The author of this book set out originally to write an article based on twelve reports made by local authorities in 1783 on the Colotlán frontier of western New Spain; however, upon the advice of scholars of the Instituto de Historia of the University of Mexico, she decided also to publish the twelve reports. These reports, deposited today with the Archivo General de la Nación, were made by the priest, padrón, alcalde mayor, corregidor, or local leading citizen of each of the parishes of the Colotlán district. The district was roughly what is now the extreme northern part of the Mexican state of Jalisco and principally the valleys of the Balaños and Colotlán rivers. The region was brought under Spanish control in the early 16th century by Ñuño de Guzmán. After the bloody war of the Mixton in 1541, Viceroy Luis de Velasco, as a part of his “diplomacia de la paz,” caused it to be settled with vassal Indians, mostly Tlaxcaltecas. Colotlán was a military buffer zone against the Indios bravos, in this case the Chichimecas and Nayaritas. It also protected the mines of Zacatecas and the Camino Real which ran along its eastern boundary.
In 1783, because of a jurisdictional dispute, the new Viceroy, Matías de Gálvez, ordered that a report be made on Colotlán. He specified that it include information on the number of inhabitants, their customs, their occupations and other activities, and recommendations on what form of government would be best to establish among them. Since the recognized subdivision of the district was the parish, a separate report was ordered for each of these. What author Velázquez has done is to describe the contemporary historical situation and to synthesize the contents of the reports. It is not often that a reviewer has such a ready opportunity to check the author’s use of documents, but in this case the treatment seems to be fair and balanced and the conclusions warranted. One might question the inclusion in such a short book of forty-nine pages of names, the census of several villages, when the only possible interest is genealogical, but this does no harm to the remaining passages. The book also contains two excellent maps, one in color.
This book should be of special interest to historians of the Mexican frontier as a source of first-hand information on the conditions in a frontier district after it had outgrown its usefulness. By 1783 the Nayaritas had become quite tame (one official reported he would rather live with them than the Indians of the frontier villages), and the frontier Indians had become unmanagable because they were allowed to maintain militia companies and to retain the important privileges granted to frontiersmen, especially exemption from taxes. Indeed, they had been known to kill Spanish militia commanders who were not to their liking.
American frontier historians might also be interested in this book as a comparison to the frontier they study. At first the similarities might seem few. For instance, the Spanish technique of settling the frontier with subjugated Indians to be used as buffers against the wild Indians might seem to have no counterpart in United States history, but is it not possible that a similarity exists between this and the U. S. policy of Indian removal? Consider the case of the five civilized tribes of the South who were removed to Oklahoma and, whether it was planned this way or not, served as an effective buffer against the savage Plains Indians.
