The logo for Lesson 9 is Sor Juana

In a sense, this attitude was the continuation of the independent attitudes of the early conquistadores and adelantados, who felt that they were the ones who were making the sacrifices, and not the bureaucrats in Madrid or Lisbon. Thus, they deserved the rewards and benefits of their courageous deeds. At first this focused on the looting and pillaging of the precious metals they found in the empires of the Aztecs and the Incas. Once these activities peaked and declined, attention shifted to the profits that would come out of the mines and fields. For this the New World Iberians needed land and labor. Initially the land and labor (in the form of the Indigenous who lived on it) came as a package: the monarch, through the institution of the "encomienda", awarded the conquistador and his family a grant of land and "commended" the Indians living on it to his care, with the obligation of bringing them the Catholic religion and some limited education. As we have seen, the settler did not hesitate to use the labor and permit the priests to convert. But the amount of "care" he gave his charges was limited, and education for the Indian was almost nonexistent. Power, wealth and social status lay in holding the land and controlling the Indians (and later the Black slaves) who extracted the riches from the land.