The Welsers were followed by Spanish colonizers. 
Indians who resisted their advance into the interior were 
slain or captured and enslaved. 
By the 17th Century, the Church arrived, organized 
missions and taught the natives agriculture and trades. 
The result was a kind of encomienda system (encomienda 
—a certain estate granted by the Spanish king). This 
type of encomienda was followed by another, in which in- 
dividuals were given land. The Indians living on it were 
considered property to be exploited. In both types of 
encomienda, Indians were forced to do many kinds of 
hard work to which they were not accustomed, continu- 
ing the toll of sickness and death among them. 
Finally, in the 17th Century, the remaining Indians 
were collected into villages (reduccién, a settlement of 
converted Indians). Miscegenation, which had existed 
all along, increased under this arrangement (64). 
In the following two hundred years, surviving Indians 
were gradually absorbed into the spreading Spanish civi- 
lization and an ever-increasing mestizo (half-breed) popu- 
lation appeared. Thus, three elements—Spanish (which 
became criol/o, but of pure blood), mestizo and Indian— 
fused, to become the Venezuelan Andean population of 
today. ‘Throughout its evolution, this population re- 
tained many culture patterns—among them, the prepa- 
ration and use of chimo. 
‘Today, mostly among rural, lower-income people, 
chimo is used by men, women and boys. It is regarded 
as a solace to the spirit and a comfort to the body, and 
around it has grown up a complex of beliefs and customs 
a way far removed from the 
which are a way of life 
primitive circumstances of its origin. 
At some time during the 19th Century, European 
techniques of tobacco use reinforced the customs con- 
[ 14 J 
