Could there be a sincere 500th anniversary celebration for the discovery of Mexico by the Europeans? Or not? At the time of this writing, there seem to be none planned.
So, I’d like to review the history and raise some of the questions why, since Columbus and his discovery of the Caribbean islands is celebrated all over Mexico.
In 1517, Hernandez de Cordoba landed on what is now the Yucatan peninsula, following in the scrabbled voyages of Columbus and maintaining that this too was another island of the Indies. Cordoba died within a few months of his landing.
Two years later, another man would venture into the new land, which had already been dubbed New Spain, with the stated missions of Catholic conversion and benign engagement. Not surprisingly, he would find himself at war, first with many of the land’s fractured tribes and then with its powerful and distinctly un-European Aztec empire. This man was Hernando Cortés.
Cortés, by most accounts, was a superb statesman, leader and military tactician, as well as devout Catholic who attempted to follow his nation’s and his church’s “precepts of engagement,” which were much more humanitarian and principled than popularly thought. Cited in William H. Prescott’s “History of the Conquest of Mexico,” are 30 rules given to Cortés by his superior in Cuba, Governor Velasquez, as he ventured into the new territories. Among the 30 rules, one point recurred with considerable emphasis: the requirement to avoid harming innocent inhabitants in any way, their livelihoods, their property, and their women (yes, as modern as Star Trek).
With such a set of formal humanitarian rules, Cortés arrived in Mexico hoping the “primitives” would witness an obviously superior culture, and that their assimilation into it would be fluid and peaceful. This didn’t turn out to be the case, given the Spaniards’ bizarre teaching, that is, that the natives were converted to Catholic doctrine and then informed that, as converts, they were guilty of terrible sins and were going to spend eternity in hell. Needless to say, this was a hard sell.
Still, while determined to maintain his allegiance to Velasquez’s rules and remain a pious disciple of Christ, he needed to get this mission accomplished. To that end, he could not resist the practicality of the sword, a tool more convincing than the tongue. And more efficient.
Oppressive Catholic dogma and bad communication skills set Cortés on a course for notoriety that would last for centuries. His small military expedition into Yucatan (about 500 men and just over a dozen horses) in 1519 suggests that his “High Command” send him as explorer and missionary, with no plans for war. Despite Cortés’s initial cautions, the territories into which he advanced were tribal strongholds whose warriors interpreted Cortés’s march as an invasion. The native military musters vastly outnumbered his own, and the natives everywhere sensed easy victory.
To avoid violent clashes, his army tried to ply the Mexican tribes with good will and an honest proclamation of their intentions: to free the peoples of their heathen beliefs and to trade, mine or exploit the territory for gold – pause for this – with the appeal that they needed it as a heart medicine.
This is the first of a four-part series that will run weekly through January.