Reasons for Cortes' Journey
Hernan Cortes was a Spanish explorer. He is famous for his march across Mexico and his conquering of the Aztec empire in Mexico. Hernan Cortes went on a journey to find gold,food, and spices. He had 500 men on the voyage as well as a lot of horses. He only had 2 cannons and he had a lot of guns. Indians accompanied Cortes as well.
http://www.pbs.org/kpbs/theborder/history/timeline/1.html
A video of Cortes Journey:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/cortes-and-the-aztecs-pt-2-4/5144.html
Dona Marina
Dona Marina was an American Indian of Aztec/Nahua who played a critically important role in the Spanish conquest of Mexico. Everybody thought she was a princess of a Nahuatl (the Aztec language) speaking tribe.During her youth and because of family politics, she was sold to coastal slave traders. In 1519, Marina was presented to Cortes along with 20 other female slaves, as a piece of offering. Cortes found out that Marina spoke the Aztec language. Since Marina spoke Mayan as well as Aztec, Cortes had a way of communicating with most of the Aztec tribes. She served as a translator, negotiator, cultural mediator, and an adviser. Marina helped Cortes though his journey by finding him passageways and warning him and his army of danger. She even gave birth to Cortes' child in 1522.
Cortes' Description of Tenochtitlan
"This great city of Tenochtitlán is built on the salt lake, and no matter by what road you travel there are two leagues from the main body of the city to the mainland. There are four artificial causeways leading to it, and each is as wide as two cavalry lances. The city itself is as big as Seville or Córdoba. The main streets are very wide and very straight; some of these are on the land, but the rest and all the smaller ones are half on land, half canals where they paddle their canoes. All the streets have openings in places so that the water may pass from one canal to another. Over all these openings, and some of them are very wide, there are bridges. . . . There are, in all districts of this great city, many temples or houses for their idols. They are all very beautiful buildings. . . . Amongst these temples there is one, the principal one, whose great size and magnificence no human tongue could describe, for it is so large that within the precincts, which are surrounded by very high wall, a town of some five hundred inhabitants could easily be built. All round inside this wall there are very elegant quarters with very large rooms and corridors where their priests live. There are as many as forty towers, all of which are so high that in the case of the largest there are fifty steps leading up to the main part of it and the most important of these towers is higher than that of the cathedral of Seville. . . ."
http://www.eduplace.com/ss/hmss/7/unit/act7.1blm.html
Cortes describes the capital of Mexico, Tenochtitlan, by stating that it is a very beautiful place. The city has many public squares where people could set up their markets. In these markets, an individual can find all kinds of merchandises, such as food, jewels of gold and silver, medicine, lead, copper, shells, snails, other types of animals, feathers, and etc. They sell everything by either measuring it or by a number. This city also has many temples or idols that are found in houses. Altogether, there are forty towers which are well-built and one of them has fifty steps leading to the entrance. Tenochtitlan contains magnificent houses, even the wealthy.
War with the Aztecs
Aamir Salim