The nine essays contained in this book were originally presented as conference papers at the 1997 International Congress of Americanists in Quito, Ecuador. Heterogeneous in thematic and geographical focus, the work is useful, but not all that cohesive. The book is divided into two parts. Three chapters in part 1 examine the immensely important role played by the Spanish Consulado of Seville and later Cádiz. Six chapters of part 2 examine a wide variety of largely unrelated issues dealing with colonial commerce.
Enriqueta Vila Vilar, co-editor of the book, begins with an examination of the Consulado’s growing political influence during the seventeenth century, arguing that its power stemmed from the critical role it played as the Crown’s primary financier. A symbiotic relationship between the Crown and the Consulado developed in which the Crown came to depend on loans from the Consulado and the Consulado learned to extract favorable concessions in...
