- 4 months ago
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00Mexico City, one of the largest concentrations of
00:29humanity anywhere on the planet.
00:34It's currently estimated that around 26 million people live here, and the city stretches for
00:40miles in all directions.
00:45Let's scratch the surface, and you'll find there was once another great city here, one
00:50that rivalled in size and complexity the cities of Europe, but whose religion, rights, and
00:57ways of life and death, were utterly alien to Europeans.
01:04The people who lived here called themselves the Mexica, and gave their name to modern Mexico,
01:09but they're universally known as the Aztecs.
01:13The Aztecs, one of America's great civilizations, and in 1502, their last and best-known emperor
01:19was crowned.
01:20His name was Motekasuma, perhaps best known in the West as Montezuma.
01:37Montezuma.
01:38We're probably all familiar with the name, if only because of that slightly odd 1960s expression,
01:43Montezuma's Revenge, which has everything to do with an upset stomach, and nothing at all
01:47with an actual character from history.
01:50But now, thanks to a major new exhibition at the British Museum in London, there's a chance
01:54to find out more about him as a man, why he's so fascinating and so worthy of a great exhibition.
02:00Each of the strange and enigmatic objects on display provides a window, a glimpse of the
02:13physical and cultural landscape of Central America 500 years ago, and the unique architecture,
02:19art, and way of life of the Aztec people.
02:22They also invoke an incredible story, how Montezuma, sophisticated, semi-divine emperor,
02:30came to fight a courageous psychological duel with a formidable opponent from another world.
02:35It's also the story of how, in less than two years, the Aztec civilization he governed would
02:41be virtually wiped out by a handful of European adventurers.
02:45But to begin, at the beginning.
02:47It's the year 1502 AD, not a year marked in Europe by any truly momentous events.
02:55Henry VII was on the throne of England.
02:58Michelangelo had just begun work on his sculptural masterpiece, David.
03:02But across the Atlantic, on the great continent discovered by Columbus barely ten years since,
03:07a significant event was taking place.
03:10Here in Mexico, a new emperor is being crowned.
03:13Montezuma II inherited off his uncle an empire that's expanded, galvanized, sophisticated,
03:21and powerful.
03:24Montezuma's Aztec empire stretched from the Gulf of Mexico in the east to the Pacific Ocean
03:29in the west, and as far south as Guatemala.
03:33His subjects are estimated to number as many as 10 million people, a greater population than
03:39Spain at the time.
03:41And in the high plains of central Mexico, where Mexico's capital is today, there was once an
03:47island city.
03:48Montezuma's own capital, home to 200,000 people.
03:53That's five times the population of Tudor London, bigger than Rome or Constantinople.
03:59And with its network of glittering canals, more beautiful, it was said, than Venice.
04:04This was Tenochtitlan.
04:06The focal point of the city was a huge walled enclosure, which contained Montezuma's palace
04:12and many of the great Aztec religious buildings.
04:15But towering over them all was one extraordinary structure.
04:21Here at the heart of the sacred precinct, but also the heart of the city, the empire, and
04:26in fact the Aztec universe, was a great pyramid.
04:32The Templo Mayor.
04:36The incredible thing is that there isn't just one Templo Mayor pyramid, there are six
04:45of them, all built on top of each other.
04:50This is the outside of the great temple in Montezuma's time.
04:53He would have climbed these steps himself.
04:56What archaeologists have discovered as they've excavated this site is that each pyramid temple
05:01was built on top of a previous one, like Russian dolls.
05:04So this is a previous generation's temple here, and so on, as you go deeper into this
05:09site.
05:10Now what's fascinating is that in the gaps between the temples, they've left votive offerings,
05:15like these three replica statues here.
05:18But there would have been other ones, like animal skeletons and small models of canoes and all that
05:22kind of thing.
05:23Each generation wants to enlarge on the previous generation's temple, that's why you get this
05:28layering effect.
05:29In the middle here, you can see the very earliest Aztec temple, where their first rulers would
05:35have climbed up to intercede with the gods on behalf of their people.
05:41Unlike physically similar structures in Egypt, Aztec pyramids were not the burial places of great
05:46leaders or pharaohs.
05:47They were built to mirror the mountains, the physical environment that surrounded them.
05:54But the Templo Mayor also reflected an abstract philosophical structure, the 22 layers of the
06:00Aztec universe that passed right through this site, from the highest heavens to the deepest underworld.
06:09To Montezuma and his people, there is no more significant place on earth or in the universe.
06:14Here was a coming together of all that's sacred.
06:21The gods worshipped here at Templo Mayor were Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec tribal god associated
06:27with warfare in the life-giving sun, and Tlaloc, the god of rain.
06:32Both capricious and both essential to the survival of the Aztec people.
06:38As emperor, Montezuma would have presided over the major festivals in the Aztec
06:43religious calendar, overseeing the raw religious theatre that was human sacrifice.
06:52More often than not drugged, sacrificial victims were led up the steps of the pyramid to be greeted,
06:57then dispatched by waiting priests.
07:00The corpses of these sacrificial victims, minus their hearts, were then thrown down the front
07:07steps of the temple, and they'd have landed on or near this magnificent disc, truly one of the
07:13great treasures of all the Mesoamerican civilisations. It would have been brightly coloured, and it depicts
07:18Curaxalcui, the sister and mortal enemy of the mythical founding father of the Aztec people.
07:25One day they fought on a mountain top, he won, and her cut-up body was thrown to the bottom.
07:31It's this myth that Montezuma and his people were reenacting every time they sacrificed a human victim.
07:39Looking at this, the lesson could not be clearer.
07:42This was the fate that awaited the enemy of the Aztec.
07:53To reinforce that message, the victims' heads were then chopped off
07:56and placed on long skull racks known as Tom Pantley.
08:00The body would then be dismembered and the limbs given to the warrior that had taken
08:08that victim prisoner. He would typically then eat them, mixed with peppers and salt.
08:14Now, it's easy to get hung up on the ghoulishness of this process, but the Aztecs
08:18powerfully believed that the perpetuation of life involved the giving of it.
08:23To them, sacrifice was a solemn sacrament. The body, the blood and the heart's energy
08:33given to ensure the fruitfulness of the earth and the continued passage of the sun
08:38through the heavens. Everything in the daily life of an Aztec citizen was governed by a complex
08:44calendar system and an endless cycle of ritual and ceremony. Central to all of them was Montezuma.
08:51During his time as emperor, Montezuma was called on to perform a very special ceremony indeed.
09:01Once every 52 years, the lights of Tenochtitlan were dimmed and the population stood still,
09:08silent, in the dark, watching a distant hillside. Then a light flickered, a bonfire was lit. And in
09:15joyful ceremony, a procession of torches carried that light back from the hillside into the city.
09:21This ceremony represented the preservation of the universe and also the Aztec empire for the next 52 years.
09:29The sheer theatricality of the Aztec belief system and their world view is expressed
09:42powerfully in their art. And for state of the art, read art of the state. It was meant to be scary.
09:50Amongst the art treasures that have survived are books. And while they look more like cartoons than bibles,
09:56their purpose was deadly serious. The few that remain tell of a highly moral and ordered society.
10:03Everything in life and death was preordained. Birth itself was attended by soothsayers,
10:10who determined from their calendar books how auspicious a birthday was. It's a boy meant it's a
10:17warrior born to die with honour, his umbilical cord taken away to be buried on a battlefield. Whereas a
10:24girl's umbilical was buried by the half stone. Here she was destined to sow, to feed, to breed.
10:32Some might wonder how much has changed. But probably uniquely anywhere in the world at the time, boys and
10:38girls were required to attend school. Montezuma himself would have attended an elite school,
10:43a culmacaque, a kind of Aztec Eton, where along with Aztec cosmology, poetry and music, Montezuma would have
10:50learned the art of battle.
10:58Central to any Aztec battle plan was one key aim, not to kill, but to take prisoners, captives for ritual
11:05sacrifice. That was its purpose. It was institutionalised and ritualised warfare, not unlike that of the
11:11samurai. A great warrior was one who took, say, four prisoners in hand-to-hand combat. This earned him
11:17great honour, distinctive battle dress and respect. All Aztec men were trained and expected to bear arms
11:24when necessary, but there were only two squadrons of full-time soldiers, the elite eagle and jaguar
11:30warriors. If a warrior died on the battlefield, a pool of his and others' blood was likened to flowers,
11:37and so-called flowery wars were an annual event between the Aztecs and a neighbour,
11:43the Clashgalans, whom the empire surrounded. Montezuma likened them to birds in a cage,
11:50something to play with during the rainy season. And if the nature of battle was prescribed,
11:55then so too was the real reason for war itself, to expand the empire and exact tribute.
12:01It's absolutely stunning, but it's as exact as it is beautiful. Each one of these represents a
12:20certain number of the commodity shown. So for example here, the blue bird skins, there's 20, 40,
12:2660, 80, 160 in all. Down here, lots of cocoa, 20, 40, 60, 80, 100, 200 lots of cocoa and 40 jaguar pelts.
12:40The sheer quantity of tribute goods entering Tenochtitlan every year from around the empire
12:44was staggering. As well as shields, feathers, cocoa, headdresses, cochineal, pottery, gold,
12:50jade, turquoise, and other luxury goods came 4,000 tons of beans, 7,000 tons of maize, and 2 million
12:58one-size-fits-all cotton cloaks. As for Montezuma, he would only eat off pottery from the tribute state
13:05of Cholula. Gold, known in Aztec as Teoquicatl, or the excrement of the gods, was less highly prized
13:13than turquoise or jade, but prized almost above anything else were brightly coloured feathers,
13:20shadows of the sacred ones, as they called them. It's safe to say that Aztec values were not those
13:25of contemporary Europeans. And if tribute wasn't forthcoming, then imperial retribution would be
13:32swift, uncompromising, and brutal. No one knows exactly how many human sacrifices were made in any
13:40given year. But we do know, for example, that Montezuma himself took 5,000 captives for sacrifice
13:47in a raid on two rebel townships as part of his coronation ceremony. But it was his uncle and
13:53predecessor, Owitzatel, who changed the pace and intensity of warfare, inuring his people to
13:59bloodletting on a vast scale, and turning captive taking from the annual conquer match of the flowery
14:04wars into an instrument of state terror. This ensured that his successor, Montezuma,
14:10inherited subjects who paid up on time, did what they were told, and were terrified.
14:18Whatever the continent, whatever the century, there's one truism that always holds firm,
14:23and that is an army marches on its stomach. Montezuma's military power relied on his ability
14:29to feed his troops and the 200,000 inhabitants of his capital city. Now, a third of that food came
14:36from tribute states, and the Aztecs had to find the other two-thirds by themselves.
14:44Just how they did that fully merits its world heritage recognition. South of Mexico City, there's a vast
14:51160-kilometre system of waterways. They're a honeypot for city dwellers, a day out on the barges with
14:58family and friends. They're a riot of colour and bank-to-bank mariachi bands.
15:06But this is only a fraction of what was here during Montezuma's time, and it's not the waterways
15:10that are important, but the highly productive fields they define and feed, the chinampas.
15:18They're still using the same methods here as the Aztecs did 500 years ago. As you can see,
15:23they place stakes into this marshy ground, put wattling in between them and then
15:28plant these willow trees, and that creates artificial islands. In the middle, you put all sorts of
15:32organic waste, even human excrement, to create very fertile islands in this marsh, which you then farm
15:38by coming along here in your canoe or your punt. You take all that produce off to Tenochtitlan.
15:48During Montezuma's time, these chinampas extended over 9,000 hectares. That's over 34 square miles.
15:56There were a feat of planned and sophisticated agricultural engineering,
16:00far in advance of anything in Europe at the time, in scale or productivity.
16:06With huge quantities of food and tribute goods pouring into Tenochtitlan from all over the empire,
16:11an efficient distribution system was essential. The market.
16:24The market was vast, with up to 30,000 citizens visiting every day. Not only was the market the
16:30commercial and economic hub of Montezuma's empire, it was also the place to socialise. The way for the
16:36young ladies to attract the attention of the lads was to chew gum and slap some makeup on, yellow
16:42okra for blusher and lacklustre hair washed in indigo to make it shine. Oh, and one other thing,
16:48the teeth. They'd be coloured red with cochineal for maximum impact. Nice.
16:53This truly was a society red in claw and tooth. But it's not just the amount of food for barter,
17:03it's the sheer variety. The range of crops cultivated was far in excess of anything in
17:08Europe at the time. The staple was maize. But there were also onions, squashes, beans, sweet potatoes,
17:15peanuts, manila, herbs, spices, fruits I've never heard of. It's amazing just how many of these Aztec
17:22crops and other foodstuffs have found their way into our vocabulary and our stomachs. Chili, tomatoes,
17:30avocado, cocoa, chocolate. A drink that was enjoyed exclusively by Montezuma and the nobility.
17:37We know from contemporary accounts that Montezuma would dine behind a golden screen
17:42and be entertained by jugglers and musicians. But what sort of food did he eat? Perhaps the best
17:47person to ask is the leading Mexican chef and expert in Aztec banquets, Marta Ortiz. Hey Marta,
17:54this is incredible looking food. Yes, this is a Montezuma's table. This is what he would have eaten? Of
18:00course. Try it. Those look like bugs. They are bugs, are they? Yes. Are they good for you?
18:07Yes, minerals and proteins.
18:12Quite salty. But nice. The pulque, please try the pulque. Before the sacrifice.
18:18You had this before you get sacrificed? Yes, before. What's this made from?
18:21From the maguey, from the heart of the maguey. Which is a cactus? It's a cactus, yes.
18:29Ah, that's quite rich as well. And they're quite unusual flavours, aren't they?
18:32Yes. For me. But I think they're fantastic.
18:34Delicious. And sensual. I've tried these beautiful tortillas.
18:37Why are these so beautifully decorated? Because they were tortillas for an emperor.
18:41So everything has its meaning. Power, beauty, passion.
18:46Okay.
18:46What do you think?
18:51Mmm, that is good. I think it's sophisticated and luxury and beautiful. This is the real treasure
18:59that Mexico has given to the world.
19:01In the history of western civilisation, I can think of few empires, other than ancient Rome perhaps,
19:08where state control over food production was as efficient. And it's clear that Montezuma was also
19:14trying to extend Aztec control over all aspects of daily life further and further into his expanding empire.
19:32In the mountains, 50 miles south of Mexico City, there's another site I've been reading about
19:37that I've been really looking forward to visiting. It's said to be one of the most intact of all the
19:41Aztec remains in Mexico.
19:48At the top of this beautiful mountain pass, absolutely buzzing with cicadas, lie the remains of Malinalco.
19:56It's awe-inspiring.
20:00The core of this pyramid is a cave, apparently hacked out of the living rock.
20:06And we know from the Aztec records that it was completed during Montezuma's reign.
20:10But Malinalco's real significance lies in its function.
20:14There's no doubt that it was, in part, a religious building.
20:17The Aztecs believed that caves were places for communication with the earth gods.
20:21But there's more to it than that.
20:23These sculptures here are the clue. There are three of them, thrones for the civil and military
20:30commanders of the region. But if you look at the sculpture, the design, they're Aztec motifs,
20:35the mountain lion and the two eagles. What Montezuma is doing here is absorbing this region
20:41more firmly into the Aztec empire by imposing Aztec administration and religious norms. A bit like the
20:48way the ancient Britons end up wearing togas and using the Roman legal code after the Roman conquest.
20:53Montezuma is trying to make the world Aztec.
21:05This was a huge advance for people who, just a few generations earlier,
21:08had been nothing more than a small band of nomads from the north.
21:12Their tribal god, Huitzilopochtli, had told them to settle where they saw an eagle land on a cactus.
21:19An eagle did land on a cactus on an island in the middle of a great lake. And in 1325 AD,
21:26that island became their power base, Tenochtitlan, and the eagle and cactus still adorn the Mexican
21:31national flag. So there's a structured, highly complex society ruling over vast territories with
21:39a pantheon of gods worthy of ancient Rome, and Montezuma himself at the pinnacle of that society.
21:46And yet, by the time he took over as ruler, the Aztec empire was barely 200 years old.
21:53It's a bit of a mystery. How did this sophisticated society, with its belief systems and its
21:58organisations, seemingly spring forth out of nothing? Well, I've come to a place that might give us a few answers.
22:09This is Teotihuacan.
22:39This place marks nothing less than the beginning of life itself. According to the Aztec creation myth,
23:02all was darkness and some gods gathered around a council fire. Two of them threw themselves into
23:09the flames and were reborn as the sun and the moon. Hence, the pyramid of the moon and the pyramid of the sun.
23:20If Teotihuacan represents the birth of the moon, the sun and of life itself, it was also the cradle of
23:26most of the key elements in Aztec belief, ritual, architecture and cultural expression. And yet it
23:32was a civilisation that had virtually disappeared a thousand years before. Still, the Aztecs wove what
23:39they discovered and understood of this and other later cultures into their own, forging quite literally
23:45their own sense of history, identity and continuity. Montezuma himself would make the 25-mile journey here on
23:53foot in homage to his adopted forebears. And whilst it seems certain that the people of Teotihuacan
23:59practiced human sacrifice, it was a practice the Aztecs made perfect a millennium later.
24:06And though it might have been Montezuma's predecessor who turned this occasional ritual
24:10into a weapon of state terror, oppression and murder, it was a weapon Montezuma wielded with equal
24:15ferocity. As the annals show, during his time as holy Aztec emperor, Montezuma won many victories,
24:23consolidated his empire and exacted massive tribute payments. He also maximised executive power in
24:30himself. He legislated that no one should touch him or even look him in the face. So Montezuma,
24:37cultured, spiritual, vain and ruthless, believing the Aztecs to be a chosen people,
24:43and believing it was his divine right and duty to lead them. Enter into his empire from Cuba,
24:50recently populated by the Spanish Hernán Cortés, trained in law, full of Catholic fervour,
24:56much given to quoting the classics, and fluent in ambition. It was now the year 1519. Henry VIII was on
25:05the throne of England. It was the year that Leonardo da Vinci died. Ferdinand Magellan set off on his epic
25:11voyage around the world. And on Maundy Thursday, April 1519, a small Spanish fleet made landfall off
25:18the modern-day port of Veracruz, some 250 miles from Tenochtitlan, as the eagle flies. On board,
25:26under the command of Hernán Cortés, there was a small army of some 400 soldiers and cavalry. They had just
25:33been put through their paces against a Mayan army down the coast on the Yucatan Peninsula and won easily.
25:40These dogs of war were now supremely confident in the effect of their battle drill, their armour
25:45and their horses against Central American peoples. They knew that their steel-tip weapons,
25:50their crossbows and their firepower could cause mass destruction.
26:08As well as the men in the hardware, Cortés also brought ashore a secret weapon. Her name was Malila.
26:16Malila. Rechristened Doña Marina by the Spanish, Malila was to become known in Mexican folklore and
26:24history as La Malinche. She was a slave girl the Mayans had given Cortés as part of the payoff
26:32following their recent battle. She was, by all accounts, a beauty. But the beauty for Cortés was
26:38that she'd been born an Aztec princess. She spoke Nahuatl, the language of Montezuma and the fabulous
26:45empire that he'd been hearing about. Cortés' instinct was that Marina would prove invaluable in helping
26:51him achieve his ambitions for the expedition. And he was right. But what was Cortés trying to achieve?
26:59I think Cortés' motivation as he landed on this coast can be summed up in four words.
27:05Gold, God, glory and greed. He wanted to win new lands and wealth for his sovereign,
27:13King Charles of Spain, and ensure that his own name made it into the history books.
27:18But he was also a passionate Christian. He had a crusading zeal to save the souls of heathens.
27:27But surely what drove Cortés the most, and fired the imagination of his followers,
27:32was a lust for gold. If there was an El Dorado out there ruled over by a heathen emperor, Montezuma,
27:38it was their Christian duty to relieve him of the burden of his gold and save his soul.
27:46But was this legend about the gold actually true?
27:52The answer came sooner than Cortés could have imagined.
27:55On Easter Sunday, just four days after landing, Montezuma's local steward arrived,
28:06bearing greetings and chests full of priceless treasure.
28:11Through La Malinche, Cortés introduced himself as the ambassador of Don Carlos,
28:16king of Spain and ruler of the largest part of the world. He then said that some of his men
28:22were suffering from an affliction of the heart that could only be cured by gold.
28:27Does the great Montezuma possess gold? He asked. Indeed he does, came the reply.
28:33It was the correct answer, but it was the worst response in the history of Aztec civilization.
28:42News traveled as fast in the new world as the old. This might have been a civilization to whom the
28:47horse and the wheel were totally alien. Yet communication networks within the Aztec empire
28:53were phenomenal. It had taken Montezuma only a few days to find out about Cortés's victory over
28:59the Mayans, and only a day and a half before he heard of his landings.
29:06It was a 250-mile journey, but relays of runners carried the troubling news to Tenochtitlan.
29:12One account says that Montezuma was in the snake house of his personal zoo when he heard the news
29:19that the messengers had returned from their meeting with Cortés. He prepared himself for the worst.
29:24He personally sacrificed two human victims and sprinkled their blood on the messengers. Then he
29:30heard what they had to say. Apparently it filled him with dread, as if swooning. His soul was sickened,
29:37his heart anguished. He was then told about the strangers who covered their bodies with clothes.
29:43Their faces were white, their eyes like chalk. Most had long beards. Perhaps most worryingly of all,
29:51he heard of the cannon that tore trees and hills apart, of deer as high as houses that bore the men on
29:58their backs. Had the gods foretold this, did the arrival of these men mark the end of the world?
30:12Before long, there were to be two further meetings between Cortés and ambassadors from Montezuma,
30:17who brought gifts of unimaginable value and beauty. To Montezuma's mind, the gifts were meant to be seen
30:25as an indication of his sublime power and superiority. They were mere baubles, but they were given to
30:31Cortés along with a stern injunction. Stay away from Tenochtitlan. But to Cortés, all this meant
30:39something completely different. Surely this was a grovelling peace offering, an admission of his
30:44superiority, and there must be plenty more where that came from. He decided to push on with his expedition.
30:50One thing Montezuma could not have known was that Cortés's campaign was barely legal and certainly
30:58did not have official sanction. The Spanish governor of Cuba hated Cortés, and his king,
31:04Charles of Spain, had no idea of his activities. So to avoid potential conflict with the king and to gain
31:10his blessing for this crusade, Cortés sent vast quantities of Aztec treasure back to Spain, declaring his
31:17intention to conquer and pacify the territory and to take Montezuma dead or alive, subject, of course,
31:23to his majesty's will. Back in Tenochtitlan, there were wildly differing opinions on how to deal with
31:32the intruders. To the Aztec mind, nothing happened by chance. And if the year was 1519 to the Europeans,
31:40to the Aztecs, it was the year Queacatl, a fateful year, a dangerous year.
31:52Long before the landings, ill omens had been observed. A great tongue of fire in the night sky,
31:58strange wailing in the streets at night. And Montezuma himself had had his image carved on the rock at
32:04Chapel Tepec, a sort of Aztec Mount Rushmore in miniature, perhaps his last testament in the
32:10landscape.
32:17No matter who they were, gods, freebooters or ambassadors, the consensus of the Aztec leaders
32:23was that the aliens had to be kept away from Tenochtitlan by bribery or by force. There is no
32:29doubt that this was a journey that was beginning to reveal and define the true character, not just of
32:34two alien civilizations in a titanic close encounter, but of two people, the two main protagonists,
32:41Cortez and Montezuma.
32:46Their interaction was beginning to resemble a game of chess, and Cortez, ever the opportunist,
32:52was about to find his pawns here at Sempo Alan, home of the Tottenacks.
32:59At Sempo Alan, Cortez befriended a Tottenac chief who bemoaned his fate as a tribute-paying
33:12vassal king to Montezuma. He was also told that other kingdoms hated the Aztecs every bit as much as he.
33:23This news was the opportunity Cortez had been waiting for. He immediately tried to persuade the
33:28king to cease his tribute payments to Montezuma and join him in the alliance. The king agreed.
33:33So long as Cortez would lead the force with his artillery and cavalry, the king would bring infantrymen
33:39and supplies. This was the first great transatlantic alliance in history. Spaniard and Tottenac,
33:46old world and new, allying against a common foe. Cortez had just removed the first stone from the base of
33:53Montezuma's pyramid. Tenochtitlan was now vulnerable, and Montezuma knew it. Now, the Aztecs had no standing army,
34:02but he immediately mobilized a local militia to crush the Tottenacs and Cortez.
34:10It was a total rout. As soon as the Aztec army saw Cortez's men and felt the power of their weapons,
34:17they turned and fled, chased by the cavalry. Cortez now harbored a suspicion that even the massed
34:24imperial Aztec army wouldn't be able to stand up to his force. Their weapons were primitive and their
34:30battle discipline inferior. Perhaps what would have surprised and terrified them more than anything
34:39was this, the horse. What you're looking at here is one of the great weapon systems of the pre-industrial
34:46age. A man has a certain ability to inflict violence on his enemies. Put him on a horse,
34:53that ability is multiplied several times over. First of all, horses, of course, give you incredible
35:01mobility. You can strike over huge distances with the elements of surprise and at great speed.
35:06The horses also gave you a great advantage. When you're up high, you can swing down with huge power
35:14on the enemy below you and it's very difficult for them to defend. And what all this adds up to is an
35:19impact weapon, a terrible psychological weapon. Especially if you think about the Aztecs, who've never
35:24seen these before. Europeans had generations to get used to the charge of heavy cavalry. The Aztecs had a few months.
35:32But Montezuma still had some distinct advantages. And if it appeared as though the god of war had
35:41momentarily deserted him, not so Cliloc, the rain god. I've timed my expedition a little better than
35:49Cortes. When he marched across this land, it was the rainy season. And for the Spanish troops in full metal
35:56jackets, every step of the way must have been hell. Already, his Tottenac allies would have proved
36:03invaluable as guides and porters in this alien but beautiful terrain. I think what happens next is
36:10crucial as I try to understand Montezuma's character. Because from now on it becomes less and less clear
36:15who's the cat and who's the mouse. Cortes or Montezuma. I'm getting the feeling that Montezuma is doing
36:23his damnedest to manipulate Cortes' every move. Watching, waiting for any opportunity to wrong foot him.
36:30For weeks, he's allowed Cortes to march across his sovereign territory unhindered. He's even issued
36:36secret commands to petty chieftains to treat the Spaniards and their allies cordially. All the time, though,
36:43Cortes is getting further and further away from the coast and any hope of strategic support.
36:52And what lies ahead is a dangerous string of obstacles and redoubts.
36:58By late August, Cortes is about to encounter one of the most impressive of them.
37:02Montezuma's own worst enemy and a people who might not take kindly to a small invasion force,
37:08whoever they were, wherever they came from. The Clashclones.
37:15Cortes led his men into Clashcalan territory with one of his favourite quotes from the Emperor Constantine.
37:21He said, gentlemen, let us follow the banner, the sign of the Holy Cross, and by this we shall conquer.
37:28Maybe so, but not easily. Within a few hours, his scouts got embroiled in a skirmish with a small band
37:36of Clashcalan warriors. Two of his horses were killed, a real blow to Cortes, because if the native
37:43warriors had previously thought the horses were terrifying demons, they now knew that they were mortal.
37:49Then about 20 miles away from the Clashcalan capital, a second wave of attacks, and Cortes found
37:55himself efficiently drawn into an ambush. He escaped, but he then took a terrible European revenge
38:05on some of the prisoners. He sent them back to their people without hands, ears, feet.
38:12He destroyed entire villages and slaughtered the inhabitants.
38:16Taking prisoners was one thing both the Clashclans and Aztecs understood well. After all, that's why they
38:29fought battles, to take prisoners for sacrifice, but not to mutilate them in the field like this.
38:38Cortes's rules of engagement were completely unintelligible to his opponents,
38:43driven by ruthless pragmatism and not constrained by the brutal niceties of Aztec ritual warfare.
38:49Cortes deployed every European technology and tactical advantage he had on the battlefield.
38:56The Clashclan leadership decided if the aliens' way of fighting would give them a sharp and bloody edge
39:01over their ancient enemy, the Aztecs and their leader Montezuma, then they too would join forces
39:07with Cortes in this venture. As soon as Montezuma heard about the rout of the Clashclans, he seems to
39:17have realised that in open battle, his Aztec force stood no chance against Cortes's horses, gunpowder,
39:24and superior tactics. He instead came up with a very interesting idea. He would lure the Spanish into the
39:31closed-quarters surroundings of a city where they could be ambushed and attacked from unusual angles.
39:37This way, he would negate Cortes's advantage in the open field.
39:42While Cortes and his troops were enjoying a little R&R with their newfound allies here in the Clashclan
39:47capital, Montezuma was trying to second-guess their next move. And he decided to use as his killing
39:53fields the narrow streets of the nearby city of Cholula, the next obvious stepping-stone for
39:58Cortes on his way to Tenochtitlan. Despite Tlashclan intelligence that an ambush was being prepared,
40:05Cortes was keen to push ahead to Cholula. If Montezuma had set a trap, he was going to spring it.
40:13On the 12th of October, 1519, Cortes, with a small army of Tlashclan and Tottenac troops,
40:19broke camp and marched on Cholula. Cholula was a major city and a major challenge for Cortes,
40:27with a population of around 100,000. It was a vital tribute kingdom of the Aztec empire,
40:33famous for its precious stones, its brilliant featherwork, and the pottery so admired by
40:39Montezuma himself. It was also a key religious centre on a par, I suppose, with somewhere like
40:44Mecca or Rome. An indication of that is this vast pyramid. It actually stretches from the edge of
40:51that mound there, through this rather nice reconstructed section, to the other edge of
40:56the mound right over there. At its height, this pyramid was bigger than the Templo Mayor in Tenochtitlan.
41:03And in fact, with a base area of 500,000 square feet, this had a bigger footprint than any of the
41:09pyramids in Egypt.
41:13And it's at this holy site that the true character of Cortes was about to come to the fore.
41:18Having received confirmation from Marina that an ambush had indeed been laid at Cholula,
41:24Cortes took pre-emptive action. He ordered all the lords of Cholula, dozens of them,
41:30to assemble in the temple courtyard, and then demanded to know why they wanted to kill him.
41:35Montezuma ordered it, came the reply.
41:38Playing judge and jury, Cortes declared that the assembled nobles were guilty of treason. Then he
41:50turned executioner and ordered his men to fire their muskets into the courtyard until not one man was
41:56left alive. After that, he unleashed his new Indian allies on the ordinary people of Cholula. It was an
42:03orgy of destruction. Those that weren't massacred were dragged off as prisoners for human sacrifice
42:09at a later date. After two days, Cortes called a halt.
42:22Using the same weapon of terror that for so long had been an adhesive force in Montezuma's empire,
42:34Cortes was now violently destabilizing it. From this point onwards, Cortes would have known that he
42:41had the chance to aim for nothing less than the total destruction of Aztec power.
42:50Incredibly, perhaps, Montezuma's ambassadors had been present throughout the massacre and were said
42:55to have been half dead with fear. And here, I have to say, I don't doubt the accounts. Cortes sent them
43:02on their way with a clear message for Montezuma that he and he alone was to blame for the massacre at
43:08Cholula. The Spaniard insisted that he had come in friendship and peace, but had been betrayed. Now,
43:15he meant war. Despite protestations of innocence from Montezuma and gifts of still more gold,
43:21on the 1st of November 1519, Cortes and his growing army left for Tenochtitlan. The route he chose was
43:29one that left him least open to further ambush. It meant heading for the past that lies between the
43:38volcanoes of Popocatapetl and Ishtac Sea Wattle, a past still called after him to this day, Paso de Cortes.
43:57So,
44:05so
44:11ORGAN PLAYS
44:41This is the pass of Cortez,
44:46a gap between these massive volcanic peaks.
44:49And its scenery is just breathtaking.
44:51In fact, literally so, because I'm up here at 13,000 feet.
44:55I'm trying to imagine what it would have been like
44:56for those Spanish soldiers.
44:58They'd survived voyages in leaky ships
45:01through uncharted waters,
45:03the heat of Veracruz, ambushes and battles.
45:07They'd risk death, human sacrifice,
45:10being eaten.
45:11And now they're up here with their limbs feeling like lead,
45:14short of breath,
45:15all to follow a man whose towering ambition
45:18was simply leading them further
45:19into lands that no European had ever seen before.
45:23Then, beyond them in the mist,
45:41they caught their very first glimpse
45:43of the fertile highland valley of Mexico.
45:46A scouting party reported back to Cortez
45:57what they'd seen in the distance.
45:59Another new world and a sea,
46:01and in the middle of it,
46:02a very great city.
46:04Now within reach was the heart of the Aztec Empire
46:14and the power base of Montezuma himself,
46:17Tenochtitlan.
46:18On the 8th of November, 1519,
46:25eight months after they'd first landed,
46:27Cortez and his men made their way
46:29across the long causeway
46:30to the fabled city of Tenochtitlan.
46:33He was determined to put on a good show.
46:36In the vanguard, four horsemen in full regalia.
46:40Then came the infantry,
46:41swords drawn and flashing in the sunlight.
46:44Then more cavalry, crossbowmen and artillery.
46:47And surrounded by his own colour troop, Cortez.
46:50Behind him, whooping and whistling,
46:52his native allies.
46:55It's hard to say who would have been more awestruck that day,
46:58Cortez and his troops,
46:59or the thousands of city dwellers
47:01who'd turned out to gawk at the Spanish cybermen.
47:06Certainly the Spanish couldn't believe their eyes.
47:09Contemporary eyewitness accounts capture the moment.
47:13We were astounded.
47:14Great towns and buildings rising from the water,
47:17all made of stone.
47:19They seemed like an enchanted vision.
47:21Indeed, some of our soldiers asked
47:23whether it was not all a dream.
47:25It was all so wonderful that I do not know
47:27how to describe this first glimpse
47:29of things never heard of, seen, nor dreamed before.
47:33Castellated fortresses, splendid monuments,
47:37royal dwelling places.
47:39How marvellous it was to gaze upon them,
47:41all stuccoed, carved, and painted with animals,
47:45covered with stone figures.
47:48As to what happens next,
47:49we actually have Cortez's own account of the action.
47:52Now, he's an accomplished spin doctor,
47:54but much of this does ring true.
47:56He says that,
47:56So far, so good.
48:23But Cortez was writing to his monarch,
48:26Charles V of Spain.
48:28And it's what comes next
48:29that doesn't really pass the lie detector test.
48:31Cortez claims that Montezuma
48:33had another audience with him,
48:35during which time he reassured Cortez
48:37that we shall obey you and hold you as our lord
48:39in place of that great sovereign of whom you speak.
48:42And all the land that lies in my domain,
48:45you may command as you will,
48:47for you shall be obeyed,
48:48and all that we own
48:49is for you to dispose of as you choose.
48:53The supreme ruler of the Aztec empire
48:56abdicating his power to Cortez?
48:59I don't think so.
49:02Montezuma knew
49:02that although his ambush had failed at Cholula,
49:05here in Tenochtitlan,
49:06all he had to do was wait and try again.
49:08In the meantime,
49:12he had his guests housed
49:13and fed well at his father's ancient palace.
49:16And with Marina as interpreter,
49:18something resembling cordial relations were established.
49:22But Montezuma was playing a dangerous game
49:24against a wily opponent.
49:26Cortez, only too aware of how vulnerable he really was,
49:30decided on an incredibly bold move.
49:33He took Montezuma prisoner.
49:35He was held somewhere here,
49:43in the palace that Cortez and his men were billeted in.
49:45He was treated well.
49:47His advisers were even allowed access to him.
49:49But he'd lost the initiative.
49:51And his background had taught him one thing about captives.
49:55They were destined to become human sacrifices.
49:59Losing that initiative was crucial.
50:02For one thing, it gave later commentators,
50:04both Aztec and Spanish,
50:06free rein to condemn Montezuma
50:07for being paralysed by fear or a traitor to his people,
50:11his mind distracted by a supposed prophecy
50:14about white-faced, bearded gods from the East
50:17reclaiming their birthright.
50:19But these were largely retrospective assessments
50:22of Montezuma's character
50:23and the events that were unfolding.
50:25But as soon as the slightest opportunity arose,
50:30he acted.
50:31That opportunity came in the form of Panfilo de Arnavaez,
50:35the governor of Cuba's lieutenant,
50:36who landed at Veracruz with a large squadron of troops and horse.
50:41His mission?
50:42To arrest Cortez for treason.
50:45The exploits and rumoured success of Cortez
50:47had made the Cuban governor insanely jealous.
50:51Cortez knew he'd have to act fast
50:52if he was going to contain this situation.
50:56Cortez left his second-in-command,
50:58Pedro de Alvarado,
50:59to look after Montezuma and the capital city,
51:02and himself set out on a forced march across the mountains.
51:06He arrived here in Veracruz
51:08and took Navarrez totally by surprise.
51:11He outmaneuvered him,
51:21and after a short but bloody skirmish took him
51:23and his entire expeditionary force prisoner.
51:28But for Cortez,
51:30the sweet taste of victory soon turned sour.
51:33From his prisoners,
51:34he discovered that Montezuma
51:35had been in secret negotiations
51:37through a messenger with Navarrez.
51:40Montezuma had been trying to secure his own release
51:42and the capture and imprisonment of Cortez.
51:46Again, the impression of Montezuma
51:47is as a desperate man who may have made mistakes,
51:50but he's not a man paralysed by fear,
51:53and he's certainly not a traitor to his people.
51:56In a way,
51:57Cortez actually benefited from the conspiracy against him.
52:01The expeditionary force became recruits
52:03and converts to his cause
52:04when they heard of the Aztecs' wealth.
52:07But a nasty surprise awaited them
52:09at the end of their journey.
52:13When Cortez returned to Tenochtitlan,
52:16he discovered that all hell had broken loose.
52:19His second-in-command, Pedro de Alvarado,
52:21had heard about a plot aimed at the Spanish.
52:25He'd taken pre-emptive action
52:26and had slaughtered a group of Aztec nobility
52:29at a religious festival.
52:30This was the festival of Tlaxcatl,
52:34during which, traditionally,
52:36the Aztecs sacrificed, captured Tlaxcalan warriors.
52:39So the Spanish would have had enthusiastic backing
52:42from their Tlaxcalan allies for their butchery.
52:46What happened next
52:47has been the subject of much conjecture and debate.
52:51Some versions have it
52:52that Montezuma was led onto the balcony of the palace
52:55to call for peace,
52:56but that he was stoned by his own people
52:58and later died of his wounds.
53:01Others blame the Spanish,
53:03claiming that they stabbed Montezuma to death.
53:06I think, on balance,
53:07the Spanish are the prime suspects.
53:09Cortez was certainly furious with Montezuma
53:12for conspiring with Narvaez against him.
53:15Secondly, he'd lost his usefulness to the Spanish
53:18as a mediator with the Aztec people.
53:20They had now spurned Montezuma for failing to lead them in revenge
53:25for the sacrilege and murder wrought by the Spanish.
53:29No longer did Montezuma speak for them with gods or mortals.
53:33Whichever version of his death is true,
53:38Montezuma had now become a sacrificial victim
53:41as well as a scapegoat,
53:44and the Aztec people had just lost their last emperor.
53:47What followed was dramatic.
53:52Cortez lost control of the city
53:53and then recaptured it after a terrible siege.
53:57New Aztec leaders emerged
53:59who fought a legendary and heroic rearguard action
54:02against the Spanish.
54:03But the game was up.
54:05Soon, Tenochtitlan, the hub of empire, was in ruins,
54:08a body dismembered, its heart excised.
54:11A contemporary Aztec poem sums up the devastation.
54:23Broken spears lie in the roads.
54:25We have torn our hair with grief.
54:28The houses are roofless now,
54:29and their walls are red with blood.
54:32The water has turned red, as if it were dyed,
54:35and when we drink it, it has the taste of brine.
54:39We have pounded our heads in despair
54:40against the adobe walls.
54:42For our inheritance, our city is lost and dead.
54:46The shields of our warriors were its defence,
54:48but they could not save it.
54:51The death of Montezuma
54:52and the destruction of Tenochtitlan
54:54sent shockwaves across the empire.
54:57Montezuma's strength
54:58had always been the empire's potential weakness,
55:01because all Aztec power, temporal and spiritual,
55:04had been embodied in himself.
55:06With his death, the empire quickly imploded.
55:09But not everyone was grief-stricken.
55:13The collapse of the empire had much to do
55:15with the revolt of its vassal states,
55:18men embittered by years of high-tribute demands
55:21from a vicious, tyrannical government.
55:24And the catalyst for all this came from a different world.
55:29Cortes's genius was that he turned this revolt into conquest.
55:33But the subjects of the Aztec empire
55:37would soon rue the day Cortes liberated them
55:39from the yoke of tribute
55:40and the tyranny of human sacrifice.
55:43For along with their new technology
55:45and the gift of Christianity,
55:47his troops brought something else.
55:49Disease.
55:51Recently, we might be forgiven for associating Mexico
55:54with a pandemic of flu visited on the rest of the world,
55:56Montezuma's only revenge, perhaps.
55:59But compare that to the destruction
56:01wrought by the European diseases on the Aztec people,
56:05smallpox in particular.
56:07Before the Spanish arrived,
56:08there was a population here estimated at 10 million people.
56:12By the year 1600,
56:14nine out of ten of those people had died of disease.
56:17The conquistadors, in their Christian zeal,
56:22also obliterated the Aztec's secular and religious landscape.
56:26Temples, sacred enclosures, palaces.
56:29Their invented past,
56:30as well as their very real present, were bulldozed.
56:35Take this place, for example.
56:37Cholula, one of the finest churches in Mexico,
56:40sitting on top of a hill,
56:42looking down on a city famous for its churches.
56:45Except, if you look closely at the base of this hill,
56:48you'll realise it's not a hill at all.
56:50It's a pyramid,
56:51the one that in its time
56:53was the greatest of its kind anywhere in the world.
56:57The Spanish built this as a demonstration
56:59of the superiority of the Christian God over all others.
57:06On the one hand,
57:07what happened at Cholula can be seen as emblematic
57:10of something that was to take place throughout Aztec Mexico,
57:13a gradual blending of old and new worlds,
57:16a fusion of customs, beliefs,
57:19food, language,
57:20and most importantly, people.
57:24Much of the Mexican identity today
57:26stems in one way or another
57:28from the events of 1520 A.D.,
57:30the death of Montezuma,
57:32and the destruction of Tenochtitlan.
57:34That's the positive spin.
57:35Yet over the next 400 years,
57:38as Europeans thrust into new continents,
57:41Asia, Africa, and Australasia,
57:44what happened here
57:45can be seen as a bloody dress rehearsal
57:48for the greatest imperial expansion
57:50in the history of the human race.
57:52And that's what makes
57:53the obliteration of the Aztecs
57:55so powerful,
57:57so evocative.
57:58They're the first major civilization
58:01to be wiped out
58:02as the Europeans raced
58:04to dominate and exploit new worlds.
58:08That's also why I believe
58:09that these objects
58:10from the lost Aztec empire
58:12belong on a world stage.
58:15They're an eloquent reminder
58:16of a clash of civilizations
58:18that resonates to this day.
58:22They also give us a chance
58:24to re-evaluate the central character,
58:26a man not now remembered as a hero,
58:29but one, I think,
58:30who showed considerable heroism
58:32in his attempt to hold back
58:34the irresistible force
58:36of a European invasion,
58:38Montezuma.
58:47Stay with us on BBC HD.
58:49From blood and guts
58:49to foaming at the mouth,
58:51one of the visiting mongrels
58:52has a problem.
58:53That's next,
58:54and later on,
58:55more comedy not going out.
58:59toak minimum
59:00toak minimum
59:02toak minimum
59:02toak minimum
59:04toak minimum
59:04toak minimum
59:05in the tomar
59:06May as a human
59:07must push
59:08to stop
59:08toak minimum
59:13and toakkum
59:22taking a visual
59:22post episodes
59:23things in a Front
59:24and at a time
59:25that
59:26has a clear
Comments