A viceroyalty was an entity headed by a

viceroy A viceroy () is an official who reigns over a polity in the name of and as the representative of the monarch of the territory. The term derives from the Latin prefix ''vice-'', meaning "in the place of" and the Anglo-Norman ''roy'' (Old Frenc ...

. It dates back to the

Spanish colonization of the Americas The Spanish colonization of the Americas began in 1493 on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola (now Haiti and the Dominican Republic) after the initial 1492 voyage of Genoa, Genoese mariner Christopher Columbus under license from Queen Isabella ...

in the sixteenth century.

British Empire

India

India India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...

was governed by the Governor-General and Viceroy of India from 1858 to 1947, commonly shortened to "Viceroy of India".

Ireland

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

was governed by the

Lord Lieutenant of Ireland Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (), or more formally Lieutenant General and General Governor of Ireland, was the title of the chief governor of Ireland from the Williamite Wars of 1690 until the Partition of Ireland in 1922. This spanned the K ...

, who was the representative of the British Monarchy in Ireland from the Williamite period until independence, was also called the Viceroy of Ireland.

France

* Viceroyalty of New France

Portuguese Empire

In the scope of the

Portuguese Empire The Portuguese Empire was a colonial empire that existed between 1415 and 1999. In conjunction with the Spanish Empire, it ushered in the European Age of Discovery. It achieved a global scale, controlling vast portions of the Americas, Africa ...

, the term " Viceroyalty of Brazil" is also occasionally used to designate the colonial

State of Brazil The State of Brazil () was one of the states of the Portuguese Empire, in the Americas during the period of Colonial Brazil. History In 1621, the Governorate General of Brazil was split into two states, the State of Brazil and the State ...

, in the historic period while its governors had the title of "Viceroy". Some of the governors of

Portuguese India The State of India, also known as the Portuguese State of India or Portuguese India, was a state of the Portuguese Empire founded seven years after the discovery of the sea route to the Indian subcontinent by Vasco da Gama, a subject of the ...

were also called "Viceroy". * Viceroyalty of Brazil * Governors of Portuguese India

Russian Empire

* List of viceroyalties of the Russian Empire

Spanish Empire

The viceroyalty () was a local, political, social, and administrative institution, created by the

Spanish monarchy The monarchy of Spain or Spanish monarchy () is the constitutional form of government of Spain. It consists of a hereditary monarch who reigns as the head of state, being the highest office of the country. The Spanish monarchy is constitu ...

in the sixteenth century, for ruling its overseas territories. The administration over the vast territories of the

Spanish Empire The Spanish Empire, sometimes referred to as the Hispanic Monarchy (political entity), Hispanic Monarchy or the Catholic Monarchy, was a colonial empire that existed between 1492 and 1976. In conjunction with the Portuguese Empire, it ushered ...

was carried out by

s, who became governors of an area, which was considered not as a colony but as a province of the empire, with the same rights as any other province in Peninsular Spain.

Europe

America and Asia

Controversy over whether the American Viceroyalties were Colonies or Provinces

According to the lawyer Fernando de Trazegnies, the status of the Viceroyalties was like that of a Kingdom among the Kingdoms of the Indies, and that the fact that

legal Pluralism Legal pluralism is the existence of multiple legal systems within one society and/or geographical area. History Church and State The notion of "parallel sovereignty" between premodern States and the Catholic Church was an accepted situation ...

was practiced in Derecho Indiano would be sufficient proof that the Crown did not seek to practice a Exploitative colonialism (where local institutions, which protect the socioeconomic rights of the

Vassal A vassal or liege subject is a person regarded as having a mutual obligation to a lord or monarch, in the context of the feudal system in medieval Europe. While the subordinate party is called a vassal, the dominant party is called a suzerain ...

people, are ignored, under the excuse of the

Right of Conquest The right of conquest was historically a right of ownership to land after immediate possession via force of arms. It was recognized as a principle of international law that gradually deteriorated in significance until its proscription in the af ...

), if not political integration into the Hispanic Monarchy in the same plural way that had already been done with the rest of its territories in Europe, based on the characteristic Fueros of the traditional and

composite Monarchy A composite monarchy (or composite state) is a historical category, introduced by H. G. Koenigsberger in 1975 and popularised by Sir John H. Elliott, that describes early modern states consisting of several countries under one ruler, sometimes ...

that maintained the regional laws of each nation integrated into the

Spanish Monarchy The monarchy of Spain or Spanish monarchy () is the constitutional form of government of Spain. It consists of a hereditary monarch who reigns as the head of state, being the highest office of the country. The Spanish monarchy is constitu ...

(and that was even practiced within peninsular Spain after the

Reconquista The ''Reconquista'' (Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese for ) or the fall of al-Andalus was a series of military and cultural campaigns that European Christian Reconquista#Northern Christian realms, kingdoms waged ag ...

, such as the Fueros of Aragón or the Fueros of Navarra). This would be evidenced by the creation of the República de Indios in which the political traditions of indigenous

customary law A legal custom is the established pattern of behavior within a particular social setting. A claim can be carried out in defense of "what has always been done and accepted by law". Customary law (also, consuetudinary or unofficial law) exists wher ...

would remain alive as a state within the several states that made up the Composite Monarchy, or the desire of the Spanish conquistadors to make pacts with the Natural Lords of the new lands (indigenous nobility and chiefs) to legitimize the conquest in

natural law Natural law (, ) is a Philosophy, philosophical and legal theory that posits the existence of a set of inherent laws derived from nature and universal moral principles, which are discoverable through reason. In ethics, natural law theory asserts ...

and integrate them into the seigneurial system, respecting the sovereignty of the natives and their ethnic lordships, which could not be deprived of their rights and was only possible its annexation to the Spanish Empire through alliance pacts (whose conditions of such pacts had to include the part of the indigenous sovereign, protector of the

common Common may refer to: As an Irish surname, it is anglicised from Irish Gaelic surname Ó Comáin. Places * Common, a townland in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland * Boston Common, a central public park in Boston, Massachusetts * Cambridge Com ...

Indian). At the same time, the Spanish Empire itself and the Council of the Indies did not perceive the American Viceroyalties as possessions analogous to the

Factories A factory, manufacturing plant or production plant is an industrial facility, often a complex consisting of several buildings filled with machinery, where workers manufacture items or operate machines which process each item into another. Th ...

or administrative Colonies, in the style of other empires with a more

Mercantilist Mercantilism is a nationalist economic policy that is designed to maximize the exports and minimize the imports of an economy. It seeks to maximize the accumulation of resources within the country and use those resources for one-sided trade. ...

behavior towards the Natives of their non-European possessions, but rather perceived the Viceroyalties as overseas Provinces, with rights equivalent in hierarchy to those of the rest of the provinces of the

Crown of Castile The Crown of Castile was a medieval polity in the Iberian Peninsula that formed in 1230 as a result of the third and definitive union of the crowns and, some decades later, the parliaments of the kingdoms of Kingdom of Castile, Castile and Kingd ...

(according to the Laws of the Indies), of which they were an integral part. Even the word colony would not have been used in any legal document of the Spanish Monarchy with respect to the Indies until the 17th century, and after the arrival of the Bourbons it would be used in reference to its classic etymological sense of human settlements established in new territories, and not in the modern sense with connotations of economic exploitation. That would be reaffirmed in the late empire by official statements of the Supreme Central Junta (legal representative of occupied Spain in the middle of the

Peninsular War The Peninsular War (1808–1814) was fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Kingdom of Portugal, Portugal, Spain and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French ...

). Such statements would not have been questioned by American representatives in the

Cortes of Cádiz The Cortes of Cádiz was a revival of the traditional ''Cortes Generales, cortes'' (Spanish parliament), which as an institution had not functioned for many years, but it met as a single body, rather than divided into estates as with previous o ...

, such as the Peruvian Vicente Morales Duárez. However, there would still be historiographical debates in this regard, among those (the ''nationalist'' or ''colonialist school'') who say that this was only

De jure In law and government, ''de jure'' (; ; ) describes practices that are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms, regardless of whether the practice exists in reality. The phrase is often used in contrast with '' de facto'' ('from fa ...

positions on paper, and not a De facto reality in social dynamics (the ''revisionist school''). Authors such as Annick Lempérière consider that the “colonial” concept in Hispanic reality would have been an anachronistic concept that serves mostly an ideological use by historians (wanting to develop an idyllic vision of Spanish-American Independence) rather than to make a scientific description of the history of the Spanish empire, going so far as to question its apparent “objective” usefulness that modern historiography gave to the colonial concept to relate it to the causes of the Spanish-American Wars of Independence (that is, that there is an artificial consensus that American social formations, the Reinos de Indias and it's viceroyalties, have been institutionally formed for their economic exploitation and dependence on the metropolis, instead of being an integral part of the Empire like any extension of the Crown, just like its European dominions).

References

{{Terms for types of administrative territorial entities Types of geographical division Monarchy