the aztecs
INTRO NEEDED The governor had employed a man named Hernan Cortes to lead a journey to the new world. In February 1519, five hundred soldiers led by Cortes, sent sail from the province of Cuba bound for the eastern coast of what is now present-day Mexico. In addition to the five hundred soldiers and eleven ships, Cortes brought with him two Mayan Indians who were prisoners from the early expedition to serve as interpreters. The interpreters served no purpose because when Cortes first landed in the Yucatan coast, he located and ransomed from his Indian captor a Spaniard named Geronimo de Aguilar. Aguilar served as Cortes’s interpreter while he explored the new world. Marooned by a shipwreck, Aguilar had lived for several years as a slave among the Yucatan Indians and spoke their Mayan language. With his ability to translate Mayan to Spanish, Aguilar made it possible to communicate fully with the natives on the peninsula. Like many natives ruled by the Aztec empire, the Mayans did not like strangers coming in to their territory with out proper clearance. Their feeling of territory rights lead to the first battle for the conquistadors in Mexico. Conquistadors found themselves greatly out numbered, but they managed to drive off most of the Indians with reinforcements arriving on horseback to help out the soldiers. Since the natives had never witnessed horse before these battles, they were terrified and quickly defeated. This experience taught Cortes an important lesson about Indian warfare that even a small company of soldiers on horseback could break up the Indian’s fighting force.