Lyle,

Thank you for the lecture of terminology. How about explaining the 18th
Spanish term "encomienda"? Harry Kelsey offers the following:

"The encomienda system, instituted after the Conquest, was the biggest killer
of all. The encomienda was form of personal service and tribute that
originated in Spain but received some peculiar refinements in the New World. Through
this system proprieters or encomenderos received certain villages as
encomiendas, with the right to demand goods or services or both as annual fees
(tasaciones). In exchange, the encomenderos were supposed to provide the villagers with
religious instruction and protection from their enemies. Innocuous sounding,
perhaps, but in practice the system became a vicious substitute for slavery."
(Harry Kelsey, 1986, Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo, San Marino: Huntington Library,
pages 17-18).

Kelsey went on to say that any native people who resisted were branded as
slaves and marched in cuadrillas to serve in the mines and agricultural fields.
Or, in the case of California, serve in the Roman Catholic missions. This 16th
century system for reducing native lifeways and forcing conversion to Spanish
authority continued through the 18th century. It is this system that caused
Southern California native pottery-making people to be transported to regions
where no pottery-making traditions occurred. I believe I have provided the basis
for my belief that Spanish conquest of California had a traumatic effect on
those who legitimately owned the land before they arrived. From an
archaeological viewpoint, the impact of coerced change should be reflected in the material
culture. One expression of the effects of this change would be pottery
traditions.

Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.