Agustín de Ancona seeks license for enslaved miner Francisco

Juan Pérez de Tolosa began another inspection of pearl fisheries on 17 October 1548. During this visita he appointed Pedro de Gámez as a public defender for Indigenous people, empowered to report...

Bishop Miguel Gerónimo de Ballesteros asked the Crown to send 30 enslaved Africans to maintain Coro's acequia and dam, originally built by Indigenous labor. His request linked African enslavement to...

Fundación Empresas Polar’s chronology dates an enslaved African man named Miguel’s escape from punishment at the San Felipe de Buría mines to 30 November 1552. Its account describes his flight as...

A royal decree of 25 June 1558 prohibited the future use of Indigenous people in pearl fishing and specified that Africans could be used for the work. In practice, the measure shifted the burden of...

Royal officers accounted for 123 pesos and one tomín arising from a debt owed by Pedro de Ursúa. The debt was linked to Diego, an enslaved man reportedly brought to the province by Lope de Aguirre and...

A royal cédula authorized the purchase in Cabo Verde and Guinea and transport of 150 enslaved Africans to Margarita's pearl fishery. The order shows the Crown's role in organizing coerced labor across...

The Crown authorized the transport of 25 additional enslaved Africans to Margarita for fortification construction. Their coerced labor was to serve colonial defense infrastructure; the surviving...

Maracaibo's council empowered Rodrigo de Argüelles to seek 250 enslaved people on credit for cattle raising and other production; Carora made a similar request. These were requests, not a verified...

Representatives of the province’s cabildos instructed procurator Simón de Bolívar to present 27 petitions to the Council of the Indies. These included a request to import 3,000 enslaved people from...

Caracas cabildo minutes noted that Portuguese trader Rui Gómez Bravo, sailing with a licensed slave ship bound for Cartagena, was forced to disembark at La Guaira. The source does not establish a...