Guacanagarix

Guacanagarix, Guacanacaric or Guacanagarí (?-1494) was one of the five Taino chiefs of Hispaniola at the time of the arrival of the Europeans in 1492. Guacanagarix was the one that received Christopher Columbus after the Santa María ran aground during his first voyage to the New World. He allowed Columbus to establish the construction of Fort La Navidad in his town, near present-day Caracol Bay. The Spaniards who remained there were massacred by rival tribes a few months later, just before Columbus returned from his second trip.

Guacanagarix refused to cooperate with other chiefs, who tried to expel the Spanish. He was forced to flee to the mountains, where he later died.

Guacanagarix was chief of the Marién chiefdom, in the northwest part of Hispaniola.

Fr. Bartolomé de las Casas says that all the chiefs of the island of Hispaniola hated the European invaders for the iniquities and abuses committed on the aboriginal population and fought to expel them from the island. "Only Guacanagarí," says Bartolomé de las Casas in "General History of the Indies," book I, chapter. C—, the king of Marién, [...] never did anything painful to the Christians, but in all this time he had one hundred Christians keeping them in his land, as if each one were his son or father, suffering their injustices or ugliness....&#3. 4;.

Guacanagarí even agreed to cooperate with Columbus in the campaigns to subdue and pacify the rebellious tribes of the island of Hispaniola; This is how, according to the story of Bartolomé de las Casas, the chief Guacanagarí, as an ally of Columbus, came to participate with his warriors in the battle of Vega Real on March 24, 1495 in what constitutes the first war confrontation. undertaken by Europeans in the New World against the indigenous settlers. This complacent attitude of the Guacanagarí chief ended up earning him the complete rejection of the other chiefs and tribal chiefs who opposed the invaders.

In the midst of the chaos unleashed by the war of conquest undertaken by the Spanish conquerors, the chief Guacanagarí would see his kingdom gradually diminish - due to the overexploitation of the Indians in the work of the mines and crops and the effects of the war — until he disappeared, leaving him with no other option but to go with the remains of his tribe into the thickets of the mountains where he finally died.

Guacanagarix Complex

In the Dominican Republic it is usually called in a pejorative way the Guacanagarix Complex, to refer to a Dominican who prefers the foreign over the national or shows preference in the treatment of foreigners.

Trivia

Columbus had returned to Spain, bringing samples of gold, parrots, cultural objects from those New Indies, the epic of the journey and six Indians from "Hispaniola" who accompanied him. He went to the courts of Barcelona in 1493 to meet with the kings and these Indians were baptized, with the kings themselves and Infante Juan, his son, being godparents.

The main one was renamed Don Bernardo de Aragón and was a relative of the chief Guacanagarix, according to the contemporary historian of Columbus, Gonzalo Fernández de Oviedo, who was present at that event. Another from this embassy took the name of Don Juan de Castilla and the rest as they wanted. The Indian Don Juan of Castile was incorporated into the royal house of the Infante Don Juan, at his request, with an express order to be treated as if he were the son of a leading knight , and he died in Spain. The Indian D. Bernardo de Aragón and the others returned to Hispaniola on Columbus's second voyage.