its of silver northwest of the Basin of Mexico, centered on the province of Zacatecas, provided the colonial state with a steady supply of silver bullion, fueling a price revolution in Iberia and the rest of Europe and transforming the regional colonial economies of Zacatecas, Guanajuato, and other mining regions By the mid-1600s, the sprawling colony sank into what one scholar dubbed “New Spain’s century of depression,” though the nature and extent of that “depression” remain the subject of scholarly debate Compared to the thriving colonies of British North America and elsewhere, however, New Spain did experience a prolonged period of relative economic stagnation The imperial state’s efforts to redress its colonies’ relative economic decline, launched after the War of the Spanish Succession (1701–13), are known collectively as the Bourbon Reforms, named after the ruling dynasty that assumed power in Spain after the fall of the Habsburgs In a process similar to that unfolding elsewhere in the Americas, as time passed, the “creoles” (or criollos, i.e., Spaniards born in the Americas) became an increasingly important and powerful group, despite its relatively small size—a gradual shift that by the late 1700s led to a growing sense of American identity and the first stirrings for independence from Spain Indian and “mixed-race” rebellions and uprisings occurred throughout the colonial period, but most remained local and regional and focused on redress of specific grievances relating to colonial governance or perceived abuses by individual authorities demographics The demographic makeup of the colony changed markedly over time, from its initial overwhelming preponderance of Indians and tiny number of Spaniards, to steep Indian population decline, to increasing number of mestizos and others of “mixed race,” Africans, and a small but growing number of creoles New Spain’s population at the end of the colonial period is estimated at around million—around 50 percent Indian, 30 to 40 percent “mixed race,” 10 to 20 percent Spanish and creole, and less than percent African In sum, 300 years of colonial rule left a profound and lasting legacy across New Spain, in every realm of society Grappling with the nature of that legacy remains one of the most challenging and central tasks facing scholars of postconquest Mexico and Central America See also Aztecs (Mexica); Dominicans in the Americas; epidemics in the Americas; Franciscans in the Americas; Habsburg dynasty; honor ideology in Lat- Newton, Isaac 277 in America; Loyola, Ignatius of, and the Society of Jesus; race and racism in the Americas; silver in the Americas Further reading Bakewell, Peter Silver Mining and Society in Colonial Mexico: Zacatecas, 1546–1700 Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1971; Cook, Sherburne F., and Woodrow Borah Essays in Population History Berkeley: University of California Press, 1971–79; Farriss, Nancy M Maya Society under Colonial Rule: The Collective Enterprise of Survival Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1984; Hu-Dehart, Evelyn Missionaries, Miners, and Indians: Spanish Contact with the Yaqui Nation of Northwestern New Spain, 1533–1820 Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1981; Seed, Patricia To Love, Honor, and Obey in Colonial Mexico: Conflicts over Marriage and Choice, 1574–1821 Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1988; Taylor, William B Landlord and Peasant in Colonial Oaxaca Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1972; Van Young, Eric Hacienda and Market in 18th-Century Mexico: The Rural Economy of the Guadalajara Region, 1675–1820 Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981 Michael J Schroeder Newton, Isaac (1642–1727) mathematician Isaac Newton was born in 1642 at Woolsthorpe, near Grantham, Lincolnshire, England, three months after his father, yeoman farmer Isaac, died Newton’s mother, Hannah Ayscough, married the Reverend Barnabas Smith and left Newton with his grandparents at age three He grew up to hate his stepfather and never psychologically recovered from his mother’s abandonment By the time Smith died in 1653, Newton’s personality had been forged; he became distrustful, hesitant in dealing with others, and emotionally unstable; these would be lifelong traits Newton attended day school in the nearby village and the Kings’s Grammar School at Grantham He worked on his mother’s farm at age 14 but returned to school in 1660 to prepare for entrance to Trinity College at Cambridge University in 1661 His mother refused to pay his tuition so Newton served as a subsizar, who performed a variety of jobs for fellow students Newton did not distinguish himself at Cambridge, but he privately studied and mastered the esteemed works of René Descartes and Euclid