Considering the Evidence:
The Conquest of Mexico Through Aztec Eyes (+20)
The Conquest of Mexico Through Aztec Eyes (+20)
Among the sagas of early modern empire building, few have been more dramatic, more tragic, or better documented than the Spanish conquest of Mexico during the early sixteenth century (see Map left). In recounting this story, historians are fortunate in having considerable evidence—both documentary and visual—from the Aztec side of the encounter.
The peoples of central Mexico had long used a type of book called a codex to record their history. Codices included drawings and symbols (glyphs) painted by carefully trained high-status persons known as tlacuilo (artist-scribes). Although Spanish invaders destroyed most of these codices, the codex tradition continued in a modified form in the century following conquest. These new codices, often assembled under the supervision of European missionaries, were largely composed by native peoples, many of them new converts to Christianity and some of them literate in both Spanish and Latin. These codices included numerous paintings by local artists as well as written texts in a variety of Mesoamerican languages using the Roman alphabet.
The Florentine Codex, for example, was compiled under the leadership of Fray Bernardino de Sahagun, a Franciscan missionary who felt that an understanding of Aztec culture was essential to the task of conversion. On the account Sahagun relied on Aztec informants and artists, many scholars believe that the Florentine and other codices represent indigenous understandings of the conquest. However, they require a critical reading. They date from several decades after the events they describe. Many contributors to the codices had been influenced by the Christian and European culture of their missionary mentors, and they were writing in a society thoroughly dominated by Spanish colonial rule. Furthermore, the codices reflect the ethnic and regional diversity of Mesoamerica rather than a single Aztec perspective. Despite such limitations, these codices represent a unique window into Mesoamerican understandings of the conquest.
The peoples of central Mexico had long used a type of book called a codex to record their history. Codices included drawings and symbols (glyphs) painted by carefully trained high-status persons known as tlacuilo (artist-scribes). Although Spanish invaders destroyed most of these codices, the codex tradition continued in a modified form in the century following conquest. These new codices, often assembled under the supervision of European missionaries, were largely composed by native peoples, many of them new converts to Christianity and some of them literate in both Spanish and Latin. These codices included numerous paintings by local artists as well as written texts in a variety of Mesoamerican languages using the Roman alphabet.
The Florentine Codex, for example, was compiled under the leadership of Fray Bernardino de Sahagun, a Franciscan missionary who felt that an understanding of Aztec culture was essential to the task of conversion. On the account Sahagun relied on Aztec informants and artists, many scholars believe that the Florentine and other codices represent indigenous understandings of the conquest. However, they require a critical reading. They date from several decades after the events they describe. Many contributors to the codices had been influenced by the Christian and European culture of their missionary mentors, and they were writing in a society thoroughly dominated by Spanish colonial rule. Furthermore, the codices reflect the ethnic and regional diversity of Mesoamerica rather than a single Aztec perspective. Despite such limitations, these codices represent a unique window into Mesoamerican understandings of the conquest.
In the Aztec telling of the Spanish conquest, accounts of earlier warnings or omens of disaster abound. One of these was described as follows in the Florentine Codex: “Ten years before the arrival of the Spaniards an omen first appeared in the sky like a flame or tongue of fire. . . For a full year it showed itself. . . . People were taken aback, they lamented.” That ominous appearance was illustrated in the Duran Codex - presented in the image below - showing the Aztec ruler Moctezuma observing this omen of death from the rooftop of his palace. Some scholars suggest that such stories reflect a post conquest understanding of the traumatic defeat the Aztecs suffered, for other evidence indicates that the Aztecs were not initially alarmed by the coming of the Spanish and that, instead, they viewed the Europeans as “simply another group of powerful and dangerous outsiders who needed to be controlled or accommodated.”
Image 1 QUESTIONS
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In February of 1519 Hernán Cortés, accompanied by some 350 Spanish soldiers, set off from Cuba with a fleet of eleven ships, stopping at several places along the Gulf of Mexico before proceeding to march inland toward Tenochtitlán, the capital of the Aztec Empire. Along the way, he learned something about the fabulous wealth of this empire and about the fragility of its political structure. Through a combination of force and astute diplomacy, Cortés was able to negotiate alliances with a number of the Aztecs’ restive subject peoples and with the Aztecs’ many rivals or enemies, especially the Tlaxcala. With his modest forces thus greatly reinforced, Cortés arrived in Tenochtitlán on November 8, 1519, where he met with Moctezuma. The image below presents that epic encounter, drawn from the Lienzo de Tlaxcala, a series of paintings completed by 1560. They reflect generally the viewpoint of the Tlaxcala people.
Image 2 QUESTIONS
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The woman standing behind Cortés the image is Doña Marina (sometimes called La Malinche), a Nahuatl-speaking woman who had been a slave in Maya territory and was given as a gift to Cortés’s forces in April 1519. She subsequently became an interpreter for the Spanish, as well as Cortés’s mistress. Doña Marina appears frequently and prominently in many of the paintings of the era. Cortés himself wrote that “after God we owe this conquest of New Spain to Doña Marina.” But in Mexico, some have condemned her as a traitor to her people, while others have praised her as the beginning of European and Native American cooperation and mixing.
Whatever the character of their initial meeting, the relationship of the Spanish and Aztecs soon deteriorated amid mutual suspicion. Within a week, Cortés had seized Moctezuma, holding him under a kind of house arrest in his own palaces. For reasons not entirely clear, this hostile act did not immediately trigger a violent Aztec response. Perhaps Aztec authorities were concerned for the life of their ruler, or perhaps their factional divisions inhibited coordinated resistance.
But in May 1520, while Cortés was temporarily away at the coast, an incident occurred that set in motion the most violent phase of the encounter. During a religious ceremony in honor of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec patron deity of Tenochtitlán, the local Spanish commander, apparently fearing an uprising, launched a surprise attack on the unarmed participants in the celebration, killing hundreds of the leading warriors and nobles. An Aztec account from the Florentine Codex described the scene in the quote to the right: |
"[W]hen the dance was loveliest and when song was linked to song, the Spaniards were seized with an urge to kill the celebrants. They all ran forward, armed as if for battle. They closed the entrances and passageways . . . then [they] rushed into the Sacred Patio to slaughter the inhabitants.... They attacked the man who was drumming and cut off his arms. Then they cut off his head, and it rolled across the floor. They attacked all the celebrants stabbing them, spearing them, striking them with swords.... Others they beheaded. . . or split their heads to pieces.... The blood of the warriors flowed like water and gathered into pools . . .[T]hey invaded every room, hunting and killing."
Image 3 QUESTIONS
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The Image below shows a vivid depiction of this “massacre of the nobles,” drawn from the Codex Duran, first published in 1581.
The massacre of the nobles prompted a citywide uprising against the hated Spanish, who were forced to flee Tenochtitlán on June 30, 1520, across a causeway in Lake Texcoco amid ferocious fighting. Some 600 Spaniards and several thousand of their Tlaxcala allies perished in the escape, many of them laden with gold they had collected in Tenochtitlán. For the Spaniards it was La Noche Triste (the night of sorrow), while for the Aztecs it was no doubt a fitting revenge and a great triumph. The image below, from a Tlaxcala codex, depicts the scene. Cortés and his Tlaxcala allies to the left of the image are shown on the causeway, while many others are drowning in the lake, pursued by Aztec warriors in canoes.
Image 4 QUESTIONS
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While the Aztecs may well have thought themselves permanently rid of the Spanish, La Noche Triste offered only a temporary respite from the European invaders. Cortés and his now diminished forces found refuge among their Tlaxcala allies, where they regrouped and planned for yet another assault on Tenochtitlán. Meanwhile, smallpox had begun to ravage the Aztec population, which lacked any immunity to this Old World disease. The Florentine Codex described the situation: “[A]n epidemic broke out, a sickness of pustules. . . [The disease] brought great desolation; a great many died of it. They could no longer walk about... no longer able to move or stir.... Starvation reigned, and no one took care of others any longer. . . . And when things were in this state, the Spaniards came.” The Image below, likewise from the Florentine Codex, is an Aztec portrayal of the disease.
In mid-1521, Cortés returned, strengthened with yet more Mesoamerican allies, and laid siege to the Aztec capital. Bitter fighting ensued, often in the form of house-to-house combat, ending with the surrender of the last Aztec emperor on August 13, 1521. In Tenochtitlán, all was sorrow and lamentation, as reflected in some of the poetry of the time:
Nothing but flowers and songs of sorrow are left in Mexico and Tlateloco where once we saw warriors and wise men.... We wander here and there in our desolate poverty. We are mortal men. We have seen bloodshed and pain where once we saw beauty and valor. We are crushed to the ground; we lie in ruins.... Have you grown weary of your servants? Are you angry with your servants, O giver of Life? Image 5 QUESTION
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How does this image represent the impact of the smallpox epidemic and Aztec response to it?
Using the Evidence: The Conquest of Mexico through Aztec Eyes
1. Evaluating images as evidence: What are the strengths and the limitations of these images as sources for understanding the colonial conquest
of Mexico? How well did the native artists who created them understand the Spanish?
2. Analyzing perspectives: How might you define the perspective from which these visual sources approach their subjects? Keep in mind that they
were drawn by native artists who had been clearly influenced by Spanish culture and religion. In what ways are they criticizing the Spanish conquest, celebrating it, or simply describing it?
3. Portraying the Spanish: In what ways do these visual sources portray the Spanish? How might the Spanish themselves present a different account of the conquest?
4. Describing the conquest: Based on the information in this section, write a brief description of the conquest from the Aztec point of view.
1. Evaluating images as evidence: What are the strengths and the limitations of these images as sources for understanding the colonial conquest
of Mexico? How well did the native artists who created them understand the Spanish?
2. Analyzing perspectives: How might you define the perspective from which these visual sources approach their subjects? Keep in mind that they
were drawn by native artists who had been clearly influenced by Spanish culture and religion. In what ways are they criticizing the Spanish conquest, celebrating it, or simply describing it?
3. Portraying the Spanish: In what ways do these visual sources portray the Spanish? How might the Spanish themselves present a different account of the conquest?
4. Describing the conquest: Based on the information in this section, write a brief description of the conquest from the Aztec point of view.