by Hugh Thomas
12. The main square in Salamanca in the sixteenth century was smaller than it is today. Nor is it clear whether any of the conquistadors had been to Venice.
13.
“Las dádivas desmedidas, los edificos reales,
Llenos de oro, las vaxillas tan fabridas,
Los enriques y reales del tesoro,
Los jaeces, los cavallos de su gente y atavíos tan sobrados,
¿dónde iremos a buscallos?
¿qué fueron sino rocíos
de los prados?”
Jorge Manrique
14. The fact that maize was known in Italy and in England as “Indian corn” or gran turco is an indication as to how confused the men of the European Renaissance were about geography.
15. See above, pages 220–21.
16. There are some in the Museum of Mankind in Vienna.
17. Of which the British Museum has the best collection.
18. Gilberto Freyre, The Masters and the Slaves, tr. Harriet de Onis, New York 1968, 183, claims this beneficent product for Brazil.
19. By far the best short account of religion in ancient Mexico is Henry Nicholson, “Religion in Prehispanic Central Mexico,” in the Handbook of Middle American Indians, vol. 10, Austin 1971.
20.
En todas partes está
Tu casa, Dador de la vida,
La estera de flores,
Tejada de flores por mí
Sobre ella te invocan los príncipes.
21. Fr. Diego Durán, Historia de las indias de la Nueva España, new ed., 2 vols., Mexico 1867–80, 2, 128.
22. CDI, 39, 415: a certain Benito González, a Valencian, said in 1515: “Que el dicho almirante el postrimero viaje que fizo descobrió una tierra dicha Maya.…”
23. Fr. Toribio de Motolinía in Joaquín García Icazbalceta, Colección de documentos para la historia de México, new ed., 2 vols., Mexico City 1980, 1, 65.
24. Oviedo [2:43], 1, 124.
25. Jorge Klor de Alva, “Martín Ocelotl,” in D. G. Sweet and Gary B. Nash (eds.), Struggle and Survival in Colonial America, Berkeley, CA, 1981.
26. Martyr [6:34], 241, in a letter to Pope Leo X: “¿Eh, tambien vosotros tenéis libros? ¡Cómo! También vosotros usáis de caracteres con los cuales os entendéis estando ausentes.” Possibly this Corrales was Rodrigo de Corrales, from Medina del Campo.
27. Fernando Alvarado Tezozomoc, Crónica Mexicayotl, Mexico 1949, 1987, 684ff.
28. Tezozomoc [33:27], 685.
29. Las Casas [2:50], 3, 165.
Chapter 34
1. “Harto amigo mío,” says Las Casas [2:50], 3, 156. A fuller description of this voyage can be read in my Conquest of Mexico, [27:15], ch. 7.
2. The Enciclopedia de México, 7, 3859, says he was born in 1475.
3. Probanza of 1522, 189, in BAGN, Mexico 1937, 9, ed. E. O’Gorman.
4. “que viniese con la dicha armada en busca de nueva tierra” (Alaminos in Probanza of 1522).
5. “con tiempo contrario que les dio no pudieron tomar las islas de los Lucayos, do daban, e aportaron en la costa que dicen que es de Yucatán” (Probanza of 1522, 189).
6. For the whole question of “taking possession,” see again Morales Padrón [6:19], passim.
7. “Otras tierras en el mundo no se habían descubierto mejores,” in Díaz del Castillo [15:45], 1984.
8. Andrés de Monjaraz said in 1522 that “él quería ir a Castilla para hacer saber a sus altezas cómo el habia descubierto la dicha tierra de Yucatán” (Probanza of 1522, 208).
9. A memorial to Antonio Velázquez de Bazán, the heir of Velázquez, shows that Grijalva was indeed his nephew (CDI, 10, 82). Again, see ch. 7 of The Conquest of Mexico [27:15] for a fuller account.
10. “No traía licencia para poblar, sino para bojar e recatar en la dicha tierra” (Probanza of 1522, 191).
11. Oviedo [2:43], 2, 118–48.
12. I have not yet found Angel Bozal, El Descubrimiento de Méjico. Una gloria ignorada: Juan de Grijalva, Madrid 1927.
13. Alaminos recalled “aún delante de este testigo el dicho Diego Velásquez riñó con el dicho Juan de Grijalva” (Probanza of 1522, 232).
14. Martyr [1:2], 3, 325.
Chapter 35
1. “Señor nuestro: te has fatigado, te has dado cansancio: ya a la tierra tú has llegado. Has arribado a tu ciudad: México.…”Bernardino de Sahagún, Historia General de las Cosas de la Nueva España, vol. 4, ed. Angel María Garibay, Mexico 1981, 108.
2. This countess was a daughter of King Enrique IV’s chief minister, Pacheco, and was described by Palencia ([1:19], 38) as “cruel y corrumpida,” cruel and corrupt, who kept her son for a time in a narrow well. For these dates, see my Conquest of Mexico [27:15]. These connections are explored in a genealogical table on p. 627.
3. Membership was about 3,000, of whom 10 percent usually attended. In 1519, sheep numbered over 3 million. See Klein [3:7].
4. Among those who had been at Salamanca with Cortés was Fray Diego López of Medellín, who said that “había estudiado alguno tiempo en el estudio donde estudiado el dicho don Hernando” (“Audiencia en Truijillo,” BRAH, 1992, 199). Las Casas testified to his skill in Latin: “Hacia ventaja en ser latino, porque había estudiado leyes en Salamanca y era de ellos bachiller” (Las Casas [2:50], 2, 475). Lucio Marineo Siculo commented: “Deleitaba mucho en la lengua latina” (De los memorables de España, Alcalá de Henares, 1530, ff. 208 211 r.).
5. Inés de Paz was an aunt of Cortés’s, and he stayed in her house in Salamanca.
6. Cortés shared the mayoralty of Santiago in 1516 with Alonso de Macuelo, in 1517 with Gonzalo de Guzmán, who would become his enemy, and in 1518 with Alonso de Mendoza, who was later his ally (Residencia vs. Andrés de Duero, AGI, Justicia, leg. 49, f. 204).
7. See, for a discussion, my Quién es quién en la conquista de México [18:35], 77–79. The best edition of Cortés’s letters is that of Angel Delgado Gómez, Cartas de Relación, Madrid 1993, though the English edition of Anthony Pagden (Letters from Mexico, with an introduction by Sir John Elliott, New Haven, CT, 1986) is admirable, too.
8. Instructions to Cortés from Diego Velázquez in José Luís Martínez, Documentos Cortesianos, Mexico 1990, 45–57.
9. See my own Quién es quién en la conquista de México [18:35].
10. In the Residencia vs. Velázquez, several witnesses testified to this effect: for example, Rodrigo de Tamayo, who said: “Este testigo oyó decir al capitán Hernando Cortés cuando yva a conquistar a la Nueva España quel adelantado le avia dado licencia para llevar de esta isla ciertos yndios” (in answer to question 23).
11. See the Información of Servicios y Méritos of this individual carried out in Écija on Jan. 7, 1520 (AGI, Patronato, leg. 150, no. 2 r. 1). I owe my knowledge of this document to Francisco Morales Padrón.
12. “Y en parte donde el susdicho los mató era casi dos leguas de donde estaba el dicho marqués y su gente, a como el dicho Angel Tinterero vido al dicho Gerónimo Aguilar aun que estaba muy desconocido de ser cristiano según el traje que traya, le conosció en la habla porque le habló” (declaración de Martín López in Información de Andrés de Rozas, 1572).
13. For Aguilar’s companion, Gonzalo Guerrero, see Bibiano Torres Ramírez, “La odisea de Gonzalo Guerrero en México,” in Congreso [1:22], 369ff.
14. Sahagún [35:1], 44.
15. See above, ch. 31.
16. “Por el mes de noviembre pasado halló en Sevilla un Portocarrero e Montejo que venían de la tierra nueva que se ha descubierto e que dixeron a este testigo como el dicho Gerónimo de Aguilar hera bibo …” (AGI, Patronato, leg. 150, no. 2, r.1).
17. Díaz del Castillo [15:45], 2, 21.
18. Sahagún [35:1], 44.
19. The conversation seems to have occurred in January 1520.
20. See my Conquest of Mexico [27:15], 328.
21. See the testimony of witnesses discussed in my Conquest of Mexico, 324ff.
22. His grandson said so. See Zavala [8:11], 745.<
br />
23. Sir John Elliott so argues in his Introduction to Anthony Pagden’s edition of the Cartas de Relación of Cortés to Charles V [35:7].
24. Evidence of Jerónimo de Sepúlveda in the Residencia vs. Velázquez: “quando fue Pánfilo de Narváez a Yucatán … llevaba muchos yndios d’esta ysla las personas que con el yvan que unos dezian que los llevaba con licencia del adelantado e otros syn ella” (question 23).
25. CDI, 27, 10: “los que venían, que heran mala xente, vizcaynos …”
26. In J. Díaz et al., “La Conquista de Tenochtitlan,” Historia, 16, ed. Germán Vázquez, Madrid 1988, 191. Aguilar became a Jeronymite in the Escorial after the war and wrote this account to inform his fellow brothers.
27. Cortés’s concessions were that Tlaxcala should always have a garrison in Tenochtitlan; that Tlaxcala should be given Cholula; that Tlaxcala should never have to pay tribute to anyone who ruled in Tenochtitlan, including Spain; and that they should share whatever booty there was after the fall of Tenochtitlan. The evidence for this derives from the Información de Tlaxcala, 1565, and is discussed by me in Conquest [27:15], 737, fn 57. The treaty with the Tlaxcalteca was usually neglected in all histories before my own.
28. See Charles Gibson, Tlaxcala in the Sixteenth Century, New Haven, CT, 1952.
29. There were nine separate expeditions to Vera Cruz to assist Cortés after that of Narváez: they were directed by Hernando de Medel, Rodrigo Morejón de Lobera, Juan de Nájera, Francisco de Rosales, Antonio de Carmona, Francisco de Saavedra, Juan Suárez, Julián de Alderete, and Juan de Burgos, as well as some men left over from Ponce de León’s last expedition to Florida. For details, see my Quién es quién [18:35], passim.
30. For the lives of these individuals, see Quién es quién [18:35], 291–94. Córdoba was referred to by both Giménez Fernández [2:39], 2, 963, and Morales Padrón [32:35], 111, as the financier or financiador of Cortés, but neither gave evidence to support this. I searched Giménez Fernández’s papers in the archive of the Ayuntamiento de Sevilla for evidence of this without success. See also Giménez Fernández’s “El Alzamiento de Fernando Cortés según los libros del tesorero de la Casa de la Contración,” in Revista de la Historia de América, 31, Mexico, 1–58.
31. See, for example, Thomas J. Riedlinger (ed.), The Sacred Mushroom Seeker, Portland, OR, 1990, 96.
32. For a discussion of the losses in this war, see my Conquest [27:15], 528.
33. Díaz del Castillo [15:45] 1, 97.
34. Díaz del Castillo [15:45] 2, 515.
35. Samuel Purchas, A Discourse of the Diversity of Letters Used by the Divers Nations of the World, Hakluyt Posthumous, 20 vols., Glasgow 1905, 1, 486; and Tzvetan Todorov, La Conquête d’Amérique, Paris 1982. Greenblatt [4:35], 9, who drew attention to Purchas’s comment, talks of “a complex, well-developed and above all mobile technology of power, writing, navigational instruments, ships, warhorses, attack dogs, effective armour, and highly lethal weapons.”
36. For a description, see the Información de Servicios y Méritos of Francisco de Montano in AGI, Patronato, leg. 54, no. 7, r.1.
37. See my Conquest [27:15], 561. See also George Kubler’s fine study, Arquitectura mexicana del siglo XVI, Mexico 1983, ch. 1.
38. Hernando Cortés [35:7], 450.
39. Martyr wrote on March 7, 1521 [1:2], 4, 143–45.
40. These Investigaciones de Servicios y Méritos were the basis for my Who’s Who in the Conquest of Mexico, London 2000.
Chapter 36
1. Aranda had married Ana Pérez Cisbón, of a well-known converso family. Aranda’s daughter Juana married another merchant from Burgos, Fernando de Castro. See Gil [3:37], 3, 518.
2. “¿Y si no halláis estrecho por donde habíes de pasar a la otra mar?” Las Casas [2:50], 3, 175.
3. See Oviedo [2:43], 2, 229; and Antonio Pigafetta, Primer Viaje Alrededor del Mundo, ed. Leoncio Carbrero, Madrid 1985, 58, 27. An English tr. is in the Hakluyt Society, no. 52, reprinted 1992. Pigafetta, an Italian from Vicenza but from a Tuscan family, was born between 1480 and 1491. One can see his family’s house in Vicenza behind the Basilica, and on it there is the phrase “Il n’est rose sans épine.” There is also a villa belonging to the Pigafettas in Agugliaro, near the Villa Saraceno, which is now dilapidated though attractive. The history of that small town shows a large family tree of the Pigafettas. Antonio’s father was probably Marco Pigafetta, a cultivated Renaissance man. Antonio himself served in the galleys of the Order of Rhodes against the Turks. He went to Spain in the suite of the nuncio Francesco Chieragati, going first to Barcelona. He applied to join Magellan, “prompted by a craving for experience and glory.” Perhaps Magellan, a Knight of Santiago, welcomed Pigafetta as a passenger because he was a Knight of Rhodes.
4. Morison [4:42], 302, suggests that another map had been made by Johannes Schöner of Nuremberg.
5. Solís’s instructions are in CDI, 39, 325, 327.
6. Las Casas [2:50], 3, 105.
7. Cadenas [22:2], 107–8.
8. See CDI, 22, 46–52, 65.
9. See Oviedo [2:43], 2, 229; and Pigafetta [36:3], xxix. Also Oviedo [2:43], 2, 217.
10. Letter of Sept. 28, 1518, cit. in Pigafetta [36:3].
11. Navarrete [4:38], 421ff.
12. See a collective work, A viagem de Fernão de Magalhães e a questão das Molucas, Lisbon 1975. But much of the material can be found in Navarrete [4:38], 2, 417ff.
13. Morison implies he was illegitimate: [4:42], 338.
14. Pigafetta [36:3], iii.
15. Oviedo [2:43], 2, 237, said that he was chief pilot.
16. 594,790 ms. on wine, 564,188 ms. on armaments including gunpowder. I am grateful to Mauricio González for these figures.
17. Navarrete [4:38], 2, 415f.
18. Navarrete [4:38], 2, 502f. Earl Hamilton [3:8], 45. Haro was later a factor of the Fuggers in Spain, for which see Kellenbenz [3:32] 43, 59, etc.
19. Electric light sometimes seen on the masts of ships before or after a storm.
20. Paul Gaffarel, Histoire du Brésil français au seizième siècle, Paris 1878, cit. John Hemming, Red Gold, London 1978, 17.
21. The Essays of Michel de Montaigne, tr. M.A. Screech, London 1987, “On the Cannibals,” 240.
22. See Hemming [36:20], 487.
23. Martyr [6:34], 2, 353.
24. This story of the rebellion of San Julián derives from Navarrete, Historia de Juan Sebastián Elcano, in Manuel Walls y Merino, Primer Viaje Alrededor del Mundo…, Madrid 1899. Elcano’s own account can be seen in Navarrete [4:38], 2, 520f., 580f.
25. The best secondary description is that of Morison [4:42], 380ff.
26. The journey was similar to that taken by Bougainville in 1767–68.
27. Pigafetta [36:3], 94.
28. Pigafetta [36:3], 111; Navarrete [4:38], 2, 447.
29. Oviedo [2:43], 2, 223.
30. Pigafetta [36:3], 102.
31. Las Casas [2:50], 3, 175.
32. Elcano gave replies to a detailed questionnaire about the journey that can be seen in Navarrete [4:38], 2, 581ff.
33. Pigafetta [36:3], 161.
34. This is also from the records of Mauricio González.
Chapter 37
1. “Otro nuevo mundo de oro fecho para él, pues antes de nuestras días nunca fue nascido.” The speech is to be seen in the record of the Cortes, Cortes de los Antiguos Reinos de León y Castilla [5:53], 4, 285ff. Fernández Álvarez [17:19], 19, discusses.
2. See ch. 4.
3. Galíndez de Carvajal [2:10].
4. Amadís de Gaula [5:5], 1, 506.
5. Las Casas [2:50], 1, 338: the phrase was “… constituyó y cría los dichos Católicos Reyes y a sus sucesores de Castilla y León, príncipes y reinos de todas estas Indias, islas y tierras firmes, descubiertas y por descubrir …”
6. Qu. Edwards [2:25], 223.
7. Qu. Liss [2:42], 308.
8. See Menéndez Pidal [5:40].
9. For Ruiz de la Mota, see John S
chwaller, “Tres familias mexicanas del siglo XVI,” in Historia Mexicana 122 (1981), 178. He does not mention any converso blood in the family.
10. Cortés [35:7], 161: “porque he deseado que Vuestra Alteza supiese las cosas desta tierra, que son tantas y tales que como ya en la otra relación escribí, se puede intitular de nuevo emperador della y con título y no menos mérito que el de Ale-maña que por la gracia de Dios Vuestra Sacra Majestad posee.…”
11. Cortés [35:7], 160.
12. Cortés added the following, in his fourth letter [35:7], to show that he had not forgotten his proposal: “Creo que con hacer yo esto, no le quedará a vuestra excelsitud más que hacer para ser monarca del mundo.” In his fifth letter, Cortés speaks of Charles V as the Emperor “en la tierra esta … a quien el universo por providencia divina obedesce y sirve” (Ibid., 143).
13. For a discussion, see Antonio Muro Orejón, “El Problema de los Reinos Indianos,” in AEA, 27, 45–56.
14. This was stressed by R. B. Merriman in The Rise of the Spanish Empire, 4 vols., New York 1918–38, 2, 221.
15. See, for example, Quentin Skinner, Visions of Politics, vol. 2: Renaissance Virtues, Cambridge 2002.
16. E. G. Thomazi, Les flottes d’or, Paris 1956.
17. See my Conquest [27:15], 569.
18. Fernand Braudel cit. Sevilla, Siglo XVI, ed. Carlos Martínez Shaw, Madrid 1993, 115.
Chapter 38
1.
“De los álamos vengo, madre,
De ver cómo los menea el aire.
De los álamos de Sevilla,
De ver mi linda amiga,
De los álamos vengo, madre,
De ver cómo los menea el aire.”
Villancico, c. 1500
2. Cit. Martínez Shaw [37:18], 14.
3. “Hércules me edificó / Julio Cesar me cercó de muros y torres altas / y el rey santo me ganó con Garci Pérez de Vargas.”
4. Cit. Morales Padrón [32:35], 42. Antoine de Lalaing noted when he was in Seville with the Archduke Philip in 1501 that the streets were “all bricked” (García Mercadal [2:57], 1, 473).
