I’m looking for references to the production especially of mail armor (armadura de malla) in colonial New Spain. In Europe, makers of mail armor (malleros in Spain) were highly specialized and usually organized in guilds. Though documents suggest that Spanish colonists generally brought their weapons and armor (including cotas de malla) from Europe, the geographical extent and long period of colonization of northern New Spain would seem to have required a more reliable way of supplying (and repairing) armor. The last name “mallero” pops up in a few places such as Mexico City and the mines of San Martín (on the Nueva Galicia frontier), but I haven’t yet seen any more specific evidence of actual production. The word “mallero” is also translated into Nahuatl in Molina’s 1571 vocabulario de la lengua Mexicana, which leads me to wonder if some native craftsmen picked up this trade.
Reason for this question is the recent discovery of large amounts of mail anillos of seemingly various types at a 16th-/17th-century pueblo in New Mexico.
Thanks for any information.
I know of no source that documents armor production in New Spain.
Molina is not the only source for Nahuatl terms for armor. Such translations are also in the Ayer manuscript at the Newberry Library.
http://content.ebscohost.com.libproxy.unm.edu/ContentServer.asp?T=P&P=AN&K=12541420&S=R&D=ufh&EbscoContent=dGJyMNLr40Sep7I4xNvgOLCmr0%2Bep69Ss624S7eWxWXS&ContentCustomer=dGJyMPGqtk22qLNNuePfgeyx44Dt6fIA
You might ask the question of the author, Mary Clayton. She is emerita at IU, but perhaps her email is still active.
http://www.indiana.edu/~spanport/people/clayton.shtml
As you probably know, native artisans were employed in some forms of craftwork (e.g. plumeria). Whether they would have been entrusted with tools and materials to make weapons, as well as defensive gear, is a good question. I don’t think anything like that was done in the workshops under Vasco de Quiroga.
Simmons, Marc, and Frank Turley. Southwestern Colonial Ironwork: The Spanish Blacksmithing Tradition from Texas to California. (1985) mentions two ironworkers who came up with Oñate: Juan del Caso and Juan Pérez, and notes a short inventory of Caso’s tools (p.23). It would seem, if they could repair a harquebus, that they could have repaired chain mail, since the process was not technically demanding. Simmons does talk a bit about iron ore mining, referencing Clavijero (p. 18).
Howdy Mike, have you tried to talk with Matt Schmader who just retired as the open spaces archaeologist for the city of Albuquerque? As you know he had some mail armor and other equipment he recovered at the location he excavated near Coronado National Monument. I don't have any of his professional publications on this, but he has a popular article in Archaeology magazine from March/April 2012. I know he looked into ways to associate crossbow darts with Coronado's visit as compared with different NM expeditions, but do not know what other research he was able to perform. Matt isn't always easy to find, I can try to get a hold of him if that is really difficult. Of course, a trip to the Archivo General de Indias in Sevilla would be a fun place to look at this issue!
I agree. Talking with Matt might be useful. He's surely no longer on his City email and I don't have a mobile number, but the landline number I have is 505-341-9979.
Thank you, James and Rusty for your input.
I have talked to Matt Schmader in the past (not lately though) and am aware of his work at Piedras Marcadas. Unfortunately, the Coronado diagnostics such as bolt heads or caret-headed nails don't help me presently with the Sevilleta material, as such diagnostics are missing (but so far, we have covered only minimal ground with the metal detector; producing 168 metal objects to date). Also, the potential range of armor deposition at Sevilleta is from 1540 up to 1681, with a few possible later outliers (Vargas-related, perhaps; and we have an early 19th-century percussion cap from the general area as well). Also, Charlie Haecker and Chris Adams are helping me with the metal detecting, so I'm already getting a fair dose of Coronado talk, as it were.... :-)
My "obsession" with the malla comes from some of the links resembling period armor that I've seen in Europe, while others look quite different, "archaic" even. There are a few clear cases of "home-made" butted repair links, but the sample of welded anillos appears visually variable enough that I'm wondering if it is possible to detect functional, chronological, or source variability (or some combination thereof). I'm working on getting some xrf done to get at least some data on metallic composition (same with the abundance of lead shot from Sevilleta, but that's another story). Hence the question about possible malleros in New Spain. I'm aware of the "iron problem" in colonial NM and am thus more concerned with possible production (small-scale presumably, perhaps using imported Vizcayan iron or "scrap") in Mexico City or perhaps Puebla and Zacatecas. I'm exploring various archival avenues in that direction.
Despite the frequent references to cueras and cotton-quilted armor especially in the context of the Chichimeca War, malla never seems to have gone out of fashion, especially not in NM where hand-down pieces appear to have been used well into the 1700s. There is unfortunately little to nothing on armor in Simmons and Turley.
Thanks again, Michael
Hello Mr. Beltzer. Are you still interested in colonial iron?. My name is Angel Garcia. I am a metallurgical chemist and I work at the INAH (National Institute of Anthropology and History) of Mexico. I am currently working on a project on iron production and trade in New Spain. Based on the determination of the origin of iron objects by analyzing their impurities. I think it would be very interesting to collaborate. If you are interested, I can give you my email. Best regards and thank you.
@ Angel Garcia. Thank you for your note. That would really be interesting indeed. So far, there is a running sample of nearly 1800 metal objects (ferrous and non-ferrous) from Tzelaqui/Sevilleta Pueblo (c. 1300-1681). Due to the proximity of the old camino de Mexico, the sample spans the entire contact/colonial period from 1540 to 1821 and on to the arrival of the railroad in the 1880s. The vast majority of metal is associated with the pueblo's colonial occupation, however. Roughly half is armor fragments and lead balls (fired and unfired). We have done XRF on a subsample of non-ferrous objects to identify alloy typese but nothing that would indicate sources. I'll send you a private message with email contact and more information over the next days. Saludos al Mexico lindo... Michael
Hello Michel, thanks for your answer.
Here is my email: [email protected]
best regards.
Angel
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