Requirement (Conquistadors)

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The Requirement was a document that Spanish conquistadores upon arriving in the New World read to native populations before attacking them. The text gave a brief overview of the history of the world, focusing on the rise of Christianity, and demanded that the natives accept the King of Spain as their supreme ruler on behalf of the Pope and allow for missionaries to preach the Gospel among them.

The Requirement was originally intended as a response to complaints by Spanish clerics that the wars against the Native American peoples were unjust. Comparing them to Spain's wars against the Moors, the clerics claimed that Muslims had knowledge of Christ and rejected Him, so that waging a Crusade against them was legitimate. In contrast, wars against the Native Americans, who had never come into contact with Christianity were unacceptable. The Requirement was intended as a legal loophole to place the native population in the position of having rejected Christianity. It stated: "We protest that any deaths that result from this [rejection of Christianity] are your fault…"

Many critics of the conquistadors' policies were appalled by the flippant nature of the Requirement, and Bartolomeo de Las Casas said in response to it that he did not know whether to laugh or to cry. While the conquistadors were encouraged to use an interpreter to read the Requirement, this was not absolutely necessary, and in many cases, it was read out to an uncomprehending populace. In some instances, it was read to barren beaches and empty villages, long after the natives had fled, to prisoners after they were captured, or even from the decks of ships once they had just spotted the coast. Nevertheless, for the conquistadors, it provided a religious justification for attacking and enslaving the native population, and because of its potential to enrich the coffers of Spain, the Requirement was not generally questioned.