Conquistador: Hernan Cortes, King Montezuma, and the Last Stand of the Aztecs

by Buddy Levy

  The appearance of those afflicted was grotesque, for they broke out in flaming pustules and weals that gouged their faces and bodies; some welts and blisters were so prevalent on the victims’ faces as to render them blind. The inexplicable epidemic caused panic and paralysis across the lacustrine district. The Aztecs long afterward remembered the pestilence and its symptoms: “Sores erupted on our faces, our breasts, our bellies; we were covered with agonizing sores from head to foot. The illness was so dreadful that no one could walk or move. The sick were so utterly helpless that they could only lie on their beds like corpses, unable to move their limbs or even their heads. They could not lie face down or roll from one side to the other. If they did move their bodies, they screamed with pain.”13

  Skin conditions were not entirely unknown to the Aztecs, who understood their minor forms as punishments meted out by the god Tezcatlipoca. But they had no experience with an epidemic of this magnitude, which partly explains why the Aztec soldiers were unable to pursue and finish off Cortés. People died in such numbers that even cremation was halted. Bodies were heaped into canals or taken by canoe to the middle of the lake and dumped without ritual or ceremony.14 Women grew too sick to grind maize, so that a serious food shortage developed, and for seventy days—the period coinciding precisely with Cortés’s crucial convalescence in Tlaxcala and Tepeaca—the general populace was too ill to function properly. The recently enthroned Cuitláhuac also contracted the disease.

  The Aztecs attempted to deal with the pestilence as best they could. Physicians treated the horrific sores with ancient remedies, employing their considerable knowledge of the medicinal properties of plants and animals. They sprinkled finely ground obsidian powder into the wounds of the afflicted, then wrapped them in plasters. They pressed special “bloodstones,” called eztetls, to the nostrils of the sick to stanch their nosebleeds, and they tried plants like sarsaparilla and jalap, and even crushed beetles, but none could remedy the scourge of the smallpox, against which the indigenous peoples of Mexico had no immunity.15 Most of these attempted remedies merely failed, but one actually further spread the disease: communal bathing. Ritual and curative bathing was a widespread, established practice in everyday life, used for general cleanliness but also to purge maladies. Unfortunately, one of the most common medicinal techniques—that of the steam bath or temazcalli—perfectly suited the spread of smallpox.

  A bather at a temazcalli entered through a low door into a low-slung stone dome fueled by woodstoves. He began tossing water onto the fire-heated walls, and he “was then enveloped in steam, and he switched himself violently with grasses. Often there would be another person there, particularly if the bather were an invalid, to massage him; and after the massage the bather would lie upon a mat to let the bath have its effect.”16 The touching of open sores, the sharing of infected water, and the breathing of the close communal air helped transmit the disease, and soon “the Great Rash” ravaged the mighty metropolis of Tenochtitlán and the rest of the Aztec empire.

  Innumerable Aztec warriors died from the disease, and many of those who lived only barely survived, stricken woefully, “disabled and paralyzed”17 by the pox, some permanently blinded. In less than three months body counts staggered the cities—in some cases smallpox claimed half of the population. The Aztecs lumbered about in a sickly daze, wondering yet again why their gods had forsaken them, why they were being punished. As the Aztec accounts sadly reported, “a great many died from this plague, and many others died of hunger. They could not get up to search for food, so they starved to death in their beds.”*40 18 Chronicler Francisco de Aguilar, who was there, noted the cosmic irony of the timing, observing that just “when the Christians were exhausted from war, God saw fit to send the Indians smallpox.”19

  While the pox decimated the Aztecs physically, it also worked against them psychologically. The Spaniards were immune to the plague’s effects, most having been exposed as children. Their immunity made them appear ever more powerful, even superhuman; it most certainly rekindled the notion (which had been at least contemplated by the late Montezuma) that these men were not men at all but gods.20

  THE catastrophic “Great Rash” smote friend and foe alike, and by late December 1520 it had taken not only the Aztec emperor Cuitláhuac but also Maxixcatzin, Cortés’s chief ally in Tlaxcala, as well as the kings of Tacuba, Chalco, and Cholula and the leader of the Tarascans. The deaths of these key leaders, especially of those in the city-states of the central plain, put Cortés in an unexpected position of authority in the region. He was called upon to suggest successors for those whom the smallpox had taken. In this way he was allowed to handpick the new ruler of Izúcar (one of Montezuma’s nephews) and the new king of Cholula.21 Both of these new leaders were positively disposed to Cortés, or were at least malleable, and they greatly strengthened Cortés’s growing political choke hold on the region.

  WHILE the Aztecs lay dying, Cortés fortified his position at Segura de la Frontera and watched his soldiers grow stronger by the day. He used the opportunity, and the safety of the hilltop stronghold, to take care of some crucial legal and diplomatic business. He penned a number of legal documents to justify the actions and decisions he had made during his expedition and to underscore his continued efforts to procure gold for the crown. He informed Spain that Velázquez and Narváez had been serious impediments to his progress, costing him time, money, and lives, and he explained his rationale in seizing Narváez’s ships, arms, and men.22 He understood that he would eventually have to answer for his actions, and he laid the groundwork for his own defense with this correspondence. One document, confirming that the entire army believed in the enterprise and agreeing that Cortés should remain captain-general and chief justice of Villa Rica, was signed by more than five hundred of his men.23

  He finished the second of his famous letters to the king (who Cortés had by now learned was also Holy Roman emperor Charles V as well as king of Germany), apprising him of the events since leaving Vera Cruz and of his present situation. He admitted to having temporarily lost Tenochtitlán, but he suggested, with his usual bravado, that this was only a minor setback: “I intend, as soon as such help arrives, to return to that country and its great city, and I believe, as I have already told Your Majesty, that it will shortly be restored to the state in which I held it before, and thus all our past losses shall be made good.”24 Cortés followed this confident claim with the rather bold suggestion (noting the tremendous similarities between Spain and Mexico) that the emperor formally call the newly discovered land “New Spain of the Ocean Sea,”25 adding that he had already been doing so in the emperor’s name and honor. Cortés closed by expressing the hope that a trustworthy legal emissary would be sent to “make an examination and inquiry”26 of his dealings to ascertain their legitimacy. The letter was dated October 30, 1520, though it would not in fact be sent (either delayed by bad weather, as Cortés claimed, or for political reasons) until March of the following year.

  Though his force had been greatly strengthened by the recent ship arrivals, Cortés decided to send four ships back to the islands for more arms, ammunition, horses, men, and political support. One captain was chosen to sail a ship to Jamaica to purchase mares for breeding, and another went to Santo Domingo to acquire horses and also to entreat the Royal Audience there to support the cause or at the very least not hinder it.27 The animals, ammunitions, and equipment would be paid for with gold ingots, which Cortés had hoarded for just this purpose.

  Some of the last of Narváez’s men reiterated their desire to return to the islands, and Cortés now consented, cleverly divesting himself of a few potentially mutinous captains. Among them was his friend and business associate Andrés de Duero, who he hoped might in time smooth Velázquez’s very ruffled feathers and serve as a kind of buffer between them. Cortés gave Duero a letter for his wife, Catalina Suárez Marcaida Cortés, and another for his brother-in-law, Juan Suárez, sending them both some gold bars and precious golden jewelry that
he had personally retained from Montezuma’s treasure.28

  Cortés conferred with Sandoval and determined that the towns of Jalacingo and Zautla, which lay to the northeast on the route to Vera Cruz, had to be subdued in a similar fashion to Tepeaca. Sandoval left with two hundred soldiers, twenty cavalry, twelve crossbowman, and a considerable force of Tlaxcalans, riding out on a monthlong expedition. He returned having taken these towns without the loss of a single Spaniard (though eight were badly injured, and three horses had been killed). He brought back two Spanish saddles and a number of bridles that the natives had absconded with and offered at their temples as idols. Trailing behind Sandoval, tethered to poles, were a “great spoil of women and boys…branded as slaves.”29

  These people, like the slaves taken and branded at the conclusion of the brief but brutal Tepeaca campaign, were distributed among the Spanish soldiers. Some discontent arose among the men, who argued that the best-looking slave women were always stolen or hidden away for the captains and that they received only the old and ugly women; there was much grumbling and fighting.30 Cortés’s solution to the problem was to sell the women to his men at public auction; the men paid a higher price for the women they most desired, and a lower price for the older women and those deemed less attractive. Cortés figured that in this way his men could have no grievance with him.

  His business in Segura de la Frontera was finally completed on December 13, 1520, and he prepared to set out for Tlaxcala, where he would spend Christmas. He wished to check on the progress of the brigantine project and shore up the final plans for his military reconquest. Before departing, Cortés placed artillery commander Francisco Orozco in charge of guarding the fortress at Segura de la Frontera, along with about sixty men, twenty of whom were still too wounded to march.31 Orozco was also to monitor the passes and roads leading to and from the city, keeping the route clear of hostiles.

  Cortés rode out on December 13, taking his position at the vanguard of twenty horsemen. He and the small cavalry would ride to Tlaxcala via Cholula, where he intended to gird their alliance, while his foot soldiers, under Diego de Ordaz, were to march straight to Tlaxcala without stopping. Cortés arrived in Cholula and was welcomed by the nobles, who well remembered his wrath and wished to appease him. Many of their highest lords had succumbed to smallpox, and Cortés was called upon to assist them in choosing new leaders, a role he happily fulfilled.32 He spent three days there tidying up these appointments before continuing on to Tlaxcala.

  Cortés’s pleasure in arriving back at the seat of his central allies was tempered by the news he received there: his dear friend and crucial supporter, the Tlaxcalan overlord Maxixcatzin, had perished from “the Great Rash.” He grieved deeply at his loss, entreating his captains and men to mourn by wearing black cloaks, and most of them did so. Remaining chiefs and elders, including Xicotenga the Elder and Chichimecatecle, asked him to help name a successor, and he suggested the eldest of Maxixcatzin’s legitimate sons, a boy of just twelve. With all the nobles attending, Cortés then “knighted him with his own hand,”33 likely the first such instance of formal knighting bestowed on an American Indian.34 Through Malinche, Cortés urged the young boy to act in the manner of his noble and honored father, whom all had respected and loved. The boy was then baptized, as was Xicotenga the Elder, both becoming Christians with, according to Bernal Díaz, “the greatest ceremony that at that time it was possible to arrange in Tlaxcala.”35

  Cortés then met with shipbuilder Martín López to discuss his progress and was pleased to discover that things were going well. López and his carpenters had completed much of the planking and many of the crossbeams. They were basing the design of the ships on one of those that had been left at Vera Cruz; the ship had been dismantled and, in an excruciatingly difficult operation, carried in pieces by Tlaxcalan porters over the mountains. Now López used it as a template on which to pattern the thirteen brigantines. Cortés could see his grand plan coming together, and he launched once more into aggressive action. “I then sent to Vera Cruz,” he wrote to Emperor Charles, “for all the iron and nails they had, and also for sails and rigging and other necessary things, and as we had no pitch I had certain Spaniards make it on a hill close by.”36 This gear was retained from one of the scuttled ships, confirming his foresight to use the materials again when needed. It required one thousand Tlaxcalan bearers to hike over the mountains and convey the needed gear back.

  Since September Martín López, his carpenters, and a great many Tlaxcalan assistants had been laboring in the dense forests on the western flanks of Matlalcueitl. Here López and his skilled carpenters stalked the woods looking for perfect oak and evergreen trees, which they felled and sawed into beams and planks. The rough-hewn timbers were then transported by Tlaxcalans across the fifteen or twenty miles of rolling scrub back to the city, where they were stacked and ordered for further refining, trimming, and dressing. This was merely the beginning of the most ambitious undertaking of the entire campaign, and it is still among the largest landlocked naval operation ever conducted in the history of warfare.

  Cortés had decided, since his narrow escape from Tenochtitlán, that the brigantines were the key to the whole conquest. But the task was so bold as to be almost incomprehensible. Martín López, by now personally invested monetarily in the project, believed it could be achieved, and to that end “he toiled in everything connected with [the brigantines’] construction, all day long, and often after dark and before dawn by the aid of candles, working himself and directing and encouraging other workmen, with the zeal of a man who comprehended the urgency of the case.”37

  The grand scheme was to carry the rough-cut planks and beams from the mountains to Tlaxcala and to fashion and finish them there, beyond Aztec reach and knowledge, whetting and drying and shaping them. Then the boats would be assembled at a makeshift shipyard on the edge of the Río Zahuapan, which López would dam to ensure a deep enough flow. The boats, which would be between forty and fifty feet long, would be tested for seaworthiness, checked for leaks, and then disassembled. Once they were deemed worthy, at Cortés’s order the boats were to be transported some fifty miles over the mountains and down into the Valley of Mexico, to Texcoco, where they would (assuming that everything went according to plan) be reassembled. Then, under the direction of López, an army of Tlaxcalan workers would dig a mile-long canal twelve feet deep and twelve feet wide, so that they could launch the reassembled armada of brigantines from a safe and defensible distance.

  The plan was overly ambitious—some might even say that it was insane. Nonetheless, as Christmas fell cold and clear over the Mexican highlands, it was the master plan of Hernán Cortés. His vision for the reoccupation—and ultimate reconquest—of the Aztec empire hinged on skeletal staves of timber plucked from the hillside of a dormant volcano.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  Return to the Valley of Mexico

  WHILE CORTÉS WAS FINALIZING HIS PLANS to return to the Valley of Mexico, the Aztecs foundered in confusion and despair. On December 4, 1520, the new king and warlord Cuitláhuac died after a brief battle with smallpox, leaving the Aztec rulership uncertain once again. The people who had just survived nearly three months of plague mourned for their short-lived ruler, praying and making sacrifices at his passing, but they had little time for proper tribute. They were still busy disposing of bodies fallen to the pox. They made one lengthy prayer to him, an incantation, as part of the deliberations used to contemplate and select his successor. “Who now shall order matters for the good of the people and the realm?” chanted the priests. “Who shall appoint the judges to minister justice to the people? Who shall bid the drum and the flute to sound, and gather together the veteran soldiers and the men mighty in battle?”1 Those questions would haunt the empire for two months, during which time the Aztecs lived without a ruler.

  The answer finally materialized in the form of Prince Cuauhtémoc,*41 nephew to both Montezuma and Cuitláhuac and son of King Ahuitzotl, the eighth emperor
of the Aztecs. The choice made sense given the dire conditions in the valley and the fractured imperial system. Cuauhtémoc had battle in his blood, and as a devout worshipper of Huitzilopochtli, he vehemently opposed any concessions to Christianity. His imperial parentage certainly played a role in his selection as well.

  Initially Cuauhtémoc had been among the cool-minded leaders who were against confrontation with the Spaniards, but that time had long since passed, and he in fact had led the throng to the base of the Palace of Axayacatl and cried out at the weakened and, in his mind, pathetic Montezuma as the puppet emperor stood on the parapet and attempted to calm the horde. One native source claims that Cuauhtémoc had thrown the stone that fatally wounded Montezuma.2 He was young and strong and pugnacious; Bernal Díaz described him as “not more than twenty-five years old, and elegant in his person…very valiant, and so terrible, that his followers trembled in his presence.”3 He had distinguished himself in the battles in the capital, and once installed as ruler, he rapidly took charge, sending spies and runners to report to him on the movements and condition of Cortés and his army.4