Spanish colonial pueblos and villas in North America

Spanish colonial authorities in North America established misiones (churches with attached farms), presidios (military forts) and villas or pueblos (civilian settlements with residences, retail businesses, agricultural markets, etc.). Official pueblo establishments (as opposed to those that developed organically) were granted four square Spanish leagues of land and were required to be sited at least five Spanish leagues away from any other pueblo. According to one Arizona history, "Each organized pueblo was to have at least thirty inhabitants, each one to have ten breeding cows, four oxen, one brood mare, one sow, twenty Castillian ewes, six hens and one cock. House lots and sowing lands were to be distributed among pueblo settlers."[1] Among the leadership of a pueblo was an alcalde (preceded in the history of Spanish administration by the title corregidor).

Historical map of Spanish North America
Map of Spanish America c. 1800
Diagram of Pueblo of Santa Barbara, California (Walter A. Hawley, 1910)
U.S. post office application from 1866 shows the four square Spanish leagues of the pre-statehood Los Angeles Pueblo
Provincias Ynternas de Nueva España mapped in 1817

Spanish colonial pueblos in North America included:[2]

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Mattison, Ray (1946-10-01). "Early Spanish and Mexican Settlements in Arizona". New Mexico Historical Review. 21 (4). ISSN 0028-6206.
  2. ^ a b c d "Rancho, Pueblo, Presidio & Mission Lands". CA State Lands Commission. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  3. ^ a b c d "Renewing Spanish Colonial Society". myText CNM. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  4. ^ Cerkkila (2022-07-27). "Santa Fe and the Spanish City System". SAH ARCHIPEDIA. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  5. ^ Shorris, Earl (1999-05-09). "Rio Grande, Ciudad Juarez". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  6. ^ "A Year in the Life of a Spanish Colonial Pueblo: San José de Guadalupe in 1809". Google Arts & Culture. Retrieved 2023-03-30.
  7. ^ Robinson, W. W. (1948). Land in California, the story of mission lands, ranchos, squatters, mining claims, railroad grants, land scrip [and] homesteads. Chronicles of California. Berkeley: Univ. of California Press. p. 37.
  8. ^ "Santa Barbara Pueblo Lands, Diseños 543, GLO 386, Santa Barbara County, and associated historical documents".
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