When Montezuma Met Cortes

by Matthew Restall

  72.CA: ff. 76v77r; the Primeros Memoriales (Sahagún 1997 [c.1560]: 193); Castañeda de la Paz (2013: 251–57); Mundy (2015: 99–117). On continuities in Mexica rule and status through and beyond Huanitzin’s day, see various articles by Castañeda de la Paz (e.g., 2009).

  73.AGI Patronato 21, no. 2, ramo 4 (old citation 16, ramo 4): quotes all f. 1; also published in Mathes (1973: 101–5), whose translations I followed. I thank Megan McDonie for helping me locate the original documents.

  74.AGI Mapas y Planos, México 6 (and referenced in AGI Patronato 21, no. 2, ramo 4: f. 7); also reproduced in Mathes (1973: 102).

  75.Edict of 1529: AGI Patronato 16, no. 2, ramo 19, quote on f.1r; also published in Mathes (1973: 107–14).

  76.Cortés to Oñate: AGI Patronato 16, no. 1, ramo 15, quote on f.1r; also published (including facsimile of the letter) in Mathes (1973: 115–18). Paltry Spanish colony: Founded by Sebastián Vizcaíno (AGI Patronato 20; Mathes 1968) as La Paz, which name it retains. Also see León-Portilla (2005 [1985]: 117–22).

  77.Biographers: Madariaga (1969 [1942]); Martínez (1990; DC).

  78.CCR (Letter of May 15, 1522; 1960: 170; 1971: 277); Mathes (1973: 17).

  79.Mathes (1973: 18–19).

  80.DC, I: 439–75 (quotes, in sequence, on 459, 467, 445) (quiso preferir . . . que por su bondad quiso le fuse emperador del universe . . . ocho o diez cartas en latín, los nombres en blanco . . . porque como lengua mas general en el universo . . . que halleis judios o otras personas que las sepan leer); Mathes (1973: 18–19); Gruzinski (2014: 202); León-Portilla (2005 [1985]: 68–84).

  81.Decrees in DC, III: 49–58 (four of July 6), 59–62 (two of July 27) (also see AGN Hospital de Jesús legajos 123 and 124; CC: 125–39; González-Gerth 1983: 85).

  82.Previous two paragraphs based on DC, I: 439–75, 491–503 (documents of 1527–28, mostly transcribed from AGI and AGN); also see Mathes (1973: 20); Gruzinski (2014: 203–7); León-Portilla (2005 [1985]: 123–65). Hernando de Grijalva, a relative of Juan, joined the war in Mexico in 1520, thereafter remaining a Cortesian loyalist.

  83.Gruzinski (2014: 207).

  84.Conversations: Martínez Martínez (2010). Mediterranean: Goodwin (2015: 108).

  85.I have obviously made no attempt to poetically translate Vaca de Guzmán (1778: 7) (Si quieres ver el ánimo valiente, / Que tanta gloria á tu Nacion ha dado, Prevenido en los riesgos, y prudente, / Resuelto en las empresas, y arrestado, / Un General de la Española gente, / Cuyo valor el mundo ha respetado, / En el grande Cortés lo verás todo, / En el grande Cortés, mas de este modo: . . . ).

  86.“Bed”: Duverger (2013: 25) (Es el único de los conquistadores en morir en su cama). Medal: Yoeli and Rand (2015: “Sunday Review,” 10).

  CHAPTER 8: WITHOUT MERCY OR PURPOSE

  1.Epigraph sources, in sequence: CA: f. 42v (using translation in Lockhart 1993: 274–75); ENE, XVI: 64; PRT: 199 (por los muchos agravios y molestias que reçebimos de los españoles por estar entre nosotros y nosotros entre ellos); Gopnik (2015: 104) (I have omitted five sentences between “things” and “Frightened”); Candelaria (2011: 6).

  2.The scene is in episode 7 of the TVE series, originally broadcast in 2015 (I thank Jorge Gamboa in Colombia and Enrique Gomáriz in Costa Rica for bringing the series to my attention). (Soy vos tu esposo, soy el gobernador de la Nueva España; tengo un mundo entero a mis pies, yo aqui soy un dios, un dios; un demonio, un demonio loquecido.)

  3.As Fernández del Castillo (1980 [1929]: 37) pointed out, the prominent signatures of Cortesian enemies Nuño de Guzmán and Ortiz Matienzo, the connections back to Cobos (royal minister and supporter of the late Velázquez) in Spain, and the precise timing of the accusation by doña Catalina’s mother with the start of the residencia inquiry suggest strongly an orchestration of the allegation (which does not make it untrue).

  4.Juan de Salcedo also testified that she had been “very ill with [muy enferma del] mal de madre”; WWC: 386–88; residencia testimony on Catalina’s death in RC; AGI Justicia 220, no. 5; 221, part 4; 222, parts 3 and 5; DC, II: 53–54, 59, 75–101.

  5.“Not proven”: Abbott (1904 [1856]: 304; italics his). “Bad behavior”: Townsend (2006: 138). The claim by one of doña Catalina’s maids that, when told that the whole city “is saying you killed your wife,” Cortés responded, “She lay down fine and woke up dead,” if true, would seem to support the notion of a man so callous he was capable of uxoricide (1529 testimony by Ana Rodríguez; DC, II: 83) (dicen que mataste a vuestra mujer; ella se echo buena e amaneció muerta). Among numerous verdicts by writers and historians, two competing books published in Mexico in the 1920s offered rival verdicts (innocent: Fernández del Castillo 1980 [1929]; guilty: Toro 1922); also see Solana (1938: 22, 161–74); Martínez (1990: 382–94); Thomas (1993: 579–82, 635–36; WWC: 385–89); Miralles (2008: 144, 189, 203). The inclusion in the Codex Cardona of an image of Cortés placing a hand on doña Catalina’s coffin intriguingly suggests that—should this now-lost and possibly fraudulent document resurface—there will always be something to prod interest in such mysteries (Bauer 2009: 3).

  6.The conversation was reported by Isidro Moreno, Cortés’s majordomo; see AGI Justicia 220, no. 5: ff.336–43; CDII, XXVI: 338–40; DC, II: 87–89 (quotes 88–89) (Vos, Solís, no queries sino ocupar a mis indios en otras cosas de lo que yo les mando e no se face lo que yo quiero; Yo, señora, no los ocupo, ahí está su merced que los manda e ocupa; Yo vos prometo que antes de muchos días haré yo de manera que no tenga nadie que entender con lo mío; Con lo vuestro, señora? Yo no quiero nada de lo vuestro); also quoted by Martínez (1990: 383–84) and Thomas (1993: 580; WWC: 386); Cortés’s cruel double entendre is not spotted as often as one might think: Pérez Martínez noticed, and called it “malevolent [malévola]” (2014 [1944]: 204); it is fully articulated by Townsend (2006: 138).

  7.Catalina Suárez (or Xuárez) arrived in Hispaniola with her mother, brother, and sisters in 1509 or 1510, settling in Cuba after its conquest by Velázquez (who allegedly fell in love with one of the sisters). According to Gómara, “las Xuarez” were “bonicas [pretty]” (1552: f. 3r), the local Spaniards competed for their favors, and “Cortés courted Catalina and eventually married her, although at first there was some quarrelling over it and he was imprisoned, because he did not want her as his wife and she sued him to keep his word” (1552: f. 3r; 1964: 11) (las festajavan muchos, y Cortes a la Catalina. Y en fin se caso con ella. Aun que primero tuuo algunos pendencias, y estuuo preso. La no la queria por muger. Y ella le demandaba la palabra); also see Fernández del Castillo (1980 [1929]: 10–43); Duverger (2005: 104–8). On Díaz being wrong about the surprise trip, and claims that Cortés sent doña Catalina’s brother to Cuba to fetch her, see WWC: 385–86. On daughter Catalina’s fate and her father’s will: DC, IV: 313–41; Conway (1940); Johnson (1975: 220). On her mother Leonor and Salcedo: DCM: #940; Thomas (1993: 635).

  8.Rodríguez: CDII, XII: 255; DC, II: 81–83; hers and Tapia’s quotes also in Thomas (translated slightly differently; respectively WWC: 387; and 1993: 765n50) (don Fernando festejaba damas e mujeres que estaban en estas partes; era celosa de su marido). Another conquistador: Antonio de Carvajal in DC, II: 58 (vido en casa del dicho don FC a muchas fijas de señores desta tierra).

  9.“Family Matters”: The caption from this Codex Cozcatzin image reads, “Don Alonço de Alvarado married the daughter of the prince of Muntesçuma: Doña Yssabel de Muntesçuma, sister of don Pedro Tlacaquepan, who went to Spain. They are son and daughter of the Emperor Muntesçuma of Mexico.” Image discussed by Hajovsky (2015: 52) and Mundy (2015: 192–93), who also reproduces it; the original codex is in BnF, Ms. Mexicain 41–45. Gemelli visited: Gemelli (1704: 544).

  10.DC, II: 44. Leonor had a daughter, named doña Isabel de Tolosa Cortés Moctezuma, who married Juan de Oñate, the first governor of New Mexico. Spaniards laid claim for generations to the status of royal Aztec lineage, surely aware of the “conquest” circumstances of its genesis (one can read between such lines as V
illagrá’s trumpeting how a fellow conquistador in New Mexico, Cristóbal de Oñate, was descended from both Cortés and Montezuma: “The Great Marquis of the Valley begat a daughter / By a princess, one of three girls to Montezuma born”; Villagrá 1610; also quoted by Goodwin 2015: 255). On doña Isabel Moctezuma Tecuichpo, see Chipman (2005), Martínez Baracs (2006), Castañeda de la Paz (2013), and Villella (2016); her story has inspired several novels (e.g., Haggard 1893; García Iglesias 1946; Aguirre 2008).

  11.“Very publicly”: Vásquez de Tapia in DC, II: 41–42 (muy publico en este pueblo e fuera dél que se echó con dos o tres hermanas hijas de Motunzuma [sic] . . . por amiga, e que teniendola); also DC, II: 44, 45 (Vásquez de Tapia again, and Gonzalo Mejía, both in 1529). Modern historian: Townsend (2006: 106). Cuéllar: DCM: #249.

  12.Thomas (1993: 765n52; WWC: 386). I previously argued (2003: 83) that the timing of Malintzin’s pregnancy suggested that Cortés refrained from making sexual demands on her until the campaign was over, as she was too valuable as an interpreter to be lost to pregnancy or childbirth complications (an idea that I believe originated with Frances Karttunen, personal communication, although I did not cite it as such); Townsend (2006: 139) argued that this gives Cortés too much credit, and that more likely her “poor diet, sleep deprivation, and psychological strain” during the war prevented conception—a disturbing point that is well taken.

  13.“In Cuba”: That accusation is common in the residencia documents; e.g., Vásquez de Tapia in DC, II: 41 (con primas e con hermanas; “habiendo tenido a mi hija públicamente en Cuba”; etc.); Juan de Burgos in DC, II: 53–54; Antonio de Carvajal in DC, II: 58; and Gonzalo Mejía in DC, II: 45. “Niece”: Ibid. (se echaba el dicho don Fernando con Marina, en quienes hubo ciertos hijos, que era mujer de la tierra, e con otra sobrina suya). “Daughter of hers”: Alonso Pérez in DC, II: 62 (don Fernando Cortés se ha echado carnalmente con dos hermanas fijas de Motezuma [sic] e con Marina, la lengua, e con una fija suya e demas deste vido este testigo dos o tres indios ahorcados en Cuyoacan [sic] en un árbol dentro de las casa del dicho don Fernando Cortés . . . los habia mandando ahorcado porque se habian echado con la dicha Marina).

  14.Townsend (2006: 200), who also (op. cit.: 153) translates and quotes Herren (1992: 141): “If anyone ever really loved Marina, it was not don Hernán Cortés.” One might add, if Cortés ever loved anyone, it was his Taíno family of Leonor and Catalina.

  15.Thomas (1857: 39–40 [Act III, Sc. 1]).

  16.“Of noble” to “Christianity”: Ranking (1827: 320), who elaborated upon Clavigero’s elaboration upon a few comments by Díaz. “Extraordinary” to “union”: Abbott (1904 [1856]: 80).

  17.Abbott (1904 [1856]: 81); Novo (1985: 52) (Yo lo sentía soñar sus sueños de oro; sus sueños pueriles e inagotables de riqueza y poder. Pero yo acariciaba el oro vivo de sus cabellos. Era mío el tesoro de su cuerpo que respiraba, que vivía. Por conservarlo junto a mí, le habriá abierto las puertas de cien ciudades).

  18.“A Clement Cortés” in the Gallery is another lithograph in the same series (CSL-Sac, Rare Prints #2001–0008); Maurin lived in Paris in the first half of the nineteenth century (see discussions in Chapters 2 and 7) (Cortès accepta l’inappréciable cadeau du chef Cacique, et ce jour fut le premier d’une passion qui jeta quelque douceur sur les sanglans triomphes du vainqueur du Mexique).

  19.“Traitor”: phrase is Townsend’s (2006: 2), who points out that one of the earliest examples in literature of this interpretation is Anonymous (1999 [1826]).

  20.“Symbol”: a 1999 phrase by Jean Franco, as quoted by Townsend (2006: 3); also see Hassig (1998).

  21.Richmond (1885: 158); Abbott (1904 [1856]: 81).

  22.Díaz CCIII (1632: f. 238r); Thomas (1993: 622); Abbott (1904 [1856]: 31, 38, 80–81). “Temperament”: MacNutt (1909: 448). “New type” to “species”: Solana (1938: 19, 21) (un tipo nuevo en el ser humano . . . El pasaje del amor carnal de Don Hernando Cortés, Marqués del Valle de Oajaca, tiene toda la magnitud de un versílico bíblico donde Jehová bendecía la fecundidad, tantas veces incestuosa, de los patriarcas porque ella continuaba la especie).

  23.“Amorous”: Benito (1944: 127) (los lances amorosos de aquel conquistador de reinos y de damas). See “A Clement Cortés” in the Gallery, and “Conquest as Crucible,” the painting that faces the Epilogue’s title page.

  24.“Heathen”: residencia testimony in DC, II: 41 (pero que otras cosas tenía más de gentílico que de buen cristiano especialmente que tenía infinitas mujeres dentro de su casa).

  25.My verdict on doña Catalina’s death is essentially the same as Hugh Thomas’s; he likewise read all the testimony in the residencia inquiry, and speculated that while “Cortés was capable of murder,” she probably “had a heart attack and died” after he shook her when they were arguing (1993: 582).

  26.Prévost (1746–59, XII [1754]: 265) (le prétexte qi les fit recevoir; main il est certain que Cortez prit de l’inclination pur une de ces Femmes, qu’il fit batiser sous le nom de Marina, & dont il fit la Maîtresse. Elle étoit, suivant Diaz, d’une beauté rare & d’une condition relevée). See the images “Gifts of Women” atop this chapter (Anonymous 1760–61, [of 20 volumes]: facing p. 19) and “To Make Corn Bread” in the Gallery (Prévost 1746–59, XII [1754]: 265) (le Cacique de Tabasco fit accepter à Cortez vingt Femmes indiennes, pour faire du pain de Maïs à ses Trouppes). Other examples of the Prévost image printed in the eighteenth century reversed the right–left orientation.

  27.On Las Casas’s whereabouts: Orique (2017); Clayton (2012: 342–47). Edict: CI, IV: 369–70; CC #88: 312–14; DC, IV: 342–43 (entre otros cargos que fueron hechos . . . nadie con buena conciencia y título pueda tener los dichos indios por esclavos . . . los pongais en libertad y ansi mismo a todos los hijos y descendientes de las mujeres que quedaron pos esclavos de la dicha razón . . . que habia tomado de paz . . . don Hernando habia hecho apartar de los dichos indios cuatrocientos hombres que eran para pelear, y los habia hecho matar todos y los otros que habian quedado, que eran mujeres y niños en cantidad de hasta tres mil, los habia hecho herrar por esclavos . . . estando los indios del dicho pueblo y pueblos a él sujetos de paz, dio en los dichos indios y mató a muchos dellos y prendió a otros y a mujeres y los trajo al dicho pueblo de Tezcuco . . . y los habia hecho herrar por esclavos y vendídolos . . . habían hecho herrar más de quinientos ánimas por esclavos . . . quando el dicho don Hernando fue de Guerra sobre la ciudad de Chulula . . . cuatro mil indios, poco más o menos . . . sin causa alguna habia mandado a los dichos españoles que les matasen y que así habia muerto muchos dellos y hechos esclavos otros).

  28.RC; AGI Justicia 224, 1: f. 294; Justicia 223, 2: f. 227; CDII, XXVII: 28, 231–32; DC, I: 208; Thomas (1993: 435–38); also CCR; Díaz CXLIII, CCXIII (1912, IV: 54; 1916, V: 306–7) (“wrecked” quote from Díaz); and Cervantes de Salazar (1914 [1560s]: 523–33 [Bk. 5, Chs. IX–XVI]), on Tepeaca massacre and enslavement.

  29.Proceedings: Cortés’s will has been frequently published (e.g., Conway 1940; DC, IV: 313–41); for the record of the 1548 auction of Cortés’s household goods on the steps of Seville’s cathedral, see DC, IV: 352–57; for a 1549 debt settlement using 93 kilos’ worth of gold and silver jewelry from Cortés’s estate, see DC, IV: 358–61. “Poverty”: quote by a Mexican-American filmmaker and university student, expressing a common view, in Myers (2015: 309); this myth of Cortés’s final years goes at least back to the eighteenth century, with the dovetailing of him and Columbus often made explicit (e.g., “this great, this meritorious man, now found himself at the close of his life in circumstances similar to those of Columbus, compelled to supplicate justice at the hands of an ungrateful King and malicious ministers”; Campe 1800: 269, who even shaves off Cortés’s last seventeen years to have him die in Spain in 1530). Inventory: AGN Hospital de Jesús 28; DC, IV: 364–432 (quote on 393) (una prisión de esclavo, con cuatro eslabones de hierro); also see AGN Hospital de Jesús 398; Riley (1973).

  30.DC, IV: 370–415. I have
taken Xitl’s occupation (formero) to be hornero, meaning he worked the sugar-boiling furnaces and ovens, but I might be wrong ( Juan Ucelote, indio, natural de Ecatepeque, de edad de cincuenta años, e así lo parecía . . . Isabel Siguaquesuchil, india, natural de Tlaxcala, de edad de cuarenta y tres años . . . Juan Xitl, indio, natural de Guaxaca, de edad de cuarenta e un años, e dijo ser formero . . . Cecilia, esclava india, condenada por veinte años, natural de Tepexi, de edad de cuarenta años . . . Cristóbal, indio natural desta Nueva España, e dijo que no sabe de dónde es natural, porque vino pequeño a poder de españoles, de edad de treinta e cinco años poco más o menos).

  31.“Toleration”: MacNutt (1909: xi). “Abhorrent”: Johnson (1975: 176). “Richest”: Reséndez (2016: 66).

  32.The literature on these topics is vast, but the broad number of Africans enslaved and transported to the Americas, in the late fifteenth through nineteenth centuries, is 10–15 million; recent work on indigenous enslavement in the Americas, for the same centuries, has produced a range of 2.5–5 million (see the massively documented table in Reséndez 2016: 324). Vásquez de Tapia’s number of 20,000 is suspicious (it is a nice round sum and he was not a friendly witness in the Cortés residencia), but it is also plausible that such a number passed through the markets on Cortés’s behalf.