Documentary Fonds of Royal Audiencia Court of La Plata (RALP)
Documentary heritage submitted by Bolivia and recommended for inclusion in the Memory of the World Register in 2011.
©Bolivian National Archives
Jurisdiction of the Ralp
The documentary fonds originated in the Royal Audiencia Court of La Plata (RALP) which after 1825 came to be known as Bolivia. This documentary resource spans the period 1561 -1825 and is related to the development of the silver mines of Potosí, whose exploitation launched complicated mechanisms that facilitated the formation of an extensive economic network that, from its basis on American soil, extended its radio of projection to the entire known world. Silver from Potosí, extracted under an effective system created by Spain for draining the mines, was exported to the Iberian Peninsula, crossed Europe and continued on to the Orient and the Asian markets. Thus, the documentation of the RALP constitutes the first link of an entire globalized commercial circuit for silver in the 16th and 17th centuries.