Hernan Cortez and the Conquest of the Aztecs

When the Spanish leader Hernan Cortes conquered the Aztecs, it marked a huge turning point in the history of Mexico and shifted the nature of the Spanish enterprise. During the sixteenth century, the Spanish pursued empire throughout the littoral societies of the Caribbean, and when Amerigo Vespucci found the Americas or the New World, they were determined to extend their influence globally (Brooks 149). In February of 1519, Cortes sailed to the Mexican coast and arrived on the Yucatan in April of that year. The Spanish had discovered Mexico a year prior to Cortes' arrival, and they desperately wanted to settle in it. By 1521, Cortes seized control of Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital and site of modern-day Mexico City (Mancall 224). Along with soldiers and horses, Cortes and the Spanish conquerors brought with them foreign illnesses that the natives lacked immunity from. As a result, the force of disease became woven into the narratives of the New World and shaped the early history of Spanish influence in Mexico. Cortes and his soldiers exacted extreme brutality and violence, which local observers documented. They not only sadistically murdered and raped natives but also attempted to efface local religious practices (Mancall 33). The Spanish enterprise was not imperial from the beginning, as commerce and religion were the primary motives. However, it proceeded in an ad hoc way and shifted to colonization when prospects for commerce dwindled. The conquest of the Aztecs marked the birth of modern-day Mexico and reshaped the Spanish enterprise to become more imperialist in its conception. This systemic shift would influence rapid European conquest abroad for the next four centuries.

Prior to European contact, the Aztec civilization was a thriving, centralized political entity around which an empire was built. Aztecs settled in Tenochtitlan during the mid-fourteenth century and adopted political and social forms of the agricultural societies that they conquered. Before forming an empire, the Aztecs were subordinate mercenaries to the Tepanec up until the 1420s (Wolf 68). During the 1420s, a militarized empire 700 miles long and 500 miles wide formed quickly in that region. The Aztecs used their religion, which revolved around the cult of the god Huitzilopochtli, to reinforce the legitimacy of their empire, just as the Spanish used Christianity to justify expanding their empire. A product of this use of religion was that rather than killing off their enemies, they took captives and offered prisoners of war as a human sacrifice. As a result, the Aztecs had a strong warrior elite class whose sacred duty was to wage war (69). Although they built an immense empire, historian David Ringrose points out that there were destabilizing elements growing in the empire which enabled Cortes and his 400 soldiers to topple it. The warrior class had grown too large to administer and control. Furthermore, the empire had over-expanded its geographical limits. The Spanish had more technologically advanced firearms and modes of transportation. Finally, Cortes politically exploited divisions amongst Aztec tribes, as he made alliances with one group against others (Ringrose 59). With a spirit of invincibility and imperialistic mindset that the Aztecs were vulnerable, Cortes and his men vanquished them and established Spanish imperialism in the New World.

Motives for European imperialism during the sixteenth century evolved from trade to conquest and consolidation, which is evident through the Spanish enterprise in the Americas. European imperialism was comprised of three distinct elements. Conquerors possessed a Eurocentric view of the world in which Europeans assumed superiority over all non-Europeans. Thus, they firmly believed that they had a right to conquer and rule other races. In turn, they also believed that non-European races accepted that they were naturally inferior to Europeans and willfully became subjects under European rule (Brooks 150). No matter how "civil" the Aztecs treated the Spaniards, the Spaniards viewed them as "irrevocably inferior." Aztec religion, Spaniards contended, was a "filthy mixture of superstition and devil worship" (Clendinnen 18). Finally, Europeans justified imperialism by asserting that this hierarchy constituted the natural order of things. Once other races realized and accepted their subjugation, they too considered their domination natural (Brooks 150). Other factors influenced the Spanish conquest of Mexico. The Spanish Crown sought to assert its sovereignty and have greater control over colonization. It also wanted to establish the Catholic religion globally. Thus, Cortes and other Spanish conquerors established Spanish rule and extended European influence into the New World and beyond.

Religious and financial interests drove European conquest and colonization during the sixteenth century, and Cortes sought personal fame and power in his venture to conquer Mexico. In the early decades of Spanish presence in the Caribbean, commerce and establishing economic relations with natives served as the primary motive for venturing to foreign lands. In his history, Bernal Diaz recounted that Hernan Cortes told a Mexican chief that "Spaniards suffer from a disease of the heart, for which gold is the only specific" (Clendinnen 13). Although the search for gold continued to serve as a motor for further exploration and discovery, Spain quickly moved from commercial goals to more systemic ones of colonization. Cortes drew on the militant Christian ideology of Reconquista as well as from chivalric legends about going on an adventure and showing honor. To prove himself as a strategist and capable leader of the New World, he manipulated many Europeans in order to set out on his expedition (16). The governor of Hispaniola had not approved of it, thus rendering his expedition an act of defiance by Cortes. In a letter to Charles V, the most powerful European ruler during the sixteenth century who was building up an imperial ideology in Europe, Cortes drew on biblical imagery, historical tradition, and chivalric imagery to construct his enterprise as legitimate (Cortes). Furthermore, he "founded" the city of Vera Cruz because he knew it was crucial in the European mindset to found towns (Brooks 150). As a result, Cortes established the Spanish empire in the New World.

Cortes' expedition virtually ignored the Yucatan with its menacing waters in favor of Aztec territory because of the prospect of Mexican riches. He directed his venture to Cozumel Island in order to refurbish and water his ships prior to reaching Mexico (Clendinnen 16). There the natives did not resist, and Cortes established a convention whereby later Spanish imperialists would show respect and kindness towards the Indians who lived on the island. Thus, the Indians had a long history of welcoming foreigners on the island. Cortes soon learned through interpreters that after a shipwreck, two Spaniards had been captured and imprisoned on the mainland as slaves. Thus, he sent out various envoys to rescue them, ultimately retrieving one of the men named Geronimo de Aguilar who told Cortes about his and his compatriots' misfortune. Many of the shipwrecked sailors died from disease or hunger while others were offered killed as a human sacrifice. To the astonishment of Cortes, Aguilar detailed how the only other survivor named Gonzalo Guerrero forwent rescue in favor of living with the natives. He had eloped with a Native American woman who had children with (17). The motivation for Guerrero to transition into an Aztec is still unknown, but his disdain for his former countrymen threatened the success of the Spanish colonization of the Aztecs. Ultimately, Aguilar, who knew both Spanish and Aztec language, proved vital to Cortes negotiating his way into Aztec emperor Montezuma's great city of Tenochtitlan rather than having to fight his way in (18). Unearthing the truth about the meeting between Montezuma and Cortes, however, has proven difficult due to the nature of the sources that cover it.

The meeting between Cortes and Montezuma has attained mythic qualities in the history of Mexico and Spanish imperialism. The main source historians look when reconstructing the meeting is Cortes' second letter to Charles V, which Cortes had sent almost a year after it occurred. Tainted by notions of Spanish superiority and imperialistic language, the letter presents "a tale of unmitigated disaster" (Brooks 151). On November 8, 1519, Cortes, who claimed to be a representative of the Spanish Crown and the Holy Roman Emperor, met with the Aztec emperor Montezuma. Cortes attempted to embrace the Aztec leader but was prevented from doing so by Montezuma's men, who asserted that no one was allowed to touch the "Great Speaker" (150). Cortes claimed that during that same evening, Montezuma peacefully gave over his empire to Cortes, which marked the birth of the Spanish Empire and ushered in an age of imperialism for Europe (150). The narrative he wove emphasizes the submission of all lords to the Spanish and the admission by the Aztec leader that his people were never truly natives of the land. Rather, Charles V was their "natural lord," and Montezuma agreed to "obey Cortes as his representative" (153). Montezuma is arrested, which makes his submission to the Spanish complete (160). Many scholars have rendered the notion that Montezuma quickly handed over his empire ridiculous, although they believe that the Aztecs did "surrender to fate" (182). Aztecs viewed history as cyclical, and the arrival of Spanish conquerors merely represented the fate God planned for them. However, they would return to greatness in the future (182). Ultimately, this meeting between Cortez and the Aztec leader catalyzed the Spanish conquest of the Aztecs.

Contemporary observers chronicled the Spanish defeat of the empire, limning the extent of the brutality by Cortes. As a result, Cortes had to legitimize his venture to the Spanish Crown. Attitudes adopted by travel writers in foreign places are predetermined by the political, economic and cultural situations of the time period. Travel writing addresses the home culture and traditions; thus, the line separating documentation and embellishment is often obscured (Mancall 4). During the bloody assault, Spanish conquerors disrupted the Aztec's sacred dance in a temple, closing the doors behind them and brutally murdering those inside. One chronicler noted, "[The Spanish] attacked the man who was drumming and cut off his arms. Then they cut off his head and rolled it across the floor" (Mancall 224). The prominent missionary Bartolome de Las Casas articulated his disgust upon learning about the conquest of Mexico. He described the Spanish as barbaric for perpetrated such cruelty and violence towards innocent individuals (224). Even so, de Las Casas never refuted Spain's natural right to rule the Aztecs (Brooks 161). As a result of his brutal domination of Aztecs as well as his act of defiance against the Spanish court, Cortes needed to legitimize his enterprise in Mexico. He wrote many letters to portray his achievements in a positive light, suppressing certain details while distorting his portrayal of what actually transpired. In one letter, he meticulously described the city of Tenochtitlan, lauding its great architecture and marveling at certain Aztec practices. He further compares the city with cities in Spain, exclaiming that Tenochtitlan was more impressive than anything he had ever seen in European society (Cortes). Thus, Cortes justified his brutal take over of the Aztecs to the Spanish Crown and Holy Roman Emperor.

Hernan Cortes and his conquest of the Aztecs shifted the Spanish enterprise to become more imperial. Commerce and religion had previously driven Spanish exploration. Furthermore, the desire to find gold also led to various expeditions in the Caribbean as well as in the New World. Although his venture was viewed as an act of defiance by other European powers, Cortes' exploitation of tribal divisions emerged as a brilliant strategy that those who sought to conquer and colonize the New World would emulate. Contemporary chroniclers described the brutality Cortes and his men used against the Aztecs in their conquest. Many observers including European missionaries expressed horror, which prompted Cortes to justify his actions through embellished and distorted accounts of what actually happened. Despite the horror, Cortes launched a brilliant two-year campaign in Mexico that delineated him as a brilliant political strategist. It not only revealed the shift in the Spanish enterprise to conquest and consolidation but also set the standard for subsequent imperialists to emulate.

Works Cited

Brooks, Francis. "Motecuzoma Xocoyotl, Hernan Cortes, And Bernal Diaz del Castillo: The Construction of Arrest." The Hispanic American Historical Review 75.2 (1995): 149-183. Print.

Clendinnen, Inga. Ambivalent Conquests: Maya and Spaniard in Yucatan, 1517-1570. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Print.

Cortes, Hernan. "Second Letter of Hernando Cortés to Charles V, by Hernán Cortés 1485-1547." Second Letter of Hernando Cortés to Charles V, by Hernán Cortés 1485-1547. N.p., n.d. Web. 15 Mar. 2014. <http://mith.umd.edu/eada/html/display.php?docs=cortez_letter2.xml>.

Cortes, Hernan. Letters From Mexico. Trans. Anthony Pagden. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1916. 102-112.

Mancall, Peter C.. Travel Narratives From the Age of Discovery: an Anthology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006. Print.

Ringrose, David R.. Expansion and Global Interaction, 1200-1700. New York: Longman, 2001. Print.

Wolf, Eric R.. Europe and the People Without History. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982. Print.