Indigene Kinder als Träger der Evangelisierung – Das franziskanische Erziehungsprojekt im kolonialen Mexiko am Beispiel der Halbinsel Yucatán
Description of the doctoral project:
Preliminary working title: "Indigene Kinder als Träger der Evangelisierung – Das franziskanische Erziehungsprojekt im kolonialen Mexiko am Beispiel der Halbinsel Yucatán" [Indigenous children as agents of evangelization - The Franciscan educational project in colonial Mexico using the example of the Yucatán Peninsula]
In the mid-16th century, the Franciscans arrived in the Yucatán Peninsula, a region of the indigenous Maya, as part of the expanding colonization of Mexico. The aim of the friars was to spread the Christian faith among the indigenous population.
The Franciscans had already gained experience with this in the Mexican center. There, the Franciscans encountered ethnic groups who were unfamiliar with monotheistic Christianity.
The pre-Hispanic cultures of Mesoamerica, including the Aztecs (actually Mexica according to their own name) and the Maya, who lived in the Mexican center, knew a multitude of deities. They erected monumental buildings in their honor, which have survived as ruins to this day. They also paid homage to the gods with elaborate ceremonies and sacrifices.
The beliefs of the indigenous people, which were foreign to Europeans, were soon labeled as pagan superstition and idolatry, and their practice was increasingly systematically punished and penalized. The missionaries were motivated by hopes of liberating the natives and bringing Christian salvation. The religious were also inspired by thoughts of building an ideal community in the original Christian style, with eschatological ideas of an approaching end of the world also playing a role.[1]
But a faith as deeply rooted as that of the indigenous people could not simply be replaced by Christianity in mass baptisms. The Franciscans recognized that in order for the indigenous people to permanently accept and understand Christianity and European values, they had to be integrated into the European-Christian cultural system.[2] Furthermore, the pre-Hispanic memory (memoria) was to be suppressed and replaced by a European-Christian one.[3] To achieve this, the indigenous population had to be "educated", so to speak, by the religious – the foundation stone of the Franciscan education system in colonial Mexico.
The Franciscan education system in colonial Mexico focused primarily on the education of indigenous children, as they were still considered "blank slates"[4], free from the influences of the old faith. Teaching them was intended to help pass on the Christian faith and the European cultural system to their parents' generation. Depending on gender and social status, children were educated in the churchyards (patios) of the newly built monasteries and in the monastery schools. There were also elite schools for vocational training and higher education. The teaching content varied from basic knowledge of Christianity and standard prayers to higher instruction in Latin, Spanish and the septem artes. Particular attention was paid to the education of the noble sons, as they were considered the future generation of rulers and therefore particularly influential among the local population.[5]
In the course of the 16th century, the Franciscans spread to four provinces, including the Provincia de San José de Yucatán.[6] The doctoral project will begin with the transfer of the Franciscans to Yucatán. A previous master's thesis (2023) focused on the Mexican center; the examination of the Franciscan educational system on the Yucatán Peninsula is now intended to expand this coherently. It is worth looking at the Yucatán region and the evangelization and education of the Maya. On the one hand, research to date – with a few exceptions such as Martín Ramos Díaz and John F. Chuchiak IV[7] – has concentrated primarily on the Mexican center; on the other hand, other conditions prevailed among the Maya on the Yucatán, such as hieroglyphic writing and thus the existence of literacy – a basic prerequisite for evangelization in Mexico. And the conquest of the peninsula was also a lengthy and incomplete process, unlike in the center.
In addition to the European view of the Franciscan educational project, this cross-epochal and cross-cultural doctoral project also aims to filter out the indigenous view of the events by studying the sources, insofar as this is possible. Reports by chroniclers, letters to the Spanish and religious authorities and administrative documents are available for the study of sources. From an indigenous perspective, there are documented cases in which the indigenous people turned to the authorities. There were also indigenous chroniclers.
As a further and fundamental aspect, it is important to take a look at the conditions of the Franciscans in medieval Europe and how they viewed education in general and the Christian education of the population. The training of the religious will also be examined and a comparison drawn with the situation in Yucatán – an approach most recently pursued by Chuchiak 2021[8].
[1] Cf. Righetti-Templer, Stephanie: Der spanische Franciscanismo in der Neuen Welt. An investigation into the transfer of Franciscan theology to Latin America in the 16th century based on the works of Fray Toribio de Benavente Motolinía, in: Melville, Gert (ed.): Vita regularis. Ordnungen und Deutungen religiosen Lebens im Mittelalter, Berlin 2019; p. 95 and p. 98.
[2] Cf. Kobayashi H., José María F. Kazuhiro: La educación como conquista: empresa franciscana en México, México D.F. 1997 [19741]; pp. 155–156.
[3] Cf. Cuesta Hernández, Javier: La educación indígena y la memoria en Nueva España en el siglo XVI; in: Boletín de Antropología, Vol. 33, Núm. 56 (2018), pp. 103–116; pp. 106–107 and p. 115.
[4] Cf. González Cicero, Stella María: Perspectiva religiosa en Yucatán 1517-1571. Yucatán, los franciscanos y el primer obispo fray Francisco de Toral, México D.F. 1978; p. 116.
[5] Cf. López de la Torre, Carlos Fernando: El trabajo misional de fray Pedro de Gante en los inicios de la Nueva España, in: Fronteras de la Historia, Vol. 21 (2016), pp. 90–116; p. 95.
[6] Cf. Rubial García, Antonio: Estudio preliminar Fray Gerónimo de Mendieta. Tiempo, Vida, Obra y Pensamiento, in: Fray Gerónimo de Mendieta: Historia Eclesiástica Indiana I (Joaquín García Icazbalceta), México D.F. 2002, pp. 15–52; p. 27.
[7] Cf. Ramos Díaz, Martín: Idólatras y mentores. Escuelas en el Yucatán del siglo XVI, in: Estudios de Historia Novohispana, 28 (2008), pp. 37-60. And cf. Ramos Díaz, Martín: Libros, ideas y educación en la frontera sureste de la Nueva España, in: Macias Richard, Carlos/ Ramos Díaz, Martín/ Bracamonte y Sosa, Pedro/ Solís Robleda, Gabriela (ed.): El Caribe mexicano. Origen y conformación, siglos XVI y XVII, México D.F. 2006, pp. 529–405. As well as cf. Chuchiak, John F.: Sapientia et Doctrina: The structure of Franciscan Education in San José Province and the Teaching of Alphabetic Literacy among the Yucatec Maya, 1545-1650, in: Cohen, Thomas M./ Harrison, Jay T./ Galindo, David Rex (eds.): The Franciscans in Colonial Mexico, Norman/Oceanside 2021, pp. 127–155.
[8] Cf. Chuchiak 2021; pp. 129–140.