there than in Iberia for a good deal of the sixteenth century. And after Iberia, the largest African populations in Europe were in Milan—continuously the subject of bicker between “Frenchmen” and Milanese—Naples, and Sicily (all ruled from Madrid after 1535).9
Moreover, Spaniards were enduring revolts by thousands of organized indigenes in Darien, a province of Panama.10 Predictably, in 1537 Africans revolted in the heart of New Spain, as their numbers were at a level that gave them confidence that they could succeed, and then they rebelled again in 1612.11 Tristan de Luna y Arrellano, who reached today’s Pensacola by 1559, sharpened his skill in combating indigenes in Oaxaca by 1548.12
Moreover, in the first half of the sixteenth century, there was an acute shortage of Spanish women in many of the hemispheric colonies, yet as the inevitable occurred and the number of mestizos grew, the Crown fretted that this would simply fuel dreams of secession.13 The situation cried out for a “whiteness” project, curbing religious sectarianism and inviting settlers from various European polities irrespective of confessional preferences, but it would take the scrappy underdogs who were the Protestants to embark on this pragmatic route. Assuredly, rampaging indigenes were not sitting around waiting for the Crown to sort out its demographic problems but, instead, were attacking on virtually every front.14 Enslaving indigenes and Africans was complicated when in 1550 the Crown hampered the ability to acquire slaves from the eastern Mediterranean—similar grounds hindered acquiring Wolofs, that is, their being largely Muslim, not to mention rebellious; in the long run, this would mean more enslaving of non-Muslim Africans and indigenes.15
Not accidentally, the mass liquidation of indigenes increased the odds of Spanish colonialism prevailing. But working against Madrid was its intensifying rule of the Netherlands, dominated by the Crown for decades, which drove numerous refugees into England. This flow increased beginning in about 1550 and continued for decades and contributed to the tens of thousands who made England their new home—and also, coincidentally, contributed to an incipient “whiteness.” Tellingly, Antwerp, a nearby site of Spanish influence, had one of the largest populations of Africans in Europe.16 In short, Spain’s religious sectarianism was at odds with the needs of colonialism, meaning, for example, that Havana’s resident European population generally did not grow in the 1540s and 1550s, which would mean more reliance upon Africans.17
This reliance was understandable since the liquidation of indigenes since 1492 had been nothing less than breathtaking. The objection of the colonist Bartolomé de las Casas is now well known, as indigenous numbers fell precipitously from approximately two million in 1492 to less than 15,000 a few decades later.18 The enraged cleric lamented that “there is no language, no art or science, that can avail to recite the abominable and bloody actions committed by these human monsters. Neither is it possible to exaggerate their detestable deeds” for “to all these horrible scenes, I was an eye-witness.” He cried that the conquerors sought to “blind their eyes with red hot irons, sear their tongues from their mouths,” and “drop molten lead on their bare flesh.”19 Thus, alert to the demographic debacle, when Charles V authorized the importation of more Africans into the Americas, the license for delivering 17,000 unfortunate souls was said to be for “philanthropic motives,” that is, “to preserve the Indians,” an exercise in the rankest cynicism.20
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