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Spanish men and women settled in greatest numbers where there were dense indigenous populations and the existence of valuable resources for extraction. [1] The Spanish Empire claimed jurisdiction over the New World in the Caribbean and North and South America, with the exception of Brazil, ceded to Portugal by the Treaty of Tordesillas. Other ...
At that time, plantation-based colonies absorbed the vast majority of European immigrants (and enslaved Africans). [3] During the 16th century and the first half of the 17th century, the origins of Spanish immigrants were strongly drawn from the Spanish southwest, with the majority of settlers coming from Andalusia, Extremadura and Castile. [4]
The term "Spanish America" was specifically used during the territories' imperial era between 15th and 19th centuries. To the end of its imperial rule, Spain called its overseas possessions in the Americas and the Philippines "The Indies", an enduring remnant of Columbus's notion that he had reached Asia by sailing west.
By the mid-1600s the Spanish in America numbered more than 400,000. [8] After the establishment of the American colonies, an additional 250,000 immigrants arrived either directly from Spain, the Canary Islands or, after a relatively short sojourn, from present-day central Mexico. These Spanish settlers expanded European influence in the New World.
Spanish immigration was the third largest among immigrant groups in Brazil; about 750,000 immigrants entered Brazil from Spanish ports (a number smaller only than that of Argentina and Cuba after the independence of Latin American countries). [12]
This practice was known as the encomienda system and granted free native labor to the Spaniards. Based upon the practice of exacting tribute from Muslims and Jews during the Reconquista, the Spanish Crown granted a number of native laborers to an encomendero, who was usually a conquistador or other prominent Spanish male. Under the grant, they ...
Lebanese and Syrian immigrants started to settle in large numbers in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The vast majority of the immigrants from Lebanon and Syria were Christians, but smaller numbers of Jews, Muslims, and Druze also settled. Many lived in New York City's Little Syria and in Boston.
Spanish claims to Alaska and the west coast of North America date to the Papal bull of 1493, and the Treaty of Tordesillas. In 1513, this claim was reinforced by Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa , the first European to sight the Pacific Ocean when he claimed all lands adjoining this ocean for the Spanish Crown.