Long before the conquest the Indians had been experts in the manufacture of earthenware and pottery, numerous specimens of which are found throughout the country. Under Spanish rule the variety of design was greatly increased and a larger field was opened to them. They also learned the fabrication of glass, and as this industry gradually developed, several factories arose, chiefly at Puebla, where forty-six establishments for the making of glass and pottery were in a flourishing condition in 1793. Subsequently a decline took place, and in the beginning of this century the number was reduced to eighteen.
The fabrications of iron never made any notable progress in New Spain, and the iron implements in use came almost exclusively from the mother country. It was only when communication with the old world was interrupted or difficult that an impulse was given to this branch of industry.[1]
There were, however, other branches in which the natives excelled the most skilful European artisans, and chief among them was the art of dyeing with cochineal and indigo. Both were produced mainly in Oajaca; but owing to failures of the crop and the oppressive policy of the government,[2] the indigo trade declined considerably, and toward the close of the eighteenth century the yield was not enough for home consumption,[3] and. the want was supplied by importations from Guatemala.
Cochineal long maintained its place as one of the leading exports of new Spain, its production being encouraged by the crown from the earliest days.[4] I
- ↑ Revilla Gigedo, Instruc., 92, attributes the small progress of the iron industry to the unwillingness of the merchants to introduce the instruments and machinery required for the production of that metal. Estalla, xxvii. 46, speaks of some excellent work in steel, manufactured at Puebla, but this is rather doubtful.
- ↑ A law of 1563 prohibited the employment of Indians in the cultivation on the ground that it was injurious to their health. Recop. de Ind., ii. 307-8.
- ↑ The second Revilla Gigedo estimated the yearly production in 1794, at 1500 arrobas. Instruc., 100. For details as to its cultivation see Alzate, Diario Lit., 50-2.
- ↑ Cochineal was exempted from tithes. Ordenes de la Corona, MS., iii.
