The Violent Edge of Empire: The Spanish-Ute Alliance and the Origins of the Great Basin Indian Slave Trade

Ned Blackhawk

In the 1750s, affiliated bands of Ute Indians and Spanish authorities in New Mexico initiated treaty relations which bound these former enemies together in new and unexpected ways. Developed in a world of pandemic violence, the New Mexican–Ute alliance ended cycles of mutually destructive warfare between these societies. The violence of Spanish colonialism, however, did not end. It became displaced by these alliance members onto more distant and unknown peoples throughout New Mexico’s northwestern hinterlands. Throughout the late eighteenth century, Indian peoples in the American Great Basin became un-consenting participants in Spain’s North American empire. In the most remote corner of New Spain, Great Basin peoples witnessed unprecedented forms of disruption, violence, and slavery. [WP# 98020]