Martín de Mujica y Buitrón

Martín de Mujica in a contemporary presentation

Martín de Mujica y Buitrón (* in Villafranca (today: Ordizia ), Guipuzcoa Province in the Spanish Basque Country ; † May 4, 1649 in Santiago de Chile ) was a Spanish officer who served as governor of Chile .

Life

Origin and career in Europe

Mujica came from a noble Basque family and served the Spanish crown from an early age. He rose to the rank of Sargento Mayor and distinguished himself in the war against France in Piedmont , especially when the Spanish attacked Vercelli on June 15, 1638. He then went to Catalonia , which, with the support of the French, went against King Philip IV . had raised. In April 1642 he came with his entire unit into French captivity; Nothing is known about his release, but from 1644 he served again in the Spanish army.

He was accepted into the Order of Santiago and appointed Governor of Chile by royal charter on December 30, 1644. His term of office was to last eight years. In the middle of 1645, Mujica embarked for South America and reached Lima in February 1646. In Concepción he arrived on May 8, 1646 and took over the government. The city council (Spanish: cabildo ) of Santiago received him solemnly.

Term of office as governor in Chile

Discipline of the Soldateska

He ensured that soldiers were disciplined, whose debauchery had become a burden for the colony. Mujica was seen as a very religious and morally strict man.

Peace with the Mapuche

With the Mapuche Indians, who had been fighting a war with the Spanish conquerors for decades, a comprehensive peace was agreed in the Parlamento de Quillín . His general inspector Francisco de la Fuente y Villalobos had made the preparations, in February 1647 around a thousand Indians met with representatives of the Spaniards in Quillín and solemnly swore peace.

Administrative measures

In view of the poverty of the colony and the fact that the hopes of the Spaniards for extensive gold discoveries had proven to be unfounded, Mujica proposed to the king to ease the burden of taxes on the population. Mujica was convinced that state intervention was the decisive factor for economic success and made numerous orders to promote the development of the colony. He also suggested the establishment of further settlements in the south, for which the funds were lacking.

1647 earthquake

On Monday, May 13, 1647, at 10:30 p.m. local time, a severe earthquake shook the Andes, from southern Chile to the area of Cusco in present-day Peru . Santiago was badly hit, almost all the houses were destroyed, even from the Cerro Santa Lucia rocks came loose and fell on the houses and into the streets of the city. The governor was in Concepción at the time; there the news reached him on May 26th through a report from the Real Audiencia of Chile .

Mujica decided to act quickly and devoted not only his own fortune but also a considerable amount of the state treasury to compensating the victims in Santiago. At that time, this was an unheard of unauthorized action that he could only have the king approve of afterwards. In Peru, the viceroy and senior officials raised over 12,000 pesos for the earthquake victims in Chile. The Audiencia and the City Council of Santiago decided to rebuild the city against all risks in the same place. The following winter of 1648 was accompanied by unusually heavy rainfall and floods, which repeatedly set the construction work back.

The governor and Cabildo finally obtained a six-year tax exemption for the city from the king. In the rest of the country, too, taxes were lowered in favor of the monasteries.

Conflict with the Audiencia

In view of the total destruction of the country and the shattered state finances, Mujica considered the administrative system of the Real Audiencia to be oversized. He suggested to the king that the audiencia should be dispensed with for reasons of budget and that its duties should be carried out with the help of normal alcaldes (executive bodies ) and a lieutenant governor. However, this proposal was rejected.

Sudden death

For the entire year 1648, Mujica was bound in Concepción, where violent actions by the Indians repeatedly endangered the peace. In April 1649 he went back to Santiago to visit the reconstruction work and to take part in the celebrations for Holy Week (Spanish: Semana Santa ). On May 1st he arrived in Santiago, on the third day there he had just finished the first course of his dinner when his mouth suddenly foam and his tongue swelled; he left the blackboard, went to his room and was dead within an hour. Contemporaries suspected an attack by poison; He was not lacking in influential enemies in the Audiencia and the clergy.

literature

• José Toribio Medina : Diccionario Biográfico Colonial de Chile . Imprenta Elziviriana, Santiago, Chile 1906, p. 560 (Spanish, memoriachilena.cl [PDF; accessed June 15, 2010]).
• Diego Barros Arana : Historia General de Chile . tape 4 . Editorial Universitaria, Santiago de Chile 2001, p. 301–333 (Spanish, memoriachilena.cl [accessed June 10, 2010] first edition: 1886).