Conquest Cortes, Montezuma, and the Fall of Old Mexico

Contents

ILLUSTRATIONS
PREFACE
NOTES

I
ANCIENT MEXICO

1 Harmony and order
2 Palace of the white sedges
3 I see misfortune come
4 Not with love but with fear

II
SPAIN OF THE GOLDEN AGE

5 The golden years begin
6 The Pope must have been drunk
7 Better lands have never been discovered
8 What I saw was so splendid
9 A great Lord born in brocade
10 Sweating, hunger and hard work

III
TO KNOW THE SECRETS OF THE LAND

11 A gentlemanly pirate
12 The advantage of having horse and cannon
13 As much as where Solomon took the gold for the temple
14 A dragon's head for a "Florentine" glass
15 They received him with trumpets
16 If I continue, shall I win?
17 To leave none of us alive
18 This cruelty restored order
19 Another new world of great cities and towers

IV
CORTÉS AND MONTEZUMA

20 An image of Quetzalcoatl
21 Bees and spiders make works of art
22 Something must be done for the Lord

V
CORTÉS' PLANS UNDONE

23 The King, our lord, is more King than other Kings
24 A voice very deep and hoarse as if it came from a vault
25 To cut off Don Hernando's ears
26 The blood of the chieftains ran like water
27 As a song you were born, Montezuma
28 Fortune spins her wheel

VI
THE SPANISH RECOVERY

29 The sweetness of death by the obsidian knife
30 It was convenient to impose the said punishment
31 My principal intention and motive in making this war
32 They were all lords

VII
THE BATTLE FOR TENOCHTITLAN

33 Remember the bold hearts
34 A great harvest of captives
35 Such mad dogs

VIII
AFTERMATH

36 The general exodus
37 The songs and voices scarcely ceased
38 The clause in Adam's will which excludes France
39 An absolute monarch

EPILOGUE
GLOSSARY

APPENDICES
I The population of old Mexico
II A summary of Montezuma's tribute
III Mexican calendars
IV Spanish money c. 1520
V Cortés' ladies

GENEALOGIES
I The emperors of Mexico
II The Spanish and imperial royal families
III Cortés and his relations
IV The transformation of the Mexican royal family
V Cortés' arrival in the nobility

UNPUBLISHED DOCUMENTS
1 Cortés' father Martín Cortés in Medellín
2 Cortés' grandfather Diego Alfon Altamirano
3 Cortés' journey to America, 1506
4 A letter from Cortés in Mexico, 6 July 1519
5 Montezuma's concession of power, 1520
6 New evidence about the death of Catalina
7 Cortés, art and loyalty
8 Diego Velázquez's punishments

CHAPTER NOTES
SOURCES
INDEX

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