Victors and Vanquished

The Spanish conquest of Mexico is an epic tier that is understudied. The historical documents recounting the events be either written through the memory of the conquerors or the conquered, and as a result there is a great disparity in the facts, those facts changing dep baring on which side produced the documents. We go a vogue take a look at several of the documents published in Victors and Vanquished from both the Spanish and Nahua perspectives, analyzing them for bias, lessons learned, as well as the different contrasts between different perspectives.In addition I think it is w eightery to look at the overall motivation behind the Spanish conquest. In Bernal Diaz second writing in the book he speaks of the Spanish movement from Santa Maria de la Victoria to San Juan de Ulua. When The Spaniards arrive they have their world-class meeting with representatives from Moctezuma. According to Diaz, Cortez treats the ambassadors very well, and it seems that Cortez is quite intended on making a good gist with Montezuma as well as the locals, confessing that they be there to simply trade with the Indians.When Montezumas ambassadors return from delivering Cortez message to their king, they bring back a good amount of treasures with them. The ambassadors also tell Cortez that Montezumadoes not think an capitulum is necessary. This is an interesting statement and virtuallything that I believe may have shown the hidden motivations behind Montezumas thinking. I have to wonder if Montezuma was hoping that if he sent an acceptable amount of gold and some kind oral communication the Spaniards would accept it graciously and be on their way.When a person in power says something along the lines of, an reference is not necessary (pp 90), it is a nice way of saying, I do not want to be interviewed. Political correctness is not something that is new to modern times. Unfortunately for Montezuma, by sending all that gold, his contrive backfired as the Spaniards noted th at with the helmet filled with fine grains of gold it, showed us that there were good mines there. (pp 89-90) Shortly by and by this, Cortez informs Montezumaof his strong intentions on meeting him.Another interesting fact is that Cortez seems very focused on tell the idea that he is there with peaceful intentions, despite the eight hundred Indians he had left bushed(p) in Tabasco. I can understand Cortez desire to trade and explore a new soil with new people, but the bottom line is that he had more on his mind than trading and exploration. He and his men had received a less than warm welcome in Tabasco, and rather than find other r push throughe or turn back (which of course they couldnt do) they opted instead to kill around eight hundred of the indigenous peoples.When Montezuma sent that helmet filled with gold to Cortez I believe he sealed his fate. Cortez acts of graciousness from that point forward were a means to an end, a necessary deposit on what he hoped to be a big p ay get rid of. The next few writings Id like to look at deal with the Chalula massacre. In Adres de Tapias account of the incident the Cholulans put up a very hail-fellow front, but are however plotting to kill the conquistadors all along.The Plot is un circus tented through Dona Marina (Cortez translator and get under ones skin to his son) once the conquistadors are informed of the plot they confront the Chalulan warriors (who were at the time under the guise of slaves). They end up locking the warriors in a courtyard and then according to de Tapia, he ordered nearly of the lords to be killed. (pp 118) Then the Spaniards and Indians (Tlaxcalans) went throughout the city, killing warriors and burning houses. (pp 118) De Tapia makes it sound as if the Spaniards were simply executing those iniquitous of treason and lies.However I think one has to question if the destruction of the entire city was necessary. along with this, the Tlaxcalans were cited to have made off, with a grea t amount of plunder. (pp 118) It is hard for me to believe that while the Tlaxcalans were making off with all that plunder, the conquistadors were standing by not indulging themselves. In my opinion, the Tlaxcalans provide a good scapegoat for the conquistadors. The other side of this story written by Sahagun offers some key differences (as expected).Sahaguns story is a good deal simpler than de Tapias with the conquistadors arriving in Cholula and having been previously warned by the Tlaxcalans that, the Cholulans are very evil they are our enemies. (pp 121) They simply inconvenience a general summons for the higher ranking officials and warriors to assemble in the courtyard and slaughter them followed by the city. According to Sahugun the Chalulans were not even armed. Sahagun goes on to describe the conquistadors as a war machine.Mentioning all the atomic number 26 incorporated with their weapons and armor, and making it sound like they steamrolled through Chalula which was a small bump on their way to Mexico. One interesting fact is that in this account there is no mention of the plunder that Diaz had mentioned. habituated the Nahuas obvious spite for the conquistadors it seems plausibly that they would take every opportunity to mention all the prohibit aspects of the Spanish conquest. This leads you to believe they either did not know about it, or it didnt happen (most likely the former. They do make mention of the conquistadors greed when shortly after Montezuma sent them gold gifts and, Like monkeys the grabbed the gold. It was as though their hearts were put to rest. (pp 122) The Spaniards entry into Tenochtitlan was initially surprisingly peaceful. With each leader hearting out the other, Montezuma especially seems to be very cordial toward the Spaniards treating them as teules (gods). This shaky peace ends on the spur of the moment with a battue during the fiesta of Huitzilopochtli. there are three documents dealing with this massacre tha t Id think are important to look over. All the documents are fairly short in length, but there are a lot of things to consider. The first document written by Francisco Lopez de Gomara (whom Bernal Diaz often mentions with disdain) discusses the fiesta covering some of the rituals and dances, then quickly progresses to the Indian murders. The only motivation Gomara offers as to why the Spanish so abruptly decided to abandon peace was that, they coveted their gold and jewels. (pp 162) Thus the Spaniards locked the doors to the temple and murdered all that were inner(a) taking from them their treasures. Given the conquistadors track record up to this point it is not unbelievable that this could happen, but I find myself wondering if there wasnt something more persuading them. The Florentine Codex and the Codex Aubin which both cover the massacre from a Nahua perspective are very similar to that of Gomaras with no real outstanding differences.This begs the question, was the treasure p resent at the ceremony reason enough to attack? I think that question is answered in another source. Bernal Diaz while describing the initial entry of the Spaniards into Tenochtitlan seems to be fairly peaceful as mentioned before. There is, however a turn point is his writings. The Spaniards find a cemented door near there quarters in the city and end up breaking into it, only to discover a large transshipment center of treasure.The description of the vast quantities of gold was like a dream. Immediately after this discovery the Spaniards start to feel like they are wearing out their welcome, and that the Aztecs are becoming more hostile toward them. This should not be surprising given that they had broken into the Aztecs treasure vault, of sorts. However the conquistadors discovery of the chamber seems to be the major turning point in the relations between the Aztecs and the Spaniards and is what I believe led to the massacre and ventual conquer of the empire. In my opinion the Spaniards greed was ultimately one of the biggest driving forces behind the destruction of the Aztec empire. When analyzing historical documents it is very exhausting to try and read between the lines and separate fact from fiction. Undoubtedly emotions and time cloud peoples memories. However with so many various sources I think you begin to realize the truth stereotypically resides somewhere close to the middle.