Cortes Conquers Mexico

The Wealth of the New World Enriches the Old

Columbus’s feat, in 1492, of joining two worlds, though one was not Asia as he claimed, had rung down the curtain on the middle Ages. Behind it the stage was being set for the new era of modern history.

Isabella I

The year, a momentous one for all Europe, was particularly so for Spain, whose centuries-long struggle with the Moorish invaders had triumphantly ended with the fall of Granada, shortly before the three Spanish caravels had sailed from Cadiz. Flushed with victory, Spain felt itself the elect among nations.

Less than a score of years earlier the turbulence of rebellious barons had brought disorder and anarchy. From their castles they had waged private war against each other, preyed on trade, made the highways unsafe and defied the authority of the Crown. But when in 1478 Isabella of Castile ascended her throne, these recalci­trant subjects quickly learned that they had met their match in the mild but strong-willed woman, who with her husband, Ferdinand, King of Aragon, held sways over all Spain.

By strategy, guile and force of character she began to bring order out of chaos. Bribery, flattery, political bargains and a religious war against the remaining Moslems were the means she used to stimulate patriotism and national unity, and the discovery of America was most opportune in this process of consolidating her authority. Now, with comparative peace reigning throughout her realms, the New World offered an outlet for the tireless energy of leaders long accustomed to war, and for the restless ambition of second sons.

Thus it came about that many military expeditions, subsidized for the most part by their leaders, poured out of Spain. From the bridgeheads of Cuba and San Domingo, in the West Indies, they overran with their few thousands the vast territories of a continent.

Like most entrepreneurs then and since, these men, who were investing their fortunes and their lives in risky ventures, looked for quick returns and large dividends. Certainly they wanted gold, but they were equally keen to acquire social prestige which was symbolized by landed estates amply supplied with serfs bound to them to extract the fruits of the earth for them.

The rapid emergence of Spain as one of the first modern nations had coincided with the realization that the inhabited world was a vaster space than ever dreamed of before. This sudden expansion of horizons to unbelievable dimensions, intellectual as well as physical, was now coupled for Spain with a sense of destiny as the appointed agent of God for the tremendous task of converting the whole world to Christianity. The final crushing of the Moors and the discovery of the New World were clear indications, in the Spanish view, of the special approval of Providence, and this conviction released a prodigious national energy and powerfully stimulated the imagination of youth.

An enormously enlarged world was crammed full with the possibilities for adventure, riches and romance, in which the wildest dreams and the fondest hopes of fame and fortune might be fulfilled. Life had a zest and an irresistible allure in the bright renaissance light that was swiftly shedding the medieval gloom. And as if the promises of reality were not enough, there was the additional stimulant of the ”romances of literature” coming from the newly invented printing press.

These novels, under whose hypnotic influences all seemed to fall, from the lowliest clerks to the monarchs, resembled authentic chronicles of the exploits of knightly heroes in strange and enchanted lands. They presented a highly idealized concept of life in which strength, virtue and passion were all of a translucent and unnatural character, and they brought to over-receptive minds plausible accounts of fantastic places, riches and wonders that, so it seemed if the tales of travellers coming back from the farthest corners of the New World were to be credited, had their counterparts in reality. Young men burned to see and possess for themselves the marvels portrayed in these wonderful tales.

Map depicting Cortés' invasion route

Scarcely did they disembark in the New World than they rushed inland in search of the elusive El Dorado, the Amazons with their golden tools, the Fountains of Youth, the Seven Enchanted Cities and other equally fabulous inventions of the literary mind. Many of them did not come back, and most of those who did had to confess that they had not found what they had been looking for. Yet, so strong was the desire that the failure merely encouraged others to try their fortune.

Contemporary painting of Cortés

Among the Conquistadores, however, there was one who had more success than the rest. Born a younger son in a noble family in 1485, after two years at the University of Salamanca, Hernando Cortes set out in 1504, at the age of nineteen, to seek adventure in the West Indies. For the next fourteen years adventures in plenty came his way, but he was no nearer to making his fortune at the end of them than he had been at the beginning.

At this time the Governor of Cuba was Don Diego Velasquez, a greedy and rapacious man, who was jealous of the wealth which some of the explorers of the Mexico coasts brought back from their expeditions. None, however, had excited him so much as the treasure acquired by a certain Juan de Grijalva, who set out with two hundred and forty men in 1518, and returned within a few months with more than “sixteen thousand pesos in jewels and low grade gold” which he had obtained by bartering knives and swords with the natives.

Since the risks had apparently been comparatively small and the rewards so great, Velasquez decided at once to despatch an expedition on his own account, and to lead it he appointed Hernando Cortes. By this time, Cortes had settled down in Cuba, was married to a beautiful wife, the daughter of a Spanish immigrant, and had become one of the wealthiest ranchers in the island. He seemed to have shed the urge for excitement in the many ventures in which he had been involved during his early twenties, and was content to live the quiet life of a comfortably well off don.

Nevertheless, when he heard Grijalva’s account of the strange country to which he had come, of the stone statues which towered thirty or forty feet high, and the great white road he had seen disappearing into the far distance inland, it was this, rather than the gold, which excited his curiosity. It seemed clear to him that Grijalva had discovered some great new territory which should be explored for Spain without delay.

So rekindled was all his old spirit of adventure, so fired his imagination, that even when he learned that Don Diego was not intending to contribute a single peso himself to the cost of the expedition, but was requiring him to raise the necessary funds, Cortes cheerfully mortgaged his estates, borrowed more from local merchants and canvassed for volunteers to accompany him.

Soon he had collected more than two hundred men and six ships, and was busily engaged in provisioning the latter when word came to him that Don Diego had decided to remove him from command of the expedition. Friends of the Governor, jealous of the opportunity which it would give its leader to enrich himself, had persuaded Don Diego that Cortes, known to be so rash and impetuous in his younger days, would either lead the venture to disaster and those who went with him to death, or he would not return, but set himself up wherever he found a suitable location, and keep the wealth he acquired for himself.

It was late at night when the news reached Cortes, and he decided to thwart Don Diego’s designs by sailing immediately, though he still lacked half the men he had estimated he would need, and had only six of the eleven ships. So the men were rounded up out of their beds and summoned from the taverns and by midnight were aboard. The ships, carried by the ebb tide, drifted towards the open sea, and when dawn came were standing off-shore, awaiting their commander. He was still in the town rounding up all the supplies of meat on which he could lay hands. This he had carried down to the ships’ boats in the lightening day, and had just ordered them to be rowed out to the ships when Don Diego, who had been hastily awakened, arrived at the water’s edge, roaring, and “Is it thus you part from me?”

“Time is short, Excellency,” Cortes called back. “Has your Excellency any last command for me?”

In his anger the Governor was speechless, and as he watched the little fleet weighed anchor and sailed away.

From Cuba, Cortes made first for Trinidad, where he planned to persuade more men to join him and to take on the provisions he still needed. While he was there Don Diego sent a letter to the mayor, ordering him to arrest Cortes and return him, bound, to Cuba. But when Cortés’s men threatened to burn down the little town if a hand was laid on their commander, the mayor did not dare to act.

By the early weeks of 1519 all was ready, and on 10 February the expedition set sail. There were now eleven ships in the little fleet, comprised of one of a hundred tons, three of seventy tons and the remaining seven small fishing boats which offered no shelter from the weather. Into these ships Cortes had crowded four hundred and twenty men, sixteen horses, ten fair-sized cannon and four lighter guns. It was with this ridiculously puny force that this extraordinary Spaniard conquered Mexico for his king.

Running first to the island of Cozumel, where they stayed ten days, on 6 March, 1519, the fleet rounded Cape Catoche and swung westward, and keeping a mile off-shore they followed the coastline until they came to the mouth of a great river, which he recognized as that described by Grijalva, and thereby knew that he was on the right course. He attempted two or three landings on the coast, but was driven off by unfriendly natives, and eventually came to the place where one of the veterans declared Grijalva had obtained the gold and jewels which had been the cause of the present expedition.

The man was mistaken, but ongoing ashore, he found the natives friendly, and here he learned, through the Aztec girl, subsequently named Marina by the men, who accompanied the expedition from now on as interpreter that he had landed on the eastern shore of the Aztec empire. This vast territory stretched from the Atlantic westwards to the white shores of the Pacific. Its ruler was a powerful emperor called Montezuma, whose fabulous capital, Tenochtitlan, lay in a valley among the mountains, deep in the interior. This city Cortes decided at once that he must visit, and there attempt to persuade its emperor peacefully if possible, or if not by war, to accept the over lordship of the King of Spain, who henceforward he declared to be true ruler of this country.

Aztec Empire Also known as Aztec Triple Alliance 1325–1521

Disaffection had by this time taken hold of some of his men, and to prevent them from deserting he ordered all the ships except one to be burned. On 15 August, Cortes placed himself at the head of his little band. Fourteen of them were mounted, and carried lances; thirty carried muskets and sixty had crossbows. The remainder were armed with swords and daggers.

After three days’ marching, they emerged from the first mountains into a vast plain, dotted with farmhouses and ploughed fields, and as they went on it became clear to Cortes that these people were no savages, but men as civilized, though in a different pattern, as the Spaniards themselves. They appeared also to be friendly disposed, for often deputations would come to meet them, offering presents of gold and jewels and supplies.

Moctezuma I

The road, however, lay through the territory of a warlike tribe, the Tlascalans, who refused to submit to the authority even of Montezuma. Traversing this country, the Spaniards had to defend themselves; but their horses, like the Carthaginian elephants, played a large part, with the muskets and cannon, in the Spaniards’ ultimate victory, for these were the first horses ever to be seen in these parts. And so they came to the Valley of Mexico, at the far end of which Montezuma’s capital lay.

As they continued their way through the valley, they were again greeted by friendly people. On 8 November, 1519, having covered more than four hundred miles they came to the great city. Their defeat of the fierce Tlascalans had made a deep impression on Montezuma, who, in many years of attempting to subdue them, had never been successful, and the emperor had decided to welcome the Spaniards.

The civilization which the Spaniards found in Tenochtitlan, which they now renamed Mexico was something which they had never encountered before. What amazed them most was the vast wealth in gold and jewels which all the Aztecs appeared to possess, and the vast scale on which the houses and palaces were built. Three hundred men had successfully reached Mexico City, and were quartered in the palace of Montezuma, each man in his own room, and this without incommoding the Aztec population of the palace. Before setting out from Vera Cruz, as Cortes had named the place where he had landed, he had decided to renounce the authority of the Governor of Cuba, and declare his direct allegiance to the King of Spain. The one ship which had not been burned, he had despatched to Spain to state his case.

News of what he had done reached Don Diego, who at once sent a second expedition to recall Cortes, who had scarcely had time to consolidate his position in Mexico City, when this expedition arrived at Vera Cruz. Leaving a number of his men in the city he set out with the rest for Vera Cruz to prevent the new expedition from marching inland. Arriving on the coast he was able to persuade the majority of the newcomers to join him; those who would not were sent back to Cuba.

He then marched back to Mexico City with his augmented force, and there found the men he had left behind in a very precarious position. In his absence, some of Montezuma’s chieftains, angry at the submission of their emperor to the Spaniards, had gathered their forces and attacked the invaders. Realizing that he could not hold the city he withdrew.

For the greater part of a year the struggle continued; then on 14 August, 1521, Cortes launched his final attack on the city. The battle raged fiercely from noon to sunset and ended with the surrender of the Aztecs. At the age of thirty-six, Cortes found himself the effective ruler of the great empire, now recognized by its peoples and all others besides as a possession of the Spanish Crown, its first considerable possession in the New World.

Moctezuma II

It was an outstanding achievement, but it was marred by the extreme cruelty of Cortes towards his victims. He burned towns and villages in reprisal and slaughtered their inhabitants in a bloodbath scarcely equalled in history. Every Aztec leader who fell into his hands he burned at the stake; every prisoner he took he put to the sword; yet their only crime was that they had tried to defend their country. He took the Aztec ruler Montezuma II prisoner and having promised to show him all the respect due to so great a monarch, on the flimsiest of excuses he murdered him and all his sons and daughters. Indeed, Cortés’s excesses throughout his conquest of Mexico bestowed on him the continuing doubtful distinction of a place among the most ruthless and cruel military leaders the world has ever seen.

Administered from Madrid, the settlement of Mexico was carefully controlled. But it was the great treasure which it yielded, much of which the great Spanish galleons transferred to the Mother Country, which made Spain the dominant power in Europe for almost a century.

Never in modern history has any power so enhanced its position by the operations of so few men, Cortés’s last army comprised fewer than a thousand men, nor at so little cost of life; nor acquired such vast portable wealth from one short campaign. But though the Spaniards themselves might go into a decline in Europe, with the conquest of Peru, by Pizarro, by the middle of the century, and later conquests, they firmly attached the whole of the South American continent to the Iberian Peninsula. The mercurial temperaments of the Spaniards and Portuguese have made a firm impression on the lives and destinies of the Latin American peoples, and seem likely to continue to do so in the future.