Mapping Control: The Colonial Grid and the Architecture of Exclusion
Plaza Mayor as a Case Study of Oppression in Spanish Colonial Urbanism
E.L. Dominguez van Tilburg (TU Delft - Architecture and the Built Environment)
S. Calitz – Mentor
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Abstract
This thesis examines the role of urban planning in the establishment of colonial power structures in Santo Domingo, the first Spanish settlement in the Americas. Founded in 1502 by Governor Nicolás de Ovando, Santo Domingo became an administrative center and a spatial model for later colonial cities across the New World. Central to this study is the orthogonal grid plan and the design of public plazas, particularly the Plaza Mayor, which were not merely public spaces in the city but spatial instruments embedded with ideologies of oppression.
While scholars have explored the origins and influences of the colonial grid, as well as the social and economic aspects of labor and race under Spanish rule, relatively little attention has been paid to how these factors intersected within the built environment of early colonial cities. This thesis addresses that gap by asking: how did the spatial configuration and use of the Plaza Mayor, including features such as La Picota, function as tools of social control and racial oppression in colonial Santo Domingo, and how are these narratives embedded in the city’s contemporary urban landscape?
Through spatial analysis of historical maps and archival documents, this research demonstrates how the city’s urban fabric was deliberately designed to reinforce racial hierarchies and maintain colonial order. The Plaza Mayor operated not only as a symbolic and administrative center but also as a stage for public punishment, surveillance, and exclusion of enslaved and marginalized populations. The findings of this study contribute to a nuanced understanding of spatial mechanisms used in Spanish colonial urbanism and the legacy of racialized spatial organization in Santo Domingo.