Oct 10, 2013 - Sale 2324

Sale 2324 - Lot 405

Price Realized: $ 11,875
?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 5,000 - $ 7,500
(PARAGUAY.) Arias de Saavedra, Hernando (Hernandarias). Important decree concerning the rights of Indians. Manuscript Document Signed on page 691 as "Hernandarias"; additional signatures by García Venegas and others. 14 manuscript leaves, some numbered 685 through 694 and 696. Folio, stitched, with 3 unnumbered leaves loose; worn and wormed with minor loss of text, minor dampstaining to the loose leaves. Asunción, 12 December 1598
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Hernando Arias de Saavedra (1561-1634) was born in Asunción, Paraguay. He was named governor of Rio de la Plata in 1597, the first man born in the Americas to be appointed as ruler of any European colony. He served intermittently through 1617.
The bulk of this document is devoted to a 29-point decree by Hernandarias concerning the protection of the local Indians under the encomienda system. It forbids transfer of Indians from one location to another without permission of the governor (items 6 and 8), mistreatment of Indians (item 10), interference with their hunting and fishing (item 11), and breaking up Indian families (item 12). Specific fines and prison sentences are set forth to punish disobedience. The decree was published under the title "Derechos de los Indios y su protección" in Revista de Derecho, Historia y Letras XXIII (Buenos Aires, 1905), pages 370-381.