The Complete Idiot's Guide to 2012 - Dr. Synthia Andrews Nd [9]
Climate Change
Finally, there was a substantial drought during this time period initiated by climate change. Water was already a limited commodity needing careful management. A series of droughts may well have been the turning point for the Maya.
We may never know the true circumstances, but the end result is that Mayan culture disappeared from the forefront of the Mesoamerican scene before the Spanish came in the 1500s.
Spanish Conquest
The Spanish conquest of the Americas rightly starts with Christopher Columbus. The stories he brought to Spain of the riches, animals, and resources in the “New World” sparked the imagination of Hernando Cortés Pizarro. Setting sail from Spain in 1505, Cortés landed in Hispaniola where he lived for several years. In 1519 he sailed to Cuba to claim it from the natives for Spain. In February 1519 he sailed for the coast of Yucatán. With 11 ships, approximately 500 to 600 soldiers, and 16 horses he landed at Tabasco on the northern coast of the Yucatán peninsula.
Celestial Connection
You probably know that Christopher Columbus was looking for a new trade route to India and Japan when he discovered the Americas in 1492. Instead of finding India, he found what are now the Bahamian Islands. He named the first island he landed on San Salvador, despite the fact that the inhabitants had already named it Guahanal. Columbus did not actually reach South America until his third voyage, in 1498. Many men from his first voyage stayed and settled throughout the islands. The main island inhabited by the Spanish was Hispaniola, now Santa Domingo.
Military Conquest
The remnants of the once mighty Maya lived primarily in the Yucatán. Their large cities like Chichen Itza and Mayapan had already fallen through warfare with neighboring tribes. The region was fragmented into 16 city-states, each independently governed although they shared the same belief systems. The Maya initially received Cortés with friendship and presented him with gifts, some freely and others to forestall conflict. One way or the other, Cortés received the gift of 20 women. He took one of them, named Malinche, to become both his mistress and interpreter. Malinche has been the subject of much dispute. Many see her as a traitor to her people. She was born into a noble Aztec family but when her father died she was put into slavery. She ended up a slave in the Yucatán, where she learned the Mayan language in several dialects. Her ability to interpret for Cortés allowed negotiation that saved thousands of lives, making her essential to the success of Cortés’s campaign to conquer the Aztec. She eventually converted to Catholicism and gave birth to Cortés’s son, the first “Mexican.”
Codex Cues
It is said that the Aztec and Maya welcomed Cortés into their cities, believing him to be the return of the white god Quetzalcoatl, the Great Plumed Serpent God of Mesoamerica, whose return was anticipated. However, modern historians disagree. Documents that suggest this have been influenced by the Spanish and may even be entirely of Spanish origin.
In 1519, Cortés invaded the Aztec capitol of Tenochtitlán. He destroyed the city, rebuilding it as Mexico City in 1521. By the end of 1521, after many betrayals and brutal massacres, the Aztec empire fell.
Conquest of the Maya was more difficult because there was no single political center to overthrow. Each Mayan city-state fiercely resisted the Spanish and each had to be overcome one by one. In the end it was not Cortés who subjugated the Maya. A member of his original war party returned with his own army. He waged war with the Maya through three separate campaigns between 1527 and