Mestizo facts for kids

An image from colonial South America shows that mestizos are the children of Spanish people and Indians

Mestizo (meh-STEE-tzo) is a Spanish term for a person who is of mixed European (usually Spanish) and Indigenous ancestry.

Mestizos have existed since the time when Spain controlled what is now Latin America. A mestizo was usually the son of a Spanish father and a Native American mother. Mestizos form the largest part of the population in some Latin American nations, a large minority of mestizos makes up most of the population in Mexico, which is the Spanish-speaking nation with the largest population in the world.

During the colonial era, many Native Americans were converted to Roman Catholicism and began using the Spanish language instead of their traditional one. This was because of the concept that existed in the Spanish colonies which gave more "value" to European people over Native Americans and Africans. Because of this, many Native Americans gained better social status by calling themselves "mestizos" instead of "indios."

Indo-Mestizo

Indo-Mestizo (also known as Cholo) is a Spanish term for a person who is around 3/4 Native American and 1/4 Caucasian ancestry.

Indo-Mestizos are mostly found in Eastern and Southern Mexico, much of Northern Central America, Ecuador,south of Peru, and Bolivia

Indo-Mestizos usually have more Native American traits, but may have a light pigmentation with completely Native American features, or a dark pigmenation with some obvious Caucasian features.

Famous Indo-Mestizos include Maya Zapata, George Lopez, and Danny Trejo. They are so called because of their appearance, not because of known genetic background.

Images for kids

• 

  A casta painting by Miguel Cabrera. Here he shows a Spanish (español) father, Mestiza (mixed Spanish–American Indian) mother, and their Castiza daughter.

• 

  Luis de Mena, Virgin of Guadalupe and castas, 1750. The top left grouping is of an indio and an española, with their Mestizo son. This is the only known casta painting with an indio man and española woman.

• 

  Casta painting showing 16 hierarchically arranged, mixed-race groupings. The top left grouping uses cholo as a synonym for mestizo. Ignacio Maria Barreda, 1777. Real Academia Española de la Lengua, Madrid.

• 

  A statue of Gonzalo Guerrero, who adopted the Maya way of life and fathered the first mestizo children in Mexico and in the mainland Americas (the only mestizos before were those born in the Caribbean to Spanish men and Indigenous Caribbean women).

• 

  Chavela Vargas Mixed-Costa Rican Born - Singer

• 

  Keylor Navas Mixed-Costa Rican - Real Madrid Goalkeeper

• 

  Painting of the First Independence Movement celebration in San Salvador, El Salvador. At the center, José Matías Delgado, a Salvadoran priest and doctor known as El Padre de la Patria Salvadoreña (The Father of the Salvadoran Fatherland), alongside his nephew Manuel José Arce, future Salvadoran president of the Federal Republic of Central America.

• 

  Mestizo-Mestiza, Peru, circa 1770.

• 

  José Ramos-Horta, 1996 Nobel Peace Prize winner, former President of East Timor.

• 

  Brazilian footballer Ronaldo

• 

  The dance group Joyas Mestizas ("Mestiza jewels") performs at the Fiestas Patrias Parade, South Park, Seattle, 2017

• 

  Statue of José Vasconcelos in Mexico City

• 

  Español, India, Mestizo.

• 

  Castizo, Mestiza, Chamizo. Miguel Cabrera 1763.

• 

  Mulatto and Mestiza, produce Mulatto, he is Torna Atrás [throwback]" by Juan Rodríguez Juárez

• 

  Mestizo, India, Coyote. Miguel Cabrera 1763.

• 

  De mestizo e India, sale coiote (From a Mestizo man and an Indigenous American woman, a Coyote is begotten).

• 

  Mestizo, Albarazada, Barcina.

• 

  Mestizo, Mestiza, Mestizo Sample of a Peruvian casta painting, showing intermarriage within a casta category.

• 

  1919 Barrientos family in Baracoa, Cuba, headed by an ex Spanish soldier and his Indigenous wife

See also

In Spanish: Mestizo para niños