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00:00The 8th of November, 1519.
00:10In a magnificent city, surrounded by water,
00:15an all-powerful Aztec ruler prepares to meet a man like no one he's ever seen before.
00:22Imagine, in your mind, blue sky, beautiful weather, sunlight, glittering on the lake.
00:36And these basically visitors from Mars advance across the causeway.
00:41These are the Spaniards.
00:45They wear unfamiliar clothes and carry strange weapons.
00:50The first meeting between Cortez and Moctezuma is one of the great moments in human history.
00:59This is the moment when the two halves of humanity come together.
01:05Old world meets new.
01:12Changing forever the course of history.
01:14One, a formidable ruler who has been dominating his world for 20 years.
01:23The other, one of the most ruthless, effective, brilliant, brutal opportunists in world history.
01:30This fateful meeting will expose fault lines at the heart of the Aztec Empire.
01:43A harsh regime fueling resentment.
01:46And a fatal weakness in the face of an invisible killer.
02:10Ancient Egypt.
02:11The Roman Empire.
02:18The Aztecs of Mexico.
02:23And the samurai of Japan.
02:28Four great civilizations.
02:31Each a pinnacle of human ingenuity and achievement.
02:34Each lasted for centuries.
02:40Their people thought they would endure forever.
02:46Until suddenly.
02:49Everything changed.
02:50These civilizations faced challenges that are all too familiar today.
03:04Climate catastrophe.
03:10Pandemic.
03:15War.
03:15Challenges for which ancient societies had few solutions.
03:29But what if there was a place that had the answers to what went wrong?
03:35A place full of secrets and stories.
03:37A repository of memory stretching back through time.
03:47The British Museum, home to more than eight million artifacts, is a record of how and why
03:56the greatest civilizations rose to power and then spectacularly fell.
04:02It's treasures are the human traces that survived disaster.
04:10But might they also hold lessons for our own future?
04:17Every civilization throughout history has had an expiry date.
04:21With great societies, the seeds of their destruction are sown within the society.
04:29They're already there.
04:33No civilization ever thinks it's going to fall.
04:37But the question is, what can we learn from the past?
04:51What can we learn from the past?
05:01In the shadow of volcanoes,
05:04on an island in the middle of a vast lake,
05:09the city of Tenochtitlan is home to around 200,000 people.
05:14It is the dazzling jewel at the heart of the mighty Aztec Empire.
05:28Stretching from coast to coast, across what is modern-day Mexico,
05:33its territory covers over 77,000 square miles.
05:37Tenochtitlan is far more advanced than most European cities of this age.
05:48Five times the size of Henry VIII's London.
05:52Tenochtitlan is not like an old medieval European city.
05:58It was planned in the form of a grid, rather like Manhattan is today.
06:02The city is green and lush.
06:09Fertile water gardens produce multiple crops each year.
06:15This civilization created the technology in order to use this water
06:22and also to construct fields on the water.
06:25And these people, it's possible to sow corn, to sow beans, to sow tomatoes on these fields.
06:37You have all kinds of foods, chilies, peppers.
06:43You can buy fish pre-wrapped in a maize leaf,
06:48so you can kind of take away your dinner if you'd like.
06:50They have huge kind of seething markets where tens of thousands of people go shopping every day.
07:00This city is teeming with life. There are priests and soldiers, weavers, traders.
07:06The city is overwhelming in its colors and its smells and the sort of the atmosphere of excitement and bustle.
07:14Much of what we know of this civilization and the clues to its catastrophic collapse
07:33lie in a remarkable set of books that survived from that time, written by the Aztecs themselves.
07:40We have hundreds and hundreds of pages in the Aztec language. They're called the codices.
07:59They're called the codices. They're called the codices.
08:04Today, we can look at the beautiful images and the alphabetic writing and learn a great deal
08:10about their political history, their religious beliefs.
08:16The Aztecs have a very long tradition of writing.
08:20This is my mother tongue, and this is the language that my parents transmitted to me in the 20th century.
08:38We feel very proud to find a very strong legacy in the history of the Aztec society.
08:50You're hearing things that were said, performances that were given, prayers that were uttered.
08:54It's really quite extraordinary.
08:59The picture that emerges from these manuscripts is of a community bound together by a level of equality,
09:07very unlike Europe at the time.
09:11Aztec society is incredibly progressive.
09:15You have institutional education for boys and girls.
09:21They instill the children with an understanding of being part of that Aztec machine.
09:29Men and women have very specific and very different roles,
09:32but both are regarded as equally essential to the successful perpetuation of their culture.
09:44The empire and its five million inhabitants
09:54are under the control of a single, all-powerful ruler.
09:58Moctezuma was a man in his early 40s.
10:08He had been emperor for 17 years and a very successful one.
10:14His name Moctezuma means frowns like a lord, so presumably he was high-handed and had a temper.
10:20Moctezuma became ruler after the death of his uncle.
10:28He did not inherit the throne. He was chosen.
10:33The Aztecs are so interested in who's going to do a good job
10:36that that takes over from who is the closest relative.
10:42Moctezuma looks like a good bet as ruler. He is a brilliant, effective warrior.
10:48There's good evidence that he himself went out into the field and led armies and was a successful general.
11:00However, in private, Moctezuma appears to be an emperor who
11:05likes to sit in Tenochtitlan and read books and learn about his empire.
11:12He is intelligent and he has a thirst for knowledge.
11:15Moctezuma believes in his own ability to understand and control the world around him.
11:26His people revere him as a demigod.
11:30But soon he will face a challenge for which he is completely unprepared.
11:45Moctezuma believes in his own ability to understand and control the world around him.
12:021500 miles away, on the island of Cuba, a Spanish adventurer is plotting a bold expedition.
12:10His name is Hernan Cortez.
12:21The single most important thing about Hernan Cortez is that he is a nobody.
12:25He was born in 1485 in Extremadura, a kind of scrubby frontier bit of Spain.
12:33He could have stayed in Spain, but he's clearly very ambitious.
12:37It has been nearly 30 years since the arrival of Christopher Columbus in the Americas.
12:51Since then, Spanish explorers, mercenaries and merchants have been travelling to the Caribbean
12:57the Caribbean in their thousands, looking for land, gold and glory.
13:07They are known as conquistadors.
13:10Everyone who's going to the new world is going to seek their fortune.
13:19It's the American dream. It's the idea of anyone can go and make something of themselves.
13:26They're a bit like venture capitalists investing in tech. They're looking for the next frontier,
13:35the next big thing.
13:40Cortez, growing up in Spain, saw ships laden with treasure arriving from the new world.
13:48He followed the lure and joined the ranks of the conquistadors.
13:52Cortez wants money and gold and probably also fame and recognition.
14:04Cortez is a narcissist. He's possibly a sociopath. He's a clever guy, but he's an awful person.
14:15Cortez will sacrifice friendships and betray his colleagues in order to get what he wants.
14:25Arguably, Cortez is kind of a monster.
14:33Cortez has set his sights on the mainland to the west. A previous expedition has explored its coast
14:41and brought back tales of a mysterious kingdom beyond, said to be laden with gold.
14:49He starts drumming up support and gathering men, promising them great wealth if they come with him.
14:59Cortez is often described as a very Machiavellian kind of character.
15:05Very manipulative. He's highly ambitious.
15:11Leading 11 ships and some 500 men.
15:17Cortez's thirst for gold is about to take him into the unknown
15:22and into the heart of the most powerful warrior culture in the Americas.
15:27Do Cortez and any of his men have any sense of Tenochtitlan, of the Aztec Empire,
15:33of the extraordinary power of this civilisation? I think the answer is clearly no.
15:49Throughout his rule, Moctezuma has ruthlessly expanded his empire.
15:57He's also known to be a part of the Aztec Empire.
15:59He's also known to be a part of the Aztec Empire.
16:05Inspired by the ferocious power of the apex predators that hunt in the wilds of the Aztec world.
16:18Everything in nature, whether it be animals or mountains or plants or trees,
16:22is seen as part of their world view.
16:25They feel that there are strong spiritual bonds there.
16:31Aztec warriors even dress as the animals whose primal violence they seek to harness.
16:39Eagle and jaguar warriors were the two highest orders in the Aztec army.
16:45They symbolise bravery, proximity to power and to creation.
16:49The Aztecs aren't just a fearsome military culture.
16:58Their religious beliefs also lead them to practice a terrifying ritual.
17:03It's hard to get away from sacrifice when it comes to the Aztecs.
17:14The popular image of Aztec culture is basically they love a sacrifice.
17:34They love nothing more than plunging a knife, ripping out your car and holding it up to a baying mob.
17:42Everybody's covered in blood.
17:45But it's not how the Aztecs behave.
17:47They almost certainly saw these as very serious kind of religious rituals.
17:59This knife clearly is an incredible symbolic object.
18:04Knives like this are often used as part of ritual offerings.
18:08The blade is crafted from razor sharp flint.
18:16The handle carved in wood.
18:19Then decorated in mother of pearl, turquoise and malachite.
18:26To depict one of the most formidable of all Aztec fighters.
18:32The eagle warrior.
18:34The black patches at the tips of the eagle's wings, those are singeing from the sun.
18:40Because supposedly they were the animals that stood the closest to the sun at its creation.
18:47The Aztecs see it as their duty to uphold the balance of the cosmos.
18:53To achieve this, they must feed the sun and the earth with blood.
19:04The most common ritual sacrifice takes place on top of the temple pyramid.
19:13Four priests would stretch the arms and legs of the person backwards over a pointed stone.
19:21They stretch the arms of the victim backwards.
19:24And then a fifth priest removes the heart from the ribcage, which is extended.
19:33And the heart is given to the gods.
19:35They stretch the arms and legs of the body.
19:46Human sacrifice also allows Moctezuma to rule his empire with absolute authority.
19:53This isn't just about saying, look how many people will die.
19:58It's about saying, look how powerful our gods are.
20:03It's about Moctezuma being at the heart of that power and being the figure around which the cosmos is swirling.
20:10He is the man who has to hold all those forces in balance.
20:13And that is a big statement about power.
20:18The Aztecs wanted to frighten people.
20:20Human sacrifice became a weapon in their war against others.
20:26For now, Moctezuma is terrifying his enemies into submission.
20:31But he is about to face an entirely new kind of opponent.
20:43Two months after setting out from Cuba, the conquistador Hernan Cortez reaches the coastline of the Aztec Empire.
21:06When the Spaniards first arrive on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, their expedition is being watched.
21:13It's the first time that the Aztec people are observing strange people.
21:21Their skin was more or less white.
21:27They were using swords riding horses.
21:32These animals were not known in central Mexico.
21:39They have ships that are large.
21:41They have different clothing and weaponry.
21:46They are hairier, smellier, and the Spaniards seem and are grubby.
21:51Moctezuma's spies are watching.
22:01And he soon hears reports of the strange new arrivals.
22:04He could crush the Spaniards, but he chooses to let them live.
22:17Moctezuma is curious and he wants to see them.
22:21If an alien spaceship landed and aliens looked human, got out and walked around,
22:29your first instinct wouldn't be, we must immediately kill them.
22:32You'd want to talk to them and find out where they've come from.
22:34He cannot possibly think that they pose a threat to his life or to the survival of his empire.
22:45Moctezuma sends a message to the newcomers intended to show his strength.
22:50Moctezuma sends a message that will be misread with tragic consequences.
22:56Moctezuma sends a message that will be misread with tragic consequences.
23:02He dispatches a gift of gold.
23:04The Asics had a special name for gold, which was the excrement of the gods.
23:28Something so precious and so beautiful that only gods could do.
23:34A few items made of gold from the Aztec world still exist.
23:57We often hear the Asics prefer turquoise, but this is really not true.
24:04Once they discover the beauty, they go crazy with gold.
24:15We see the Asics being in a way like nouveau riche,
24:19that has acquired wealth suddenly and is showing it off.
24:25Is it equivalent to a Rolex watch?
24:28For the Aztecs, gold is not just valuable, it is sacred.
24:37A sign of the presence of gods on earth and through intricate craftsmanship, a way to harness supernatural forces.
24:48This ring is depicting a jaguar, the most powerful feline in the Americas.
24:59This could have been born by a noble or a priest or a distinguished warrior.
25:08So it's a symbol really of power and it's a symbol of strength.
25:20I would read that as a display of power or else a grand display, look how rich I am.
25:38I can give you all of these things so you should go away.
25:43The Spanish of course see it as a submission.
25:45He's agreed that you'll give us all these gifts and so we're going to be in charge.
25:50Moctezuma believes he's shown his strength.
25:56What he fails to realize is that he has just made Cortez more determined than ever.
26:04It is a catastrophic mistake.
26:20What he fails to realize is that he has to be in charge of his strength.
26:30Four months later, Cortez and his men are forging a path inland.
26:37Up through the lowland jungle.
26:41They are beginning to understand that to get their gold, they will have to take on a vast warrior empire.
26:51But then Cortez discovers a weakness that he can exploit.
26:58There are plenty of people who have been suppressed by the Aztecs,
27:01who might want to take advantage of the arrival of a new power player in the territory.
27:08There is a simmering resentment against Moctezuma.
27:13The source of this resentment is encoded in a remarkable object from the Aztec world.
27:20This is a human existence that has been transformed into a work of art.
27:40This is a human existence that has been transformed into a world of art.
27:56Beneath a layer of precious stones is a human skull.
28:01We call it the decorated skull.
28:08But it's not a decorated skull.
28:10It's a power object.
28:15Its mosaic covering is of dazzling turquoise, black lignite, and red oyster shell.
28:23Precious materials Moctezuma demands from the wider Aztec empire.
28:31Part of a harsh system of taxation imposed on his subjects.
28:36The city of Tenochtitlan is a parasite on other territories.
28:42So tribute can encompass everything from raw materials and currency,
28:47so things like gold and cacao and cotton, to fully created warrior outfits,
28:54and even in some cases sacrificial victims.
29:01The richly decorated skull, attached to a deerskin belt,
29:06was designed to be worn by an Aztec warrior, strapped to his back,
29:10to strike awe into those that followed.
29:17The idea that this skull mask could be attached to the body,
29:22looking behind you as you move forward as a priest or a warrior,
29:27that in some senses here is this object that talks about the overcoming of death.
29:33It is a symbol of death.
29:35I can imagine the warrior going into battle wearing this thing,
29:40somehow feeling invincible,
29:44protected, being reinforced in their own inner potency.
29:52The decorated skull, built from cruel tribute,
29:57is a symbol of Aztec domination.
29:59But it also holds a warning for Emperor Moctezuma.
30:06The danger for him is that there will be some people who think,
30:09God, you know, the Aztecs are very overbearing.
30:11This guy Moctezuma, you know, he's a real menace.
30:14Like, I can't wait to see the back of him.
30:16And that, of course, means that there are people who,
30:19if a new group entered the arena,
30:23would be very keen to ally with them against Moctezuma.
30:25It's a curse often to be in a position of power.
30:32You are in a position that is incredibly precarious.
30:36In the case of the Aztec Empire, it was even worse,
30:38because this was an empire that was recently built upon
30:41conquest of multiple different groups and ethnicities.
30:44It was bloated, overtaxed, unequal, and fragile.
30:59Cortez and his men press on.
31:02And now they discover that Moctezuma's empire
31:06doesn't just harbour people who resent his rule.
31:09There are also those prepared to resist.
31:15There are city-states within Mexico
31:18which don't send tribute to Tenochtitlana and actually defy it.
31:23Most famously, its big rival is a place called Tlaxcala.
31:28Tlaxcala is a pocket of independent territory
31:36that lies directly on Cortez's route to the Aztec capital.
31:41When the Spanish first arrive,
31:43Tlaxcalan warriors try to drive them back.
31:49But Cortez has a secret weapon.
31:52Someone who can help him negotiate with the people of Tlaxcala.
31:58When the Spaniards first arrive on the coast,
32:00Cortez is very lucky that the Spaniards are given 20 girls
32:06to be part of the Spanish entourage.
32:11Among them is a young woman who will help change the course of history.
32:16In Spanish, she is known as Malinche.
32:20The Aztecs call her Malincin.
32:22Malincin is said to have been born in the household of a nobleman
32:30very near the Gulf of Mexico.
32:34Between 8 and 12 years old, she was captured and sold into slavery.
32:42We did not know how many people had owned her.
32:49Hernan Cortez gave Malincin to the highest-ranking Spaniard in his group,
32:55who was very impressed by Malincin because she was beautiful,
33:00and also she was very confident.
33:05Malincin soon proves extremely useful to Cortez.
33:10Born just outside the Aztec Empire, she speaks their language.
33:16And as well.
33:17Almost overnight, she moves from being a sexual servant to being a translator, directly aging.
33:31Images of Malincin herself can be seen in the Aztec record books.
33:36She often appears either as large or larger than Hernan Cortez, which points to her importance.
33:51Malincin is helping Cortez, but she has her own agenda.
33:58She holds a deep grudge against the Aztecs.
34:02It was they who tore her from her family and sold her into slavery.
34:10Malincin is freely advancing her own interests.
34:15We can well imagine that it might have seemed like an opportunity for her to escape slavery.
34:22The Clascalan's own records capture the moment when, with Malincin as his translator,
34:37Cortez tries to persuade them to help him.
34:43The Spanish have to work really hard before the Clascalans eventually decide,
34:49OK, it looks like we might have a chance of defeating the Aztecs, so let's join forces.
35:19Six months after setting foot on the mainland, Cortez and his men, backed by 6,000 of their new
35:27local allies, cross the mountain passes surrounding Tenochtitlan.
35:32They finally get their first glimpse of the spectacular Aztec capital.
35:42They start to proceed across the causeway. Cortez and his captains leading this column of Spaniards.
35:51They have all their finery. They want to impress their hosts.
36:00Moctezuma believes in the strength and power of his empire.
36:06So he welcomes the Spanish, but he also reminds them who has the upper hand.
36:12There really is an enormous power imbalance. And Moctezuma emphasizes that power imbalance by making
36:22Cortez wait for ages and ages and ages. And he has to wait for absolutely hours before eventually
36:30he meets Moctezuma himself.
37:00This moment is, I think, the most richly symbolic, the most momentous meeting of two human beings
37:11in world history.
37:15Because it stands for something much bigger, which is the European discovery of the New World.
37:20And, of course, the New World's discovery of Europeans.
37:23And all of that is embodied in these two extraordinary people.
37:43First comes an exchange of gifts.
37:46Cortez presents a necklace of pearls and glass beads.
37:57It's no match for the craftsmanship Moctezuma can call upon.
38:03One written account records the gift of a carved serpent covered in turquoise.
38:09Remarkably, an Aztec artifact to match that description has survived.
38:17And it holds clues to the message Moctezuma meant to convey.
38:30The double-headed serpent is this absolutely exquisite object that,
38:45from the moment you first see it, you can never forget.
38:49Because it imprints itself on your memory.
38:51Snakes, for the Aztecs, represent fertility.
39:10They represent life and death.
39:12The shedding of the skin symbolises rebirth.
39:21This is to be seen, to be admired, to be shown to the world.
39:29It's part of the pride that the Aztecs have.
39:33It's a display of power.
39:36The person that made it must have been aware of the emergent power of this object,
39:49and been spellbound by it as it was being made.
39:53The gift is meant to impress Cortez, but it may also be a warning.
40:11The double-headed serpent is an ambiguous symbol.
40:14It can be a negative omen, because you have the two of them pulling in different directions.
40:20So there's that slight hint of danger underlying it.
40:29If you're a betting man, and you look at these two blokes, you say,
40:32come on, there's only going to be one winner here.
40:34And it's not the Spaniards, who's got a few hundred adventurers and ruffians at his back.
40:40It's the bloke with a massive capital city and kind of millions of people.
40:44It seems like no match at all, but Moctezuma critically underestimates the threat.
40:54He treats Cortez like a friendly visitor, a courtly prince, when in reality he is a ruthless mercenary.
41:02He says to Cortez, welcome, this is your home, please come into the city, everything is yours.
41:10You know, we're so delighted that you've come.
41:14This was basically like people who say, oh, come into my house, but you never really mean it.
41:20You're saying polite things, these are the courtly conventions,
41:24courtesies, that you extend to your guests.
41:27That's what Moctezuma is doing.
41:29And I think the Spanish take that literally.
41:32Cortez is like, great, you know, let's go.
41:39The Spaniards, along with the Clasgarland leaders,
41:43take up residence inside the Aztec capital.
41:50Moctezuma thinks, I am much more powerful than the Clasgarlands,
41:54and these guys will be overwhelmed by my city and me, my power,
42:00and probably they'll abandon the Clasgarlands and come and work for me.
42:08Cortez is clearly in awe of this wonderful city.
42:13One of the other conquistadors later says,
42:15we wondered if it was not a dream because it was all so beautiful.
42:18He and his men are housed in a palace next door to Moctezuma's own palace.
42:25We have this sense that he is building a relationship, a rapport with Moctezuma.
42:30The Spaniards are engaging in a kind of prolonged diplomatic encounter.
42:35They go hunting together.
42:36They were very impressed by the market.
42:40They saw the inside of temples.
42:43They were taken by boat to the other side of the lake shore to see other little towns and villages.
42:51The more the Spanish see of this fabled land, the more desperate they are to get their hands on it.
42:57The problem for Cortez is that there's no apparent end point to this prolonged period of diplomacy.
43:17The more the Spanish see, the more the Spanish see, the more the Spanish see.
43:25After five months of diplomatic stalemate, Cortez receives news that forces him to act.
43:33Cortez learned that some other Spaniards had arrived on the coast.
43:38He knew he had a problem because he didn't have the permission to be there.
43:42He knew he had to be there.
43:45Cortez has embarked on his bold venture without getting approval from the Spanish authorities.
43:54Cortez has gone rogue.
43:56Effectively, Cortez is attempting to defeat an empire without actually having a license from the
44:03King of Spain to do what he's doing.
44:06The new arrivals are here under orders to arrest Cortez.
44:10He needs a bargaining chain.
44:14So he takes a huge risk.
44:17Cortez thought it would go better for him if he could say that he had control of the kingdom
44:22through a hostage prince.
44:24This was an age-old way of making war in Europe.
44:26You take a prince hostage and then you have control over their people.
44:30He had the nerve to send a group of men into the throne room where Montezuma was
44:45and literally take him prisoner.
44:55Melinche is doing all the translating.
45:02And they say, look, you're coming with us.
45:04And he's just so stunned.
45:06It's a kind of paralysis.
45:11He's like, okay, I'll go.
45:14Such a mad gamble, such a mad thing for Cortez to do to take Montezuma prisoner.
45:18You get this sense of Cortez being this amazing maverick who makes the right choices at the right time.
45:38What's often forgotten is the fact that he is a desperate man.
45:44He can't turn back.
45:46He's got no choice.
45:47So he may as well plow on.
45:51The gamble pays off.
45:54And Cortez bribed the new arrivals to join him in his quest for gold.
45:59Cortez is able through his usual mix of military and diplomatic prowess to win the new Spaniards over.
46:09In fact, it takes almost no winning over at all.
46:12He now has 800 additional soldiers.
46:16But having kidnapped Montezuma, Cortez has made the whole population of the Aztec capital his enemy.
46:23Once they have taken Montezuma prisoner, the mood in the city has definitely darkened.
46:40There's a few hundred Spaniards.
46:41They're in this palace, but around them, it's not merely the city with hundreds of thousands of people,
46:48but there's a whole massive empire.
46:53A band of Aztec warriors stages an attack on the palace where Montezuma is being held prisoner.
47:03The emperor is ordered by Cortez to try and defuse the situation.
47:10Montezuma was forced on a balcony to appeal to his people.
47:15They're kind of using him as a bit of a hostage, a human shield,
47:19possibly still hoping that he can act as an intermediary with the people,
47:22although I think it's pretty clear by this point that his authority has drained away
47:28and that people are no longer listening to him.
47:33The emperor has lost all control over his people.
47:38Once hailed as a demigod, he is now powerless
47:42and all too mortal.
47:46Montezuma, he's a hostage who has outlived his usefulness.
47:51We know the Spanish kill all their other hostages and there are sources that say the Spanish basically
47:57came into his room and killed him.
47:59The corpse of the once mighty leader of Central America's greatest civilisation
48:10is left on the street to rot.
48:12The corpse of the once mighty leader of Central America's greatest civilisation
48:16The corpse of the once mighty leader of the once mighty leader of Central America's greatest civilisation
48:26is left on the street to rot.
48:29Before the Aztec warriors can take their revenge,
48:47the Spanish decide to grab what they can and make their escape.
48:51They're sneaking through the streets which seem deserted.
48:57How are we going to get out of here with our lives?
49:01They are seen by a woman who's collecting water and she raises the alarm.
49:05And then it's as though the whole city is pouring out of the buildings.
49:20Canoes are swarming around the Spaniards.
49:24The mortality rate is just piling up.
49:28Horses are being killed, people are being killed by the hundreds.
49:32In the chaos, around two thirds of the Spaniards die.
49:38Some 600 men.
49:41Cortes himself is quite badly injured, but he survives.
49:46This night has gone down in history with the name of La Noche Triste,
49:50the Night of Sorrows, because for the Spaniards it is a tragedy.
49:56From the indigenous point of view, maybe we might think of it as more like a night of triumph.
50:02Finally, the Aztecs have rid their capital city of the newcomers.
50:10The whole city celebrates.
50:12The Spaniards are gone.
50:16But they have left behind a parting gift.
50:20An invisible threat that will bring the Aztecs to their knees.
50:32After the Spaniards left, for a few weeks, people were very happy.
50:48But then people began to die.
50:50For the Aztecs, can you imagine the horror as this silent, unexplainable killer first appears among them?
50:59Tantalising evidence for this mystery disease may be embedded in the most iconic artefact from the Aztec world.
51:20Masks were a central element of Aztec life.
51:28Turquoise masks were usually placed on corpses at the time of a funeral.
51:35Here we see an Aztec, with ammonite-like eyes, aquiline nose, and beautiful teeth.
51:49But this mask contains some unexpected details.
52:14We see these stones.
52:21They stand out so the imperfections of the skin are being shown.
52:27We see the man being afflicted.
52:30He is showing us what he is suffering from.
52:36The lumps on the skin might represent the disease of leprosy, widespread in the Americas.
52:45But they are also a remarkable match for a killer plague that the Spanish have introduced to the new world.
52:54Smallpox.
52:54It seems very evident to me that those bigger bits of turquoise on the surface,
53:03that is the lumps that you would find on the face of somebody afflicted by smallpox.
53:11It's hard not to associate the mask with exactly that, this wave of mortal disease that decimated 40% of the population.
53:24Since the Spaniards' arrival, smallpox has spread inland from the coast,
53:34before engulfing the Aztec capital itself.
53:40This population was virgin population in the sense that they had never been exposed to these western microbes.
53:47They all got sick.
53:50They had no medicine that worked for it, no way to understand it.
53:56It was psychologically devastating.
54:02Smallpox is one of the most deadly diseases we've had in the history of humanity.
54:08Infectious enough to spread quite quickly,
54:10but deadly enough that actually it kills a third of people infected.
54:16It is higher than SARS, which is 10%.
54:19It's higher than COVID-19, which was, you know, one to two percent.
54:22When you get it, you start feeling unwell, high fever, headaches, vomiting.
54:31The next stage is the tongue and the mouth get covered with pus-filled little sacs.
54:38Once your skin starts rising up, almost like little peas underneath your skin, incredibly painful,
54:44soon come all the way up and develop into scabs.
54:45Once it's in your home, everyone will get it, and then it's the question of how many will survive.
54:57Disease is the greatest reaper across human history.
55:00More people have fallen to pathogens than they have to any other cause.
55:05Epidemics are a shock, but ultimately what's more important
55:09is how vulnerable is a society which is hit by an epidemic.
55:15It's the most important part of the world.
55:17Nearly 14 months after he fled the Aztec capital,
55:21Cortes has returned to a civilisation in its death throes.
55:26Now, backed by his local allies, he launches a brutal attack.
55:35They're fighting a disease-ridden, weakened, starving population,
55:39and I think that is massive in explaining how he's able to achieve what he does.
55:46The Aztecs insist on fighting to the death.
55:50So, the Spanish start moving through the city, practicing total war.
55:59Simply the only way the Spanish are able to force the Aztecs, this proud warrior culture, to surrender.
56:06Finally, the mighty warrior empire of the Aztecs,
56:24The Aztec empire fell apart within two years.
56:41This makes it one of the fastest collapses for outworld history.
56:45That was due to the sheer variety of threats at first.
56:51An overbearing leader who demanded tax and tribute.
56:57A disaffected people with nothing to lose.
57:02And a ruthless opponent who exploited these fault lines for his own gain.
57:07Once you think about the huge amount of indigenous people who were not happy and were ready to fight
57:17against the Aztecs, you get a very different view of the situation.
57:24This is an indigenous civil war, an empire that has collapsed in on itself.
57:29A collapse, hastened by an unforeseen killer.
57:35Disease is still one of the greatest threats to civilization.
57:40We do need to look at our collective vulnerability.
57:42Just think of what happened with Covid.
57:45Pathogens always seem to be two steps ahead of us and we're trying to catch up in that race.
57:49The story of the Aztecs is ultimately a story about the arrival of the unexpected.
57:57And I think that has to be a pretty sobering lesson for us.
58:04We are deluded if we think that everything we take for granted will be here forever.
58:11Japan, a unique culture closed off to the west for centuries, is on a collision course with the modern world.
58:29As foreign aggressors arrive on their shores, Japan's ancient warrior class, the samurai, must fight to save their way of life.
58:41The fall of the Aztecs
58:46Dominic Sandbrock reveals more about the fall of the Aztecs.
58:49Listen to the Restis history podcast on sounds.
58:53Another ancient relic next on BBC Two.
58:55Mammoth may have made a new best friend.
58:57The new series continues in the Mammoth.
59:11Mammoth may have made a new tercer mo-fiтор of Mammoth.
59:13Mammoth may have made a new relationship between Islam and other other swans.
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