Viceroy Francisco de Toledo

Viceroy Francisco de Toledo was the Spanish Viceroy of Peru from 1569 to 1581.


 * "Toledo arrived in Peru in 1569 with the twin responsibilities of restoring royal dominion ni a viceroyalty wracked by civil strife and organizing all aspects of royal revenue production. Central to his effort was the final legitimation of the Hapsburg claim to sovereignty in Peru. In fact, the conquest of the Inca Empire was as yet incomplete, for Manco Inca and his successors held out at Vilcabamba until 1572."

Reorganization of Indigenous

 * "A general census, conducted by the viceroy himself during an extensive tour of the realm, recorded 1,077,697 Indians, belonging to 614 ayllus (large kin units, composed of one or more moieties). The Indians were subsequently settled in new villages to facilitate their control, the collection of tribute, and their religious instruction. Members of one or more ayllus were settled in one of two parcialidades, and each parcialidad was placed under an Indian gobernador (governor), and other kurakas (Indian headmen, initially nobles, also called caciques). The settlement of the Indians into aggregated villages had first been proposed in 1550 by President Pedro de la Gasca of the Audiencia of Lima, and was begun by 1567, but it was only under Toledo that the program became extensive and effective. This was to be characteristic of his viceroyalty - the use of extant policies and practices in a larger, more organized manner."

Mita Labor in the Mines of Potosí
During the colonial period, Viceroy Francisco de Toledo led the Spanish to co-opt the Inca system of mit'a to conscript millions of indigenous to work in the mines of Potosí in modern day Bolivia.


 * "The mita was a draft Indian labor regimen designed by Viceroy Francisco de Toledo in 1573 to meet the need for unskilled labor in the revitalized silver industry at Potosí. That revitalization was prompted by the development of a new amalgamation refining method suitable to the mining zone's high elevation, which held the promise that potosi might recapture the fabled production levels that had made it famous during its first two decades of exploitation (1545-65)."

Related Sourcewatch Articles

 * Timeline of European Conquest of the Americas
 * Timeline of the Exchange of Crops After 1492
 * Mita