Juan de Carvajal (Conquistador)

Juan de Carvajal (* 1509 / 1510 in Villafranca del Bierzo ( León ) and Villafranca de los Barros ( Badajoz ); † 17th September 1546 in El Tocuyo (today Venezuela belonging)) was a Spanish officer and conquistador who in 1545 the city El Tocuyo founded and in 1546 the murder of the German conquistadors Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomäus VI. Welser prompted.

Life

In 1528, Emperor Charles V , who also ruled Spain as King Charles I, and the Augsburg banking and trading house led by Bartholomäus V. Welser came to an Asiento in which the Welsers became governor of the Spanish overseas province of Venezuela was transferred. The Welser were obliged to develop resources, build up a regular administration, found settlements and convert the indigenous natives to the Catholic faith.

Nothing is known about Juan de Carvajal's life prior to his arrival in South America. He arrived in Coro in 1529 or 1530 with an expedition set up by the Welsers, which was not founded until 1527, and worked from 1531 to 1533 as a clerk in the army of the German conqueror Ambrosius Ehinger . Since he was able to carry out this activity, it is assumed that he attended a university in Spain. Carvajal worked as an administrative clerk in Coro since 1535 and participated in the development of the surrounding regions, in particular the area around Maracaibo .

As early as May 1538, Juan de Carvajal was referred to as a former employee of the Welser. The reasons for the termination of his services for the Augsburg trading house have not been passed down. Carvajal is said to have often complained to the governor in Santo Domingo about alleged or actual violations in the treatment of Spanish soldiers by German officers or administrative employees. In the following years he worked with the governor of Santo Domingo, Alonso de Fuenmayor, on whose behalf he is said to have brought and sold fifty-five Indian slaves from Maracaibo to Santo Domingo. Due to a shipwreck in 1540 his undertaking to bring captured Indians from the lagoon of Maracaibo to Cabo de la Vela for pearl fishing failed . Then Carvajal was rapporteur for the Court of Justice (Audiencia) of Santo Domingo, which in 1544 appointed him Lieutenant Governor and Captain General of Venezuela.

Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomäus VI. In 1546, Welser will consider the certificate of appointment presented by Carvajal to be a forgery. This claim could not be clearly proven or refuted until today. Since 1542 the Spanish crown changed its colonial policy, with the new laws (Spanish: Leyes Nuevas ) the indigenous natives were to be protected from encroachments by the conquistadors and private companies such as the colonization by the Welser were to be restricted. The appointment of Carvajal as vice governor and captain general of Venezuela can be seen as a targeted action by the Spanish crown or its colonial authorities to eliminate German competitors.

Juan de Carvajal arrived in Coro in December 1544. There he profited from the dissatisfaction of the Spaniards living in poor circumstances and the Indians living with them from the Jirajara group as well as the absence of the German conquistadors around Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomäus VI. Welser who tried since 1541 to find the legendary gold country " El Dorado ". Carvajal viewed this expedition as a violation of the agreement between the Spanish crown and the Augsburg banking and trading house. In his opinion, the Germans neglected their task of colonizing the newly discovered areas and settling soldiers and their families. So he organized an expedition and convinced most of the locals to found another town in an area more suitable for agriculture and livestock.

After a four-month march, the Spanish settlers and the natives who accompanied them reached a fertile valley that was traversed by a river that the Spaniards called the " Río Tocuyo ". In this valley Juan de Carvajal founded the city "Ciudad de Nuestra Señora de la Pura y Limpia Concepción de El Tocuyo" on December 7, 1545 , which functioned from 1546 to 1548 as the administrative seat of Venezuela. The strategic importance of this city foundation for the development of Venezuela shows u. a. also that the expedition that led to the founding of Caracas was led from El Tocuyo.

At the end of 1545 or beginning of 1546 Philip von Hutten and Bartholomäus VI returned. Welser returned to the depopulated Coro. As a result of their long absence, the German conquistadors were not informed of the changes in Spanish colonial policy. Philipp von Hutten saw in the actions of Carvajal an usurpation of his official powers as captain general of Venezuela. At the end of April 1546 there was a tense meeting between the two rival groups. Since Bartholomäus Welser tried to kill Carvajal, a battle broke out, which Carvajal's troops won. The defeated were disarmed, but they were assured safe passage to Coro. On May 17, 1546 there were renewed verbal and physical attacks between the warring groups. Thereupon Carvajal condemned the German conquistadors Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomäus VI. Welser and her Spanish followers Diego Romero and Rodrigo de Plasencia to death by beheading. The sentence was carried out immediately. With the death of Philipp von Hutten and Bartholomäus Welser, the activities of the Welser in Venezuela ended.

Based on rumors and inquiries, Charles V ordered that the events in Venezuela be cleared up. The Santo Domingo Court of Justice commissioned the lawyer Juan Pérez de Tolosa to investigate the fate of the two German conquistadors. After six weeks, Pérez de Tolosa managed to track down and arrest Carvajal in El Tocuyo. On September 16, 1546, he charged his prisoner with the murder of the four conquistadors. In his defense, Carvajal stated that because of the precarious living conditions of the Spanish settlers in Coro, he felt obliged to settle them in a more fertile region. He rated the actions of the Germans as resistance to his administration. Pérez de Tolosa nevertheless found him guilty and sentenced him to death. On September 17, 1546, Juan de Carvajal was tied to a horse and dragged to death. His body was then hung on a Ceiba tree in the main square of El Tocuyo.

In the city of El Tocuyo, founded by Juan de Carvajal, over 105,000 people lived in 2010.

Web links

• Jörg Denzer: The conquest of the Augsburg Welser Society in South America 1528 - 1556
• La web de las BIOGRAFIAS: Juan de Carvajal (span.)
• PUEBLOS ORIGINARIOS Biografias: Juan de Carvajal (span.)