Aztec emperor

“ To bring home captives to grace his coronation was ever the first duty of an Aztec monarch, and Montezuma II., who led his armies at once against a rebel tribe, returned in triumph with a goodly throng of victims for the gods. Never had Tenochtitlan known so brilliant a scene. With music and games and dances, and the awful pomp of priestly ceremonies, the exultant Aztecs celebrated the coronation of their emperor. From far and near the people flocked to see the magnificent sight, and even some noble Tlascalans, the hereditary enemies of the Aztecs, were present in disguise. ”

“ But when the people heard their emperor declare that the ruthless invaders of their city were his guests and friends, a frenzy of patriotic wrath swept through the multitude. "Base Aztec!" they cried, "coward! woman! fit only to weave and spin!" and, before the Spaniards could shield him, Montezuma was struck senseless to the ground by a shower of stones and arrows. A sudden horror at their own deed instantly smote the Aztecs, who scattered in every direction with groans of bitter mourning, leaving the great square silent and deserted. ”

“ None trembled more than the Aztec emperor on his throne among the mountains. He read in these events the dark character traced by the finger of Destiny.2 He felt his empire melting away like a morning mist. He might well feel so. Some of the most important cities in the neighbourhood of Cholula, intimidated by the fate of that capital, now sent their envoys to the Castilian camp, tendering their allegiance, and propitiating the favour of the strangers by rich presents of gold and slaves. Montezuma, alarmed at these signs of defection, took counsel again of his impotent deities ”

“ Even from the summary and incomplete indications here given, it is seen that the Aztec state possessed many excellent institutions and elements of an advanced civilisation, and, despite the co-existence of certain limitations which have led some to doubt the development claimed for them, our interest in the origin and history of the mysterious races of Andhuac is stimulated to wonder and admiration for what we do know of their empire, and to boundless regret for the disappearance of all, save the few vestiges which remain to excite a curiosity they are inadequate to appease. ”

“ By terror alone were these subject peoples ruled. No love or loyalty could they have for the distant emperor who exacted from them a tribute so grinding that it drove them to frequent revolt. Then would the Aztec armies mercilessly ravage their lands and carry off the rebels by hundreds to slavery and sacrifice.
Hardly less dreaded than the tribute-gatherers were the Aztec merchants, who took high rank in Mexico, and travelled supported by small armies through the wide empire to the countries beyond its bounds. ”

“ A pathetic figure is that of this Aztec king, gifted with some of the highest qualities of his race, venerated during a long and prosperous reign almost as a demi-god, only to be humbled to the very dust. The starting point of his downfall was his superstition, for had he listened to his generals rather than to his priests Cortes and his handful of adventurers would never have left the sea-coast alive. ”

“ Finding himself, in two years, emperor of Mexico, after being, at the commencement of that period, nothing more than commander of a regiment, it may be pardoned if he was bewildered by the rapidity of his rise, and if the air he breathed in his extraordinary ascent was too etherial for a man of so excitable a temperament. ”

“ Many of the best men in modern Mexico trace with pride their descent from Aztec kings and nobles. A uniform and rich language with its system of phonetic writing, the introduction of horses and beasts of burden, the use of iron and leather, improved systems of mining and agriculture which have brought under civilisation vast tracts of land, and increased the variety and quality of crops — these and countless other resources, unknown and unknowable to the Mexicans, have revolutionised the conditions of their existence beyond anything their ancestors could have dreamed. ”

“ Espionage was also established on the emperor in his intercourse with courtiers, by placing in the apartment the page Orteguilla, who had acquired a fair knowledge of Aztec. Of prepossessing appearance, agreeable and sprightly in manner, the youth became a favorite with the captive king. Among other things, the little spy gave the monarch an insight into Spanish customs and proceedings at home and abroad, into the power and grandeur of the Castilian king, and into the mysteries of the faith. ”

“ A perpetual coming and going of Aztec ambassadors accompanied the march from Vera Cruz. These unfortunate messengers, burdened with conflicting and impossible instructions, must have felt themselves sent upon a fool's errand, pulled hither and thither according as Montezuma's hopes or fears happened to be in the ascendant. The task of turning back the obnoxious strangers, but without offending them, lest, being gods, they might wreak vengeance on the Empire, was laid upon them. ”

“ Thus fish was served at the banquets of the emperor Montezuma which twenty-four hours before had been caught in the Gulf of Mexico, two hundred miles away. Thus too the news was carried when any war was going on, and as the messengers ran to acquaint the court with the movements of the royal armies, the people by the way knew whether the tidings were good or bad by the dress of the courier. But the training of warriors was the chief end and aim of all Aztec institutions. ”

“ Like the Incas, the Aztec emperors [7] returned from campaign after campaign loaded with trophies and embarrassed with strings of captives from the vanquished peoples who had dared oppose this powerful confederation. The rich tropical regions of both the eastern and western slopes of the tableland of Anahuac thus paid tribute to the Aztecs, as well as the boundless resources of the south. ”

“ The very ignorance and naïveté of the conquerors are good warrants for the truth of much that they wrote, for as they were illiterate men (even Cortes had but a scanty store of learning, gathered during his brief course of two careless years at Salamanca) without sufficient knowledge to invent descriptions of the Mexican laws, customs, religion, and institutions, the facts which they state, and in which they agree, are indubitable. The Aztec Empire possessed some highly developed institutions ”

“ The gaudy trappings have the usual theatrical effect, and no doubt serve, together with the deep peals of the organ, the dim light of the interior, the monotone of the priest's voice, in an unknown tongue, profoundly to impress the poor and ignorant masses. The largest number of devotees, nearly all of whom, as intimated, are women, were seen kneeling before the small chapel where rest the remains of Iturbide, first emperor of Mexico, whose tomb bears the simple legend: "The Liberator." ”

“ The Aztec civilisation, which attained its highest development in Tenochtitlan and Texcoco, never reached the level of the Maya culture, nor did its cities contain any such admirable buildings as those whose ruins still delight and mystify the traveller in Yucatan and Central America. Outside its few centres of learning and luxury, the numerous tribes under Montezuma's rule were dwellers in caves, living by the chase and in no way sharing in the benefits of the Aztec polity. ”

“ I have elsewhere read that the Aztec system was a purely patriarchal one, and that such slaves as were not destined for human sacrifices had everything but their freedom; it being also against the law to sell them, while their children were all born free, and they could hold property of their own. ”

“ Between the years 1536 and 1540 the history of the Mexican viceroyalty was uneventful, save in the gradual progressive efforts made not only by Mendoza, but by the Emperor himself, in endeavoring to model and consolidate the Spanish empire on our continent. Schools were established; hospitals were erected; the protection of the Indians, under the apostolic labors of Las Casas was honestly fostered, and every effort appears to have been zealously made to give a permanent and domestic character to the population which found its way rapidly into New Spain. ”

“ Iturbide, Emperor of Mexico.—1821—1824.
It will be seen by the Plan of Iguala, that Mexico was designed to become an independent sovereignty under Ferdinand VII. or, in the event of his refusal, under the Infantes Don Carlos and Don Francisco de Paula. Iturbide was still a royalist—not a republican; and it is very doubtful whether he would ever have assented to popular authority, even had his life been spared to witness the final development of the revolution. ”

“ The city was likewise divided into four districts, in which people of the separate tribes lived, each under its own chief. As the country was hemmed in on all sides by the Aztec Empire, there was no commerce, and the chief pursuit was agriculture. The Tlascalans were a brave, hardy, and war-like people, well advanced in military science, and having something very like a feudal system of chivalry, in that the different chiefs or lords had each his own standard and crest, and the soldiers were uniformed in their leaders' colours and owed him allegiance; Xicotencatl's. ”

“ In November, General Garza headed a revolt in the northern provinces. Santa Anna, then governor of Vera Cruz, declared againt the emperor. General Echavari, sent by Iturbide to crush the future president of Mexico, resolved not to stem the torrent of public opinion, and joined the general he had been commissioned to capture. Guadalupe Victoria,—driven to his fastnesses by the emperor, who was unable to win the incorruptible patriot, descended once more from the mountain forests, where he had been concealed, and joined the battalions of Santa Anna. ”

“ In 1535, Mendoza arrived in Mexico with letters for the Audiencia, and was received with all the pomp and splendor becoming the representative of royalty. His instructions were couched in the most liberal terms, for, after all, it was chiefly on the personal integrity and discretion of a viceroy that the Spanish sovereigns were obliged to rely for the sure foundation of their American empire. Of the desire of the Emperor and Empress to act their parts justly and honestly in the opening of this splendid drama in America there can be no doubt. Their true policy was to develope, not to destroy ”

“ For several generations they lived, like their remote ancestors, the Red Men of the Woods, as hunters, fishers, and trappers, but at last their prince or chief cazique was powerful enough to be called king. The rule of this Aztec prince, beginning A. D. 1440, marked the beginning of their greatness as a race. It became a rule of their kingdom that every new king must gain a victory before being crowned; and thus by the conquest of a new nation furnish a supply of captives to gratify their tutelary deity by the necessary human sacrifices. ”

“ From the moment of his coronation the Aztec sovereign lived in an atmosphere of adulation unknown to the mightiest potentate of the old world. Reverenced as a god, the
haughtiest nobles, sovereigns in their own land, humbled themselves before him; absolute in power, the fate of thousands depended upon a gesture of his hand. ”

“ Nezahualpilli, the wise king of Texcuco, the valued relative and adviser of the Aztec royal house, made an address at the coronation which has been preserved.
"Who can doubt," he exclaimed at the close, "that the Aztec empire has reached the zenith of its greatness! Rejoice, happy people, and thou, happy youth, doubt not that our Great Deity will keep thee safe upon thy throne through many long and glorious years."
Now let us try to imagine this young heir to a splendid kingdom, just ascending the steps of the throne, clothed in all the majesty which the customs of his country allowed. ”

“ The contrast between the steel-clad cavaliers of Castile, whose burnished armor blazed and glittered in the brilliant torch-light, and rung under their heavy martial tramp upon the marble floor, and the comparatively fairy figures of the gaudily apparelled Aztecs, was as strong as could possibly be presented in a scene like this. The costumes and customs of each were matter of wonder and admiration to the other. The Aztec trembled at the mysterious power, the incomprehensible weapons, of the white man. ”

“ The Aztecs were frightened when they saw the thousand soldiers Cortes now brought up against them, for it looked as if the new troops had come down from the skies to the help of the Spaniards. When the battle was fiercest, the broken-spirited emperor went out to plead with the natives to stop their fighting. This made them so angry that they hurled stones at him and he died of a broken heart. The hatred of his own people was even harder to bear than Spanish cruelty. ”

“ Roger interrupted.
"There is, on the west, another great sea like this on the east, which stretches away no man knows whither; and between these two seas all the peoples, save one, acknowledge the dominion of Mexico--for although we are in alliance, the Aztecs have of late years taken the lead, for they have had very great monarchs, and are more war loving than we of Tezcuco; and our kings, and those of Tlacopan, acknowledge the Aztecs to be the leading power, and give to their king the title of Emperor.
"We maintain our own laws and usages. ”