Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
THE UTOPIAN KINGDOM OF THE JESUITS IN CHIQUITOS
When the Spanish first arrived in what is now eastern Bolivia, the vast, forest-covered
plains between the Río Grande and the Río Paraguay were densely populated by up to fifty
different
indigenous groups
. To the Spaniards this was a strategically vital region, provid-
ing a link between the silver of the Andes, their settlements in Paraguay and the Río de la
Plata. However, a century of constant military expeditions failed to subdue the indigenous
population - known collectively as the
Chiquitanos
.
In exasperation, at the end of the seventeenth century the colonial authorities in Santa
Cruz turned to the
Jesuits
to pacify the region and secure the empire's frontier. By this
time the Jesuits had more than a century of experience in South America, and were quick
to implement the missionary strategy that had proved successful elsewhere. Small groups
of dedicated priests set out to convert the indigenous peoples and persuade them to settle
in missions known as
reducciones
, places where they could be brought together and “re-
duced”toEuropean“civilization”,whichincludedbeingconvertedtoCatholicism.Though
many missionaries met gruesome deaths at the hands of those they sought to convert, the
different tribal groups of Chiquitania quickly flocked to join the new settlements, which
offered them many advantages. After a century of war, many had anyway been seeking a
peaceful accommodation with the colonial regime, and under the aegis of the Jesuits they
were protected from the rapacious slave raids of the Spaniards in Santa Cruz and the Por-
tuguese in Brazil, as well as from their own tribal enemies.
“CIVILIZING” THE CHIQUITANOS
Ten
missions
flourished under the Jesuit regime: European livestock and crops were suc-
cessfully introduced; the Chiquitanos had limited autonomy under their own councils or
cabildos
, and were taught in their own languages (one of these, Chiquitano, was eventually
adopted as the main language in all the missions); indigenous craftsmen were trained in
European techniques and built magnificent churches; European musical instruments were
introduced and quickly mastered by the
Chiquitanos
,
establishing a
musical tradition
that
survives to this day. The missions were not quite the autonomous socialist utopia Jesuit
sympathizers have since tried to make out - many indigenous people were brought in by
force, and the political and ideological control exercised by the fathers was pretty much ab-
solute - but in general the missions provided a far more benign regime than anything else
on offer under Spanish rule.
SPANISH DOMINANCE
In the end, though, for all their self-sufficiency and autonomy, the Jesuit missions were ut-
terly dependent on the Spanish colonial authorities. When in 1767 political developments
in far-off Europe led the
Spanish king
to order the Jesuits out of the Americas, the fathers
meekly concurred, and the Chiquitanos were quickly subjected to
forced labour
and the
