Conquest Of Mexico Essay

a city where an eagle with a snake in its beak rested on a cactus. This

     The Aztecs were an American Indian people who ruled a mighty empire in Mexico from the 1400's to the 1500's. The Aztecs had one of the most advanced civilizations in the Americas and built cities as large as any in Europe at that time. They also practiced a remarkable religion that affected every part of their lives and featured human sacrifice. The Aztecs built towering temples, created huge sculptures, and held impressive ceremonies all for the purpose of worshipping their gods. The Spaniards destroyed their magnificent empire in the year 1521, but the Aztecs left a lasting mark on Mexican life and culture .

Associated with their attention to the spiritual needs of conversion, the priests endeavored to eliminate ‘heathen’ practices among those Indians that they baptized.[x] The non-Christian people of the Americas were not simply to be converted; they were to be civilized, taught, humanized, purified and reformed. The Indians to be converted were strangers speaking in many unfamiliar tongues. In most cases, when the Friars first encountered them, they had been only recently conquered and subjugated, and even if not actively hostile they were likely to retain covert antagonisms. In their experience all Spaniards were exploitative.

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Underestimating us, defying rules and power in our own rightful land. Mexico should not be treated so poorly after their gaining of independence. In 1836 Texas had gotten their independence from Mexico. Still 10 years later, America had interfered with the set border at the Nueces River (Doc B). Mexico was only defending their rightful lands and laws of slavery and governmental power when America invaded. Americas thoughts of going to war with Mexico were unjustified. Even though America was trying to achieve their American dream, and reach coast to coast; they never had to be disrespectful to Mexico’s authority and laws .The American government was being ignorant to Mexico’s governmental authority, invading their rightful territory, and defying the laws of slavery.

On May, 13 1846, the United States officially went to war with Mexico. Before this declaration had taken place, Texas had broken away from Mexico and became independent, but the mother country believed this had been done illegally and that Texas’ land still belonged to them, because they’d held General Santa Anna at gunpoint. After ten years, America annexed the Lone Star Republic, which greatly angered Mexico. Fuel was only added to the fire when the two countries couldn’t agree on Texas’ border, arguing between the Rio Grande, where the United States believed they owned up to, and the Nueces River, where Mexico thought the border was. On April 25, 1846, United States’ soldiers were patrolling the disputed territory along the Rio Grande, Mexican troops fired at them, injuring and killing sixteen.

After the Spanish gained the Native Americans trust they converted them to their religion because they believed that if the Natives had the same beliefs as they did that they would be easier to manipulate. The Spanish made missions to protect the popes, however because the walls were not tall enough, the Indians were able to escape. After they ran away and returned to their tribes they would revert back to their former ways and because they all looked so similar, the Spanish could not tell them apart, meaning they couldn’t just go and point out which Natives were their escaped

Mexico is bordered by the United States on the north, the Pacific Ocean on the west, the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea on the east, and Guatemala and Belize on the south. It is characterized by an extraordinary diversity in topography and climate and is crossed by two major mountain chains, the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Sierra Madre Oriental. The high central plateau between these two mountain ranges historically funneled most of the human population toward the center of this region. Mexico features volcanic peaks, snow-capped mountains, tropical rain forests, and internationally famous beaches. Mexico City is an enormous metropolitan area and dominates the rest of the country's culture, economy, and politics. Nearly

The greed for gold and the race for El Dorado were the main inducements of the Spaniards who, at the peril of their lives, crossed the ocean in unfit vessels in a mad pursuit after the gold and all other precious property of the Indians” (Peace 479). The royal rulers of Spain made it a rule that nothing would jeopardize their ability to rob the land from the native people of Latin America. The missionary process, “had to be encouraged, but the missionaries could not be permitted to dominate the colony at the cost of royal rule” (Gibson 76). The European governments established missionaries to cleanse their minds of any guilt aroused by the slaughtering of innocent men, women, and children. When European “ships arrived in the 16th century to colonize the land and exploit its natural resources, they killed indigenous people and brought black slaves from Africa. Millions of indigenous people were slain and their cultures completely destroyed by the process of colonization” (Ribero). The overall devastations caused by the Christianization of the native inhabitants created a blend of cultures within the indigenous civilizations which gradually isolated old native ways into a small population of oppressed people. The Christianized people became a symbol of loyalty to the European powers and were left alone simply on their religious status. This long term mission of total religious replacement caused very strong and advanced

Hernando Cortes was one of the bravest military leaders of all time. Born in Medellin, Spain, he was a Spanish Conquistador who conquered most of Central America. He also gave Spain three-hundred years of control over Mexico. Cortes started exploring in the early 1500’s. He explored to find riches and conquered by being observant of the natives. With a small army, he conquered the Aztec Empire. Cortes went to the university in Salamanca, Spain. He attended the university to study Latin and Law. Unfortunately, Cortes completed only two years of school. He returned to his family in Medellin, Spain. However, life became boring for him. Nevertheless, Christopher Columbus inspired Cortes to explore the New World. Finally, Cortes was able to

The conquistador’s invasion of the Aztecs was unjustifiable and inhumane. Instead of discovering a new civilization they destroyed one. Because of the conquistadores finding the Aztecs, many of the citizens were killed because of their greed, genocide that almost decimated a population, and later destroyed an entire culture. This wasn’t a voyage to discover a part of the world, no; it was another slaughter in history. This is one of the histories moments that we shouldn’t be proud of.

Following eleven years of struggle, Mexico finally achieved its independence from Spain in September of 1827. Yet over the next 40 years, Mexico would see nearly half of its lands lost from circumstances both in its control and those that were not. Fundamental in the structuring of the events that occurred were the altercations between Mexico and the U.S., chiefly speaking the cessation of Texas from Mexico, the war between Mexico and the United States, and the Gadsden Purchase. These proceedings crippled an already weakened nation, and set in motion a tortuous path for the nation that still exists to this very day. The internal and external strife from these three events left Mexico 's ties with the United States diminished, a long lasting alienation of Mexican-Americans within the U.S. boundaries, its people torn asunder by the continuance of combat, both abroad and on its native soil.

     In 1519 Hernán Cortés led a couple hundred other Spaniards inland to the impressive Empire of the Mexica ruled by the Great Montezuma. Many historians today tell how quickly and almost effortlessly these Spaniards conquered the Empire. They paint an image of ignorant, helpless Indians practically giving up their land out of fear of this group because certainly the Spaniards must be gods since they have powerful weapons and strange animals. We know neither Cortés nor any of his men were gods, of course, but what was it that allowed Cortés to prevail over the inhabitants of the land?

An important contribution into development and progress of the colonies have brought the Jesuits, who were engaged the defense and conversion of Indians to Christianity, as well as significant work on lifting the moral level of the colonists. The Indians, who was converted to Christianity, settled in the organized settlements "aldei» (aldeias) by the Jesuits, which were similar in structure to the mission in Spanish America, or the Jesuit

before reading the chapters in Fuentes and Brewer and viewing The Mission, I did not know anything about the Spanish conquest of America because I am not Mexican and nobody tough me anything. I think it’s important for us to learn about history because it reflect who we are today. Yes, there are a lot of new things that I learned after reading the chapters in Fuentes and Brewer and viewing The Mission. Racial colonialism was the most interesting that I learned because they were determined their races by different skin color, which Spanish and Portuguese created a caste system. Therefore, in a caste system, there are dozens level of skin color. I have never known that Spanish and African produced Mulatto, Indian and African produced Lobo and