“The Indians of every denomination were free, and independent of us”: Anglo-Virginian explorations of indigenous slavery, freedom, and society, 1772–1830

Ray, Kristofer

doi:10.1080/14664658.2016.1215019

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On July 15, 1594, officials in Puebla de los Ángeles arrested fifty-eightyear-old Margarita de Sossa (b. 1536) on charges of witchcraft (brujería) and hauled her from the city where she then resided, Puebla in New Spain, to the secret jails of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in the viceregal capital, México (present day Mexico City). As was typical in inquisitorial trials, Sossa did not know why she had been arrested. 1 However, she soon informed the prosecutors in her trial that she was innocent; her spiteful enemies in Puebla must have furnished any accusations levied against her. Sossa had harbored such enemies, she explained, because some years earlier she had testified against Bargas Machuca, a resident of Puebla, regarding his crime of incest against a young Indigenous Chichimeca girl to whom both Sossa and Machuca served as godparents. When inquisitors in Mexico City eventually heeded Sossa's calls to investigate the previous court case in Puebla where witnesses had supposedly provided false testimonies against her, inquisitors discovered a lengthy divorce

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Introduction

Ball¹,

Seijas²,

Snyder³

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Margarita de Sossa, Sixteenth-Century Puebla de los Ángeles, New Spain (Mexico)

Ireton¹

2020

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On July 15, 1594, officials in Puebla de los Ángeles arrested fifty-eightyear-old Margarita de Sossa (b. 1536) on charges of witchcraft (brujería) and hauled her from the city where she then resided, Puebla in New Spain, to the secret jails of the Holy Office of the Inquisition in the viceregal capital, México (present day Mexico City). As was typical in inquisitorial trials, Sossa did not know why she had been arrested. 1 However, she soon informed the prosecutors in her trial that she was innocent; her spiteful enemies in Puebla must have furnished any accusations levied against her. Sossa had harbored such enemies, she explained, because some years earlier she had testified against Bargas Machuca, a resident of Puebla, regarding his crime of incest against a young Indigenous Chichimeca girl to whom both Sossa and Machuca served as godparents. When inquisitors in Mexico City eventually heeded Sossa's calls to investigate the previous court case in Puebla where witnesses had supposedly provided false testimonies against her, inquisitors discovered a lengthy divorce Research for this chapter was conducted under the auspices of a Social Science Research Council International Dissertation Research Fellowship and The Leverhulme Trust in 2016 with a Study Abroad Studentship that permitted me to conduct research in archives in Mexico City for six months. I am extremely grateful to the editors of this volume, Erica L. Ball, Tatiana Seijas, and Terri L. Snyder, for inviting me to participate in the project, and for their incisive and inspiring comments and conversation about an earlier draft of this chapter. After spending time listening to and deciphering Margarita de Sossa's voice and life story, I dedicate this research to Thomas Ireton; for all that he has endured and to his strength and patience with us as we all learn to listen.

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“The Indians of every denomination were free, and independent of us”: Anglo-Virginian explorations of indigenous slavery, freedom, and society, 1772–1830

Cited by 33 publications

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As If She Were Free

As If She Were Free

Introduction

Margarita de Sossa, Sixteenth-Century Puebla de los Ángeles, New Spain (Mexico)

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