergy which strained the internal mechanism of Church and state make fascinating reading. Despite the popular impression of a monolithic Spanish Church, the regular clergy fought for privileges against the secular clergy. These in turn, aided and abetted by the crown, advanced on the missions, hitherto the exclusive bailiwick of the orders.2 The religiotus orders and the secular clergy wrangled over tithes, benefices, and jurisdiction, among other things, and many of the quarrels continued from the early seventeenth century into the eighteenth. One of the most famous of these disputes was the controversy between the Jesuits and the Bishop of Puebla de los Angeles, Juan

American Constitutional Law and Politics · Historical and Linguistic Studies · Historical Studies in Latin America · History · Latin American history and culture · Medicine · Philosophy

• The Great Visitas of the Mexican Holy Office 1645-1669

  Open Access•Richard E Greenleaf•The Americas A Quarterly Review…•1988

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• The Jesuit expulsion

  Open Access•Francisco Garfias, Emily A Sellars•World Development•2025

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