Florence in the academic year 1998–99, a year that I spent partly at the University of California at Berkeley in the Chair of Italian Culture, and partly at Cedeplar (UFMG— Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte) and Nepo (UNICAMP— Universidade Estadual de Campinas). Research was carried out at the three institutions, and preliminary versions of this paper were presented at Berkeley in December 1998, and at the Population Association of America’s meeting in Los Angeles in March 2000. Several colleagues have read the preliminary text and helped me with their criticism and advice. I wish to thank, in particular, Luis Arranz Marquez, Carlo Corsini, Tim Liao, Bob McCaa, Letizia Mencarini, Cecilia Rabell, David Reher, Nicolas Sanchez Albornoz, Enrique Tandeter, as well as an anonymous reviewer. I am particularly grateful to Maria del Carmen Diez Hoyo, director of the Biblioteca Hispanica of Madrid, for her help in locating badly needed documentation. Abbreviations: CDI = Coleccion de documentos ineditos relativos al descubrimiento, conquista y colonizacion de las posesiones Espanolas en America y Oceania, edited by J. Pacheco, F. Cardenas, and L. Torres Mendoza, 42 vols. (Madrid: 1864–84). CDU = Coleccion de documentos ineditos relativos al descubrimiento, conquista y organizacion de las antiguas posesiones espanolas de ultramar, 2nd series, 25 vols. (Madrid: Real Academia de Historia, 1885–1932). CDD = Coleccion documental del descubrimiento (1470–1506), Juan Perez de Tudela, ed., 3 vols. (Madrid: Real Academia de Historia, 1994). RCC = Reales cedulas y correspondencia de gobernadores de Santo Domingo: Coleccion de J. Marino Inchaustegui, vol. 1, 1516–1541 (Madrid: 1958).