- 2 days ago
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00The 8th of November, 1519.
00:15In a magnificent city, surrounded by water, an all-powerful Aztec ruler prepares to meet
00:23a man like no one he's ever seen before.
00:30Imagine, in your mind, blue sky, beautiful weather, sunlight glittering on the lake.
00:40And these basically visitors from Mars advance across the causeway.
00:46These are the Spaniards.
00:49They wear unfamiliar clothes and carry strange weapons.
00:56The first meeting between Cortez and Moctezuma is one of the great moments in human history.
01:04This is the moment when the two halves of humanity come together.
01:08Old world meets new, changing forever the course of history.
01:19One, a formidable ruler who has been dominating his world for 20 years.
01:27The other, one of the most ruthless, effective, brilliant, brutal opportunists in world history.
01:36This fateful meeting will expose fault lines at the heart of the Aztec empire.
01:47A harsh regime, fueling resentment.
01:57And a fatal weakness in the face of an invisible killer.
02:01Ancient Egypt, the Roman Empire, the Aztecs of Mexico, and the Samurai of Japan.
02:29Four great civilizations, each a pinnacle of human ingenuity and achievement.
02:41Each lasted for centuries.
02:45Their people thought they would endure forever.
02:50Until suddenly, everything changed.
02:59These civilizations faced challenges that are all too familiar today.
03:09Climate catastrophe.
03:14Pandemic.
03:21War.
03:23Challenges for which ancient societies had few solutions.
03:34But what if there was a place that had the answers to what went wrong?
03:39A place full of secrets and stories.
03:44A repository of memory stretching back through time.
03:52The British Museum, home to more than 8 million artifacts, is a record of how and why the greatest
04:01civilizations rose to power and then spectacularly fell.
04:09Its treasures are the human traces that survived disaster.
04:15But might they also hold lessons for our own future.
04:22Every civilization throughout history has had an expiry date.
04:27With great societies, the seeds of their destruction are sown within the society.
04:34They're already there.
04:38No civilization ever thinks it's going to fall.
04:41But the question is, what can we learn from the past?
05:05In the shadow of volcanoes, on an island in the middle of a vast lake, the city of Tenochtitlan
05:16is home to around 200,000 people.
05:24It is the dazzling jewel at the heart of the mighty Aztec empire.
05:33Stretching from coast to coast, across what is modern-day Mexico, its territory covers over 77,000 square miles.
05:46Tenochtitlan is far more advanced than most European cities of this age.
05:52Five times the size of Henry VIII's London.
05:56Tenochtitlan is not like an old medieval European city.
06:01It was planned in the form of a grid rather like Manhattan is today.
06:07The city is green and lush.
06:13Fertile water gardens produce multiple crops each year.
06:17The civilization created the technology in order to use this water and also to construct fields on the water.
06:30And these people, it's possible to sow corn, to sow beans, to sow tomatoes on these fields.
06:42You have all kinds of foods, chilies, peppers.
06:47You can buy fish pre-wrapped in a maize leaf.
06:52So you can kind of take away your dinner if you'd like.
06:55They have huge kind of seething markets where tens of thousands of people go shopping every day.
07:04This city is teeming with life.
07:06There are priests and soldiers, weavers, traders.
07:10The city is overwhelming in its colours and its smells and the sort of atmosphere of excitement and bustle.
07:29Much of what we know of this civilization and the clues to its catastrophic collapse lie in a remarkable set of books that survived from that time, written by the Aztecs themselves.
07:46We have hundreds and hundreds of pages in the Aztec language. They're called the codices.
07:52Today, we can look at the beautiful images and the alphabetic writing and learn a great deal about their political history, their religious beliefs.
08:17The Aztecs have a very long tradition of writing.
08:29This is my mother tongue.
08:31And this is the language that my parents transmitted to me in the 20th century.
08:36We feel very proud to find a very strong legacy in the history of the Aztec society.
08:55You're hearing things that were said, performances that were given, prayers that were uttered.
08:59It's really quite extraordinary.
09:01The picture that emerges from these manuscripts is of a community bound together by a level of equality, very unlike Europe at the time.
09:16Aztec society is incredibly progressive.
09:20You have institutional education for boys and girls.
09:23They instill the children with an understanding of being part of that Aztec machine.
09:33Men and women have very specific and very different roles, but both are regarded as equally essential to the successful perpetuation of their culture.
09:41The Empire and its five million inhabitants are under the control of a single, all-powerful ruler.
10:02Moctezuma was a man in his early forties.
10:12He had been emperor for 17 years and a very successful one.
10:17His name, Moctezuma, means frowns like a lord.
10:21So presumably he was high-handed and had a temper.
10:24Moctezuma became ruler after the death of his uncle.
10:31He did not inherit the throne. He was chosen.
10:37The Aztecs are so interested in who's going to do a good job that that takes over from who is the closest relative.
10:46Moctezuma looks like a good bet as ruler. He is a brilliant, effective warrior.
10:52There's good evidence that he himself went out into the field and led armies and was a successful general.
11:03However, in private, Moctezuma appears to be an emperor who likes to sit in Tenochtitlan and read books and learn about his empire.
11:15He is intelligent and he has a thirst for knowledge.
11:19Moctezuma believes in his own ability to understand and control the world around him.
11:28His people revere him as a demigod.
11:32But soon he will face a challenge for which he is completely unprepared.
11:41He knows what eso is next.
11:42He knows what his enemyé…力 needs to pass via un mayoral Albuquerque.
11:47With Menoquaz, he stands alongside enabled ships he travels a bit.
11:50He世led in time to despise his most memorable army.
11:53We work out to young men and reunions, a young man are even back in Timatón.
11:541,500 miles away, on the island of Cuba, a Spanish adventurer is plotting a bold expedition.
12:19His name is Hernán Cortés.
12:24The single most important thing about Hernán Cortés is that he is a nobody.
12:30He was born in 1485 in Extremadura, a kind of scrubby frontier bit of Spain.
12:37He could have stayed in Spain, but he's clearly very ambitious.
12:47It has been nearly 30 years since the arrival of Christopher Columbus in the Americas.
12:53Since then, Spanish explorers, mercenaries and merchants have been travelling to the Caribbean in their thousands, looking for land, gold and glory.
13:07They are known as conquistadors.
13:13Everyone who's going to the new world is going to seek their fortune.
13:23It's the American dream. It's the idea of anyone can go and make something of themselves.
13:30They're a bit like venture capitalists investing in tech. They're looking for the next frontier, the next big thing.
13:40Cortés, growing up in Spain, saw ships laden with treasure arriving from the new world.
13:52He followed the lure and joined the ranks of the conquistadors.
13:56Cortés wants money and gold and probably fame and recognition.
14:08Cortés is a narcissist. He's possibly a sociopath.
14:14He's a clever guy, but he's an awful person.
14:22Cortés will sacrifice friendships and betray his colleagues in order to get what he wants.
14:29Arguably, Cortés is kind of a monster.
14:31Cortés has set his sights on the mainland to the west.
14:43A previous expedition has explored its coast and brought back tales of a mysterious kingdom beyond.
14:50Said to be laden with gold.
14:53He starts drumming up support and gathering men, promising them great wealth if they come with him.
15:03Cortés is often described as a very Machiavellian kind of character, very manipulative.
15:11He's highly ambitious.
15:14Leading 11 ships and some 500 men, Cortés' thirst for gold is about to take him into the unknown.
15:26And into the heart of the most powerful warrior culture in the Americas.
15:33Do Cortés and any of his men have any sense of Tenochtitlan, of the Aztec Empire, of the extraordinary power of this civilisation?
15:40I think the answer is clearly no.
15:54Throughout his rule, Moctezuma has ruthlessly expanded his empire.
16:02Backed by an army of some 200,000 warriors.
16:10Inspired by the ferocious power of the apex predators that hunt in the wilds of the Aztec world.
16:22Everything in nature, whether it be animals or mountains or plants or trees, is seen as part of their world view.
16:31They feel that there are strong spiritual bonds there.
16:33Aztec warriors even dress as the animals whose primal violence they seek to harness.
16:42Eagle and Jaguar warriors were the two highest orders in the Aztec army.
16:49They symbolise bravery, proximity to power and to creation.
16:53The Aztecs aren't just a fearsome military culture.
17:03Their religious beliefs also lead them to practise a terrifying ritual.
17:08It's hard to get away from sacrifice when it comes to the Aztecs.
17:22The popular image of Aztec culture is basically they love a sacrifice.
17:39They love nothing more than plunging a knife, ripping out your car and holding it up to a baying mob.
17:45Everybody's covered in blood.
17:49But it's not how the Aztecs behave.
17:52They almost certainly saw these as very serious kind of religious rituals.
18:03This knife clearly is an incredible symbolic object.
18:07Knives like this are often used as part of ritual offerings.
18:16The blade is crafted from razor sharp flint.
18:20The handle carved in wood.
18:23Then decorated in mother of pearl, turquoise and malachite.
18:29To depict one of the most formidable of all Aztec fighters.
18:35The eagle warrior.
18:39The black patches at the tips of the eagle's wings, those are singeing from the sun.
18:45Because supposedly they were the animals that stood the closest to the sun at its creation.
18:52The Aztecs see it as their duty to uphold the balance of the cosmos.
18:56To achieve this, they must feed the sun and the earth with blood.
19:06The most common ritual sacrifice takes place on top of the temple pyramid.
19:17Four priests would stretch the arms and legs of the person backwards over a pointed stone.
19:24They stretch the arms of the victim backwards.
19:28And then a fifth priest removes the heart from the ribcage which is extended.
19:35And the heart is given to the gods.
19:39Human sacrifice also allows Moctezuma to rule his empire with absolute authority.
19:57This isn't just about saying, look how many people will die.
20:03It's about saying, look how powerful our gods are.
20:07It's about Moctezuma being at the heart of that power and being the figure around which the cosmos is swirling.
20:13He is the man who has to hold all those forces in balance.
20:18And that is a big statement about power.
20:22The Aztecs wanted to frighten people.
20:25Human sacrifice became a weapon in their war against others.
20:30For now, Moctezuma is terrifying his enemies into submission.
20:35But he is about to face an entirely new kind of opponent.
20:43Two months after setting out from Cuba, the conquistador Hernan Cortes reaches the coastline of the Aztec Empire.
21:06When the Spaniards first arrived on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, their expedition is being watched.
21:19It's the first time that the Aztec people are observing strange people.
21:26Their skin was more or less white.
21:29They were using swords riding horses.
21:36These animals were not known in central Mexico.
21:44They have ships that are large.
21:46They have different clothing and weaponry.
21:49They are hairier, smellier, and the Spaniards seem, and are grubby.
21:55Moctezuma's spies are watching.
22:05And he soon hears reports of the strange new arrivals.
22:13He could crush the Spaniards.
22:15But he chooses to let them live.
22:17Moctezuma is curious.
22:18Moctezuma is curious.
22:20And he wants to see them.
22:24If an alien spaceship landed and aliens looked human, got out and walked around, your first instinct wouldn't be, we must immediately kill them.
22:36You'd want to talk to them and find out where they've come from.
22:38He cannot possibly think that they've posed a threat to his life or to the survival of his empire.
22:49Moctezuma sends a message to the newcomers intended to show his strength.
22:54But it's a message that will be misread with tragic consequences.
23:06He dispatches a gift of gold.
23:09The Aztecs had a special name for gold, which was the excrement of the gods.
23:33Something so precious and so beautiful that only gods could do.
23:39A few items made of gold from the Aztec world still exist.
24:01We often hear the Aztecs prefer turquoise.
24:05But this is really not true.
24:11Once they discover the beauty, they go crazy with gold.
24:19We see the Aztecs being in a way like Nouveau Riche that has acquired wealth suddenly and is showing it off.
24:28Is it equivalent to a Rolex watch?
24:37For the Aztecs, gold is not just valuable, it is sacred.
24:42A sign of the presence of gods on earth.
24:45And through intricate craftsmanship, a way to harness supernatural forces.
24:55This ring is depicting a jaguar, the most powerful feline in the Americas.
25:05This could have been worn by a noble or a priest or a distinguished warrior.
25:12So, it's a symbol really of power and it's a symbol of strength.
25:23Moctezuma's gift of gold is extremely valuable to the Aztecs, but it is not meant as a welcome.
25:35I would read that as a display of power or else a grand display, look how rich I am, I can give you all of these things so you should go away.
25:47The Spanish, of course, see it as a submission.
25:50Oh, he's agreed that you'll give us all these gifts and so we're going to be in charge.
25:55Moctezuma believes he's shown his strength.
26:01What he fails to realize is that he has just made Cortez more determined than ever.
26:09It is a catastrophic mistake.
26:25Four months later, Cortez and his men are forging a path inland, up through the lowland jungle.
26:46They are beginning to understand that to get their gold, they will have to take on a vast warrior empire.
26:56But then Cortez discovers a weakness that he can exploit.
27:03There are plenty of people who have been suppressed by the Aztecs who might want to take advantage of the arrival of a new power player in the territory.
27:13There is a simmering resentment against Moctezuma.
27:18The source of this resentment is encoded in a remarkable object from the Aztec world.
27:25This is a human existence that has been transformed into a work of art.
27:28This is a human existence that has been transformed into a work of art.
27:45Beneath a layer of precious stones is a human skull.
27:51We call it the decorated skull.
27:54But it's not a decorated skull.
27:55It's not a decorated skull.
27:56It's a power object.
27:57Its mosaic covering is of dazzling turquoise, black lignite.
27:58and red oyster shell.
27:59It's a power object.
28:00It's a power object.
28:01And red oyster shell.
28:02Precious materials.
28:03Precious materials.
28:04Moctezuma demand.
28:05It's a power object.
28:06It's mosaic covering is of dazzling turquoise, black lignite and red oyster shell.
28:07Precious materials.
28:08Precious materials.
28:09Moctezuma demands from the wider Aztec empire.
28:13Part of a harsh system of taxation imposed on his subjects.
28:20The city of Tenochtitlan is a parasite on other territories.
28:27So tribute can encompass everything from raw materials to all to the wall.
28:41The city of Tenochtitlan is a parasite on other territories.
28:46So tribute can encompass everything from raw materials and currency,
28:52so things like gold and cacao and cotton,
28:55to fully created warrior outfits,
28:59and even in some cases, sacrificial victims.
29:05The richly decorated skull attached to a deerskin belt
29:10was designed to be worn by an Aztec warrior,
29:14strapped to his back.
29:16To strike awe into those that followed.
29:21The idea that this skull mask could be attached to the body,
29:27looking behind you as you move forward as a priest or a warrior,
29:32that in some senses, here is this object
29:34that talks about the overcoming of death.
29:39I can imagine the warrior going into battle wearing this thing,
29:44somehow feeling invincible,
29:49protected,
29:50being reinforced in their own inner potency.
29:54The decorated skull, built from cruel tribute,
30:01is a symbol of Aztec domination.
30:05But it also holds a warning for Emperor Moctezuma.
30:09The danger for him is that there will be some people who think,
30:14God, you know, the Aztecs are very overbearing.
30:16This guy Moctezuma, you know, he's a real menace.
30:19Like, I can't wait to see the back of him.
30:21And that, of course, means that there are people who,
30:24if a new group entered the arena,
30:27would be very keen to ally with them against Moctezuma.
30:33It's a curse, often, to be in a position of power.
30:37You are in a position that is incredibly precarious.
30:41In the case of the Aztec Empire, it was even worse
30:43because this was an empire that was recently built upon
30:45conquest of multiple different groups and ethnicities.
30:48It was bloated, overtaxed, unequal, and fragile.
31:03Cortez and his men press on.
31:06And now they discover that Moctezuma's empire
31:10doesn't just harbour people who resent his rule.
31:14There are also those prepared to resist.
31:18There are city-states within Mexico
31:23which don't send tribute to Tenochtitlana
31:27and actually defy it.
31:29Most famously, its big rival is a place called Tlaxcala.
31:37Tlaxcala is a pocket of independent territory
31:39that lies directly on Cortez's route to the Aztec capital.
31:45When the Spanish first arrive,
31:48Tlaxcalaan warriors try to drive them back.
31:53But Cortez has a secret weapon.
31:57Someone who can help him negotiate with the people of Tlaxcala.
32:01When the Spaniards first arrive on the coast,
32:05Cortez is very lucky that the Spaniards are given 20 girls
32:11to be part of the Spanish entourage.
32:15Among them is a young woman who will help change the course of history.
32:20In Spanish, she is known as Malinche.
32:24The Aztecs call her Malincen.
32:29Malincen is said to have been born in the household of a nobleman
32:34very near the Gulf of Mexico.
32:37Between 8 and 12 years old, she was captured and sold into slavery.
32:46We do not know how many people had owned her.
32:52Hernán Cortez gave Malincen to the highest-ranking Spaniard in his group,
33:00who was very impressed by Malincen because she was beautiful
33:04and also she was very confident.
33:10Malincen soon proves extremely useful to Cortez.
33:14Born just outside the Aztec Empire, she speaks their language.
33:21Now she learns Spanish as well.
33:25Almost overnight, she moves from being a sexual servant
33:30to being a translator, directly engaging and working with Hernán Cortez.
33:39Images of Malincen herself can be seen in the Aztec record book.
33:44She often appears either as large or larger than Hernán Cortez,
33:54which points to her importance.
33:59Malincen is helping Cortez, but she has her own agenda.
34:06She holds a deep grudge against the Aztecs.
34:10It was they who tore her from her family
34:13and sold her into slavery.
34:18Malincen is freely advancing her own interests.
34:23We can well imagine that it might have seemed
34:27like an opportunity for her to escape slavery.
34:30The Clascalan's own records capture the moment when,
34:43with Malincen as his translator,
34:46Cortez tries to persuade them to help him.
34:48The Spanish have to work really hard before the Clascalan's eventually decide,
34:57OK, it looks like we might have a chance of defeating the Aztecs,
35:02so let's join forces.
35:03Six months after setting foot on the mainland,
35:18Cortez and his men,
35:22backed by 6,000 of their new local allies,
35:36cross the mountain passes surrounding Tenochtitlan.
35:40They finally get their first glimpse of the spectacular Aztec capital.
35:49They start to proceed across the causeway.
35:54Cortez and his captains leading this column of Spaniards.
35:59They have all their finery.
36:02They want to impress their hosts.
36:09Moctezuma believes in the strength and power of his empire.
36:14So he welcomes the Spanish,
36:17but he also reminds them who has the upper hand.
36:24There really is an enormous power imbalance,
36:26and Moctezuma emphasizes that power imbalance
36:29by making Cortez wait for ages and ages and ages.
36:35And he has to wait for absolutely hours
36:37before eventually he meets Moctezuma himself.
36:40To be continued...
36:52This moment is, I think, the most richly symbolic,
37:15the most momentous meeting of two human beings in world history.
37:22Because it stands for something much bigger, which is the European discovery of the New
37:28World, and of course the New World's discovery of Europeans.
37:37And all of that is embodied in these two extraordinary people.
37:51First comes an exchange of gifts.
37:58Cortes presents a necklace of pearls and glass beads.
38:03It's no match for the craftsmanship Moctezuma can call upon.
38:12One written account records the gift of a carved serpent covered in turquoise.
38:19Remarkably, an Aztec artifact to match that description has survived.
38:26And it holds clues to the message Moctezuma meant to convey.
38:34The double-headed serpent is this absolutely exquisite object that from the moment you first see
38:55you can never forget because it imprints itself on your memory.
39:03Snakes for the Aztecs represent fertility.
39:19They represent life and death.
39:21The shedding of the skin symbolises rebirth.
39:24This is to be seen, to be admired, to be shown to the world.
39:36It's part of the pride that the Aztecs have, is a display of power.
39:43The person that made it must have been aware of the emergent power of this object and been spellbound by it as it was being made.
40:01The gift is meant to impress Cortes, but it may also be a warning.
40:19The double-headed serpent is an ambiguous symbol.
40:22It can be a negative omen because you have the two of them pulling in different directions.
40:28So there's that slight hint of danger underlying it.
40:37If you were a betting man and you look at these two blokes, you'd say,
40:40come on, there's only going to be one winner here.
40:42And it's not the Spaniards who's got a few hundred adventurers and ruffians at his back.
40:48It's the bloke with a massive capital city and kind of millions of people.
40:53It seems like no match at all, but Moctezuma critically underestimates the threat.
41:02He treats Cortes like a friendly visitor, a courtly prince, when in reality he is a ruthless mercenary.
41:10He says to Cortes, welcome. This is your home. Please come into the city. Everything is yours.
41:17You know, we're so delighted that you've come.
41:19This was basically like people who say, oh, come into my house.
41:25But you never really mean it. You're saying polite things.
41:29These are the courtly conventions, the courtesies that you extend to your guests.
41:34That's what Moctezuma is doing.
41:36And I think the Spanish take that literally.
41:39Cortes is like, great, you know, let's go.
41:46The Spaniards, along with the classical and leaders, take up residence inside the Aztec capital.
41:53Montezuma thinks, I am much more powerful than the Tlaxcarlands.
42:02And these guys will be overwhelmed by my city and me and my power.
42:07And probably they'll abandon the Tlaxcarlands and come and work for me.
42:16Cortes is clearly in awe of this wonderful city.
42:20One of the other conquistadors later says, we wondered if it was not a dream because it was all so beautiful.
42:27He and his men are housed in a palace next door to Moctezuma's own palace.
42:32We have this sense that he is building a relationship, a rapport with Moctezuma.
42:37The Spaniards are engaging in a kind of prolonged diplomatic encounter.
42:42They go hunting together.
42:44They were very impressed by the market.
42:47They saw the inside of temples.
42:50They were taken by boat to the other side of the lake shore to see other little towns and villages.
42:56The more the Spanish see of this fabled land, the more desperate they are to get their hands on it.
43:05The problem for Cortes is that there's no apparent end point to this prolonged period of diplomacy.
43:14After five months of diplomatic stalemate, Cortes receives news that forces him to act.
43:39Cortes learned that some other Spaniards had arrived on the coast.
43:44He knew he had a problem because he didn't have the permission to be there.
43:50Cortes has embarked on his bold venture without getting approval from the Spanish authorities.
43:58Cortes has gone rogue.
44:03Effectively, Cortes is attempting to defeat an empire without actually having a license from the king of Spain to do what he's doing.
44:13The new arrivals are here under orders to arrest Cortes.
44:17He needs a bargaining chip.
44:21So he takes a huge risk.
44:24Cortes thought it would go better for him if he could say that he had control of the kingdom through a hostage prince.
44:31This was an age-old way of making war in Europe.
44:34You take a prince hostage and then you have control over their people.
44:37He had the nerve to send a group of men into the throne room where Motezuma was and literally take him prisoner.
44:54Malinche is doing all the translating.
45:09They say, look, you're coming with us.
45:11And he's just so stunned.
45:13It's a kind of paralysis.
45:15He's like, okay, I'll go.
45:21Such a mad gamble.
45:23Such a mad thing for Cortes to do to take Motezuma prisoner.
45:38You get this sense of Cortes being this amazing maverick who makes the right choices.
45:45at the right time.
45:48What's often forgotten is the fact that he is a desperate man.
45:52He can't turn back.
45:54He's got no choice.
45:55So he may as well plow on.
45:58The gamble pays off.
46:01And Cortes bribes the new arrivals to join him in his quest for gold.
46:08Cortes is able through his usual mix of military and diplomatic prowess
46:14to win the new Spaniards over.
46:16In fact, it takes almost no winning over at all.
46:19He now has 800 additional soldiers.
46:23But having kidnapped Moctezuma, Cortes has made the whole population of the Aztec capital his enemy.
46:30Once they have taken Moctezuma prisoner, the mood in the city has definitely darkened.
46:43There's a few hundred Spaniards.
46:49They're in this palace.
46:50But around them, it's not merely the city with hundreds of thousands of people.
46:56But there's a whole massive empire.
46:58A band of Aztec warriors stages an attack on the palace where Moctezuma is being held prisoner.
47:11The emperor is ordered by Cortes to try and defuse the situation.
47:17Moctezuma was forced on a balcony to appeal to his people.
47:22They're kind of using him as a bit of a hostage, a human shield.
47:26Possibly still hoping that he can act as an intermediary with the people.
47:29Although I think it's pretty clear by this point that his authority has drained away
47:34and that people are no longer listening to him.
47:40The emperor has lost all control over his people.
47:44Once hailed as a demigod, he is now powerless and all too mortal.
47:55Moctezuma is a hostage who has outlived his usefulness.
47:58We know the Spanish kill all their other hostages.
48:01And there are sources that say the Spanish basically came into his room and killed him.
48:06The corpse of the once mighty leader of Central America's greatest civilization is left on the street,
48:35left on the street to rot.
48:50Before the Aztec warriors can take their revenge,
48:54the Spanish decide to grab what they can and make their escape.
49:00They're sneaking through the streets which seem deserted.
49:04How are we going to get out of here with our lives?
49:09They are seen by a woman who's collecting water and she raises the alarm.
49:17And then it's as though the whole city is pouring out of the buildings.
49:20Canoes are swarming around the Spaniards.
49:29The mortality rate is just piling up.
49:34Horses are being killed. People are being killed by the hundreds.
49:39In the chaos, around two-thirds of the Spaniards die, some 600 men.
49:48Cortes himself is quite badly injured, but he survives.
49:52This night has gone down in history with the name of La Noche Triste, the Night of Sorrows,
49:58because for the Spaniards it is a tragedy.
50:01From the indigenous point of view, maybe we might think of it as more like a night of triumph.
50:08Finally, the Aztecs have rid their capital city of the newcomers.
50:13The whole city celebrates. The Spaniards are gone.
50:23But they have left behind a parting gift.
50:27An invisible threat that will bring the Aztecs to their knees.
50:43After the Spaniards left, for a few weeks, people were very happy.
50:56But then people began to die.
51:00For the Aztecs, can you imagine the horror as this silent, unexplainable killer first appears among them?
51:13Tantalising evidence for this mystery disease may be embedded in the most iconic artefact from the Aztec world.
51:43Masks were a central element of Aztec life.
51:52Turquoise masks were usually placed on corpses at the time of a funeral.
52:00Here we see an Aztec with ammoni-like eyes, aquiline nose and beautiful teeth.
52:11But this mask contains some unexpected details.
52:26We see these stones.
52:29They stand out, so the imperfections of the skin are being shown.
52:35We see the man being afflicted. He is showing us what he's suffering from.
52:44The lumps on the skin might represent the disease of leprosy, widespread in the Americas.
52:52But they are also a remarkable match for a killer plague that the Spanish have introduced to the new world.
52:59Smallpox.
53:00It seems very evident to me that those bigger bits of turquoise on the surface, that is the lumps that you would find on the face of somebody afflicted by smallpox.
53:15It's hard not to associate the mask with exactly that, this wave of mortal disease that decimated 40% of the population.
53:29Since the Spaniards' arrival, smallpox has spread inland from the coast, before engulfing the Aztec capital itself.
53:45This population was virgin population in the sense that they had never been exposed to these Western microbes.
53:54They all got sick.
53:57They had no medicine that worked for it, no way to understand it.
54:02It was psychologically devastating.
54:10Smallpox is one of the most deadly diseases we've had in the history of humanity.
54:15Infectious enough to spread quite quickly, but deadly enough that actually it kills a third of people infected.
54:22It is higher than SARS, which is 10%.
54:27It's higher than COVID-19, which was, you know, 1 to 2%.
54:32When you get it, you start feeling unwell.
54:35High fever, headaches, vomiting.
54:39The next stage is the tongue and the mouth get covered with pus-filled little sacs.
54:46Once your skin starts rising up, almost like little peas underneath your skin, incredibly painful.
54:50Students come all the way up and develop into scabs.
54:54Once it's in your home, everyone will get it.
54:57And then it's the question of how many will survive.
55:04Disease is the greatest reaper across human history.
55:08More people have fallen to pathogens than they have to any other cause.
55:13Epidemics are a shock.
55:14But ultimately what's more important is how vulnerable is a society which is hit by an epidemic.
55:24Nearly 14 months after he fled the Aztec capital,
55:29Cortes has returned to a civilization in its death throes.
55:33Now, backed by his local allies, he launches a brutal attack.
55:38They're fighting a disease-ridden, weakened, starving population.
55:43And 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.
55:55So, the Spanish start moving through the city, practicing total war.
56:00It's simply the only way the Spanish are able to force the Aztecs, this proud warrior culture, to surrender.
56:13Finally, the mighty warrior empire of the Aztecs has fallen.
56:34The Aztec empire fell apart within two years.
56:49This makes it one of the fastest collapses throughout world history.
56:53That was due to the sheer variety of threats at first.
56:55An overbearing leader who demanded tax and tribute.
57:04A disaffected people with nothing to lose.
57:09And a ruthless opponent who exploited these fault lines for his own gain.
57:14Once you think about the huge amount of indigenous people who were not happy and were ready to fight against the Aztecs, you get a very different view of the situation.
57:32This is an indigenous civil war, an empire that has collapsed in on itself.
57:37A collapse hastened by an unforeseen killer.
57:42Disease is still one of the greatest threats to civilization.
57:47We do need to look at our collective vulnerability.
57:50Just think of what happened with COVID.
57:52Pathogens always seem to be two steps ahead of us and we're trying to catch up in that race.
57:59The story of the Aztecs is ultimately a story about the arrival of the unexpected.
58:04And I think that has to be a pretty sobering lesson for us.
58:08We are deluded if we think that everything we take for granted will be here forever.
58:18Japan, a unique culture closed off to the west for centuries, is on a collision course with the modern world.
58:34As foreign aggressors arrive on their shores, Japan's ancient warrior class, the Samurai, must fight to save their way of life.
58:47Virus is going from six or four years immediately.
59:04It feels so fast because science is divided all the time.
59:08It LOAN I'm comparisons with the Aztecs.
Be the first to comment