Indian Conquistadors

Melissa Mariscal

The term used to refer to the Spanish soldiers, explorers, and adventurers who brought much of the Americas under the control of Spain in the 15th through the 19th centuries.

The conquistadors in the Americas were more volunteer militia than an actual organized military.

The conquistadors had to supply their own materials, weapons and horses.

European diseases caused many more fatalities than the wars themselves and brought small box, chicken pox, and measles

The fall of Tenochtitlan was a epic battle between Spanish Troops and Mexicas defenders.

During the second half of the sixteenth century, various groups sent out letters claiming rights and privileges based on their participation in the conquest.

In Xochimilco a document claims that twelve thousand Xochimilca took part in Tenochtitlan and that another twelve five hundred accompanied Pedro de Alvarado to Guatemala and Honduras.

Cities were often attack sequentially The Aztecs unprecedented expansion took them to regions where they had no traditional enemies The strategies of expansion conquest employed by Spaniards in 16th

century Mesoamerica have been explained in terms of genius of Cortes

The members of such Alliances were not centrally controlled nor they shared a common ethnic identityThe triple alliances of Texcoco, Tlacopan, Tenochtitlan was developed by the Mexica as a conquest machineOne important dimension to alliance building in Mesoamerica both before and during the Spanish invasion was the exchange of women for marriage

When the Spaniards arrived in Mesoamerica this culture area consisted of a multitude of city-states interconnected through a complex web of social, political, and economic relationships.Trade, gift exchange, and tribute payments took place both within and between these zones.Some of the trade routes are well documentedThe route from Tenochtitlan to Guatemala is one of them

Teotitlan was on important crossroads towards Tuxtepec in the Mazatec mountains There is many different routes of placesThe trade route to Guatemala with that followed by the conquistadors it becomes clear that they are indeed the sameThe last part of the route is confirmed both by Diaz Del Castillo and Lopez de Gomara