Aboriginal and Spanish Colonial Trinidad: A Study in Culture Contact

This study of the operation and impact of colonial institutions in a peripheral and relatively neglected area of the empire is welcome. Trinidad possessed neither mineral wealth nor sophisticated aboriginal cultures with which to attract large numbers of Spanish settlers. It was mainly a military base from which expeditions ventured forth in search of the fabled El Dorado. The crown did little to encourage investment in human and financial resources on the island until the administrative reorganization of the empire in the late eighteenth century. This book describes in abundant detail the characteristics of aboriginal culture and the impact of Spanish colonization schemes from 1498 until the island was seized by the British in 1802. Newson’s analysis of the culture–contact process permits subtle comparisons with the colonial structure in core areas of the empire.