Motivating Factor

The motivating factor for historical change in the Stern book is economics and this was also discussed in class.  I agree with this because the reason that the conquest occurred in the first place was to find wealth for those that were not lucky enough to find it in the mother country of Spain.  It is the search for wealth that led to the discoveries of the varying empires such as the Aztec, the Inca, and the Maya.  As stern writes, “an insatiable thirst for the money-commodities (i.e., precious metals), and the hope to make money ‘work’ or grow now captivated a spreading entrepreneurial imagination.”  The reason the Spanish decided to stay and attempt to rule these native people was because they wanted wealth, they searched for gold, silver, and precious stones.  Their intentions were not to make peaceful contact and understand these civilizations, their culture, their origins, or their religion but to use the knowledge these people had of their land in order to find the gold.  The labor systems that are discussed by Stern rose because of the greedy conquistadors, elite Spaniards, elite Indians, and their ambition for wealth or their economic wellbeing.  Some of these labor systems are the encomienda, wage labor, and debt peonage with some of these, as we discussed in class, may fall under slavery or have some characteristics of slavery. The conquest became a conquest because the motivation for its beginning was economic, to get rich, to find land, to find gold, and to ascend the social hierarchy many could not achieve in Spain.  If the motivating factor would have been scientific, artistic, philosophical, or anthropological then the conquest could have been an exploration, an expedition of these foreign lands and amazing civilizations and not a conquest.  History would have taken a different turn if the motivating factor had been other than economic.