ZUNI
768
ZUNI
order to appreciate the task that confronted the first
Bishop of Mexico. The great multitude of Indians
who asked for baptism, said to have greatly increased
after the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe in
1531, forced the missionaries to adopt a special form
for administering this sacrament. The catechumens
were ranged in order, the children in front, the
prayers were recited in common over all, the salt,
saUva, etc., applied to a few, and then water was
poured on the head of each one without using the
holy oils nor chrism, because these were not to be
had. So long as the Franciscans were in charge of the
missions there was no question raised, but as soon as
members of other religious orders and some secular
ecclesiastics arrived, doubts began to be cast upon the
validity of these baptisms. To put an end to dis-
pute Bishop Zumdrraga submitted the case to Rome,
and on 1 June, 1537, Paul III issued the Bull " Altitudo
divini consilii", which declared that the Friars had not
sinned in administering baptism under this form,
nothing being said with regard to its vaUdity since
on this score there could be no doubt, but decreed
that in future it should not be thus administered
except in cases of urgent need.
Other difficulties arose apropos of marriage. In their pagan condition the Indians had many wives and conculDines, and when they were converted the question arose which were wives and which were concubines, and if perchance there had been a vaUd marriage with any one of these women. The Fran- ciscans knew that certain rites were observed for cer- tain unions; that in some cases where separation or divorce was desired, it was necessary to obtain the consent of the authorities, and that in other cases the consent of the interested parties sufficed; that therefore there were valid marriages among the Indians. Others denied that this was the case. Bishop Zumdrraga took part in all these discussions until the case was submitted to the Holy See and PaulIII in the same Bull "Altitudo" decreed that the converted Indians should keep the first woman they had taken to wife.
A third important difficulty concerned the position of the regulars and their privileges. Adrian VI on 9 May, 1522, directed to Charles V the famous Bull "Exponi nobis fecisti", by which he transferred to the Franciscans and other mendicant orders his own ApostoUc authority in all matters in which they judged it necessary for the conversion of the Indians, excepting for such acts as required episcopal consecra tion. This provision affected regions where there was no bishop, or where it required two or more days of travel to reach him. Paul III confirmed this Bull on 15 Jan., 1535. The bishops found their authority much limited, and a series of assemblies followed in which Zumdrraga with his customary prudence tried to arrive at an understanding with the regulars without openly clashing with them. Various modifi- cations were adopted with the consent of the regulars on condition that these "should not impair the privileges of the regulars". The question therefore remained open. In 1535 Bishop Zumdrraga received from the Inquisitor General, Alvaro Manrique, .Arch- bishop of Seville, the title of .\postoUc Inquisitor of the city of Mexico and of the entu-e diocese with extensive faculties, including that of dehvering criminals to the secular courts. He never availed himself of this title nor established the tribunal, al- though he did indict and deliver to the secular courts a resident of Tezcoco who was accused of having reverted to idolatry and offering human sacrifices.
Meanwhile Las Casas had gone to Spain and ob- tained from the famovis Junta of Valladolid (1511- 1542) the approbation of the celebrated "Nuevas Lcyes". These laws conclusively and decisively prohibited the enslavement of the Indians, withdrew all grants from all kinds of corporations, ecclesiastical
or secular, and from those who were or had been vice-
roys, governors, or employees of any description what-
soever; previous grants were reduced; Indians were
taken from owners who had ill-treated them; all
governors were deprived of the faculty to "en-
comendar" (a system of patents which amounted to a
virtual enslavement of the Indians); owners were
compelled to live upon their own possessions; and in
all newly discovered territory no grants could be
made. Francisco TeUo de Sandoval, commis-
sioned to carry out the new laws, reached Mexico on
8 March, 1544. The gravest difficulties confronted
him. Those affected by the new laws were almost
all the Spaniards of the colony, many of them far
advanced in years, who had passed through all the
trying period of the conquest, and whom the new
laws would leave in abject poverty. These had
recourse to Bishop Zumdrraga to intercede with
Tello to obtain a suspension of the order until
they could be heard before the Spanish Court.
The representatives of the colonists found the
emperor, Charles V, at Mechhn, on 20 Oct., 1545.
In virtue of the situation as explained to him, he
modified the general tenor of the laws so that while
still correcting the principal abuses, they would not
bear too heavily on the Spaniards of the colony.
Through the prudent intervention of Bishop Zumdr-
raga and the compliance of Tello, IMexico was un-
doubtedly saved from a bloody civil struggle such as
engulfed Peru on account of the enforcement of these
same laws and from which the Indians emerged worse
off than they were before.
The last years of Bishop Zumdrraga's life were de- voted to carrying out the numerous works he had undertaken for the welfare of his diocese. Among the chief of these should be mentioned: the school for Indian girls; the famous Colegio Tlaltelolco; the introduction of the first printing press into the New World; the foundation of various hospitals, especially those of Mexico and \'era Cruz; the impetus he gave to industries, agriculture, and manufactures, for which he brought trained mechanics and labourers from Spain; and the printing of many books. At the instance of the emperor, Paul III separated (11 Feb., 1546) the See of JNIexico from the metropoli- tan See of Seville, and erected the Archdiocese of Mexico, appointing Bishop Zumdrraga first arch- bishop and designating the dioceses of Oaxaca, Michoacan, Tlaxcala, Guatemala, and Ciudad Real de Chiapas, as suffragans. The Bull of appointment was sent on 8 July, 1548, but Bishop Zumarraga had died one month previously.
IcAZB.lLCET.t, Biografia de D. Fray Juan de Zumarraga CMei- ico, 1897) ; Mexico a Iraves de loa siglos, II (Barcelona) ; Mendieta, Historia eclesiaitica Indiana (Mexico, 1870).
Camillcs Crivelij.
Zuni Indians, a Pueblo tribe residing at Zuni on the bank of tlie Hio Zuni near the boundary of New Mexico, and in the adjoining villages of Nutria, Ojo CaUente, and Pescado. The name Zuni is a Spanish corruption of the Keresan Sunifitsi, and was first used by Antonio de Espajo in 1583; the natives how- ever called themselves Ashiwi {homShiwi, flesh) and their territory Shiwona. They were discovered by Fray IMarcos de Niza, a Franciscan missionary in 1539. Fray Marcos accompanied by a negro Estevanico and some Indian guides had set out in that year to prepare the way for his fellow mission- aries in unexplored regions. Estevanico had been sent forward to inspect the unknown lands: when Fray Marcus arrived in Arizona after passing through Sonora he learned that Estevanico had been killed. Nevertheless, he continued his joiu-ney and got sight of Ilawikuh, one of the seven Zuni villages or pueblos. Owing to the hostility of the inhabitants, he was forced to return to Mexico, where he published an account of his journey, relating what he had heard of
