How the Spanish Empire Was Built by Felipe Fernández-Armesto

Author:Felipe Fernández-Armesto
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Reaktion Books

In 1738 the military engineer Juan de Gayangos reported that Puerto Cabello could accommodate one hundred ships. The figure was probably realistic: some sources claimed it was big enough for 3,000. Olavarriaga described the port admiringly: the physical setting, the channels running a league across from east to west, the inner bays and the careening facilities suited to ships of up to ten or twelve fathoms of draft. The larger of the channels was big enough to hold the pirate-chasing frigates that were another of the Guipuzcoan Company’s specialities. Four years previously, a trading post and warehouses had arisen, alongside offices, a sailyard, a bakery, an infirmary, quays and moles. Later, the erection of a ‘royal pier’ confirmed the growing prestige of the place. In 1774 it had 120 inhabited dwellings and more than 3,000 residents. The minimum sojourn for a merchant was reckoned to be of two months’ duration but it was normal to stay for twice as long.

On the route north from here to New Spain, ‘the quest for the perfect port’ led to the establishment of Portobelo, Panama’s ‘point of connexion’.21 The port that preceded it, Nombre de Dios, was abandoned towards the end of the sixteenth century because of the reefs that strew the approach and inhospitable hinterland of swampland and tangled forest. Francis Drake’s incendiary raid in 1596 was the final, fatal blow. At Portobelo, 5 leagues to the west, the shore seemed perfectly configured, but the site was too unhealthy to keep most residents at home for longer than the twenty or thirty days of markets every year.22 Construction of the customs house began in 1630. The story recalls that of Veracruz, occluded by uncertainty, shadowed by health threats, menaced with abandonment and disturbed by shifting patterns of settlement.

To the south, beyond the coasts dominated by Dutch and Brazilian rivals, Spain’s next great port was Montevideo, a frontier post that gradually transformed into a naval and military base. Inland was Asunción, the great river port of the Paraguay, from where barges, toted or paddled, or propelled by a single sail, or little flotillas of canoes, or smacks or brigs for bigger cargoes, carried tobacco, yerba mate and hides to Buenos Aires. Customs records reveal moments in the history of the trade. In 1783, for instance, Juan Cuello took 2,926 arrobas of yerba mate, honey, peanuts, sugar and cotton from Asunción to Corrientes.23 Cargoes of such dimensions demanded a lot of infrastructural investment.24 Platforms – which gradually yielded to properly built docks – lined the shore. An adaptable Murcian, Antonio Sánchez, was one of the entrepreneurs responsible. He was the captain of his own trading vessels, an outfitter of boats, a carpenter, a forester and a captain of militia. From 1797 until his death in 1809 he ran the factory at Asunción that made cables and cordage. In 1801 he petitioned successfully for a salary: previously, the factory supervisor was paid piece-rates when work was on hand. His other activities continued.

In Buenos Aires, at the

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