American Indians were framed and punished as the still-troublesome Moriscos

Evidence

Explorers constructed a complex narrative about the people they encountered. This included claims that they were devil-worshippers, as if American Indians were lapsed Christians. American Indians were also identified with Muslims. These New Moors were “imagined as extensions of either the defeated Moors or the still-troublesome Moriscos.” They were also punished as if they were Muslims. — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 584

Categorization

• QUESTION: How exactly were Indians ‘punished as if they were Muslims’ — through what mechanisms and legal categories inherited from the reconquista?