The Aztec Empire VS The Spanish Conquistadors

this video is sponsored by the great courses plus at the time of first contact with the spanish conquistadors the aztecs were the most powerful civilization in north america they were rich militarily organized and in constant expansion and yet the most well-known of all miss american cultures was about to meet its end let's find out why [Music] was the capital of the azdek empire it was a humongous city for the time with a population of about 200 000 people with 60 000 people recorded in the markets every day as their life was very much economy and trade based to give you perspective no other european city at the time had that kind of population with paris having only about 150 000 people they had schools called the houses of the youth and they also had teams of public service workers that kept the city clean they had a house of song or in other words public theater a zoo and an aquarium the empire was centered in the valley of mexico it stretched all the way down to guatemala and had 450 tribute states within its influence and a number of client states which didn't pay tribute but needed to help to protect the borders tenacity land was officially established in 1325 and it rose in the middle of a lake the spanish called it the venice of the new world it had numerous canals and reasonable canoe traffic it occupied 13.5 square kilometers it was massive originally the aztecs were wanderers and nomadic people that had left their original land aslan and migrated south we don't really know why nor do we know where exactly aslan was located although some people speculate it could have been somewhere in modern day california was aslan real was it mythical no way to know for sure also because aztec books were pretty much fabricated for propaganda purposes by the half-brother of king montezuma the first who had every other previous history book burnt the aztec people were very clean in terms of personal cleanliness and although it might sound incredible they had the habit of taking water from the nearby springs and sell it at the market so basically they drank bottled water they loved art music dancing which they called singing with your feet and poetry was highly respected there were also people prone to war initially they were very popular as mercenaries for other clans until they established their own powerful city using the warrior skills they had mastered to their advantage they worshipped various gods who required human sacrifices and performed so many on a daily basis that their temples were surrounded by stakes with the skulls of the sacrificial victims attached to them on the inauguration of the seventh face of their main temple between 10 000 to 80 000 people were sacrificed early spanish accounts telling us that there were so many skulls it was impossible to count them the main temple was about 60 meters tall and on the top it had two temples one red and one blue dedicated to different gods the sacrifices were particularly brutal as they ripped off the hearts of sacrificial victims while they were alive the nostitlan was a place of life and death beauty and brutal violence the wario class was huge all boys were trained to be warriors both from the lower classes and the upper classes although the children of the nobles would be sent to specialized schools warriors protected the transit of tribute and their armies were immediately dispatched if an area didn't provide their trade tribute there were two classes of elite warriors the eagle warriors and the jaguar warriors in aztec society they would be referred to as one order which was one of the highest ranking of all warrior classes entry into these elite military orders was very difficult an aztec warrior noble or otherwise would have to prove himself worthy on the battlefield before he could be accepted to the ranks of these battle-hardened full-time warriors the aztec eagle warriors had their heads adorned in colourful feathers and shrouds representing the animal symbol and must have been a splendor for the sight the jaguar warriors were the sister order of the eagle warriors and some of the most elite warriors in the aztec army their style and uniform was based on obviously representing the jaguar with a warrior being dressed in animal skins and a helmet or shroud in the shape of the head of a jaguar the aztecs were very well organized they had a wide range of weapons spears slings but what caught the eye and the attention of the spanish conquistadors was the aztec sword which was a wooden bat with double-edged obsidian blades so sharp that according to spanish accounts those swords were able to cut the head of a horse clean in the next section we will talk more about hernan cortes the historical figure we'll talk about the spanish and how they managed to first defeat the aztecs on the battlefield and subsequently take will siege and take their capital city but before doing that i'd like to mention the sponsor that made this video possible the great courses plus the great courses plus is a very fitting sponsor for my channel and the kind of content i produce it is a fantastic addition to my own personal academic research because it contains many courses taught by very knowledgeable professors about a wide range of topics from history to maths science and much more now through your subscription you get access to their entire library which is huge we're talking about over 11 000 video lectures and that's what really is important that i'd like to underline is these are university level lectures taught by phd professors it's really really good quality stuff one of the courses that i've recently been watching is maya to aztec ancient mesoamerica revealed taught by professor edwin barnhart phd this is a massive course we're talking about 48 highly detailed video lectures and the presenter dr barnhart is the director of the maya exploration center and holds a phd from the university of texas at austin excellent speaker excellent presenter very very knowledgeable highly suggested now the great courses plus is giving you a great offer with a free trial it's free so you've got nothing to lose and everything to gain because the site really is one of my favorite and at the same time by subscribing to the great courses plus you will be supporting my work at the metatron's channel please visit thegreatcoursesplus.com metatron or click the link in the description below to start your free trial today arriving after a very long and difficult journey by ship hernan cortes was a spanish conquistador and explorer who among others began the first colonization of the americas the governor of cuba had just sent word that his license to colonize and settle had been revoked but hernan cortes completely ignored it he first knew about the aztecs from the maya who spoke about the powerful warrior city of tenochtitlan montezuma ii was the king at the time of spanish contact he knew about the spanish he knew about the colonization process that they were undergoing and most importantly he knew about the many spanish victories against other native tribes which were impressive they in fact called them teles god demons the aztec sent a welcoming party to meet cortes in the south sending gold as gifts because they had heard that the spanish were always asking about gold montezuma was happy to pay the powerful spanish whatever tribute they wanted as long as they didn't come to the capital cortes sent messages back to montezuma telling him that the spanish wanted to visit the capital but the asda king ignored those requests so cortes marched towards tenochtitlan at the time cortes had about 700 men crossbows muskets 15 horses and 15 cannons leaving a hundred soldiers to maintain control of the colony of veracruz but what kind of man was hernan cortes studying the historical figure of hernan cortes can help us understand how we managed to defeat a powerful empire such as the aztecs now a lot of people focus on the fact that of course this spanish would have superior technology they had muskets they had crossbows they had horses they had cannons so obviously there was a technological gap it was asymmetrical warfare the advantage the spanish had on the battlefield was real it was significant but it wouldn't have been enough to siege and conquer a city such as the nazi clan so of course it was enough to defeat other tribes and that's really what played a key role on the situation and i'll tell you more about that but there are other skills that have to do with hernan cortes that really help us understand how we managed to pull that one off sure he was a conqueror a soldier a builder a settler governor all of this is hernan cortes however there are two elements that are critical to understanding how he managed to defeat the aztecs element number one he had an exceptional charisma an element number two he was trained as a lawyer back in spain before becoming an explorer and a conqueror and this is critical because his speeches his ability to change people's mind and influence people with his charisma and his ability to speak to crowds which he had learned and convinced which he had learned as a lawyer back in spain really paved the way for his success he in fact managed to do what he did because he convinced many local tribes that were already enemies to the aztecs but lacked the strength to rebel to join him to fight against the aztecs so in reality rather than saying the azdek empire versus the spanish conquistadors we should say this the azdek empire versus the spanish and a few thousand natives that oppose the aztecs and allied and sided with the spanish and we'll get into the details of this but thanks to all of this he now had the superior technology he had the numbers and he had the knowledge of the land and the knowledge of his enemies tactics so let's have a look at how this story unfolds cortes decides to go to the north he wants to meet the aztecs it doesn't matter what montezuma ii says he is going and he's going to bring his cannons horses muskets and crossbows to the north and he marches so he's going on foot the reason why i decided to do that is because quite a lot of his men didn't like the idea and they said no let's just go back to spain so he burns all his own ships so now his men have no other choice as it reaches the inside of the azdex empire he starts convincing other local tribes to join him to join the fight against the aztecs how does he do that with the basic logic the enemy of my enemy is my friend a lot of tribes that were under as the controls hated the aztecs because they had to provide tribute they had to they they would take slaves uh people you know local men have slaves uh to sacrifice so a lot of people didn't like the asthma they just lacked the military power to revolt to rebel but with cortes and his ability to speak and also his other time newly acquired wife who was i believe a mayan anyway she spoke the aztec language as well which was used as a lingua franca at the time similarly to how latin was using the roman empire he manages to sway them to convince them that they need to follow him and through him they will beat the aztecs but not all tribes adhered in fact there was one tribe that was particularly problematic the clash gallants a warrior tribe and a proud one at that now given they were the sworn enemies of the aztecs so you would think why would they not join the spanish against the aztecs and that's because the slash gallants again they were a very proud warrior clan but also they didn't like the spanish either they had heard about the colonization they had heard about the fact that the that cortes was building forths and he was also building towns and churches he was trying to convert people into the christian god so that they did not like that and when cortes approaches that gallant against other tribes council because you know the trash cans were quite ferocious he approaches them he sends diplomatic teams but they reject them and say we are going to kill you we're going to sacrifice you and then we're going to eat you so the clash gallons sent 3 000 warriors but the spanish beat them what happens next really helps us understand how committed this man was to his own idea he did not secondly guess himself very much so he has now beaten 3 000 warriors of the clash gallons what does he do he sends the captive uh prisoners including captains and and leaders of the las calans back to them and he says hey we just want peace let's fight the aztecs so the ashkelons think this guy must be completely nuts we're going to eat you six thousand men this time face the spanish in battle but the spanish managed to again uh defeat them with their cannons with their muskets and with their superior armor even though we have very little spanish now and this is important because it's a very interesting victory that he managed to pull off because later on as he will face the aztecs he will have the support of thousands of native warriors which is what allow him to actually siege the city of tenochtitlan but against these local war tribes he did that on his own with his own men he manages and the class cannons start to think these spanish people they must be supernatural i mean it's just impossible to beat them so they try one last time let's go kill they ask their high priests they pray and they figure out hey these spanish when they sleep we need to go there and slit their throat so they attack them at night again they fail because the spanish were ready probably expecting something like that to happen so that's when cortes wins their respect because again these are warrior clans so he beat them he defeated me proved how powerful the spanish were in combat so now they respect him and now he's got a very powerful ally so strong together with the weapons and military tactics of the spanish the montezuma the second starts to rethink his approach he's thinking i need to invite him to the city i need to tell him how bad that lash gallons are so maybe he will not destroy us now a few deceptions later a few times montezuma tried to stab him in the back didn't work tried to attack veracruz didn't work so at the end of the day they accept the spanish in tenochtitlan and the the chronicle accounts are very interesting because they tell us that they welcome him as a god they they tell him welcome home this is your home so montezuma ii actually becomes friend with uh hernan cortes even learns the name the names of all the soldiers so apparently it seems at that time that cortez has won he has made it also because the the uh aztecs give him access to three gold mines and give him the contents of their vaults we're talking about 32 000 pounds worth of gold imagine all of those riches going back to spain he would become a hero however something happens the so-called noche triste the sad night now remember when i told you about the governor cuba trying to send word to cortes that he basically didn't have a license to do all of this to settle to colonize and cortez ignored him well he didn't appreciate that and now he hears that he's even um allying with the locals with the natives so he doesn't like that and he sends 18 ships down at veracruz to arrest cortes so what does cortes do he takes 400 men 500 men leaves a hundred men in the capital city of tenochtitlan to you know maintain their presence and he also leaves a man called pedro de alvarado man beautiful man very handsome with red hair the locals called him the son of the sun and he goes down to intercept the ships he does so and what's interesting is that these ships had 900 men okay these are armed men not all professional soldiers some which are settlers but they were all armed and they were supposed to arrest him so instead of having a battle he actually manages to convince them he speaks to them and he convinces them you know what just leave the governor in cuba why do you care we've got so much gold come with me join me let's get rich let's get famous let's go back to spain heroes so they accept him he manages to to do that everything seems to be good but remember he has left pedro de alvarado back into notre dame and this guy he was brutal he was ferocious i mean the natives kind of liked him and that's why they started showing him all their sacrifices and all their culture and their things but things that for them like the human sacrifice were good things it's like hey look at the cool things we do for our gods but he didn't like that so he decides you know what let's murder everyone so not everyone in the city were talking about 200 000 people but we're talking about everyone in that specific event he calls he kills innocent people so they they are raged they are angry they stop listening to montezuma the second and they decide to kill all the spanish that's why it's called the la noche triste the sad night because they are kicked out so as cortes moves back with his now 1200 men he sees that now he has been kicked out so what is he going to do but this is the part where he's going to utilize all of his tribal uh friends including the enemies the clash gallons the sworn enemies to the aztecs and he will declare actual war at this point of the story there will be loads of battles spanish ships against canoes loads of things happen but this battle probably requires dedicated videos but one thing that is important is that he is sieging the nordic land cutting off their supply particularly fresh water and he's using now thousands and tens of thousands of natives together with his weapons and smallpox helps because remember the spanish bring a lot of infectious disease that the natives had never encountered so they had no antibodies for they their bodies weren't ready and i have if you want to i'm not going to go into the details of smallpox and the damages the damage it has done in the way people died because i've already mentioned it in my last video the top 10 less the top and worst pandemics and so you will find a link in the description below but suffice to say that these three things together allow him to breach the capital city he enters he has a few weeks of continuous combat where the natives try desperately to to repel the spanish but eventually they have to surrender they just do not have the power to stop the spanish and the illnesses and the um the allied tribes some of which even convert to christianity at this point because they think that the only way they can survive this spanish disease is through the spanish god the spanish burn the city to the ground and build over the ruins of the city a spanish city hundreds of years of a successful civilization are now annihilated what would have happened if the spanish had never stopped their progress but probably the aztec empire would have turned into a proper empire meaning a territorial empire similarly to the romans but we will never know their civilization their culture and their religion are now just echoes in history for us to study all right nobody wants well i hope that you enjoyed this video if you did please remember thumbs up and if you're not yet members of this community become a noble one subscribe to my channel for more content from the metatron big thanks to the great courses plus for supporting my channel and sponsoring this video and remember the metatron has spread his wings [Music] goodbye

Channel: Metatron

Views: 421,221

Keywords: Metatron, Armor, Combat, History, Military, Knights, Greeks, Spartans, Romans, Helmet, Beastplate, Sword, Spear, D&D, Role Playing Game, Defense, Ancient, Classical, Medieval, Middle Ages, Castle, Tower, Legend, Gods, long sword, war hammer, lance, battle, siege, short sword, shield, bow, crossbow, arrows, dart, helm, bronze age, iron age, spear, full plate armor, axe, greatsword, warrior, barbarian, mounted, strategy, army, jousting, two-handed weapons, horned helmet, helmet, bronze, iron, Aztecs, Conquistadores

Id: lNKg_m8njt0

Length: 19min 35sec (1175 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 18 2020