Montezuma: Warlord of the Aztecs

Preface

Preface Cortés could not pronounce his name and so gave it a Spanish flavor —Montezuma. There was much more about this Indian ruler of fifteen million subjects that the Conquistador did not understand , aside from his name—properly Motecuhzoma, the Angry Lord. But he did grasp the one most correct thing about this mighty man, that he was the single point of failure of his empire, indeed, of his civilization. Two hundred years before, the Aztecs—or more correctly, the Mexica1 —had been wandering barbarians before they found their way into the lush Valley of Mexico. There they found civilization, carved out with the obsidian sword the greatest empire North America had ever seen, and built a brilliant capital that ranked as one of the great cities of the world. Mexica armies conquered from the Gulf to the Pacific coasts to the borders of Guatemala. A million bearers carried the tribute of a world into the capital every eighty days. Motecuhzoma was absolute master of this world, the last of the Mexica rulers to have assumed his throne before the arrival of the Spaniards in Mexico. He was an accomplished warrior and general who added to the endless string of Mexica conquests. To him was due the great efflorescence of this civilization as the wealth of Mexico created a cosmopolitan civilization never before seen in the Americas. To him also was due the brutal centralization of the empire, withering initiative and flexibility among the Mexica. Always before , Mexica rulers had relied on the good counsel of experienced men. Motecuhzoma kept his own counsel. As the glories of empire mounted, Mexica society lost a vital element of adaptability, the very qualities needed to repulse conquerors from across the sea. Still, even a rigid structure could well have dealt with Cortés had it been ably led by this autocrat. Instead, the autocrat cracked, victim of his own superstitious nature and a legend of a returned god come to reclaim his rightful empire. The Mexica imperial idea was based on the claim that it was the legitimate heir of the nearmythical time of perfection, the Toltec Empire. Much like the legacy of the Romans for medieval Europe, the Toltecs exerted a powerful pull on the minds of their successors. The creator of that empire, the man-god Quetzalcoatl, had sailed away to the east vowing someday to return. That prophecy had not been an important element of Mexica imperial ideology. His return lay slumbering safely in the ever-receding future, as safely as the Second Coming, until Cortés arrived in the year associated with Quetzalcoatl . With that, Motecuhzoma was undone. His moral center collapsed . He allowed Cortés to march into his capital and then turned over the empire to him as a god or emissary of a god. The Mexica could do nothing but watch in growing anger and consternation , cowed by the absolutism of Motecuhzoma. The slavish obedience that Motecuhzoma had instilled stayed the hands of men who would otherwise have made short work of the Spaniards. Cortés exploited this weakness to the hilt and through Motecuhzoma’s willing collaboration seized control of the functioning empire. The plan would have worked smoothly had not one of his subordinates committed a mass atrocity that broke all the bounds of obedience. But for the Mexica, it was too late. Their victories would be ephemeral, their wounds too deep. A few words on the pronunciation of names in Náhuatl, the language of the Mexica and central Mexico. Fray Diego Durán referred to it as language of poetry, infinite metaphors, and great subtlety. All words in Náhuatl are accented on the second to last syllable. The x is pronounced as a sh; the h is spoken with a soft aspirant as in English. The tl and tz represent single sounds. The u used before a, e, i, and o is pronounced like the English w. Cu before vowels is pronounced kw. Thus, Mexica—may-SHEE-kha xii preface and Huitzilopochtli—weets-eel-oh-POCH-tlee; Tenochtitlan— tay-noch-TEE-tlan; Cuitláhuac—Kwe-TLAH-hwac. Many place names were hispanized simply because Spanish tongues could not pronounce Náhuatl words. Cuauhnahuac (Near the Trees) became Cuernavaca, and Tollan became Tula. Special thanks to my oh-so-talented wife, Patty, who created the splendid maps for this book, and to the family of Keith...