The Conquest of Mexico.
Yes, it took plagues, it took guns, it took steel, but as the Spanish admit it would've
gone very differently without... languages?
1510. Mesoamerica.
Out east, you spoke Maya and lived in a small kingdom run by its own Real Man.
Seriously, a local Mayan leader was a Halach Winik, a Real Man.
West of the Maya, many peoples spoke many languages from many language families: Otomi,
Zapotec, Totonac.
But one group's been taking over.
You know who - straight from the Valley of Mexico, we're the Triple Alliance you dare
not defy us - the Aztecs.
Their empire was built around āltepētl, city states, each one led by "in Tlahtoāni",
the Speaker.
But one āltepētl stood above the rest: Tenōchtitlan, a huge city floating on a lake, home of high
temples, human sacrifice and the Aztec Empire's Huēyi Tlahtoāni, Great Speaker.
The current Huēyi Tlahtoāni is Motēuczōma, Montezuma to you.
He demands tribute from all of this area.
Or else!
Or else...
Tlaxcallān.
Their name may start with a very Aztec "tl", but make no mistake: Tlaxcala is a proud and
independent warrior state.
Pay up to Motecuzoma and rest easy?
Stay free but constantly watch your back for Aztec obsidian?
Tlaxcala says, eh, bring it!
I keep saying "Aztec" but let's talk names.
Aztecs means all people from the legendary homeland Aztlān, at least
it does in the Aztec language.
Linguists call that language Nāhuatl and the related peoples are Nahuan, but that's
just a way to say "[speaking] clearly".
For their part the epic Aztecs of Aztec Empire fame called themselves mēxihcah, and their
land was mēxihco, Mexico.
But while we're over here debating terminology, the Bearded Men start to arrive from the east.
And events unfold that will conspire to put Nāhuatl and Maya into the hands of
Mexico's conquerors.
1511.
A shipwrecked Spanish crew washes up on the coast of the Yucatán and is captured by Mayans.
Two will survive: Aguilar, a friar, and the sailor Guerrero.
1513.
Tabscoob.
He's the Halach Winik who gave his name to Tabasco, the state and the chile.
He battles nearby Xicalango and takes slaves as a reward.
Among them is Malinalli, a Nahuan girl who also spoke Chontal Maya, the kind of Mayan
in that part of the Gulf coast.
1517.
Bearded man Córdoba lands in the Yucatán.
He's greeted warmly and welcomed by the Maya.
Success!
Nope, turns out it's an ambush!
The Spanish retreat but manage to nab a Mayan on the way out, Melchorejo.
He'll be their first Mayan translator, but a rough one, and one who'll never buy into
this whole Spain thing.
1518.
Another explorer, Grijalva, takes Melchorejo to visit Tabscoob, who trades gifts and tells
tales of a wonderful land to the west with many more treasures, a land called Mexico.
The curious Grijalva says, hmm.... maybe I'll stick around a bit.
But Tabscoob's been warned by Mayan allies to keep these guys at a distance, and says:
I think it's time for you to move along.
Cuba.
1519.
This is where the bearded men have been sailing from.
One of them just emptied his life savings to pay for boats and crew to ahem, "explore"
the fabled riches of Mexico: Hernán Cortés.
He sails to Cuzamil (Cozumel) and sends out Melchorejo to track down those two shipwreck
survivors.
The sailor, well, he's gone for good.
Not dead.
Turns out he went full Mayan.
Seriously, he became a champion warlord!
But the other guy, Aguilar, is still alive and his heart still belongs to Spain.
The friar is back in action!
Mayan captivity turned Aguilar into a real asset.
See, the Spanish haven't been big on local languages.
Case in point, they use a word they learned back in Cuba for every local chief they meet:
"cacique".
You're a Mayan Halach Winik?
Cacique!
A Mexican Tlahtoāni?
Cacique!
The Hueyi Tlahtoāni of the whole Empire?
CACIQUE!
But not Aguilar.
He speaks Chontal Maya now.
Well, it's "Chontal" to outsiders, because the Aztec word chontalli means "foreigner".
We speak clearly.
They, on the other hand, they speak like foreigners, know what I mean?
The people of Tabasco clearly disagree, because to them it's Yokot'an, "correct language".
Whether you call Aguilar's speech foreign or correct, Cortés immediately sees his value,
keeps him by his side and makes him his "lengua", his tongue.
Great, time to talk to more Mayans!
Starting with Tabscoob.
But I don't think his town's taking to the idea of even more bearded men showing up.
Seriously?
These guys again?
No, thanks!
They put up quite a fight.
But with a little Mayan intel and a big display of horsepower, the Spanish defeat them in
the Battle of Centla.
Tabscoob buries his dead and hands over a bounty, a bounty that includes that woman
Tabscoob captured in 1513, Malinalli.
This woman has a way with words.
Not only can she speak with Aguilar, she knows the Mexican language.
Also, too many names: Malinalli took a Spanish name Doña Marina, which got translated back
into Nahuatl with an honorific suffix -tzin: Malintzin.
That came back into Spanish as "Malinche", which is how she's still remembered in Mexico.
Phew!
Cortés now has a strategy: he and Aguilar speak Spanish to each other.
Aguilar turns to Malintzin and speaks Maya.
And Malintzin uses Nahuatl with the Aztecs.
Until she eventually learns Spanish (then sorry, Aguilar, you're out).
Go Team Lenguas!
Why the long chain of communication though?
Why can't Aguilar just pick up some Aztec?
Because Classical Nahuatl and Chontal Maya come from two completely distinct
language families.
It's like Chinese and English.
Sort of.
See, there's a unique linguistic mixing that happened in Mesoamerica, but that's so cool
I'll save it for another video.
With his lenguas always by his side, Cortés begins to unravel the resentment
beneath the surface.
See, I don't know how you pictured it, but this is not going to be a small band of Spaniards
standing alone against an empire.
Success hinges on flipping allies.
Lots and lots of allies.
That's where Team Lenguas comes in.
Spain flips the Totonacs.
They downplay infighting and scuttle their own ships to go all in.
They learn of Tlaxcala.
They dare to enter Tlaxcala.
The ferocious Tlaxcalan warriors put up a major fight, but the Spanish impress the "cacique"
and earn themselves a deeply loyal ally against the mēxihcah.
The enemy of my enemy is my Malintzin.
Flipping towns and, hhh, butchering others, this allied crew pushes on to Tenochtitlan.
Knock-knock, Moteuczoma!
And in November of 1519, Moteuczoma opens.
They enter the biggest, the most impressive city they've ever seen.
The Huēyi Tlahtoāni is carried out to them, and Team Lenguas makes history in an awkwardly
gracious meeting between worlds.
Moteuczoma then launches into flowery Nahuatl that's up for interpretation but, I think,
will come back to haunt the city.
Take the word for city-state from earlier: āl-tepētl.
It literally means "water-hill".
Now listen to this line from Moteuczoma: in mātzin in motepētzin.
Mātzin and motepētzin have the same "water" and "hill", plus the same formal -tzin at
the end of Malintzin.
It's "your water sir" and "your hill sir".
He's symbolically offering the city to Cortés.
Well, to Master Malinche.
See, the Aztecs are addressing Team Lenguas not as Cortés but as Malintzin.
They even painted the pair side by side in their own codices with her as the speaker.
From here the history of this conquest turns more tactical than linguistic.
Cortés takes Moteuczoma hostage.
Months of puppet rule are broken by a brutal Spanish attack during the holiday of Tōxcatl.
That unleashes an Aztec uprising, which ends in the death of Motecuzoma and many many Spaniards
and allies as they flee the city.
Regrouping in Tlaxcala, Team Lenguas secures more reinforcements and performs
a linguistic trick.
See, Cortés interpreted Motecuzoma's poetic speech "in mātzin in motepētzin" as him
handing the empire over.
If Spain was the rightful master, that makes the Aztecs officially a people in rebellion.
Thus follows the vengeful recruiting of even more allies and the outbreak of a major plague.
The Empire shatters into, basically, a civil war in central Mexico that implodes into a
final siege on Tenōchtitlan.
A siege that lasts the summer of 1521, costs hundreds of thousands of lives and ends with
the city in ruins.
Cuauhtemōc, the final Hueyi Tlahtoāni, is spared, only to be
executed by Cortés a few years later.
Before his death, he speaks out with Aztec defiance.
"Oh, Captain Malinche, long have I understood, have I known your false words..."
Duplicity.
Today in Mexico, that's the kind of sting that the name Malinche has.
Malinchista: you'd trade your own culture for a taste of something foreign.
But heroes, villains, or players in a clash between two great empires, translators were
key in the conquest of Mexico.
Malintzin above all.
I'll be back soon to compare Aztec versus Mayan grammar and unravel a peculiar linguistic
secret about Malintzin's Mexico.
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