CACIQUES: LEGITIMACY AND INSTITUTIONAL VALIDATION IN COLONIAL CENTRAL CHILE. IMPLICATIONS AND STRATEGIES FOR CONTINUITY.

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to demonstrate that the caciques of the central zone of Chile were legitimate to the extent that their appointments were under the indigenous custom, which, once validated by the Crown, allowed the caciques to exercise the “government” of their people. In this way, indigenous law and Hispanic law came together, an issue that responded to the imperial strategy of having cultural mediators and social control agents to assist state and ecclesiastical authorities in the colonization process.