Indigenous Nueva Galicia: The Native Peoples of Jalisco and Zacatecas

 I attended the lecture "Indigenous Nueva Galicia: The Native Peoples of Jalisco and Zacatecas" as part of the Genealogical Society of Hispanic America virtual conference. The speaker was John Schmal, who previously gave a program for Clayton Library in May 2021. He is well known and regarded for his extensive knowledge of the indigenous cultures of Mexico and runs the website https://indigenousmexico.org/

In this talk he focused on the region of Nueva Galicia, an autonomous kingdom in the Viceroyalty of New Spain. It encompasses the modern-day Mexican states of Aguascalientes, Guanajuato, Colima, Jalisco, Nayarit, and Jalisco. In 1621 it was noted that 72 languages were spoken in this province.

This map from Peter Gerhard's book The North Frontier of New Spain shows the location of some of the area's indigenous groups. However, the border lines are not firm, and these groups likely lived in a state of flux, mingling with one another.

The indigenous populations suffered losses from the Spanish conquest, rebellions, famine, enslavement, dislocation, and epidemics. Immunity to Old World diseases manifested about 1650, and the populations stabilized after a dramatic decline.

The most surprising aspect of the presentation was that some indigenous groups from another part of Mexico cooperated with the Spaniards and were used as assimilation tools. Peoples from the Christianized Tlaxcalan and Otomie groups were moved to areas in Nueva Galicia to help acculturate the local indigenous groups and help them adapt to their new existence. A conflict the Spaniards were having with the Chichimeca group basically ended when the Spaniards bribed them with free handouts, giving out maize and beef, clothing, and agricultural tools. 

JO