Excerpt from The Spanish Dependencies in South America, Vol. 1 of 2: An Introduction to the History of Their Civilisation The history of Spanish rule in South America compre hends three periods, each of which has its peculiar char acter, but they cannot be exactly separated by definite dates. The first is characterised by voyages of discovery and exploring expeditions, and may be said to extend from 1492 to 1550. The second is marked by the organi sation and development of political societies dependent on Spain, and lies between 1550 and 1730 while the third period extends from this last date to the battle of Aya cucho, in 1824, and is especially distinguished by the increasing social importance of the creoles and mestizos, the disastrous effects of Spain's commercial policy, the decline of loyalty to the mother country, and the suc cessful struggle for independence. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.