Labor Conditions At Potosi

How could working in a mine affect all of the indigenous communities that called this mining area home? Potosí is a mining city in Bolivia. Potosí was founded in 1545, after the discovery of silver. The Spaniards started getting their silver from Potosí because the costs to produce silver were extremely low. The Spaniards brought Indians to Potosí who provided the workforce in the mines. These Indians were forced to work under a mita. Under this mita, Indians were required to give part of their profits to the Spaniards. The labor conditions at Potosí led to the decimation of the indigenous communities and populations. The indigenous population had to find ways to earn more money because they didn’t make enough money through the mita, this
The Spaniards brought Indians to Potosí, these Indians provided the labor force during the initial phase of silver mining. The terms of service for these Indian workers were different depending on the demands of the Spanish master and the legal status of the indigenous laborer. This was known as a mita. John Louis Casa wrote, “Precedent for paid forced labor of Indians in the mines and factories is found in the practice of the Spanish Corregidores de Indios, in charge of collecting tribute from the Crown Indians, who hired out the natives to anyone who needed laborers. Therefore, it became apparent to Spanish colonial administrators that the Indians constituted an easily available pool of workers with whom exploitation of the mines could be achieved” The Spanish Corregidores de Indios were the people that were in charge of the mita and in charge of collecting the resources from the miners. In this quote, John Louis Casa notes that it was really easy for the Spaniards to use and take charge of these Indian miners. Due to the fact that indigenous people were easy to use and take advantage of to work in the mines, indigenous communities decimated because a lot of their population was going to work in the
Mercury refining is a process in which one extracts mercury from its ore. To do this, you have to use very high heat to get the mercury above its boiling point. In a journal written by Nicholas A. Robins and Nicole A. Hagan called Mercury Production and Use in Colonial Andean Silver Production: Emissions and Health Implications they wrote, "Writing of the [mercury] refining process around 1590, the Jesuit José de Acosta described how "if some smoke or vapor comes to the people who open the pots, they get very bad mercury poisoning and die, or remain in a very bad state or lose their teeth" (de Acosta 1987)" . Mercury was a necessity in Potosí because it was used to refine the silver. The use of high temperatures was very dangerous and harmed the health of the miners that worked to extract the mercury. Some of the miners that helped with the mercury refining process often had health problems because of breathing in these harsh chemicals and it was dangerous to use this high heat. There were many deaths of indigenous people due to the high temperatures that were used and the harsh chemicals that were released during the mercury refining process because many indigenous people died or were severely