A Kingdom of God on the Rio Grande

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Jemez Pueblo Library of Congress

In this episode, we return to New Mexico and look at the ambitious mission-building program of the Franciscans in the Pueblos of New Mexico during the long seventy years between the founding of Santa Fe in 1610 and the Pueblo Revolt of 1680. Among other moments, we recount the revolt at the Jemez Pueblo in 1623. The Franciscan project, in the end, involved a huge network of missions, much of it built quite voluntarily by Indian converts. It was, in some respects, a European-Indian society quite different from that evolving in Virginia, Massachusetts, and even Florida.

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Selected references for this episode

John L. Kessell, Pueblos, Spaniards, and the Kingdom of New Mexico

Herbert E. Bolton, The Spanish Borderlands: A Chronicle of Old Florida and the Southwest

Andrew L. Knaut, The Pueblo Revolt of 1680

Matthew J. Barbour, “The Jemez Revolt of 1623”

Matthew Liebmann, “At the Mouth of the Wolf: The Archeology of Seventeenth-Century Franciscans in the Jemez Valley of New Mexico”

2 comments
  • Hey, again another great Podcast. I grew up in NM and there is quite a lot of American History there (maybe that is “pre-American” history). One comment for you, the word Pecos, is actually pronounced with the shore “e” as in “eh”. There used to be a very nice series sculptures of Ornate, it was a maybe 20 or so bronze statutes of a typical Conquistador’s caravan including horses, oxen drawn wagons and several conquistador’s marching with lances in hand. This was in a park near downtown/oldtown Albuquerque. Woke protestors made the city take it down. Maybe in another 50 years they will be put back up.

  • It’s me again. If you ever get the chance to visit NM especially Albuquerque, take the hour drive (its 54 miles but on an Interstate with a 70mph speed limit) out to the Acoma Pueblo. Up on their mesa (I believe they call Sky City) they have a church built using “converted” Puebloan’s that lived there. They too were treated more like slaves or indentured servants in the building of that church. It is made with these huge beams of wood carried to the site from Mount Taylor (no relation) some 25 miles away (as the crow flies). The church still stands and is only used for tourists now. Anyway, love your Podcast.

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