Conquistadors

Hernando Cortes Francisco Pizarro

• Hernando Cortes was a Spanish conquistador who landed in Mexico in 1519.

Hernando Cortes and the Aztecs

• The Aztec emperor was named Moctezuma. (commonly referred to as Montezuma)

• The Aztecs thought that he was a God and sent him gifts.

•Aztec Greetings - start at 6:19

• Cortes led the Spaniards and their Native American allies to the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan.

• Outnumbered, hundreds of Spaniards were killed in 1519.

• In 1521, Cortes defeated the Aztecs, and Tenochtitlan was renamed Mexico City, which today is the capital of Mexico.

Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan

Mexican capital of Mexico City

How did Cortes defeat the Aztecs?

• The Spaniards had superior technology, such as guns and cannons.

Aztec drawing representing patients affected by smallpox at different stages.

• Smallpox killed hundreds of Aztecs.

• The Aztecs wrongfully believed that Cortes was a God.

The final conquest of Tenochtitlan by Cortes and his allies.

• The Spaniards had Native American allies on their side.

Francisco Pizarro and the Incas

• Francisco Pizarro was the Spanish conquistador that attacked the Incan Empire in 1532.

When Pizarro arrived, the Incans were in the midst of a

civil war

Atahualpa was the more powerful Incan Emperor

Leading about 150 men, Pizarro landed on the northern coast of the Inca Empire in early 1523.

• Don’t write:•The Spanish told Incan messengers that they wished only to admire the Incan ruler Atahualpa.•Pizarro decided that only a quick, brutal attack would give his men an advantage over the thousands of Incan warriors. With this plan in mind, he called for a meeting with Atahualpa. But Pizarro waited safely behind with his army and sent a Spanish monk in his place. •The monk offered Atahualpa a Bible and told the chief that he should give up his Inca beliefs.  Atahualpa was angry and threw the Bible to the ground saying, "I will be no man's slave. I am greater than any prince upon the earth…. As for my faith, I will not change it." •When the monk reported that the Inca chief would not become a Christian, Pizarro and his troops came out of hiding , killing more than 5,000 Inca. Atahualpa was taken prisoner. 

Don’t Write:Atahualpa offered the Spanish a room filled with gold up to where his arm reached, and two more with silver in exchange for his release.

• After his capture, Atahualpa gave gold and silver to the Spanish in return for his freedom.

Atahualpa was declared a heretic for refusing to recognize Christ's faith and for proclaiming himself Son of the Sun. Atahualpa was sentenced to be burned at the stake, against the wishes of Pizarro.

• Atahualpa was killed after the Spanish received their riches.

• Pizarro then founded the city of Lima, which today is the capital of Peru.

Statue of Francisco Pizarro, Plaza de Armas, Lima, Peru

Coffin of Francisco Pizarro, the Tomb of the Conquistador, the Cathedral, Plaza Mayor, Lima, Peru

Don’t Write: •In February 1536,  an army of 200,000 Inca warriors went to fight the Spanish.•But the Inca failed because most supplies had been used up in a civil war only a short time before the Spanish arrived. •The Inca retreated  into the Andes Mountains.  •There they continued to fight the Spanish until 1572, when the Spanish finally defeated them.

Two Empires Destroyed

Why so quickly and easily?

First , the Spanish weapons were better.

They fought with cannons

and crossbow

as well as metal armor, horses, spears and swords made of iron and early firearms.

"Their skin is white, as chalk…. Their dogs are great monsters with flat ears and long tongues which hang out." These are the words used by Aztec messengers who tried to describe what they saw when they met the Spanish for the first time in Mexico.

"Their battle dress and their weapons are all made of iron…. They are carried on the backs of large deer [horses] wherever they like to go.

"A ball of stone flies out of their bellies and rains fire…. If the ball hits a tree, it blows away in splinters, as though a magician had blown it away from inside."

The Aztec, with bronze and copper

shields, stone knives, and cloth armor,

were no match for

them.

Second, the Spanish and the Aztec came from very different cultures. Don’t Write: They had different ways of living and believing.  Moctezuma believed that Cortes might have been a god, so he allowed Cortez to walk freely into the capital city. But Cortes saw the Aztec culture as something evil to be destroyed and replaced by the Christian faith.  The two groups even fought by different rules. The Aztec usually took captives to kill as sacrifices to their gods. The Spanish, however, fought to kill their enemies on the battlefield.

Third, the Spanish took advantage of the weakened and rebellious condition of the Aztec and Inca empires.  Many tribes were angry against the Aztec, so they were willing to guide the Spanish through their territory and  help them win their battles. Tragically, the Spanish then turned and fought those helpful tribes once the Spanish got what they wanted.

Finally, disease brought by the Europeans killed many Aztec and Inca. Smallpox and measles, which the Aztec and Inca had never been exposed to, spread rapidly through their empires. Disease killed off many in their armies, and killed off many leaders too, leaving the Aztec and Inca even weaker.

In some areas more than 90 percent of the population died as the result of the Spanish takeover.     With no one to stop them,  rich Spanish nobles took over the land and forced the Aztec into slavery on farms and in silver mines.   

The chart on the right shows the population decline among the Aztec and the Inca after the arrival of the Spanish.

Portuguese built an empire in the AmericasBecause of treaty, their empire was not as large as the Spanish one

• 1494, Treaty of Tordesillas drew imaginary line through Atlantic Ocean

– Everything west, including most of then-undiscovered Americas, would belong to Spain

– Everything to east would be Portuguese

– Only Brazil remained as Portuguese colony

Treaty• Heavy Brazilian jungles made

mining, farming difficult

• Portuguese in no hurry to settle

• 1530s, colonists slowly moved in, mostly along Atlantic coast

– Established huge farming estates, as in Spanish lands

– First used Native American, then African slave, labor to work on farms

Colonization

The Portuguese in Brazil

• Scramble to establish colonies and empires in new lands• Spain first to successfully settle in the Americas

• First areas settled by Spanish, Caribbean islands, Hispaniola, Cuba

• No gold

• Spanish introduced encomienda system there

Spain in Caribbean

• Conquistadors given land by Spanish King and Native Americans are forced to work the land

• Rebels were killed

Encomienda

• Disastrous system for Native Americans

• Mistreatment, overwork took toll on population

• Europeans spread new diseases

Millions Died

Spain Builds an Empire

Life in the Spanish Empire

• With Mexico & Peru, Spain gained control of huge empire in Americas

• Spanish king chose officials, or viceroys, to govern American holdings

• Spanish colonial economy based on gold, silver mining, farming

• Spanish drafted Native Americans for labor in mines, on farms

Beginnings of Slavery

• Disease, mistreatment took toll on native population

• Some appalled at treatment

• One reformer, Bartolomé de Las Casas recommended replacing Native Americans as laborers with imported African slaves

• Slave labor soon became common practice in Americas

Triangular Trade

Middle Passage – passage across the Atlantic Ocean from West Africa to the Americas this was the route of the African American slave trade

The slave ship Brookes with 482 people packed onto the decks. The drawing of the slave ship Brookes was distributed by the Abolitionist Society in England as part of their campaign against the slave trade, and dates from 1789.

Interior of a Slave Ship, a woodcut illustration from the publication, A History of the Amistad Captives, reveals how hundreds of slaves could be held within a slave ship. Tightly packed and confined in an area with just barely enough room to sit up, slaves were known to die from a lack of breathable air.

• Africans were crowded and chained cruelly aboard slave ships.

"...the excessive heat was not the only thing that rendered their situation intolerable. The deck, that is the floor of their rooms, was so covered with the blood and mucus which had proceeded from them in consequence of the flux, that it resembled a slaughterhouse."

-Alexander Falconbridge, a surgeon aboard slave ships and later the governor of a British colony for freed slaves in Sierra Leone.

Frequently, slaves were permitted on deck in small groups for brief periods, where the crew would encourage, and many times force, captives to dance for exercise.

"Exercise being deemed necessary for the preservation of their health they are sometimes obliged to dance when the weather will permit their coming on deck. If they go about it reluctantly or do not move with agility, they are flogged…”

Taken from Alexander Falconbridge, An Account of the Slave Trade on the Coast of Africa.

Heading for Jamaica in 1781, the ship Zong was nearing the end of its voyage. It had been twelve weeks since it had sailed from the west African coast with its cargo of 417 slaves. Water was running out. Then, compounding the problem, there was an outbreak of disease. The ship's captain, reasoning that the slaves were going to die anyway, made a decision. In order to reduce the owner's losses he would throw overboard the slaves thought to be too sick to recover. The voyage was insured, but the insurance would not pay for sick slaves or even those killed by illness. However, it would cover slaves lost through drowning.

The captain gave the order; 54 Africans were chained together, then thrown overboard. Another 78 were drowned over the next two days. By the time the ship had reached the Caribbean,132 persons had been murdered.

• Diseases, such as dysentery, malaria, and smallpox killed thousands of Africans.

• Between 1699 and 1845 there were 55 successful African uprisings on slave ships.

William Snelgrave, from A New Account of Some Parts of Guinea, and the Slave Trade

• From 13% - 20% of the Africans aboard slave ships died during the Middle Passage.