{
  "id": "prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes-de-las-indias",
  "type": "entity",
  "name": "Prescription between sovereigns and the titles said to concur: how the standard treatise on the law of the Indies argued that time had closed the question",
  "summary": "Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI §§11-19 answers the doubt whether prescription runs between kingdoms that recognise no superior — Vázquez de Menchaca said no, and the footnote names Grotius among the heretics who \"hacen gran fiesta\" of it — with Acosta, Vitoria and Baldo on the uselessness of auditing origins, then lists the other causes said to justify the wars and ends on tyranny becoming \"perfecta, y legitima Monarquia\" through long time.",
  "locale": "en",
  "tags": [
    "colonial-law",
    "law-of-the-indies",
    "legal-history",
    "jurisprudence",
    "international-law",
    "just-war",
    "indigenous-rights",
    "conquest",
    "spanish-empire",
    "americas",
    "sixteenth-century",
    "seventeenth-century",
    "eighteenth-century",
    "books",
    "historiography"
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "dominio-o-tutela-en-la-concesion-pontificia"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "intimacion-de-la-autoridad-del-papa-a-los-indios"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "mare-clausum-y-la-navegacion-exclusiva-a-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "vazquez-de-menchaca-controversiarum-illustrium"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "vitoria-relectio-de-indis-1557"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "acosta-de-procuranda-indorum-salute-1588"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "school-of-salamanca"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "prescripcion-en-las-encomiendas"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "titulo-de-la-infidelidad-de-los-indios"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "guerra-defensiva-de-chile"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "solorzano-politica-indiana"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "bula-de-alexandro-vi-en-romance"
    }
  ],
  "questions": [
    "Can one sovereign state acquire another's territory by prescription?",
    "What did Vázquez de Menchaca argue about prescription between kingdoms?",
    "How did Spanish jurists answer the charge that the conquest was unlawful in its origin?",
    "What titles besides the papal bull were said to justify the Spanish presence in the Indies?",
    "Did Spanish law claim the Indians had voluntarily submitted to the crown?"
  ],
  "claims": [
    {
      "id": "c1",
      "text": "The objection is named with its author, and the author is Spanish. §11 of Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI, page 45 of the 1736 Madrid impression: \"Porque, aunque nuestro Don Fernando de Menchaca quiso poner en duda, si podia haver prescripcion entre los Reyes, y Reynos, que no reconocen Superior, y darse por ella justo titulo para la retencion de ellos, de cuya doctrina en esta parte hacen gran fiesta contra nosotros algunos Hereges: Lo más cierto, y conveniente à la salud, y quietud del Genero Humano, y de los mesmos Reyes, y Reynos, es, que la ay, y que la aya, como refutando à Menchaca, lo resuelven otros Autores.\" The doubt the treatise has to answer was raised by a jurist of Valladolid whose Controversiarum illustrium this corpus carries separately.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c2",
      "text": "The footnote names the users of the doctrine, and the first of them is the founder of modern international law. Footnote (13) to §11 reads: \"Huber. Grotius in Mare Libero, novissimè Giphian. in tract. de Insulis, cap. 25.\" The treatise is recording that Hugo Grotius, in Mare Liberum, turned a Spanish jurist's argument against the Spanish title — the same book the same chapter names again at §29 as the source of the objection that the seas are free. Neither Mare Liberum nor Huber nor Giphanius was opened for this entry; the attribution is the footnote's.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.85
    },
    {
      "id": "c3",
      "text": "The first answer is a Jesuit's, and it is an instruction to stop asking. §12: \"Y en nuestros terminos el docto, y prudente Padre Joseph de Acosta, concluyendo, que es superfluo disputar yá de este articulo; sino passar en él con buena fé, como sobre cosa assentada, y prescripta.\" Footnote (15) places it in the De procuranda Indorum salute, a work this corpus registers separately for its argument about method in evangelisation.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c4",
      "text": "The second answer is Vitoria's, and it is a doctrine of invincible good faith. §13: \"Lo qual conviene, con lo que antes de él havia enseñado el Maestro Victoria, afirmando, que quien, para emprehender una cosa dudosa, consultó Varones Sabios, y la executó, siguiendo su parecer, queda seguro, en lo que adquirió, y retiene con este pretexto, aun quando despues se manifestasse, que erraron en el Consejo. Porque por estas vias comenzaron à introducirse todos los Reynos, y nunca se ha juzgado por conveniente, bolver à repetir, ò apurar los principios de su adquisicion: como à cada passo nos lo aconsejan graves Autores.\" Footnote (16) cites the first relectio De Indis, which this corpus carries; the passage was not collated against Vitoria's own text here.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.85
    },
    {
      "id": "c5",
      "text": "The third answer is the one the chapter gives in full, and it is a philosophy of history in six lines. §14: \"Y lo dexó escrito aquel gran Maestro de todos Baldo, diciendo: Que el tiempo, que ha mucho, que passó, le habemos de juzgar, como sino huviera sido, porque yá está, como borrado, y consumido con el vso contrario, y à este nos habemos de acomodar, y ajustar. Pues nos importa poco saber aora, si fuera mas justo, que imperára Pompeyo, qué Cesar? Sino vivir, en lo que hallamos, y como lo hallamos, sin andar escudriñando los principios, y ráizes de los tiempos, en las quales los hombres no podrán hallar mas causa, y firmeza, que la voluntad, ò permission de Dios, el qual se sirve, de que observemos, lo que vemos passar en el siglo, en que vivimos, que es, el que nos dá costumbres, y leyes, y en quien consiste nuestra vida, nutrimento, y essencia.\"",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c6",
      "text": "The contrary position is printed before it is answered, and it is the strongest thing in the chapter against the chapter. §15 reports Juan Igneo teaching that in kingdoms the origin must always be looked at, \"y que si este fue injusto, ò violento, no aprovecha; antes passa el vicio à los successores por algunas leyes, que para ello pondera\"; the answer given is that all of them cease here because the acquisition was made with title, with good faith, and with circumstances that long time confirms. One clause of that answer turns on a word this impression prints ambiguously and is not quoted here.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.85
    },
    {
      "id": "c7",
      "text": "The argument is then generalised into a rule about acting on expert advice. §16: \"Y no se puede decir, que fue injusta, ni pecaminosa la entrada de un Principe, que examinó bien al principio la justificacion de la guerra, que trató de hacer. Pues no lo es la del, que sigue la opinion, que se tiene por probable. Ni peca, ni excede, el que siguiendo el consejo de hombres graves, y doctos, hace qualquier acto, que por leyes humanas se tenga por prohibido, ò injusto.\" The printed SUMARIO head for the paragraph states it flatly: \"No peca, el que siguiendo à hombres doctos, hace acto contra Ley Humana.\"",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c8",
      "text": "Four further causes are listed, and the last of them is an admission about how the wars were won. §17: the causes that concurred over and above the papal concession were \"no querer muchos Indios recibir de paz à los nuestros, ni oirles la predicacion, y legacion Evangelica, que les llevaban\"; \"Revelarse contra ellos, y tratar de matarlos, despues que ya los havian recibido de paz, y estar muchos convertidos, y bautizados\"; \"Negarles el passo à otras Provincias, donde pudieran propagar la Fé, si injustamente no se les impidiera\"; and \"Aliarse con los nuestros voluntariamente los Indios de algunas, para que los ayudassen en las guerras, que à su modo traian, y tenian por justas con las finitimas, dandoselas en premio de su trabajo.\" The fourth is the treatise's own account of indigenous allies being paid in the provinces they helped subdue.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c9",
      "text": "The chapter's largest factual assertion is made without a single instance attached. §18: \"Y lo que mas es, que haviendo en todas ellas faltado por varios acontecimientos Reyes, ò Caciques, que los governaban, que por la mayor parte eran crueles, y tyranos, sin dexar sucesion conocida, los mesmos Indios voluntariamente se allanaron, en querer tener, y reconocer por Reyes, y dueños Soberanos, y absolutos suyos à los de España, y de ello hicieron repetidos geminados, y juridicos autos en varios tiempos, y en essa voluntad han perseverado, y perseveran constantes.\" Footnote (29) sends the reader to the author's own earlier chapter and to a memorial of Bernardino de Cárdenas, bishop of Paraguay. No act is named, no place, no date and no party. That the assertion is unsupported on this page is a reading of what the paragraph contains, and the claim is set low for that reason; what is certain is that the treatise made it.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.8
    },
    {
      "id": "c10",
      "text": "The run closes on a sentence that says what the whole argument is for. §19, beginning at the foot of page 45 and ending six lines into page 46, calls these causes \"cada una en sí, y todas juntas ciertas en el hecho, como consta de las Historias de estas conquistas, y suficientes en el derecho, para consolidar, y hacer mas firme, y seguro el de nuestros Reyes\", and concludes that even when they supervene on a dominion less perfectly or legitimately acquired they suffice \"para revalidarle, y purgar sus defectos: en especial quando los Pueblos posseidos no contradicen, y ha intervenido largo curso de tiempo, con el qual, aun la tyrania se convierte en perfecta, y legitima Monarquia, como sucedió en la de los Romanos, y en otras de las mayores, que se han conocido en el Mundo, en el qual es yá este derecho comun, y assentado entre todas las gentes.\" The treatise is arguing that a defective title is cured by time and by the silence of the possessed.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c11",
      "text": "What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that the standard treatise on the law of the Indies devoted nine paragraphs of its first book to the question whether the Spanish title could be cured by prescription; that the doubt it had to answer came from a Spanish jurist, Vázquez de Menchaca, and that its footnote names Grotius's Mare Liberum as the place where that doubt was being used against Spain; that its answers were Acosta's instruction to stop disputing, Vitoria's doctrine of good faith after consulting wise men, and Baldo's passage on the uselessness of auditing the roots of time; and that it then listed four further causes and asserted a voluntary submission, closing on the rule that long time converts even tyranny into legitimate monarchy. It does not establish that any of those things happened: §§17 and 18 are assertions of fact made on this page without named instances, and nothing here was checked against a chronicle or an act. It does not establish what Vázquez de Menchaca, Vitoria, Acosta, Baldo, Juan Igneo or Grotius wrote — none of those works was opened. It is scoped to §§11-19; §§20-28, which carry the argument into restitution and the duty not to abandon the Indies, were not read for this entry. The distinct question of prescription running against the crown inside an encomienda is treated in this corpus from libro III of the same treatise and is not this one.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    }
  ],
  "takeaways": [],
  "faqs": [],
  "evidence_tier": "primary",
  "evidence": {
    "level": "industry_observation",
    "source_types": [
      "paper"
    ]
  },
  "moat_flag": false,
  "winning_edge": "The search behind this entry found the Spanish debate over the just titles treated as a sixteenth-century affair that ends with Vitoria and the Valladolid debate. What it did not find is the argument the crown's own jurist was still making generations after the conquest and the crown was still reprinting in 1736, which is not a title argument at all but a prescription argument: that the origin of a kingdom is not auditable, that whoever acted on the advice of learned men is secure even if the advice was wrong, and that long possession converts even tyranny into legitimate monarchy. This entry gives that argument paragraph by paragraph in the treatise's own words, including Baldo's passage in full, and puts three things beside it that a defensive account would drop: that the doubt being answered was raised by a Spanish jurist and picked up by Grotius, that §17 lists indigenous allies paid in the provinces they helped subdue among the justifying causes, and that §18's claim of voluntary submission is made without one named act, place or date. Where the page asserts fact rather than doctrine, the claim says so and sits below 0.9.",
  "confidence": 0.85,
  "last_verified": "2026-09-28",
  "media": [],
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    "name": "Prescription between sovereigns and the titles said to concur: how the standard treatise on the law of the Indies argued that time had closed the question",
    "description": "Política Indiana libro I capítulo XI §§11-19 answers the doubt whether prescription runs between kingdoms that recognise no superior — Vázquez de Menchaca said no, and the footnote names Grotius among the heretics who \"hacen gran fiesta\" of it — with Acosta, Vitoria and Baldo on the uselessness of auditing origins, then lists the other causes said to justify the wars and ends on tyranny becoming \"perfecta, y legitima Monarquia\" through long time.",
    "url": "https://hispanic-legacy.com/k/prescripcion-y-titulos-concurrentes-de-las-indias",
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    "dateModified": "2026-09-28",
    "citation": [
      {
        "@type": "CreativeWork",
        "name": "Política Indiana, libro I, capítulo XI, §§11-19 — prescription between sovereigns, the passage of time, and the titles said to concur besides the bull: at §11 that 'aunque nuestro Don Fernando de Menchaca quiso poner en duda, si podia haver prescripcion entre los Reyes, y Reynos, que no reconocen Superior, y darse por ella justo titulo para la retencion de ellos, de cuya doctrina en esta parte hacen gran fiesta contra nosotros algunos Hereges', the more certain view 'conveniente à la salud, y quietud del Genero Humano' is that there is prescription, the footnote naming those heretics as 'Huber. Grotius in Mare Libero, novissimè Giphian. in tract. de Insulis'; at §12 Joseph de Acosta concluding 'que es superfluo disputar yá de este articulo; sino passar en él con buena fé, como sobre cosa assentada, y prescripta'; at §13 Vitoria, that whoever consulted wise men over a doubtful thing and executed it on their opinion 'queda seguro, en lo que adquirió, y retiene con este pretexto, aun quando despues se manifestasse, que erraron en el Consejo', since 'por estas vias comenzaron à introducirse todos los Reynos, y nunca se ha juzgado por conveniente, bolver à repetir, ò apurar los principios de su adquisicion'; at §14 Baldo, 'Que el tiempo, que ha mucho, que passó, le habemos de juzgar, como sino huviera sido … Pues nos importa poco saber aora, si fuera mas justo, que imperára Pompeyo, qué Cesar? Sino vivir, en lo que hallamos, y como lo hallamos, sin andar escudriñando los principios, y ráizes de los tiempos'; at §15 Juan Igneo to the contrary, that the origin must always be looked at and 'si este fue injusto, ò violento, no aprovecha; antes passa el vicio à los successores'; at §16 that the entry of a prince who examined the justification of the war at the outset was neither unjust nor sinful, and 'Ni peca, ni excede, el que siguiendo el consejo de hombres graves, y doctos, hace qualquier acto, que por leyes humanas se tenga por prohibido, ò injusto'; at §17 the other causes said to have concurred — 'no querer muchos Indios recibir de paz à los nuestros, ni oirles la predicacion, y legacion Evangelica', 'Revelarse contra ellos, y tratar de matarlos, despues que ya los havian recibido de paz, y estar muchos convertidos, y bautizados', 'Negarles el passo à otras Provincias', and 'Aliarse con los nuestros voluntariamente los Indios de algunas, para que los ayudassen en las guerras, que à su modo traian, y tenian por justas con las finitimas, dandoselas en premio de su trabajo'; at §18 that their kings or caciques having failed, 'que por la mayor parte eran crueles, y tyranos, sin dexar sucesion conocida, los mesmos Indios voluntariamente se allanaron, en querer tener, y reconocer por Reyes, y dueños Soberanos, y absolutos suyos à los de España, y de ello hicieron repetidos geminados, y juridicos autos en varios tiempos'; and at §19, closing at the head of page 46, that these causes are 'ciertas en el hecho, como consta de las Historias de estas conquistas, y suficientes en el derecho', and suffice to revalidate a dominion less perfectly acquired 'en especial quando los Pueblos posseidos no contradicen, y ha intervenido largo curso de tiempo, con el qual, aun la tyrania se convierte en perfecta, y legitima Monarquia, como sucedió en la de los Romanos'",
        "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=huEykw_YtzYC&pg=PA45"
      }
    ],
    "@type": "Article",
    "headline": "Prescription between sovereigns and the titles said to concur: how the standard treatise on the law of the Indies argued that time had closed the question"
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}