american-holocaust

.4INTHE AREA around the town of Barquicimeto, in the lowlands near thenorthern coast of Venezuela, a mysterious fire like a will o' the wispsometimes st;ems to be burning in the marshes. It is; tradition has it,the "soul of the traitor Lope de Aguirre [who] wanders in the savannahs,like a flame that flies the approach of men." 1Aguirre's 1561 expedition from Peru, across the Andes and down tothe Venezuelan seacoast, has become "a byword for sensational horror,"writes one historian, adding that "no pirates who infested the Caribbeanbefore or since proved more rapacious and merciless," and no militarycampaign was more "notorious for its atrocities" than the one driven by"Aguirre's mad rage." 2 In fact, Aguirre's rampage through South Americawas a good deal less destructive than those of any number of long-forgottenconquistadors. What has made it so memorable, so worthy of evocationin books and poems and films, was Aguirre's propensity for killing Spaniardsas well as Indians. This is what made him "the traitor Aguirre"-atraitor to nothing less than his race.For this reason there never has been any doubt that Aguirre was anevil man. For this reason also, when he was captured, Aguirre's fellowSpaniards cut off his head and placed it on display in an iron cage. BeyondAguirre, however, debate has gone on almost non-stop for four centuriesabout the behavior of other conquistadors-about what in some quartershas come to be called the "Black Legend." Proponents of this idea holdthat the Spanish have been unduly and unfairly criticized for their behaviorin the New World. They base this contention on two general principles:first, that the stories of Spanish cruelties toward the Indians, almost entirelytraceable, it is said, to the writings of Bartolome de Las Casas, are