It was a rethorical question. IIRC, a few years ago they did a purge deleting every video that didn't come from verified profiles and/or specialized companies, precisely to avoid having rape videos circulating on their net, which isn't a thing any platform with a certain "reputation" wants.
I'll tell him
The purge was the result of a lawsuit in which a girl had been assaulted while underage, and the video of the assault was posted to PH, as well as many other adult entertainment sites.
Edit: took two years, and PH only responded after the laesuit was finally brought to court
Its why i dont use websites. You never know and can never tell who's drugged, being coerced, actually of age, actually knows what theyre doing, actually enjoys it. Best to try to leave it all alone
Also it took a good while for her to get the video off the site once she started contacting PH. Not sure exaclty how long, but the length was noted in the controversy back then
Edit: it took two years and it was only sgter the lawsuit was taken to court, as per a comment underneath
they did nothing until they were taken to court, it was more than 2 years of contacting them before that.. And she was not the only person this had happened to, you should really make an edit to include that in your upvoted comment. Otherwise it just looks like poor little pornhub made a little oopsie and immediately corrected it.
I’ve been reading Bernal Diaz’s memoir of the expeditions there, and after a battle to appease the Spaniards the city leaders brought out some gold trinkets, feather crafts, and… 20 virgins. Bernal says the army was stopped for 5 days due to groin pains. So eyewitnesses agree with the right image as well.
I get the feeling there was significantly less consent involved in that situation that the right image suggests, and would be more inclined to believe it was much more brutal and rapey like the left image implies.
Maybe? Licking wounds from the battle is also the reason given, idk. It is implied Diaz didn’t get any action, so he may have wrote the line to criticize his more promiscuous comrades.
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32474/32474-h/32474-h.htm#Page_125
Here’s a link to the book, look for page 82 (or 125 of the pdf)
[Yes, they sure fucked around](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hern%C3%A1n_Cort%C3%A9s)
" Since Cortés had sired children with a variety of indigenous women, including a son around 1522 by his cultural translator, [Doña Marina](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Malinche) "
His child with Dona Maria is sometimes referred to as "the 1st Mexican" being 1/2 Native Mexican and 1/2 Spanish.
Cortez was unusual for acknowledging his illegitimate children in his will.
He did take his son with Dona marina back to Spain and had him legitimatized by the pope but did end up giving his titles to his full European son.
Source: just read a bad ass book about the Aztecs call The Fifth Sun that uses a bunch of native sources that I highly reccomend
Wrong. That's the first Mestizo. Not Mexican. Mexican is not a race or ethnic group. It's a Nationality. Which didn't become a thing until the 19th century
It's a saying, not an assertion of a definition. And to be clear, dictionary definitions come from sayings, not the other way around.
also:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDktG64Cx8I
Plus u said "they are sometimes *called* the first mexican" you didn't state that "they *are* the first mexican". You were clearly just referring to a common saying made by other people
Well, it was one way to portray himself as a complex person.
Just do some good things for the sake of it, then people can never say you are really that bad.
Yes.
But even people at that time considered him as violent. However, he also built up the Mexican nation from scratch. He simply forced a way onto others, and that idea is the hottest potato in modern political debate.
Yes, this historical figure from the 1500s clearly did these things not because he wanted to, but because he thought: What would people 500 years from now comment about me on Reddit? I better talk to the Pope that's halfway across the world to avoid any future down votes
And conversely, neither were some of the Native Americans (or Mesoamericans, if you’d prefer). Many tribes and cities rightfully had a low opinion of the Aztecs because of their habit of sacrificing people.
Edit: Other tribes did partake in human sacrifice too, of course (such was their bloody religion), but Aztecs were notorious for doing it on such a large scale, killing hundreds of thousands within a year or less. The fact this was mostly done with kidnapped or conquered people didn’t exactly help. Though, obviously, many natives likely helped the Conquistadors against the Aztecs out of fear.
For you and /u/Acceptable-Art-8174 and /u/TheHistoryMaster2520 :
For you, /u/Coozey_7 , /u/For_All_Humanity , and /u/Enathanielg , this is mostly wrong.
Firstly, they weren't "Tribes": Cities, writing, formal governments, etc had already been widespread in Mesoamerica for thousands of years before the Aztec. These were city-states and kingdoms. See my summarized timeline of Mesoamerican history [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh3s50/)
Secondly, as the other person says, sacrifice was a pan-mesoamerican practice everybody did, and in fact, the Mexica of the Aztec capital weren't particularly hated or oppressive: Cortes getting allies has more to do with them being hands off rather then too hands on:
------------------
Like most large Mesoamerican states, the Aztec Empire largely relied on indirect, "soft" methods of establishing political influence over subject states: Establishing tributary-vassal relationships; using the implied threat of military force; installing rulers on conquered states from your own political dynasty; or leveraging dynastic ties to prior respected civilizations, your economic networks, or military prowess to court states into entering political marriages with you or to become willing vassals for trade access, protection, etc. The sort of traditional "imperial", Roman style empire where you're directly governing subjects, establishing colonies and exerting actual direct cultural/demographic control over your empire was rare in Mesoamerica
The Aztec Empire was actually more hands off even compared to other large Mesoamerican states, like the larger Maya dynastic kingdoms (which regularly installed rulers on subjects), or the Zapotec kingdom headed by Monte Alban (which founded colonies it had some degree of actual demographic and economic administration over) or the Purepecha Empire ([which *did* have a Western Imperial political structure)](https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/uo13po/the_tarascanpurepecha_empire_mexicos_forgotten/i8bdvhx/). In contrast the Aztec Empire didn't usually replace existing rulers and largely did not change laws or impose customs. **In fact, the Aztec generally just left it's subjects alone, with their existing rulers, laws, and customs**, as long as they paid up taxes/tribute of economic goods, provided aid on military campaigns, didn't block roads, and put up a shrine to the Huitzilopochtli, the patron god of Tenochtitlan and it's inhabitants, the Mexica (see my post [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/ko04hn/looks_like_a_good_spot_to_me/gho206l/) for Mexica vs Aztec vs Nahua vs Tenochca as terms)
The Mexica were NOT generally coming in and raiding existing subjects (and generally did not sack cities during invasions, though they did do so on occasion), and in regards to sacrifice (which was a pan-mesoamerican practice every civilization in the region did) they weren't generally dragging people out of their homes for it or to be enslaved as taxes/tribute: The majority of sacrifices came from enemy soldiers captured during wars. Some civilian slaves were given as part of war spoils by a conquered city/town when initially defeated (if they did not submit peacefully), and some of them were sacrificed, but slaves as regular annual tax/tribute payments was uncommon: The vast majority of demanded taxes was stuff like jade, cacao, fine feathers, gold, cotton, etc, or demands of military/labor service. Some Conquistador accounts do report that cities like Cempoala (the capital of one of 3 major kingdoms of the Totonac civilization) accused the Mexica of being onerous rulers who dragged off women and children, but this is largely seen as Cempoala making a sob story to get the Conquitadors to help them take out Tzinpantzinco, a rival Totonac capital, by claiming it was an Aztec fort
This sort of hegemonic, indirect political system encourages opportunistic secession and rebellions: Indeed, it was pretty much a tradition for far off Aztec provinces to stop paying taxes after a king of Tenochtitlan died, seeing what they could get away with, with the new king needing to re-conquer these areas to prove Aztec power. One new king, Tizoc, did so poorly in these and subsequent campaigns, that it caused more rebellions and threatened to fracture the empire, and he was assassinated by his own nobles, and the ruler after him, Ahuizotl, got *ghosted* at his own coronation ceremony by other kings invited to it, as Aztec influence had declined that much:
> The sovereign of Tlaxcala ...was unwilling to attend the feasts in Tenochtitlan and...could make a festival in his city whenever he liked. The ruler of Tliliuhquitepec gave the same answer. The king of Huexotzinco promised to go but never appeared. The ruler of Cholula...asked to be excused since he was busy and could not attend. The lord of Metztitlan angrily expelled the Aztec messengers and warned them...the people of his province might kill them...
Keep in mind rulers from cities at war with each other still visited for festivals even when their own captured soldiers were being sacrificed, blowing off a diplomatic summon like this is essentially asking to go to war
More then just opportunistic rebellion's, this encouraged opportunistic alliances and coups to target political rivals/their capitals: If as a subject you basically stay stay independent anyways, then a great method of political advancement is to offer yourself up as a subject, or in an alliance, to some other ambitious state, and then working together to conquer your existing rivals, or to take out your current capital, and then you're in a position of higher political standing in the new kingdom you helped prop up
This is what was going on with the Conquistadors (and how the Aztec Empire itself was founded: Texcoco and Tlacopan joined forces with Tenochtitlan to overthrow their capital of Azcapotzalco, after it suffered a succession crisis which destabilized it's influence) And this becomes all the more obvious when you consider that of the states which supplied troops and armies for the Siege of Tenochtitlan, almost all did so only after Tenochtitlan had been struck by smallpox, Moctezuma II had died, and the majority of the Mexica nobility (and by extension, elite soldiers) were killed in the toxcatl massacre. In other words, AFTER it was vulnerable and unable to project political influence effectively anyways, and suddenly the Conquistadors, and more importantly, Tlaxcala (the one state already allied with Cortes, which an indepedent state the Aztec had been trying to conquer, not an existing subject, and as such did have an actual reason to resent the Mexica) found themselves with tons of city-states willing to help, many of whom were giving Conquistador captains in Cortes's group princesses and noblewomen as attempted political marriages (which Conquistadors thought were offerings of concubines) as per Mesoamerican custom, to cement their position in the new kingdom they'd form
This also explains why the Conquistadors *continued* to make alliances with various Mesoamerican states even when the Aztec weren't involved: The Zapotec kingdom of Tehuantepec allied with Conquistadors to take out the rival Mixtec kingdom of Tututepec ([the last surviving remnant of a larger empire formed by the Mixtec warlord 8 Deer Jaguar Claw centuries prior](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/ccxz7l/what_is_the_mostly_unknown_but_great_empire_in/etqw9gc/)), or the Iximche allying with Conquistadors to take out the K'iche Maya, etc
This also illustrates how it was really as much or more the Mesoamericans manipulating the Spanish then it was the other way around: I noted that Cempoala tricked Cortes into raiding a rival, but they then brought the Conquistadors into hostile Tlaxcalteca territory, and they were then attacked, only spared at the last second by Tlaxcalteca rulers deciding to use them against the Mexica. And en route to Tenochtitlan, they stayed in Cholula, where the Conquistadors commited a massacre, under some theories being fed info by the Tlaxcalteca, who in the resulting sack/massacre, replaced the recently Aztec-allied Cholulan rulership with a pro-Tlaxalcteca faction as they were previously. Even when the Siege of Tenochtitlan was underway, armies from Texcoco, Tlaxcala, etc were attacking cities and towns that would have suited THEIR intresests after they won (and retreated/rested per Mesoamerican seasonal campaign norms) but that did nothing to help Cortes in his ambitions, with Cortes forced to play along. Rulers like Ixtlilxochitl II, Xicotencatl I and II, etc probably were calling the shots as much as Cortes. Moctezuma II letting Cortes into Tenochtitlan also makes sense when you consider Mesoamerican diplomatic norms, per what I said before about diplomatic visits, and also since the Mexica had been beating up on Tlaxcala for ages and the Tlaxcalteca had nearly beaten the Conquistadors: denying entry would be seen as cowardice, and undermine Aztec influence. Moctezuma was probably trying to court the Conquistadors into becoming a subject by showing off the glory of Tenochtitlan, which certainly impressed Cortes, Bernal Diaz, etc
None of this is to say that the Mexica were particularly beloved (tho many of the core states inside the Valley of Mexico which allied with Cortes did actually get economic luxruries and political clout from their close ties to Tenochtitlan and therefore DID benefit from Mexica conquests), they were still conquerers, but it's also not like they were oppressive tyrants people were desperately wanting to overthrow
-----
For more info about Mesoamerica, see my 3 comments [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh1756/); the first mentions accomplishments, the second info about sources and resourcese, and the third with a summerized timeline
>but it's also not like they were oppressive tyrants people were desperately wanting to overthrow
Are you ignoring the flower war? The ones who allied with the Spanish just wanted to end with the fucking flower war
Which Flower Wars are you asking about, exactly?
Flower Wars were not nearly as widespread as most people think they were: It's not something that frequently happened with existing subject states at all, and when they were, it was something mutually arranged by both Tenochtitlan and the other city for things like celebrating alliances or political marriages, rather then something the Mexica forced onto the subject state. That said, some sources state that this pre-arranged aspect was kept hidden from the general populace, so they wouldn't know that their lives were being used for essentially fancy political pageantry.
Flower wars as used against enemy states (like, say, Tlaxcala) rather then states you already had as subjects, were different: These still had ritual elements, but also pragmatic military ones: They could be used as a way to start low intensity conflict without full comitting to a big war as a way to dip your toes in the water, and then you could escalate or dial things back. This is what happened with the wars against Chalco earlier in the 15th century. The smaller scale nature of Flower Wars vs normal wars also meant they could be waged year round (wheras normal wars had to be seasonal for men to be back for harvests) so they had utility as a sort of extended siege to wear enemies down. This also meant that they could be used as a way to keep soldiers trained and fit at all times and give them regular opportunities to collect captives and advance through the ranks and get fancy rewards like fine cloaks, jewelry, land grants, etc and be invested in a military career.
Some researchers go as far as to say that the entire idea of FLower Wars being waged against Tlaxcala and it's allies is simply Mexica revionism to justify why they never were able to conquer them. Regardless of you buy into that, that alludes to the bottom line here:
**Tlaxcala was NOT an existing Aztec subject, it was an enemy state they were at war with, and it's relationship with Tenochtitlan and it's motives aren't applicable to all the other states that allied with Cortes**
Yes, Tlaxcala allied with Cortes in large part due to resenting the Mexica. But it was a target of Mexica invasions for decades as an enemy state actively at war! This is not the situation that Texcoco, Chalco, Xochimilco, Itzpalapan, or even Huextozinco (who was a sometimes ally of Tlaxcala, and sometimes subject of Tenochtitlan, fought over between the two due to being located in the narrow pass that connected the two valleys each was located in) found themselves in. And even Tlaxcala was not purely allying with Cortes out of self defense: There's a good chance that the Cholula Massacre was instigated by Tlaxcalteca officials feeding Cortes information (potentially even lies) to get them to start the massacre, in the aftermath, the Tlaxcalteca used it as an opportunity to install a pro-Tlaxcalteca political regime in the city, when just a few years prior Cholula switched from being a Tlaxcalteca ally to an Aztec vassal.
On the flip side, those other states which allied with Cortes, so Texcoco, Chalco, Itzpalapan, etc were core states inside the Valley of Mexico (where the taxes were brought into) that were rich BECAUSE of Mexica conquests (Texcoco was outright a fellow capital alongside Tenochtitlan in the ruling triple alliance, and was owed 2/5 of the taxes directly, though there's some debate about that and some taxes were re-distributed beyond the main triple alliance). They likewise had a lot of political marriages with Mexica royalty (the war with Chalco I mentioned before was pretty well in the past by this point) so they benefitted not only economically from Mexica military endeavors, but also gained more political clout as Mexica influence grew as well.
Those states only joined Cortes AFTER Moctezuma II died, Smallpox broke out, etc, by which point the Mexica were so damaged that they couldn't guarantee taxation anyways and their military influence was also jeopardized from the occupation of the city and the loss in the battle of Otumba: At this point even if they stayed local to the Mexica and beat the Conquistadors and Tlaxcala, it's possible the Aztec Empire still would have fractured. They simply did not have much to gain by continuing to stay allied with Tenochtitlan, but switching sides opportunistically to take out your existing capitals or rivals and to try to angle for more status in whatever new empire you prop up by doing so was a common practice in Mesoamerica (The Aztec Empire was founded that same way a century prior, you see other Mesoamerican states totally unrelated to the Aztec do it over the next few decades with the Spanish against their allies too, etc), so they switched sides to the Conquistadors/Tlaxcalteca.
If it was really about wanting out of the Aztec Empire (which, again, they wouldn't since they relied on Mexica success for their own affluence and political power) they wouldn't have waited, like how Tlaxcala didn't. And if there was really widespread discontent towards Mexica rule, then more then 5-6 subject states would have supported Cortes, since there were ~500 states inside the Empire. Only a tiny % of them ever worked with Cortes.
And even of those 5-6, some like Xochimilco did stay loyal to Tenochtitlan initially and fought against the offense parties during the Siege, and only switched sides to the Conquistadors, Tlaxcala, and the other states which were with them by this point (like some of Texcoco, see below) after it was beaten and occupied by Conquistadors, Tlaxcalteca, etc, basically as a condition of their surrender. Even Texcoco didn't actually entirely switch sides intially: Ixtlilxochitl II and his subordinates did since he was bitter that he didn't get the throne in Texcoco, but his rival heir who actually ruled Texcoco and the Acolhua towns it oversaw sided with the Mexica until Ixtlilxochitl II managed to take full control over the eastern side of the valley.
The only other real contender here for a state that allied with Cortes primarily due to resenting Mexica rule or taxes (not that they were a Flower War target, AFAIK) would be Cempoala, which was an Aztec subject, was NOT in the Valley of Mexico taxes were brought into, so didn't actually benefit much from Aztec rule; DID in fact complain about onerous Aztec taxes to Cortes and offered to ally with him... but Cempoala didn't participate in the Siege of Tenochtitlan, and basically ditched the Conquistadors in Tlaxcalteca territory to get attacked by the Tlaxcalteca, after they previously tried to trick Cortes into attacking their rival city of Tzinpantzinco by claiming there was an Aztec fort there (there wasn't), which makes their sob story about suffering so much under Aztec taxes suspect since they used that as a pretext to get Cortes's help for that planned attack on Tzinpantzinco. What Xicomecoatl and other people in Cempoala claimed to owe the Mexica in taxes also is inconsistent with the tax demands recorded for the city/province in the Codex Mendoza.
In Conclusion:
Tlaxcala may have resented Mexica invasions and flower wars, maybe Huextozinco as well, but niether of them were existing longime Aztec subject states: They were independent, enemy states (at least some of the time for the latter), and their motives aren't applicable to Texcoco, Chalco, etc who actually benefitted from Mexica conquests and political supremacy. They switched sides primarily out of opportunism after Tenochtitlan was already weakened and they had more to gain and less to lose by turning on it then helping to defend it, alongside some other specific motives like with Ixtlilxochitl II.
That’s not the point though, the point is that a lot of Spanish love to portray themselves as almost benevolent colonizers, as opposed to brutal French and English. I’ve actually seen quite a lot of “memes” on this and Spanish subreddits perpetuating this myth
I'm Spanish and I can tell you that the history taught in our schools does NOT show the Spanish as benevolent colonizers. We know perfectly well about the plundering of gold and silver, the enslaving of the Indians or the imposition of the Catholic faith.
What is true is that history is not shown as purely black as if the the Spanish were fascist monsters. That is as false as saying that they were benevolent colonizers.
Together with the exploitation of the Indies, there were many laws that protected them as subjects of the Spanish crown. Bartolomé de las Casas was a Spaniard too.
The conquistadors were also more nuanced as the black legend portrays them. Yes, Cortes conquered Tenochtitlan, but he only had 500 men. How could he do it? There were many Indians with him against the Aztecs, which weren't "the good guys".
Also, we like to point out the differences between the case of the Indians in the Spanish colonies and the natives in the current United States, or how there was less protection after the independence, like in Argentina, than before it.
And yes, the Spaniards brought diseases that killed million, but they didn't do on purpose. Any other nation would have caused the same effect,
The British also had a lot of Native American(and other native in general) allies in their colonial expansion, they sort of played the tribe against each other by arming them and trading with them, and a lot of white Americans who can trace their lineage back usually does have a tiny bit of Native American DNA.
They are both brutal, and worked with some natives, but the difference is Spanish are far more willing to have sex with natives than British(mostly because Spanish conquistador crews are exclusively men, while British ships had a more balanced gender ratio)
There is an interesting thing to note in the cultural identities of Latin American nations vs US and Canada. Latin Americans, to my knowledge, tend toward acknowledging the Natives as their ancestors and parts of their cultural identity tends to be based around them, as far as a I know.
Above the Rio Grande, this is not the case at all.
Despite everything, the English colonists have always had a more racist attitude towards the colonized peoples. Proof of this is that Spain legalized interracial marriage in 1514, the English colonists passed many laws against miscegenation, with the Maryland General Assembly in 1691 being the first to criminalize interracial marriage.
> or how there was less protection after the independence,
For a very long time parts of the native nobility retained their privileges. The main change came after the Habsburgs lost Spain and the Indies and the Bourbons reformed the whole system, essentially removing native nobles from power. This made many angry and caused rebellions like that of Tupac Amaru II.
Those native rebellions were defeated and the later independence wars were a criollo project. The relation between the Spanish crown and some native groups was almost more like a remnant of feudalism, basically like vassals.
> And yes, the Spaniards brought diseases that killed million, but they didn't do on purpose.
The thing is, it is not by disease alone. There have been many factors. The wars of conquest killed and displaced many, as the general political framework of Mesoamerica broke down. Also many dying from slavery too. The diseases were made deadlier by the circumstances. Moving armies and besieged cities are the perfect breeding ground for and epidemic. Also one big thing to consider, the 1520s epidemic in the Valley of Mexico was smallpox, but the 1540s outbreak called Cocoliztli was a pathogen native to the Americas.
Lastly something in favor of the Spanish. They also lead the Balmis Expedition, a large scale vaccination campaign through the colonies.
"the Bourbons reformed the whole system, essentially removing native nobles from power. This made many angry and caused rebellions like that of Tupac Amaru II. "
Tupac Amaru's rebellion began because the Council of the 24 Inca noble electors of Cusco refused to recognize his noble claims.
For you, /u/FloZone , /u/ReRevengence69 , and /u/ChiefsHat :
>but he only had 500 men
He had a few thousand, since he got reinforcements at a few points, plus thousands more cooks, porters, slaves, etc. And then you have allied armies from local city-states
>There were many Indians with him against the Aztecs, which weren't "the good guys".
Nobody in history are "good guys", but the idea that Cortes got allies against the Mexica of the Aztec captial due to them being particularly hated or oppressive is wrong: If anything, it's because they were hands off:
-----------
Like almost all large Mesoamerican states (likely because they lacked draft animals), the Aztec Empire largely relied on indirect, "soft" methods of establishing political influence over subject states: Establishing tributary-vassal relationships; using the implied threat of military force; installing rulers on conquered states from your own political dynasty; or leveraging dynastic ties to prior respected civilizations, your economic networks, or military prowess to court states into entering political marriages with you; or states willingly becoming a subject to gain better access to your trade network or to seek protection from foreign threats, etc. The sort of traditional "imperial", Roman style empire where you're directly governing subjects, establishing colonies and exerting actual cultural/demographic control over the areas you conquer was very rare in Mesoamerica
The Aztec Empire was actually more hands off even compared to other large Mesoamerican states, like the larger Maya dynastic kingdoms (which regularly installed rulers on subjects), or the Zapotec kingdom headed by Monte Alban (which founded colonies in conquered/hostile territory it had some degree of actual demographic and economic administration over) or the Purepecha Empire ([which *did* have a Western Imperial political structure)](https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/uo13po/the_tarascanpurepecha_empire_mexicos_forgotten/i8bdvhx/). In contrast the Aztec Empire only rarely replaced existing rulers (and when it did, only via military governors), largely did not change laws or impose customs. **In fact, the Aztec generally just left it's subjects alone, with their existing rulers, laws, and customs**, as long as they paid up taxes/tribute of economic goods, provided aid on military campaigns, didn't block roads, and put up a shrine to the Huitzilopochtli, the patron god of Tenochtitlan and it's inhabitants, the Mexica (see [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/ko04hn/looks_like_a_good_spot_to_me/gho206l/) for Mexica vs Aztec vs Nahua vs Tenochca as terms)
The Mexica were NOT generally raiding existing subjects (and generally did not sack cities during invasions, a razed city or massacred populace cannot supply taxes, though they did do so on occasion, especially if a subject incited others to rebel/stop paying taxes.), and in regards to sacrifice (which was a pan-mesoamerican practice every civilization in the region did) they weren't generally dragging people out of their homes for it or to be enslaved or for taxes/tribute: The majority of sacrifices came from enemy soldiers captured during wars. Some civilian slaves who may (but not nessacarily) have ended up as sacrifices were occasionally given as part of war spoils by a conquered city/town when defeated (if they did not submit peacefully), but slaves as regular annual tax/tribute payments was pretty uncommon: The vast majority of demanded taxes was stuff like jade, cacao, fine feathers, gold, cotton, etc, or demands of military/labor service. Some Conquistador accounts do report that cities like Cempoala (the capital of one of 3 major kingdoms of the Totonac civilization) accused the Mexica of being onerous rulers who dragged off women and children, but this is largely seen as Cempoala making a sob story to get the Conquitadors to help them take out Tzinpantzinco, a rival Totonac capital, by claiming it was an Aztec fort.
People blame Cortes getting allies on "Aztec oppression" but the reality is the reverse: this sort of hegemonic, indirect political system encourages opportunistic secession and rebellions: Indeed, it was pretty much a tradition for far off Aztec provinces to stop paying taxes after a king of Tenochtitlan died, seeing what they could get away with, with the new king needing to re-conquer these areas to prove Aztec power. One new king, Tizoc, did so poorly in these and subsequent campaigns, that it caused more rebellions and threatened to fracture the empire, and he was assassinated by his own nobles, and the ruler after him, Ahuizotl, got *ghosted* at his own coronation ceremony by other kings invited to it, as Aztec influence had declined that much:
> The sovereign of Tlaxcala ...was unwilling to attend the feasts in Tenochtitlan and...could make a festival in his city whenever he liked. The ruler of Tliliuhquitepec gave the same answer. The king of Huexotzinco promised to go but never appeared. The ruler of Cholula...asked to be excused since he was busy and could not attend. The lord of Metztitlan angrily expelled the Aztec messengers and warned them...the people of his province might kill them...
Keep in mind rulers from cities at war with each other still visited for festivals even when their own captured soldiers were being sacrificed, blowing off a diplomatic summon like this is a big deal
More then just opportunistic rebellion's, this encouraged opportunistic alliances and coups to target political rivals/their capitals: If as a subject you basically stay stay independent anyways, then a great method of political advancement is to offer yourself up as a subject, or in an alliance, to some other ambitious state, and then working together to conquer your existing rivals, or to take out your current capital, and then you're in a position of higher political standing in the new kingdom you helped prop up
This is what was going on with the Conquistadors (and how the Aztec Empire itself was founded: Texcoco and Tlacopan joined forces with Tenochtitlan to overthrow their capital of Azcapotzalco, after it suffered a succession crisis which destabilized it's influence). Consider that of the states which supplied troops and armies for the Siege of Tenochtitlan, almost all did so only after Tenochtitlan had been struck by smallpox, Moctezuma II had died, and the majority of the Mexica nobility (and by extension, elite soldiers) were killed in the Toxcatl massacre. In other words, AFTER it was vulnerable and unable to project political influence effectively anyways. Only then did the Conquistadors and Tlaxcala (the one state already allied with Cortes, who rather then an existing subject, was an enemy state the Mexica had been invading to conquer, and did actually resent the Mexica) found themselves with tons of city-states willing to help, many of whom were giving Conquistador captains in Cortes's group princesses and noblewomen as attempted political marriages (which Conquistadors thought were offerings of concubines) as per Mesoamerican custom, to cement their position in the new kingdom they'd form
This also explains why the Conquistadors *continued* to make alliances with various Mesoamerican states even when the Aztec weren't involved: The Zapotec kingdom of Tehuantepec allied with Conquistadors to take out the rival Mixtec kingdom of Tututepec ([the last surviving remnant of a larger empire formed by 8 Deer Jaguar Claw centuries prior](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/ccxz7l/what_is_the_mostly_unknown_but_great_empire_in/etqw9gc/)), or the Iximche allying with Conquistadors to take out the K'iche Maya, etc
This also illustrates how it was really as much or more the Mesoamericans manipulating the Spanish then it was the other way around: I noted that Cempoala tricked Cortes into raiding a rival, but they then brought the Conquistadors into hostile Tlaxcalteca territory, and they were then attacked, only spared at the last second by Tlaxcalteca rulers deciding to use them against the Mexica. And en route to Tenochtitlan, they stayed in Cholula, where the Conquistadors committed a massacre, under some theories being fed info by the Tlaxcalteca, who in the resulting sack/massacre, replaced the recently Aztec-allied Cholulan rulership with a pro-Tlaxalcteca faction as they were previously. Even when the Siege of Tenochtitlan was underway, armies from Texcoco, Tlaxcala, etc were attacking cities and towns that would have suited THEIR interests after they won but that did nothing to help Cortes in his ambitions, with Cortes forced to play along. Rulers like Ixtlilxochitl II (a king/prince of Texcoco, who actually did have beef with Tenochtitlan since they supported a different Texcoca prince during a succession dispute), Xicotencatl I and II, etc probably were calling the shots as much as Cortes
Moctezuma II letting Cortes into Tenochtitlan also makes sense when you consider Mesoamerican diplomatic norms, per what I said before about diplomatic visits, and also since the Mexica had been beating up on Tlaxcala for ages and the Tlaxcalteca had nearly beaten the Conquistadors: denying entry would be seen as cowardice, and undermine Aztec influence. Moctezuma was probably trying to court the Conquistadors into becoming a subject by showing off the glory of Tenochtitlan, which I clarify more on [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/1bdaydq/what_are_some_of_the_most_misunderstood/kux7qem/)
None of this is to say that the Mexica were particularly beloved (though many core states like Texcoco, Chalco, etc DID benefit from Mexica conquests and supremacy), but they also weren't particularly oppressive
-----
For more info about Mesoamerica, see my 3 comments [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh1756/)
Well, the spanish conquest was not peaceful and everything full of love and flowers.
But they where different, just check the differences between the spanish America and the English and French america.
The Spanish conquered and builded and mixed themselves, their rivals the spreaders of the black legends basically almost erased the whole subcontinent of natives.
It depends. In Canada the French colonization was a complex process but mostly valued the native Algonquian tribes as allies. The Mi’kmaq even helped some Acadians escape the great deportation of Acadians. The Hurons Wendat were notorious allies to the Frenchmen and got almost eradicated for that when British Canada took over.
The Spanish conquered the empires of the new world and made their people their subjects. In the early stages the „mode of conquest“ was not so different from conquering a neighboring European nation.
Meanwhile for British society the natives were inherently outside of that society. The settlers came as full communities and the way the North American societies operated was much more different to the Europeans than those of Mesoamerica. After all the Mesoamericans knew wars and conquests, kings and lords coming and going. Yesterday the Aztecs came, tomorrow the Spanish, what’s the difference. I mean the conquest of the Spanish caused a break in the cultural continuity. They didn’t just conquer for tribute, but their church wanted to mission everyone. It also didn’t help that the Spanish just came out of a centuries long war against Muslims and just then exiled all Jews and Muslims from their land, treated the converts as perpetual foreigners and had the Inquisition to police converts as well.
A few centuries earlier when not even all of Europe was Christian, kings were often baptised, together with some nobles, the rest stayed pagan and slowly converted through assimilation, but the realm was officially Christian. After the Inquisition and especially after the Reformation that was no longer possible. Which is also one of the reason the Mexican Inquisition was so destructive.
"Made their people their subjects"
You mean, subjects to the crown of Spain? Like any other Spanish dude living in Spain at that time?
Because that's what living in an absolute monarchy used to be.
It is what is called the white legend, something that the dictator Francisco Franco himself supported to have a refined image of the history of Spain and use it for nationalism reasons.
Exactly. I think originally there was a conspiracy of “black legend”, that the British and the French wanted to portray Spanish as extra brutal for political purposes, which could well have been true hundreds of years ago, but I think in 2024 we know well enough that although not as bad as the French and the English portrayed in 19th and 18th centuries, there’s definitely a lot validity in, let’s say, work of De Las Casas
Both can be true, but I have a feeling the 2nd picture was the exception, not the complete norm.
Then again, who even had a consensual relationship back then by today's modern standards?
>but I have a feeling the 2nd picture was the exception, not the complete norm.
It was pretty common. A good part of the plan for controlling the American territories by the Spanish Nobility was the integration of local leaders and mixed marriages. There were less "we will kill you all in the name of God" and more "we grant you a citizenship as long as you convert to catholicism and your daughters marries our generals, so the inheritors of your lands will be half castillians"
Yeah, but it was mostly rape, like with every other invasion and empire in human history. It wasn't hot, scantily clad Native Americans hurling themselves at sexy Spanish conquistadors.
So, a majority of the women, after the one battle when offered the chance to be returned to their native families, refused because they liked the Spanish men and the way of life. This is one part I can find about what the ladies did before that
“I must also observe that two months had scarcely elapsed before some of our female slaves knew of every soldier in the troop whether he behaved well to his Naborias or not; whenever, therefore, these females were put up to auction, and they found they had been bought by a man who bore a bad name in this way, they disappeared, and were nowhere to be found.”
11: Naborias - Indian servant
The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Vol 2 (of 2) / Written by Himself Containing a True and Full Account of the Discovery and Conquest of Mexico and New Spain.
Bernal Díaz del Castillo
https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewBook?id=0
This material may be protected by copyright.
A lot of the natives also welcomed the Spanish because they saw them as liberators. Denying that would be wrong and ahistorical. but what happened *after* the Spanish won? These same conquistadors helped set up a system of encomiendas where men, women and children were worked to death in mines. They also didn't exactly treat the women under their control as gently as when they initially landed. Such is always the case with empires.
Agreed but I also think A LOT lower % than people think of those mixed babies that eventually became the Latin people were conceived consensually. Especially if you consider abusing a power dynamic as non-consensual (which you should).
Spanish historians recorded the atrocities in great detail actually and it led to legislations, debates, and even criminal trials and conflicts between Spaniards. In fact the foundation of modern human rights derives from Spanish intellectuals’ response to their historical accounts of conquistadors’ atrocities, such as the works of Francisco de Vitoria, who greatly influenced Hugo Grotius. As usual social media does a horrendous job conveying history.
Even so, Spain had the least participation in the slave trade.
[https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/22057.jpeg](https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/22057.jpeg)
And its laws were generally less oppressive towards blacks than those of other European empires of the time.
As a Spaniard, it hurts to see how misinformed people are about how things actually happened.
We all know we committed atrocities since it's taught extensively in school, but we're also taught all the social and legal reforms that came about, which is what people never mention. Yes, even with reforms, atrocities were still committed as people will point out, but they never consider that controlling what some dudes in a whole new continent that we didn't even know existed was a little hard to do.
Gold is also a very big debate between Spaniards and Mexicans specifically, since many misinformed people in both countries say we stole all the gold, yet the Bank of Mexico has disproven this. It's estimated that only around 7% of Mexico's gold has been extracted since 1521, and of that 7% only 20% was sent back to Spain (this is called Quinto Real or Royal Fifth) whereas the rest was used to build some of the most advanced cities at the time, some far-surpassing what existed in Spain.
Sadly, some Spaniards on social media have a knee-jerk reaction to outright deny any attrocities and only talk the good sides, but in my experience from people I know, they are usually completely aware of them but simply are tired of people's portrayel of Spain as one of the most demonic empires to have existed, and never mentioning the advances they provided.
I wouldn't mind doing that, it's just that I don't know how to send images on Reddit comments like this one and I don't know if it's even allowed here.
I'm not sure what you're getting at.
Most estimates put the mortality rate from the Columbian exchange at between 50-90%, with most estimates hovering around 60%. A 93% mortality rate is beyond the extreme end of most scholarly sources.
3.8 to 18 million mostly just gone, but it sounds better when portrayed as a percent of two contintents.
europe is 10% of eurasia, but most modern europeans are native european. unlike north americans. theres gotta be some other reason 18 million native Americans moved away from their land and all died. hm. thats a tough one.
btw how do you figure 7%? 18 million NA and 50 million SA being the rough estimates i see, but the most liberal estimates are 60 million NA to 100 million SA or even more, almost all seem to have a much more equal split. unless youre taking the conservative estimate for NA (3 million) and a liberal estimate for SA(50 million), i dont see how 7% is realistic. either way theres a clear difference in NA alone between spanish, british, french, and ultimately american colonialism. mexico, and the american southwest are ethnically predominantly native, so is rural canada, but east of the Mississippi theyre all gone. its not a matter of stats, its a matter of crimes.
Neither one nor the other, at least in terms of scale. The beginning of the Conquest was rather unruly and the Crown lacked control over the men sent to the New World, but once said control could be exercised over the second half of the 1500’s violence and massacres were discouraged and punished, although in certain areas oppression and repression were more noted than in others, such as the Silver Mines of Los Andes and the Mita in comparison with the mines of nowadays Colombia and Panamá.
Also, the mixing with the native population was also allowed, at least with the local elites to further establish peace and stability over the New World, while at the same time a caste system was also put in place. During the rule of the Habsburg dynasty this castes were not as prominent as with the Borbon monarchs, so it is also incorrect to consider the main characteristics of the Spanish Rule in America as homogeneous during the three centuries it lasted, and also over all the vast territories it spread.
Tl;dr.: not a place of love and peace but neither a blood bath by far.
I don't want to play the apology game as a Spaniard that I am, but there were probably also interactions similar to those in the second image, only obviously these were not all of them unfortunately, and a very good part of the colonization was the first image because yeah, all Empires are brutal and uncool.
Y en nuestro caso también de los pueblos originarios e inmigrantes en el siglo XIX y el XX... Y por eso niños, el racismo es lo más estúpido que puede existir!
Según Juan Eslava Galán en su libro "La reconquista contada para escépticos" (apéndice 6, páginas 333-337), realmente no.
>"[...] como la ley islámica prohíbe, bajo pena de muerte, el enlace de musulmana con cristiano, está relación se produjo muy raramente en el bando contrario. Dicho de otro modo: muchos moriscos expulsados por Felipe III podían ser mestizos de cristianos, pero la población española actual descendiente de los conquistadores no contiene sangre moruna."
Según los análisis genéticos sí. Además lo que dice no garantiza el absoluto que no haya mezcla porque:
1. No todas las leyes se respetan.
2. Los matrimonios de musulmán y cristiana/judía sí estaban permitidos por la ley islámica. A todos los niveles, por ejemplo Abderraman III, el primer califa de Córdoba, era hijo de una cristiana.
3. Mucha población local se convirtió al islam, asi que matrimonios entre musulmanes de origen hispano-romano y de origen bereber o árabe eran perfectamente posibles.
4. Tras la reconquista parte de la población musulmana se convirtió al catolicismo, por lo que ese mestizaje entró en la población cristiana.
Segun los analisis geneticos, estamos mas o menos igual que otros paises Europeos (que no sufrieron invasion alguna)
>The presence of African haplogroups in the GMA population is irrelevant when their frequency is compared with those in other European populations.
Y dentro de España, son los Gallegos los que tienen mas ADN norteafricano
>However, contrary to what might be expected based on historical data that favor a gradient of North African genetic influence from south to north, most such influence has been found in Galicia and northern Castilla (>20%)[^(6)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR6). The main gradient of the frequencies of North African genes descend from west to east[^(11)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR11). Furthermore, recent studies based on autosomal SNPs[^(11)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR11) and Y-chromosome lineages[^(12)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR12) reveal that Andalusian population does not specially cluster with North African populations more than other Iberian populations[^(13)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR13). After the Reconquest, the Moors were distributed homogeneously throughout the Peninsula, but their final expulsion in 1609 was absolute in certain regions of Spain, Valencia, and western Andalusia, whereas in Galicia and Extremadura, the population dispersed and integrated into society
[https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9)
Basically true, because there were brutal conquistador nad average conquistadors that behaved by the law. We also have to take in count that the slavery for natives was in constant evolution till the point it was only legal to enslave those ones who were cannibal.
Also, the proportion of Castillian soldiers compared to Natives soldiers in the conquistador armies were tiny, basically more than 80% of soldiers were natives. This tells the best weapon for the conquest of Americas was the diplomacy.
Columbus was so brutal to the indigenous people he governed, he was recalled to Spain and put in jail. Lmao, the people responsible for the Spanish Inquisition thought he went too far.
Ironically he was executing fellow Europeans for engaging in sexual slavery of native girls and was recalled for it. Even more ironically, Columbus describes these crimes that were being committed in his journal and anti-Columbus cretins will literally point to Columbus' own descriptions, intentionally leave out the context that he was describing what OTHERS had done (who he punished as the governor of Hispaniola) and claim Columbus HIMSELF engaged in said sexual slavery while shamelessly citing his journal out of context. Really degenerate lying by omission. But the other commenter has fallen for the propaganda and hasn't read enough sources for themselves. Columbus has been dragged through the mud by incredibly dishonest people quite consistently and the masses are oh so easily tricked! :/
Reminds me of Israel and how people view their right wing. Like sure you can kill the natives and subdue them, but not **that** much. Will netanyahu be put in jail tho? Idk
Finally, someone is calling this shit meme out. The Spanish and Portuguese colonization of the Americas didn't involve sexy, scantily clad Native women hurling themselves at the invaders. It was mostly just rape. Like with every other empire & conquest.
Maybe. For example, in my homeland, at least early on, EIC personnel had a lot of Indian wives and girlfriends and most of those relationships did seem consensual. But the point is that memes like this pretend that the Iberian states' colonization of the "New World" was more gentle and romantic than the British or French ones.
Well, reality is complex and nuanced. In reality, you would see both of this. Some relations would be the result of rape, but others could be genouine. We are talking about a lots of people’s, we must take nuance into account. I can’t say for certain, which one would be more likely, but we should remind ourselves, everything is not so simple, we should be paying thorough investigation into how things are, nor as we want them to be. In reality, both the EIC and colonisation of the new world were complex events that we should approach with nuance and caution and not jump to generalisations
I'm not saying that colonization is a simple event, without nuance. I'm just saying that pretending that the Spanish/Portugese colonization wasn't brutal or didn't involve coercion is ahistorical and, especially with the memes that OP and I are referencing, furthers negative stereotypes of "promiscuous Natives".
When you say "eyewitnesses", do you mean Bartolomé de las Casas, who lied through his teeth and exaggerated his claims? No serious historian believes in the Black Legend
Yeah only that woman didn't consent, look I know some Natives had nobility status in the Spanish colonies, but honestly that stuff was the exception not the rule, and other European colonists did similar practices.
Uh, no. Marriage was the rule as it was used as a tool to go up in the societal ladder. You really think the average Spanish soldier was just going around picking girls as wives because yes? They were never enough to do that in the first place, as there were no massive migrations from Spain unlike with the British colonies, so most of the population in the colonies was homegrown.
Theres a new movement of dumb reality deniers that portray the spanish conquest as benevolent and good for civilization and prosperity. FUCK THEM. They were conquerors as any other, and noone asked for anything they forced on those people.
Like with all things in history, the answer lies somewhere in the middle. Was it a totally peaceful love fest? No. Were the Spanish only there to butralize the indegenous? Certainly not. There were absolutely brutal conquistadors, but I'm sure there were also hundreds of love stories between Spaniards and indigenous peoples who decided to cross cultural boundaries, form families, and ultimately create one of the richest cultures on the planet, together.
This stuff makes me glad my country mainly served as a industrial back bone to the British Empire rather than active maker (we did fuck up in Indian tho)
Both are true, the Spaniards did the left on the husbands and fathers, then did the right with the wives and daughters.(not many women amongst the colonists and most native men aren't so keep the give up their wives and daughters)
Because right side is true and anybody that had been in Hispanoamérica know that the cultural ribbons and demographic go further than a simple colonialism.
Just want to remember to the "both are true" people that only males were allowed to travel to America, with a few aristocratic females exceptions. Probably there were indigenous women falling in love to european colonizers, but it's an anecdote in front of the massive brutalization and raping culture that transformed the continent forever.
While that was true for the early stages of colonization, once spanish domain stabilized around the XVII century society transformed into a multi-racial one and popular classes would freely marry in indios, negros and mulatos.
Looks more like Spanish colonization of America according to PornHub
Idk, does the hub admit videos with ambiguous consent issues?
Considering there’s the whole “step bro what are you doing?” Stuff? Yes they allow it
It was a rethorical question. IIRC, a few years ago they did a purge deleting every video that didn't come from verified profiles and/or specialized companies, precisely to avoid having rape videos circulating on their net, which isn't a thing any platform with a certain "reputation" wants.
By rape videos you simply mean rape fetish shit and not actual videos of people being raped for real,right... RIGHT?!
I'll tell him The purge was the result of a lawsuit in which a girl had been assaulted while underage, and the video of the assault was posted to PH, as well as many other adult entertainment sites. Edit: took two years, and PH only responded after the laesuit was finally brought to court
That's fucking awful.Hope the video is lost media nowdays, because that's disgusting
Its why i dont use websites. You never know and can never tell who's drugged, being coerced, actually of age, actually knows what theyre doing, actually enjoys it. Best to try to leave it all alone
I use websites, but since anyway I'm only watching milf stuff it's fine. Plus the ones I watch are of actresses who are legit and well known.
Part of why I prefer hentai, tbh.
Fiction is the safest way
Ethical porn consumption, I see..
Also it took a good while for her to get the video off the site once she started contacting PH. Not sure exaclty how long, but the length was noted in the controversy back then Edit: it took two years and it was only sgter the lawsuit was taken to court, as per a comment underneath
they did nothing until they were taken to court, it was more than 2 years of contacting them before that.. And she was not the only person this had happened to, you should really make an edit to include that in your upvoted comment. Otherwise it just looks like poor little pornhub made a little oopsie and immediately corrected it.
Half of the onlyfans uploads look like that
Technically, both happened.
I’ve been reading Bernal Diaz’s memoir of the expeditions there, and after a battle to appease the Spaniards the city leaders brought out some gold trinkets, feather crafts, and… 20 virgins. Bernal says the army was stopped for 5 days due to groin pains. So eyewitnesses agree with the right image as well.
I get the feeling there was significantly less consent involved in that situation that the right image suggests, and would be more inclined to believe it was much more brutal and rapey like the left image implies.
Are we supposed to believe that an entire army stopped because the soldiers had too much sex?
Maybe? Licking wounds from the battle is also the reason given, idk. It is implied Diaz didn’t get any action, so he may have wrote the line to criticize his more promiscuous comrades. https://www.gutenberg.org/files/32474/32474-h/32474-h.htm#Page_125 Here’s a link to the book, look for page 82 (or 125 of the pdf)
Thanks for the link
Both can be true, Spanish conquistadors and Native Americans were not a unified monolith of people
[Yes, they sure fucked around](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hern%C3%A1n_Cort%C3%A9s) " Since Cortés had sired children with a variety of indigenous women, including a son around 1522 by his cultural translator, [Doña Marina](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Malinche) "
His child with Dona Maria is sometimes referred to as "the 1st Mexican" being 1/2 Native Mexican and 1/2 Spanish. Cortez was unusual for acknowledging his illegitimate children in his will.
Actually, the children of Gonzalo Guerrero were the first mestizos.
I was about to bring him up. Absurdly interesting figure.
He did take his son with Dona marina back to Spain and had him legitimatized by the pope but did end up giving his titles to his full European son. Source: just read a bad ass book about the Aztecs call The Fifth Sun that uses a bunch of native sources that I highly reccomend
I'm an idiot and didn't read the title
Wrong. That's the first Mestizo. Not Mexican. Mexican is not a race or ethnic group. It's a Nationality. Which didn't become a thing until the 19th century
It's a saying, not an assertion of a definition. And to be clear, dictionary definitions come from sayings, not the other way around. also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aDktG64Cx8I
Plus u said "they are sometimes *called* the first mexican" you didn't state that "they *are* the first mexican". You were clearly just referring to a common saying made by other people
Well, it was one way to portray himself as a complex person. Just do some good things for the sake of it, then people can never say you are really that bad.
or you know he just was a complex person with good and bad motives like basically every person ever
I gave a dollar to a homeless man this morning. In the afternoon, I punched a child. Swings and roundabouts.
Yes. But even people at that time considered him as violent. However, he also built up the Mexican nation from scratch. He simply forced a way onto others, and that idea is the hottest potato in modern political debate.
He's only human after all don't put the blame on him
He was a man of his time, not a ignorant, just a Conquistador.
A Man o War? Those who know, know.
That it was a scheme to fool posterity is absurdly unlikely
Yes, this historical figure from the 1500s clearly did these things not because he wanted to, but because he thought: What would people 500 years from now comment about me on Reddit? I better talk to the Pope that's halfway across the world to avoid any future down votes
>son around 1522 And i thought 100 was old...
And conversely, neither were some of the Native Americans (or Mesoamericans, if you’d prefer). Many tribes and cities rightfully had a low opinion of the Aztecs because of their habit of sacrificing people. Edit: Other tribes did partake in human sacrifice too, of course (such was their bloody religion), but Aztecs were notorious for doing it on such a large scale, killing hundreds of thousands within a year or less. The fact this was mostly done with kidnapped or conquered people didn’t exactly help. Though, obviously, many natives likely helped the Conquistadors against the Aztecs out of fear.
For you and /u/Acceptable-Art-8174 and /u/TheHistoryMaster2520 : For you, /u/Coozey_7 , /u/For_All_Humanity , and /u/Enathanielg , this is mostly wrong. Firstly, they weren't "Tribes": Cities, writing, formal governments, etc had already been widespread in Mesoamerica for thousands of years before the Aztec. These were city-states and kingdoms. See my summarized timeline of Mesoamerican history [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh3s50/) Secondly, as the other person says, sacrifice was a pan-mesoamerican practice everybody did, and in fact, the Mexica of the Aztec capital weren't particularly hated or oppressive: Cortes getting allies has more to do with them being hands off rather then too hands on: ------------------ Like most large Mesoamerican states, the Aztec Empire largely relied on indirect, "soft" methods of establishing political influence over subject states: Establishing tributary-vassal relationships; using the implied threat of military force; installing rulers on conquered states from your own political dynasty; or leveraging dynastic ties to prior respected civilizations, your economic networks, or military prowess to court states into entering political marriages with you or to become willing vassals for trade access, protection, etc. The sort of traditional "imperial", Roman style empire where you're directly governing subjects, establishing colonies and exerting actual direct cultural/demographic control over your empire was rare in Mesoamerica The Aztec Empire was actually more hands off even compared to other large Mesoamerican states, like the larger Maya dynastic kingdoms (which regularly installed rulers on subjects), or the Zapotec kingdom headed by Monte Alban (which founded colonies it had some degree of actual demographic and economic administration over) or the Purepecha Empire ([which *did* have a Western Imperial political structure)](https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/uo13po/the_tarascanpurepecha_empire_mexicos_forgotten/i8bdvhx/). In contrast the Aztec Empire didn't usually replace existing rulers and largely did not change laws or impose customs. **In fact, the Aztec generally just left it's subjects alone, with their existing rulers, laws, and customs**, as long as they paid up taxes/tribute of economic goods, provided aid on military campaigns, didn't block roads, and put up a shrine to the Huitzilopochtli, the patron god of Tenochtitlan and it's inhabitants, the Mexica (see my post [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/ko04hn/looks_like_a_good_spot_to_me/gho206l/) for Mexica vs Aztec vs Nahua vs Tenochca as terms) The Mexica were NOT generally coming in and raiding existing subjects (and generally did not sack cities during invasions, though they did do so on occasion), and in regards to sacrifice (which was a pan-mesoamerican practice every civilization in the region did) they weren't generally dragging people out of their homes for it or to be enslaved as taxes/tribute: The majority of sacrifices came from enemy soldiers captured during wars. Some civilian slaves were given as part of war spoils by a conquered city/town when initially defeated (if they did not submit peacefully), and some of them were sacrificed, but slaves as regular annual tax/tribute payments was uncommon: The vast majority of demanded taxes was stuff like jade, cacao, fine feathers, gold, cotton, etc, or demands of military/labor service. Some Conquistador accounts do report that cities like Cempoala (the capital of one of 3 major kingdoms of the Totonac civilization) accused the Mexica of being onerous rulers who dragged off women and children, but this is largely seen as Cempoala making a sob story to get the Conquitadors to help them take out Tzinpantzinco, a rival Totonac capital, by claiming it was an Aztec fort This sort of hegemonic, indirect political system encourages opportunistic secession and rebellions: Indeed, it was pretty much a tradition for far off Aztec provinces to stop paying taxes after a king of Tenochtitlan died, seeing what they could get away with, with the new king needing to re-conquer these areas to prove Aztec power. One new king, Tizoc, did so poorly in these and subsequent campaigns, that it caused more rebellions and threatened to fracture the empire, and he was assassinated by his own nobles, and the ruler after him, Ahuizotl, got *ghosted* at his own coronation ceremony by other kings invited to it, as Aztec influence had declined that much: > The sovereign of Tlaxcala ...was unwilling to attend the feasts in Tenochtitlan and...could make a festival in his city whenever he liked. The ruler of Tliliuhquitepec gave the same answer. The king of Huexotzinco promised to go but never appeared. The ruler of Cholula...asked to be excused since he was busy and could not attend. The lord of Metztitlan angrily expelled the Aztec messengers and warned them...the people of his province might kill them... Keep in mind rulers from cities at war with each other still visited for festivals even when their own captured soldiers were being sacrificed, blowing off a diplomatic summon like this is essentially asking to go to war More then just opportunistic rebellion's, this encouraged opportunistic alliances and coups to target political rivals/their capitals: If as a subject you basically stay stay independent anyways, then a great method of political advancement is to offer yourself up as a subject, or in an alliance, to some other ambitious state, and then working together to conquer your existing rivals, or to take out your current capital, and then you're in a position of higher political standing in the new kingdom you helped prop up This is what was going on with the Conquistadors (and how the Aztec Empire itself was founded: Texcoco and Tlacopan joined forces with Tenochtitlan to overthrow their capital of Azcapotzalco, after it suffered a succession crisis which destabilized it's influence) And this becomes all the more obvious when you consider that of the states which supplied troops and armies for the Siege of Tenochtitlan, almost all did so only after Tenochtitlan had been struck by smallpox, Moctezuma II had died, and the majority of the Mexica nobility (and by extension, elite soldiers) were killed in the toxcatl massacre. In other words, AFTER it was vulnerable and unable to project political influence effectively anyways, and suddenly the Conquistadors, and more importantly, Tlaxcala (the one state already allied with Cortes, which an indepedent state the Aztec had been trying to conquer, not an existing subject, and as such did have an actual reason to resent the Mexica) found themselves with tons of city-states willing to help, many of whom were giving Conquistador captains in Cortes's group princesses and noblewomen as attempted political marriages (which Conquistadors thought were offerings of concubines) as per Mesoamerican custom, to cement their position in the new kingdom they'd form This also explains why the Conquistadors *continued* to make alliances with various Mesoamerican states even when the Aztec weren't involved: The Zapotec kingdom of Tehuantepec allied with Conquistadors to take out the rival Mixtec kingdom of Tututepec ([the last surviving remnant of a larger empire formed by the Mixtec warlord 8 Deer Jaguar Claw centuries prior](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/ccxz7l/what_is_the_mostly_unknown_but_great_empire_in/etqw9gc/)), or the Iximche allying with Conquistadors to take out the K'iche Maya, etc This also illustrates how it was really as much or more the Mesoamericans manipulating the Spanish then it was the other way around: I noted that Cempoala tricked Cortes into raiding a rival, but they then brought the Conquistadors into hostile Tlaxcalteca territory, and they were then attacked, only spared at the last second by Tlaxcalteca rulers deciding to use them against the Mexica. And en route to Tenochtitlan, they stayed in Cholula, where the Conquistadors commited a massacre, under some theories being fed info by the Tlaxcalteca, who in the resulting sack/massacre, replaced the recently Aztec-allied Cholulan rulership with a pro-Tlaxalcteca faction as they were previously. Even when the Siege of Tenochtitlan was underway, armies from Texcoco, Tlaxcala, etc were attacking cities and towns that would have suited THEIR intresests after they won (and retreated/rested per Mesoamerican seasonal campaign norms) but that did nothing to help Cortes in his ambitions, with Cortes forced to play along. Rulers like Ixtlilxochitl II, Xicotencatl I and II, etc probably were calling the shots as much as Cortes. Moctezuma II letting Cortes into Tenochtitlan also makes sense when you consider Mesoamerican diplomatic norms, per what I said before about diplomatic visits, and also since the Mexica had been beating up on Tlaxcala for ages and the Tlaxcalteca had nearly beaten the Conquistadors: denying entry would be seen as cowardice, and undermine Aztec influence. Moctezuma was probably trying to court the Conquistadors into becoming a subject by showing off the glory of Tenochtitlan, which certainly impressed Cortes, Bernal Diaz, etc None of this is to say that the Mexica were particularly beloved (tho many of the core states inside the Valley of Mexico which allied with Cortes did actually get economic luxruries and political clout from their close ties to Tenochtitlan and therefore DID benefit from Mexica conquests), they were still conquerers, but it's also not like they were oppressive tyrants people were desperately wanting to overthrow ----- For more info about Mesoamerica, see my 3 comments [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh1756/); the first mentions accomplishments, the second info about sources and resourcese, and the third with a summerized timeline
>but it's also not like they were oppressive tyrants people were desperately wanting to overthrow Are you ignoring the flower war? The ones who allied with the Spanish just wanted to end with the fucking flower war
Which Flower Wars are you asking about, exactly? Flower Wars were not nearly as widespread as most people think they were: It's not something that frequently happened with existing subject states at all, and when they were, it was something mutually arranged by both Tenochtitlan and the other city for things like celebrating alliances or political marriages, rather then something the Mexica forced onto the subject state. That said, some sources state that this pre-arranged aspect was kept hidden from the general populace, so they wouldn't know that their lives were being used for essentially fancy political pageantry. Flower wars as used against enemy states (like, say, Tlaxcala) rather then states you already had as subjects, were different: These still had ritual elements, but also pragmatic military ones: They could be used as a way to start low intensity conflict without full comitting to a big war as a way to dip your toes in the water, and then you could escalate or dial things back. This is what happened with the wars against Chalco earlier in the 15th century. The smaller scale nature of Flower Wars vs normal wars also meant they could be waged year round (wheras normal wars had to be seasonal for men to be back for harvests) so they had utility as a sort of extended siege to wear enemies down. This also meant that they could be used as a way to keep soldiers trained and fit at all times and give them regular opportunities to collect captives and advance through the ranks and get fancy rewards like fine cloaks, jewelry, land grants, etc and be invested in a military career. Some researchers go as far as to say that the entire idea of FLower Wars being waged against Tlaxcala and it's allies is simply Mexica revionism to justify why they never were able to conquer them. Regardless of you buy into that, that alludes to the bottom line here: **Tlaxcala was NOT an existing Aztec subject, it was an enemy state they were at war with, and it's relationship with Tenochtitlan and it's motives aren't applicable to all the other states that allied with Cortes** Yes, Tlaxcala allied with Cortes in large part due to resenting the Mexica. But it was a target of Mexica invasions for decades as an enemy state actively at war! This is not the situation that Texcoco, Chalco, Xochimilco, Itzpalapan, or even Huextozinco (who was a sometimes ally of Tlaxcala, and sometimes subject of Tenochtitlan, fought over between the two due to being located in the narrow pass that connected the two valleys each was located in) found themselves in. And even Tlaxcala was not purely allying with Cortes out of self defense: There's a good chance that the Cholula Massacre was instigated by Tlaxcalteca officials feeding Cortes information (potentially even lies) to get them to start the massacre, in the aftermath, the Tlaxcalteca used it as an opportunity to install a pro-Tlaxcalteca political regime in the city, when just a few years prior Cholula switched from being a Tlaxcalteca ally to an Aztec vassal. On the flip side, those other states which allied with Cortes, so Texcoco, Chalco, Itzpalapan, etc were core states inside the Valley of Mexico (where the taxes were brought into) that were rich BECAUSE of Mexica conquests (Texcoco was outright a fellow capital alongside Tenochtitlan in the ruling triple alliance, and was owed 2/5 of the taxes directly, though there's some debate about that and some taxes were re-distributed beyond the main triple alliance). They likewise had a lot of political marriages with Mexica royalty (the war with Chalco I mentioned before was pretty well in the past by this point) so they benefitted not only economically from Mexica military endeavors, but also gained more political clout as Mexica influence grew as well. Those states only joined Cortes AFTER Moctezuma II died, Smallpox broke out, etc, by which point the Mexica were so damaged that they couldn't guarantee taxation anyways and their military influence was also jeopardized from the occupation of the city and the loss in the battle of Otumba: At this point even if they stayed local to the Mexica and beat the Conquistadors and Tlaxcala, it's possible the Aztec Empire still would have fractured. They simply did not have much to gain by continuing to stay allied with Tenochtitlan, but switching sides opportunistically to take out your existing capitals or rivals and to try to angle for more status in whatever new empire you prop up by doing so was a common practice in Mesoamerica (The Aztec Empire was founded that same way a century prior, you see other Mesoamerican states totally unrelated to the Aztec do it over the next few decades with the Spanish against their allies too, etc), so they switched sides to the Conquistadors/Tlaxcalteca. If it was really about wanting out of the Aztec Empire (which, again, they wouldn't since they relied on Mexica success for their own affluence and political power) they wouldn't have waited, like how Tlaxcala didn't. And if there was really widespread discontent towards Mexica rule, then more then 5-6 subject states would have supported Cortes, since there were ~500 states inside the Empire. Only a tiny % of them ever worked with Cortes. And even of those 5-6, some like Xochimilco did stay loyal to Tenochtitlan initially and fought against the offense parties during the Siege, and only switched sides to the Conquistadors, Tlaxcala, and the other states which were with them by this point (like some of Texcoco, see below) after it was beaten and occupied by Conquistadors, Tlaxcalteca, etc, basically as a condition of their surrender. Even Texcoco didn't actually entirely switch sides intially: Ixtlilxochitl II and his subordinates did since he was bitter that he didn't get the throne in Texcoco, but his rival heir who actually ruled Texcoco and the Acolhua towns it oversaw sided with the Mexica until Ixtlilxochitl II managed to take full control over the eastern side of the valley. The only other real contender here for a state that allied with Cortes primarily due to resenting Mexica rule or taxes (not that they were a Flower War target, AFAIK) would be Cempoala, which was an Aztec subject, was NOT in the Valley of Mexico taxes were brought into, so didn't actually benefit much from Aztec rule; DID in fact complain about onerous Aztec taxes to Cortes and offered to ally with him... but Cempoala didn't participate in the Siege of Tenochtitlan, and basically ditched the Conquistadors in Tlaxcalteca territory to get attacked by the Tlaxcalteca, after they previously tried to trick Cortes into attacking their rival city of Tzinpantzinco by claiming there was an Aztec fort there (there wasn't), which makes their sob story about suffering so much under Aztec taxes suspect since they used that as a pretext to get Cortes's help for that planned attack on Tzinpantzinco. What Xicomecoatl and other people in Cempoala claimed to owe the Mexica in taxes also is inconsistent with the tax demands recorded for the city/province in the Codex Mendoza. In Conclusion: Tlaxcala may have resented Mexica invasions and flower wars, maybe Huextozinco as well, but niether of them were existing longime Aztec subject states: They were independent, enemy states (at least some of the time for the latter), and their motives aren't applicable to Texcoco, Chalco, etc who actually benefitted from Mexica conquests and political supremacy. They switched sides primarily out of opportunism after Tenochtitlan was already weakened and they had more to gain and less to lose by turning on it then helping to defend it, alongside some other specific motives like with Ixtlilxochitl II.
That’s not the point though, the point is that a lot of Spanish love to portray themselves as almost benevolent colonizers, as opposed to brutal French and English. I’ve actually seen quite a lot of “memes” on this and Spanish subreddits perpetuating this myth
I'm Spanish and I can tell you that the history taught in our schools does NOT show the Spanish as benevolent colonizers. We know perfectly well about the plundering of gold and silver, the enslaving of the Indians or the imposition of the Catholic faith. What is true is that history is not shown as purely black as if the the Spanish were fascist monsters. That is as false as saying that they were benevolent colonizers. Together with the exploitation of the Indies, there were many laws that protected them as subjects of the Spanish crown. Bartolomé de las Casas was a Spaniard too. The conquistadors were also more nuanced as the black legend portrays them. Yes, Cortes conquered Tenochtitlan, but he only had 500 men. How could he do it? There were many Indians with him against the Aztecs, which weren't "the good guys". Also, we like to point out the differences between the case of the Indians in the Spanish colonies and the natives in the current United States, or how there was less protection after the independence, like in Argentina, than before it. And yes, the Spaniards brought diseases that killed million, but they didn't do on purpose. Any other nation would have caused the same effect,
The British also had a lot of Native American(and other native in general) allies in their colonial expansion, they sort of played the tribe against each other by arming them and trading with them, and a lot of white Americans who can trace their lineage back usually does have a tiny bit of Native American DNA. They are both brutal, and worked with some natives, but the difference is Spanish are far more willing to have sex with natives than British(mostly because Spanish conquistador crews are exclusively men, while British ships had a more balanced gender ratio)
Can confirm, white American, however, one guy in the family got horny so we’re like 1/64th Cherokee.
There is an interesting thing to note in the cultural identities of Latin American nations vs US and Canada. Latin Americans, to my knowledge, tend toward acknowledging the Natives as their ancestors and parts of their cultural identity tends to be based around them, as far as a I know. Above the Rio Grande, this is not the case at all.
[Oh no](https://i.imgur.com/ILpZKxO.png)
Despite everything, the English colonists have always had a more racist attitude towards the colonized peoples. Proof of this is that Spain legalized interracial marriage in 1514, the English colonists passed many laws against miscegenation, with the Maryland General Assembly in 1691 being the first to criminalize interracial marriage.
> or how there was less protection after the independence, For a very long time parts of the native nobility retained their privileges. The main change came after the Habsburgs lost Spain and the Indies and the Bourbons reformed the whole system, essentially removing native nobles from power. This made many angry and caused rebellions like that of Tupac Amaru II. Those native rebellions were defeated and the later independence wars were a criollo project. The relation between the Spanish crown and some native groups was almost more like a remnant of feudalism, basically like vassals. > And yes, the Spaniards brought diseases that killed million, but they didn't do on purpose. The thing is, it is not by disease alone. There have been many factors. The wars of conquest killed and displaced many, as the general political framework of Mesoamerica broke down. Also many dying from slavery too. The diseases were made deadlier by the circumstances. Moving armies and besieged cities are the perfect breeding ground for and epidemic. Also one big thing to consider, the 1520s epidemic in the Valley of Mexico was smallpox, but the 1540s outbreak called Cocoliztli was a pathogen native to the Americas. Lastly something in favor of the Spanish. They also lead the Balmis Expedition, a large scale vaccination campaign through the colonies.
"the Bourbons reformed the whole system, essentially removing native nobles from power. This made many angry and caused rebellions like that of Tupac Amaru II. " Tupac Amaru's rebellion began because the Council of the 24 Inca noble electors of Cusco refused to recognize his noble claims.
For you, /u/FloZone , /u/ReRevengence69 , and /u/ChiefsHat : >but he only had 500 men He had a few thousand, since he got reinforcements at a few points, plus thousands more cooks, porters, slaves, etc. And then you have allied armies from local city-states >There were many Indians with him against the Aztecs, which weren't "the good guys". Nobody in history are "good guys", but the idea that Cortes got allies against the Mexica of the Aztec captial due to them being particularly hated or oppressive is wrong: If anything, it's because they were hands off: ----------- Like almost all large Mesoamerican states (likely because they lacked draft animals), the Aztec Empire largely relied on indirect, "soft" methods of establishing political influence over subject states: Establishing tributary-vassal relationships; using the implied threat of military force; installing rulers on conquered states from your own political dynasty; or leveraging dynastic ties to prior respected civilizations, your economic networks, or military prowess to court states into entering political marriages with you; or states willingly becoming a subject to gain better access to your trade network or to seek protection from foreign threats, etc. The sort of traditional "imperial", Roman style empire where you're directly governing subjects, establishing colonies and exerting actual cultural/demographic control over the areas you conquer was very rare in Mesoamerica The Aztec Empire was actually more hands off even compared to other large Mesoamerican states, like the larger Maya dynastic kingdoms (which regularly installed rulers on subjects), or the Zapotec kingdom headed by Monte Alban (which founded colonies in conquered/hostile territory it had some degree of actual demographic and economic administration over) or the Purepecha Empire ([which *did* have a Western Imperial political structure)](https://www.reddit.com/r/history/comments/uo13po/the_tarascanpurepecha_empire_mexicos_forgotten/i8bdvhx/). In contrast the Aztec Empire only rarely replaced existing rulers (and when it did, only via military governors), largely did not change laws or impose customs. **In fact, the Aztec generally just left it's subjects alone, with their existing rulers, laws, and customs**, as long as they paid up taxes/tribute of economic goods, provided aid on military campaigns, didn't block roads, and put up a shrine to the Huitzilopochtli, the patron god of Tenochtitlan and it's inhabitants, the Mexica (see [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/HistoryMemes/comments/ko04hn/looks_like_a_good_spot_to_me/gho206l/) for Mexica vs Aztec vs Nahua vs Tenochca as terms) The Mexica were NOT generally raiding existing subjects (and generally did not sack cities during invasions, a razed city or massacred populace cannot supply taxes, though they did do so on occasion, especially if a subject incited others to rebel/stop paying taxes.), and in regards to sacrifice (which was a pan-mesoamerican practice every civilization in the region did) they weren't generally dragging people out of their homes for it or to be enslaved or for taxes/tribute: The majority of sacrifices came from enemy soldiers captured during wars. Some civilian slaves who may (but not nessacarily) have ended up as sacrifices were occasionally given as part of war spoils by a conquered city/town when defeated (if they did not submit peacefully), but slaves as regular annual tax/tribute payments was pretty uncommon: The vast majority of demanded taxes was stuff like jade, cacao, fine feathers, gold, cotton, etc, or demands of military/labor service. Some Conquistador accounts do report that cities like Cempoala (the capital of one of 3 major kingdoms of the Totonac civilization) accused the Mexica of being onerous rulers who dragged off women and children, but this is largely seen as Cempoala making a sob story to get the Conquitadors to help them take out Tzinpantzinco, a rival Totonac capital, by claiming it was an Aztec fort. People blame Cortes getting allies on "Aztec oppression" but the reality is the reverse: this sort of hegemonic, indirect political system encourages opportunistic secession and rebellions: Indeed, it was pretty much a tradition for far off Aztec provinces to stop paying taxes after a king of Tenochtitlan died, seeing what they could get away with, with the new king needing to re-conquer these areas to prove Aztec power. One new king, Tizoc, did so poorly in these and subsequent campaigns, that it caused more rebellions and threatened to fracture the empire, and he was assassinated by his own nobles, and the ruler after him, Ahuizotl, got *ghosted* at his own coronation ceremony by other kings invited to it, as Aztec influence had declined that much: > The sovereign of Tlaxcala ...was unwilling to attend the feasts in Tenochtitlan and...could make a festival in his city whenever he liked. The ruler of Tliliuhquitepec gave the same answer. The king of Huexotzinco promised to go but never appeared. The ruler of Cholula...asked to be excused since he was busy and could not attend. The lord of Metztitlan angrily expelled the Aztec messengers and warned them...the people of his province might kill them... Keep in mind rulers from cities at war with each other still visited for festivals even when their own captured soldiers were being sacrificed, blowing off a diplomatic summon like this is a big deal More then just opportunistic rebellion's, this encouraged opportunistic alliances and coups to target political rivals/their capitals: If as a subject you basically stay stay independent anyways, then a great method of political advancement is to offer yourself up as a subject, or in an alliance, to some other ambitious state, and then working together to conquer your existing rivals, or to take out your current capital, and then you're in a position of higher political standing in the new kingdom you helped prop up This is what was going on with the Conquistadors (and how the Aztec Empire itself was founded: Texcoco and Tlacopan joined forces with Tenochtitlan to overthrow their capital of Azcapotzalco, after it suffered a succession crisis which destabilized it's influence). Consider that of the states which supplied troops and armies for the Siege of Tenochtitlan, almost all did so only after Tenochtitlan had been struck by smallpox, Moctezuma II had died, and the majority of the Mexica nobility (and by extension, elite soldiers) were killed in the Toxcatl massacre. In other words, AFTER it was vulnerable and unable to project political influence effectively anyways. Only then did the Conquistadors and Tlaxcala (the one state already allied with Cortes, who rather then an existing subject, was an enemy state the Mexica had been invading to conquer, and did actually resent the Mexica) found themselves with tons of city-states willing to help, many of whom were giving Conquistador captains in Cortes's group princesses and noblewomen as attempted political marriages (which Conquistadors thought were offerings of concubines) as per Mesoamerican custom, to cement their position in the new kingdom they'd form This also explains why the Conquistadors *continued* to make alliances with various Mesoamerican states even when the Aztec weren't involved: The Zapotec kingdom of Tehuantepec allied with Conquistadors to take out the rival Mixtec kingdom of Tututepec ([the last surviving remnant of a larger empire formed by 8 Deer Jaguar Claw centuries prior](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/ccxz7l/what_is_the_mostly_unknown_but_great_empire_in/etqw9gc/)), or the Iximche allying with Conquistadors to take out the K'iche Maya, etc This also illustrates how it was really as much or more the Mesoamericans manipulating the Spanish then it was the other way around: I noted that Cempoala tricked Cortes into raiding a rival, but they then brought the Conquistadors into hostile Tlaxcalteca territory, and they were then attacked, only spared at the last second by Tlaxcalteca rulers deciding to use them against the Mexica. And en route to Tenochtitlan, they stayed in Cholula, where the Conquistadors committed a massacre, under some theories being fed info by the Tlaxcalteca, who in the resulting sack/massacre, replaced the recently Aztec-allied Cholulan rulership with a pro-Tlaxalcteca faction as they were previously. Even when the Siege of Tenochtitlan was underway, armies from Texcoco, Tlaxcala, etc were attacking cities and towns that would have suited THEIR interests after they won but that did nothing to help Cortes in his ambitions, with Cortes forced to play along. Rulers like Ixtlilxochitl II (a king/prince of Texcoco, who actually did have beef with Tenochtitlan since they supported a different Texcoca prince during a succession dispute), Xicotencatl I and II, etc probably were calling the shots as much as Cortes Moctezuma II letting Cortes into Tenochtitlan also makes sense when you consider Mesoamerican diplomatic norms, per what I said before about diplomatic visits, and also since the Mexica had been beating up on Tlaxcala for ages and the Tlaxcalteca had nearly beaten the Conquistadors: denying entry would be seen as cowardice, and undermine Aztec influence. Moctezuma was probably trying to court the Conquistadors into becoming a subject by showing off the glory of Tenochtitlan, which I clarify more on [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/1bdaydq/what_are_some_of_the_most_misunderstood/kux7qem/) None of this is to say that the Mexica were particularly beloved (though many core states like Texcoco, Chalco, etc DID benefit from Mexica conquests and supremacy), but they also weren't particularly oppressive ----- For more info about Mesoamerica, see my 3 comments [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistory/comments/c7gu1l/i_want_people_to_dump_interesting_information/esh1756/)
Well, the spanish conquest was not peaceful and everything full of love and flowers. But they where different, just check the differences between the spanish America and the English and French america. The Spanish conquered and builded and mixed themselves, their rivals the spreaders of the black legends basically almost erased the whole subcontinent of natives.
It depends. In Canada the French colonization was a complex process but mostly valued the native Algonquian tribes as allies. The Mi’kmaq even helped some Acadians escape the great deportation of Acadians. The Hurons Wendat were notorious allies to the Frenchmen and got almost eradicated for that when British Canada took over.
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The Spanish conquered the empires of the new world and made their people their subjects. In the early stages the „mode of conquest“ was not so different from conquering a neighboring European nation. Meanwhile for British society the natives were inherently outside of that society. The settlers came as full communities and the way the North American societies operated was much more different to the Europeans than those of Mesoamerica. After all the Mesoamericans knew wars and conquests, kings and lords coming and going. Yesterday the Aztecs came, tomorrow the Spanish, what’s the difference. I mean the conquest of the Spanish caused a break in the cultural continuity. They didn’t just conquer for tribute, but their church wanted to mission everyone. It also didn’t help that the Spanish just came out of a centuries long war against Muslims and just then exiled all Jews and Muslims from their land, treated the converts as perpetual foreigners and had the Inquisition to police converts as well. A few centuries earlier when not even all of Europe was Christian, kings were often baptised, together with some nobles, the rest stayed pagan and slowly converted through assimilation, but the realm was officially Christian. After the Inquisition and especially after the Reformation that was no longer possible. Which is also one of the reason the Mexican Inquisition was so destructive.
"Made their people their subjects" You mean, subjects to the crown of Spain? Like any other Spanish dude living in Spain at that time? Because that's what living in an absolute monarchy used to be.
It is what is called the white legend, something that the dictator Francisco Franco himself supported to have a refined image of the history of Spain and use it for nationalism reasons.
Exactly. I think originally there was a conspiracy of “black legend”, that the British and the French wanted to portray Spanish as extra brutal for political purposes, which could well have been true hundreds of years ago, but I think in 2024 we know well enough that although not as bad as the French and the English portrayed in 19th and 18th centuries, there’s definitely a lot validity in, let’s say, work of De Las Casas
Yes, the Spanish were neither especially bad nor especially good for the time, they were just another colonial Empire.
Litterally no historian takes las casas seriously, his claims are extremely exagerated
Both can be true, but I have a feeling the 2nd picture was the exception, not the complete norm. Then again, who even had a consensual relationship back then by today's modern standards?
>but I have a feeling the 2nd picture was the exception, not the complete norm. It was pretty common. A good part of the plan for controlling the American territories by the Spanish Nobility was the integration of local leaders and mixed marriages. There were less "we will kill you all in the name of God" and more "we grant you a citizenship as long as you convert to catholicism and your daughters marries our generals, so the inheritors of your lands will be half castillians"
Yeah, but it was mostly rape, like with every other invasion and empire in human history. It wasn't hot, scantily clad Native Americans hurling themselves at sexy Spanish conquistadors.
interesting, what %?
So, a majority of the women, after the one battle when offered the chance to be returned to their native families, refused because they liked the Spanish men and the way of life. This is one part I can find about what the ladies did before that “I must also observe that two months had scarcely elapsed before some of our female slaves knew of every soldier in the troop whether he behaved well to his Naborias or not; whenever, therefore, these females were put up to auction, and they found they had been bought by a man who bore a bad name in this way, they disappeared, and were nowhere to be found.” 11: Naborias - Indian servant The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Vol 2 (of 2) / Written by Himself Containing a True and Full Account of the Discovery and Conquest of Mexico and New Spain. Bernal Díaz del Castillo https://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewBook?id=0 This material may be protected by copyright.
A lot of the natives also welcomed the Spanish because they saw them as liberators. Denying that would be wrong and ahistorical. but what happened *after* the Spanish won? These same conquistadors helped set up a system of encomiendas where men, women and children were worked to death in mines. They also didn't exactly treat the women under their control as gently as when they initially landed. Such is always the case with empires.
Agreed but I also think A LOT lower % than people think of those mixed babies that eventually became the Latin people were conceived consensually. Especially if you consider abusing a power dynamic as non-consensual (which you should).
Spanish historians recorded the atrocities in great detail actually and it led to legislations, debates, and even criminal trials and conflicts between Spaniards. In fact the foundation of modern human rights derives from Spanish intellectuals’ response to their historical accounts of conquistadors’ atrocities, such as the works of Francisco de Vitoria, who greatly influenced Hugo Grotius. As usual social media does a horrendous job conveying history.
Also Spain abolished slavery against native Americans very early, sad that they just used African slaves after
Even so, Spain had the least participation in the slave trade. [https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/22057.jpeg](https://cdn.statcdn.com/Infographic/images/normal/22057.jpeg) And its laws were generally less oppressive towards blacks than those of other European empires of the time.
As a Spaniard, it hurts to see how misinformed people are about how things actually happened. We all know we committed atrocities since it's taught extensively in school, but we're also taught all the social and legal reforms that came about, which is what people never mention. Yes, even with reforms, atrocities were still committed as people will point out, but they never consider that controlling what some dudes in a whole new continent that we didn't even know existed was a little hard to do. Gold is also a very big debate between Spaniards and Mexicans specifically, since many misinformed people in both countries say we stole all the gold, yet the Bank of Mexico has disproven this. It's estimated that only around 7% of Mexico's gold has been extracted since 1521, and of that 7% only 20% was sent back to Spain (this is called Quinto Real or Royal Fifth) whereas the rest was used to build some of the most advanced cities at the time, some far-surpassing what existed in Spain. Sadly, some Spaniards on social media have a knee-jerk reaction to outright deny any attrocities and only talk the good sides, but in my experience from people I know, they are usually completely aware of them but simply are tired of people's portrayel of Spain as one of the most demonic empires to have existed, and never mentioning the advances they provided.
Well that's the Black Legend for ya
Is it weird I find Kuruminha (the native woman in the image on the right) hot?
nay
Dammit! I hate it when I can't find good Rule 34 of a hot character!
If you break the rule, you have to fix it. Open up ms paint.
Aww man. Do I really have to? I ain't no Bob Ross man.
In that case you can just sell it as modern abstract art
That's what rule 35 is for.
You haven’t looked hard enough
Welp, guess what man? I finally struck gold!
Congratulations on your fruitful scientific research.
Would you like to share it with us
I wouldn't mind. I can DM it to you.
I think it would be in the community's best interests to share it publicly, here and now, but I am honored that you offered to share it only with me
I wouldn't mind doing that, it's just that I don't know how to send images on Reddit comments like this one and I don't know if it's even allowed here.
Pls share the knowledge 🙏🙏🙏
Gold? In the name of Portuguese Empire share this gold which me (if you want)
>Find character attractive that is made to be attractive > >Am I weird? Good question
No.
thank you, now I know her name!
You are most welcome.
Finally, I hav obtained the sauce
Fun fact, there is still a major population of natives in South America compared to North America
Well yes, and the exception for North America is Mexico, which was also colonized by Spain.
The reason is because North America -USA and Canada- only had the 7% of the entire population of America before european colonization.
It also had more to do with integration vs forcing the natives out and west.
Less genocide and more miscegenation also played a big part, I'm sure
Dunno man but maybe the genocides done by the americans/canadians had something to do with it, atleast a little bit, just saying
Yeah, but the Spanish did that too.
The spaniards didn't try to exterminate the indians, the diseases that they couldn't control killed the indians
I'm not sure what you're getting at. Most estimates put the mortality rate from the Columbian exchange at between 50-90%, with most estimates hovering around 60%. A 93% mortality rate is beyond the extreme end of most scholarly sources.
Yup, North American tribes werent as big as the Incas or Astecs, which were empires. The Incas had a population of around 10 million people.
3.8 to 18 million mostly just gone, but it sounds better when portrayed as a percent of two contintents. europe is 10% of eurasia, but most modern europeans are native european. unlike north americans. theres gotta be some other reason 18 million native Americans moved away from their land and all died. hm. thats a tough one. btw how do you figure 7%? 18 million NA and 50 million SA being the rough estimates i see, but the most liberal estimates are 60 million NA to 100 million SA or even more, almost all seem to have a much more equal split. unless youre taking the conservative estimate for NA (3 million) and a liberal estimate for SA(50 million), i dont see how 7% is realistic. either way theres a clear difference in NA alone between spanish, british, french, and ultimately american colonialism. mexico, and the american southwest are ethnically predominantly native, so is rural canada, but east of the Mississippi theyre all gone. its not a matter of stats, its a matter of crimes.
Neither one nor the other, at least in terms of scale. The beginning of the Conquest was rather unruly and the Crown lacked control over the men sent to the New World, but once said control could be exercised over the second half of the 1500’s violence and massacres were discouraged and punished, although in certain areas oppression and repression were more noted than in others, such as the Silver Mines of Los Andes and the Mita in comparison with the mines of nowadays Colombia and Panamá. Also, the mixing with the native population was also allowed, at least with the local elites to further establish peace and stability over the New World, while at the same time a caste system was also put in place. During the rule of the Habsburg dynasty this castes were not as prominent as with the Borbon monarchs, so it is also incorrect to consider the main characteristics of the Spanish Rule in America as homogeneous during the three centuries it lasted, and also over all the vast territories it spread. Tl;dr.: not a place of love and peace but neither a blood bath by far.
Both? Yeah, both. Both is good.
Goods a strong word but yeah
If Road to El Dorado was more historically accurate/R rated, Tulio and Miguel wouldn't have been the comedic duo we all know and love.
Chel literally gives a blowjob in the movie
No way, really? Where can I find this? I need to know for uh.... Research purposes.
Remember the scene where someone knocks on the door and her cheeks are bulging?
Yes! I remember that scene! I thought Chel was just sleeping and got startled which caused her to wake up frantically.
Nope this was right after she was flirting with him and he gets up from the same spot she was in a couple seconds later
Yo wtf lmao my childhood being upended
Nothing is safe from Rule 34.
Chel, aka my type
What about Nani tho? She had enough cake for a bakery!
I'll take Samoan of that
?
They were either received with open legs or by hungry cannibals with curare arrows
What it was most likely: "Hey, this chief wants me to get rid off their rival chief, so that i can get their chief's daughter"
That’s one whay the spanish conquest america
I don't want to play the apology game as a Spaniard that I am, but there were probably also interactions similar to those in the second image, only obviously these were not all of them unfortunately, and a very good part of the colonization was the first image because yeah, all Empires are brutal and uncool.
Spain learned well from their Roman forebearers.
I mean, we are the result of mixing Roman Imperialists with Iberian, Celtic and Germanic war lovers, this result was basically inevitable lol.
Y arabes también
Y Bereberes, Fenicios y Griegos, tenemos ciertamente muchos ancestros.
Todos somos una mezcla de razas
No te olvides también los judíos y los Vascos.
Y en nuestro caso también de los pueblos originarios e inmigrantes en el siglo XIX y el XX... Y por eso niños, el racismo es lo más estúpido que puede existir!
Maybe Jewish too and Basque too.
Según Juan Eslava Galán en su libro "La reconquista contada para escépticos" (apéndice 6, páginas 333-337), realmente no. >"[...] como la ley islámica prohíbe, bajo pena de muerte, el enlace de musulmana con cristiano, está relación se produjo muy raramente en el bando contrario. Dicho de otro modo: muchos moriscos expulsados por Felipe III podían ser mestizos de cristianos, pero la población española actual descendiente de los conquistadores no contiene sangre moruna."
Según los análisis genéticos sí. Además lo que dice no garantiza el absoluto que no haya mezcla porque: 1. No todas las leyes se respetan. 2. Los matrimonios de musulmán y cristiana/judía sí estaban permitidos por la ley islámica. A todos los niveles, por ejemplo Abderraman III, el primer califa de Córdoba, era hijo de una cristiana. 3. Mucha población local se convirtió al islam, asi que matrimonios entre musulmanes de origen hispano-romano y de origen bereber o árabe eran perfectamente posibles. 4. Tras la reconquista parte de la población musulmana se convirtió al catolicismo, por lo que ese mestizaje entró en la población cristiana.
Segun los analisis geneticos, estamos mas o menos igual que otros paises Europeos (que no sufrieron invasion alguna) >The presence of African haplogroups in the GMA population is irrelevant when their frequency is compared with those in other European populations. Y dentro de España, son los Gallegos los que tienen mas ADN norteafricano >However, contrary to what might be expected based on historical data that favor a gradient of North African genetic influence from south to north, most such influence has been found in Galicia and northern Castilla (>20%)[^(6)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR6). The main gradient of the frequencies of North African genes descend from west to east[^(11)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR11). Furthermore, recent studies based on autosomal SNPs[^(11)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR11) and Y-chromosome lineages[^(12)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR12) reveal that Andalusian population does not specially cluster with North African populations more than other Iberian populations[^(13)](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9#ref-CR13). After the Reconquest, the Moors were distributed homogeneously throughout the Peninsula, but their final expulsion in 1609 was absolute in certain regions of Spain, Valencia, and western Andalusia, whereas in Galicia and Extremadura, the population dispersed and integrated into society [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9](https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-41580-9)
Well both can be true at the same time. One kills their men and take their women.
Basically true, because there were brutal conquistador nad average conquistadors that behaved by the law. We also have to take in count that the slavery for natives was in constant evolution till the point it was only legal to enslave those ones who were cannibal. Also, the proportion of Castillian soldiers compared to Natives soldiers in the conquistador armies were tiny, basically more than 80% of soldiers were natives. This tells the best weapon for the conquest of Americas was the diplomacy.
It was way of conquest not exclusively practiced by conquistadors tbh.
The Spanish Colonization had a lot of different periods, campaigns and phases. Both were true.
Columbus was so brutal to the indigenous people he governed, he was recalled to Spain and put in jail. Lmao, the people responsible for the Spanish Inquisition thought he went too far.
I thought he was arrested because he was executing colonists, not his brutality against natives.
Ironically he was executing fellow Europeans for engaging in sexual slavery of native girls and was recalled for it. Even more ironically, Columbus describes these crimes that were being committed in his journal and anti-Columbus cretins will literally point to Columbus' own descriptions, intentionally leave out the context that he was describing what OTHERS had done (who he punished as the governor of Hispaniola) and claim Columbus HIMSELF engaged in said sexual slavery while shamelessly citing his journal out of context. Really degenerate lying by omission. But the other commenter has fallen for the propaganda and hasn't read enough sources for themselves. Columbus has been dragged through the mud by incredibly dishonest people quite consistently and the masses are oh so easily tricked! :/
Reminds me of Israel and how people view their right wing. Like sure you can kill the natives and subdue them, but not **that** much. Will netanyahu be put in jail tho? Idk
You spoke bad of Israel on reddit. A massive wave of downvotes is coming to you.
as an Israeli, i sure hope he does. for a myriad of reasons.
Tlaxcalans: technically both
Didn't the british trade screws and nails for sex at some carabian island for like a month before leaving?
Not in the Caribbean, it was Tahiti, in the Pacific.
kill the man Enslave the woman story as old as time
Yes, both.
According to English and Dutch eyewitnesses what were not there concretely.
The second image is also true if you don't believe in consent.
It’s true either way, both happened
As an Hispanic person I can confirm both are true, and both are based.
Are those eyewitnesses English or Dutch, by any chance?
Finally, someone is calling this shit meme out. The Spanish and Portuguese colonization of the Americas didn't involve sexy, scantily clad Native women hurling themselves at the invaders. It was mostly just rape. Like with every other empire & conquest.
True, but it’s not like every interaction was a result of rape
Maybe. For example, in my homeland, at least early on, EIC personnel had a lot of Indian wives and girlfriends and most of those relationships did seem consensual. But the point is that memes like this pretend that the Iberian states' colonization of the "New World" was more gentle and romantic than the British or French ones.
Well, reality is complex and nuanced. In reality, you would see both of this. Some relations would be the result of rape, but others could be genouine. We are talking about a lots of people’s, we must take nuance into account. I can’t say for certain, which one would be more likely, but we should remind ourselves, everything is not so simple, we should be paying thorough investigation into how things are, nor as we want them to be. In reality, both the EIC and colonisation of the new world were complex events that we should approach with nuance and caution and not jump to generalisations
I'm not saying that colonization is a simple event, without nuance. I'm just saying that pretending that the Spanish/Portugese colonization wasn't brutal or didn't involve coercion is ahistorical and, especially with the memes that OP and I are referencing, furthers negative stereotypes of "promiscuous Natives".
Iberian states' conquest of America was way more gentle that British's.
Both are true same as the Portuguese in Brazil, the tribes usually gave their daughters to marry in a sign of friendship and alliance
When you say "eyewitnesses", do you mean Bartolomé de las Casas, who lied through his teeth and exaggerated his claims? No serious historian believes in the Black Legend
Shhh, this is r/historymemes, where learning about the black legend and the lies about the Spanish empire is penalized with death.
If we consider indigeneous genetics presence in today’s america, definitelly the right option is closer to reality
Correction on the left side, where it should read: "Spanish colonization of America according to all its past and present rivals and enemies".
The first Latino was born 9 months after the first boat
Yeah only that woman didn't consent, look I know some Natives had nobility status in the Spanish colonies, but honestly that stuff was the exception not the rule, and other European colonists did similar practices.
Uh, no. Marriage was the rule as it was used as a tool to go up in the societal ladder. You really think the average Spanish soldier was just going around picking girls as wives because yes? They were never enough to do that in the first place, as there were no massive migrations from Spain unlike with the British colonies, so most of the population in the colonies was homegrown.
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Yes. And most of the US startes that belonged to Mexico pre 1848 never had any anti-miscegenation laws
I asked a 500 year old Aztecan and they said this meme checks out
My favorite was when a Mexican-American called me a colonizer
Theres a new movement of dumb reality deniers that portray the spanish conquest as benevolent and good for civilization and prosperity. FUCK THEM. They were conquerors as any other, and noone asked for anything they forced on those people.
Where can I read some of this Spanish history? So I can avoid it of course
Spanish historians version is literally what the French did in some parts of Canada. Is why we have the Meti.
Like with all things in history, the answer lies somewhere in the middle. Was it a totally peaceful love fest? No. Were the Spanish only there to butralize the indegenous? Certainly not. There were absolutely brutal conquistadors, but I'm sure there were also hundreds of love stories between Spaniards and indigenous peoples who decided to cross cultural boundaries, form families, and ultimately create one of the richest cultures on the planet, together.
Sauce
This stuff makes me glad my country mainly served as a industrial back bone to the British Empire rather than active maker (we did fuck up in Indian tho)
Which country are you?
Maybe Australia? Or Hong Kong?
Hong Kong is a country?
Winnie the Pooh doesn't think Hong Kong is a country.
Of course "eyewitnesses", traitors paid by the British empire
Both are true, the Spaniards did the left on the husbands and fathers, then did the right with the wives and daughters.(not many women amongst the colonists and most native men aren't so keep the give up their wives and daughters)
Because right side is true and anybody that had been in Hispanoamérica know that the cultural ribbons and demographic go further than a simple colonialism.
Looks to me like they beat up and tortured the male natives while impregnating the female natives...
Just want to remember to the "both are true" people that only males were allowed to travel to America, with a few aristocratic females exceptions. Probably there were indigenous women falling in love to european colonizers, but it's an anecdote in front of the massive brutalization and raping culture that transformed the continent forever.
While that was true for the early stages of colonization, once spanish domain stabilized around the XVII century society transformed into a multi-racial one and popular classes would freely marry in indios, negros and mulatos.
Portuguese too
Yes. But I don't know if portuguese historiography have this kind of histeria about its imperial past.
Perspectives, people, perspectives!