{
  "id": "remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares-de-los-encomenderos",
  "type": "entity",
  "name": "No second payment for a service already owed: why the crown's own jurist held that encomenderos could claim nothing for the wars they fought",
  "summary": "Since an encomienda was granted for the military charge, the standard treatise on the law of the Indies infers that encomenderos could not in strict justice ask for new rewards for the campaigns they served in: pay is contrary to a compulsory office, and services already owed create no claim. The author says he raises the point because he has seen how readily some encomenderos pester those who govern for fresh favours, and answers that they were paid in advance.",
  "locale": "en",
  "tags": [
    "colonial-law",
    "colonial-institutions",
    "encomienda",
    "feudal-law",
    "military",
    "military-history",
    "law",
    "legal-history",
    "jurisprudence",
    "patronage",
    "americas",
    "spanish-empire",
    "peru",
    "seventeenth-century",
    "colonial-administration"
  ],
  "relations": [
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "cargas-militares-y-juramento-de-los-encomenderos"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "sustitucion-en-el-servicio-militar-de-los-encomenderos"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "nobleza-de-los-encomenderos-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "anadido-de-1736-a-las-cargas-de-las-encomiendas"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "feudatarios-y-domiciliarios-de-las-indias"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "narrativa-y-calidades-de-los-titulos-de-encomienda"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "razones-por-la-perpetuidad-de-las-encomiendas"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "lanzas-y-arcabuzes-del-peru"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "tercia-parte-de-las-encomiendas-del-peru"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "encomienda"
    },
    {
      "rel": "related",
      "target": "solorzano-politica-indiana"
    }
  ],
  "questions": [
    "Could an encomendero ask the king for a reward for military service?",
    "Were encomenderos paid for fighting in colonial Spanish America?",
    "What did Spanish law say about payment for services already owed?",
    "Did conquistadors and their heirs petition for new grants?",
    "What did the Política Indiana say about encomenderos petitioning governors?"
  ],
  "claims": [
    {
      "id": "c1",
      "text": "Scope and place. This entry covers §§55-58 of libro III capítulo XXV of the 1736 Madrid impression of Juan de Solórzano Pereira's Política Indiana, which occupy the left column of page 372 from its first line to the end of §58. They are the fourth of five inferences the author draws from the military charge of the encomienda; the fifth, on nobility, begins at §59 in the same column and is treated in a separate entry, as are §§1-15, §§47-54 and the 1736 editor's numbered additions §§63-79.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c2",
      "text": "The inference, in the words of the page. At §55, \"Lo quarto, de los mismos principios infiero, que supuesto, que (como queda dicho, y probado) assi los Feudos, como las Encomiendas se dan principalmente por esta carga, y con esta carga de el servicio Militar, con que por el consiguiente, parece, que el Vassallo, ò Encomendero conduce sus obras por este premio, como tambien queda advertido, y se prueba por las Cedulas referidas, y muchos textos del Derecho Feudal: y no podrán en rigor de Justicia los tales Feudatarios, ò Encomenderos, pedir otras nuevas mercedes, y remuneraciones por los servicios, que assi hicieren, cumpliendo con esta obligacion.\" The encomienda is treated as wages paid before the work, so the work creates no further debt.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c3",
      "text": "The maxims it is built on. The same paragraph gives the doctrinal ground: as the jurisconsults say well, \"es contraria al oficio forzoso, la paga, y satisfaccion, y no obligan los servicios debidos, y obsequiales\", to which are added rules \"tan vulgares, como juridicas, que nos enseñan, que aun por lo que se debe hacer de gracia, y commiseracion, no se puede pedir paga.\" The reasoning is ordinary civil-law doctrine about compulsory office and dutiful service, applied to a colonial grant, and not a rule invented for the Indies.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c4",
      "text": "A harder opinion is reported and not adopted, and whose it is cannot be settled from this page. At §56, \"Y mucho mas la opinion de Pinelo, que como en otra parte lo dexo tocado, fue de parecer, que no pueden los Vassallos pedir remuneracion à los Reyes por los servicios ordinarios, que les hacen, ni convenirles por la evicion de las recibidas; si no son tales, que les puedan causar derecho para pedirselas en Justicia.\" The body prints the name as Pinelo; the footnote keyed to the passage prints \"Pinel.\" and cites a commentary on l. 1 C. de bonis maternis, which is the citation form of the Portuguese civilian Arias Pinel rather than of Antonio de León Pinelo, the writer on the Indies. No other printing was available here to decide between them, and this entry draws no conclusion and no link on the point.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.85
    },
    {
      "id": "c5",
      "text": "Why the question is raised at all, in the author's own words. At §57, \"Lo qual he querido tocar, por haver visto quan faciles, y molestos son algunos Encomenderos en fatigar à los que goviernan por nuevos premios, y mercedes, de qualquier Expedicion Militar, Naval, ò Terrestre, en que se ayan hallado: à los quales se puede responder, que se contenten con su estipendio, y que si en algo sirvieron, de antemano se hallaron premiados, y obligados.\" This is a minister of the Council of the Indies recording, in the standard treatise, that encomenderos pressed governors for fresh grants on the strength of any expedition they had been present at, and telling them to be content with what they already had.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c6",
      "text": "The qualification, which is as explicit as the rule. At §58, \"Pero no es por esto mi intento decir, que si procedieron valerosa, y estrenuamente, procurando no solo cumplir, sino aventajar sus obligaciones, se les dexen de hacer nuevas honras, y mercedes: porque esso es muy propio, y ordinario en los Principes, aun con aquellos, que con salarios competentes, y otros honores los sirven en sus Palacios, y Tribunales\", proved from laws of the Volumen and the doctrine of Gregorio López. The rule is therefore about what may be demanded as of right, not about what a prince may freely give, and the passage says so.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    },
    {
      "id": "c7",
      "text": "What this entry establishes and what it does not. It establishes that the standard seventeenth-century treatise on the law of the Indies held that encomenderos had no claim in strict justice to new rewards for military service, because the grant was itself the reward and the service the charge on it; that the doctrine was built out of ordinary civil-law maxims about compulsory office and services already due; that a harder opinion denying vassals any claim on kings for ordinary services is reported without being adopted; that the author says he writes the passage because he has seen encomenderos importune governors for fresh favours; and that he expressly preserves the prince's liberty to honour those who exceeded their obligations. It establishes nothing about how any such petition was in fact decided: not one petition, petitioner, expedition, date or sum appears in these four paragraphs. It says nothing about where the encomendero's stipend came from, although in these provinces it was the tribute of the Indians of the grant, which these pages do not mention. The identity of the jurist at §56 is unresolved here. The author is a judge of the Audiencia of Lima and afterwards a minister of the body to which such petitions were addressed, so he is describing a practice he had an institutional interest in discouraging.",
      "sources": [
        "solorzano-politica-indiana-1736-remuneracion-de-los-servicios-militares"
      ],
      "confidence": 0.9
    }
  ],
  "takeaways": [],
  "faqs": [],
  "evidence_tier": "primary",
  "evidence": {
    "level": "industry_observation",
    "source_types": [
      "paper"
    ]
  },
  "moat_flag": false,
  "winning_edge": "The literature on the conquistadors and their descendants is full of the relación de méritos, the petition in which a settler recited his services and asked to be paid for them, and it is usually read as a story about crown stinginess or about creole grievance. What no accessible source prints is the legal answer the crown's own jurist wrote into the standard treatise: because the encomienda was granted for the military charge, the encomendero who served had merely done what he was already paid to do, and could demand nothing more, \"es contraria al oficio forzoso, la paga\". This object prints that argument with the maxims it rests on, the harder opinion it declines to adopt, and the qualification that preserves the prince's freedom to reward anyone who exceeded his duty. It also prints the sentence that shows why the question was live — a minister of the Council of the Indies complaining in print of how readily encomenderos wearied governors for new favours after any expedition. The costs are on the record in the claims: no petition, name, date or sum is given anywhere in the range, the stipend the author tells them to be content with was the tribute of the Indians of the grant and the pages do not say so, and the man writing sat on the body that had to answer the petitions.",
  "confidence": 0.85,
  "last_verified": "2026-09-23",
  "media": [],
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    "name": "No second payment for a service already owed: why the crown's own jurist held that encomenderos could claim nothing for the wars they fought",
    "description": "Since an encomienda was granted for the military charge, the standard treatise on the law of the Indies infers that encomenderos could not in strict justice ask for new rewards for the campaigns they served in: pay is contrary to a compulsory office, and services already owed create no claim. The author says he raises the point because he has seen how readily some encomenderos pester those who govern for fresh favours, and answers that they were paid in advance.",
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    "dateModified": "2026-09-23",
    "citation": [
      {
        "@type": "CreativeWork",
        "name": "Política Indiana, libro III, capítulo XXV, §§55-58 — whether an encomendero could claim new rewards for the military service his grant already obliged him to render: at §55 the fourth inference, that since feuds and encomiendas 'se dan principalmente por esta carga, y con esta carga de el servicio Militar, con que por el consiguiente, parece, que el Vassallo, ò Encomendero conduce sus obras por este premio', therefore 'no podrán en rigor de Justicia los tales Feudatarios, ò Encomenderos, pedir otras nuevas mercedes, y remuneraciones por los servicios, que assi hicieren, cumpliendo con esta obligacion', because as the jurisconsults say 'es contraria al oficio forzoso, la paga, y satisfaccion, y no obligan los servicios debidos, y obsequiales', and other rules teach 'que aun por lo que se debe hacer de gracia, y commiseracion, no se puede pedir paga'; at §56 the stronger opinion attributed in the body to 'Pinelo' and in footnote (m) to 'Pinel.', on a commentary to l. 1 C. de bonis maternis, 'que no pueden los Vassallos pedir remuneracion à los Reyes por los servicios ordinarios, que les hacen, ni convenirles por la evicion de las recibidas; si no son tales, que les puedan causar derecho para pedirselas en Justicia'; at §57 the reason the author raises the point at all, 'por haver visto quan faciles, y molestos son algunos Encomenderos en fatigar à los que goviernan por nuevos premios, y mercedes, de qualquier Expedicion Militar, Naval, ò Terrestre, en que se ayan hallado: à los quales se puede responder, que se contenten con su estipendio, y que si en algo sirvieron, de antemano se hallaron premiados, y obligados'; and the qualification at §58, that he does not mean new honours should be withheld from those who 'procedieron valerosa, y estrenuamente, procurando no solo cumplir, sino aventajar sus obligaciones', since such liberality 'es muy propio, y ordinario en los Principes, aun con aquellos, que con salarios competentes, y otros honores los sirven en sus Palacios, y Tribunales'",
        "url": "https://books.google.com/books?id=huEykw_YtzYC&pg=PA372"
      }
    ],
    "@type": "Article",
    "headline": "No second payment for a service already owed: why the crown's own jurist held that encomenderos could claim nothing for the wars they fought"
  }
}