Fateful Encounter
By Mildred Boyd
April 2006 Guadalajara-Lakeside Volume 22, Number 8

     Kipling was wrong, you know. East and West have met many times and in many places throughout history, usually on a collision course that spelled disaster for one or both.
     The meeting which took place on that bright November day in 1519 with all the elements of a Hollywood spectacular was no exception. Towering mountains provided a theatrical backdrop for the broad causeway arrowing across a sparkling lake toward the fairy-tale towers of the distant city. A "cast of thousands" of curious Indians lined the way or kept pace with the procession in a flotilla of canoes, jostling for a glimpse of these strangers from another world.
     With snapping banners and a flourish of trumpets they came, these men, or maybe gods, who had been enemies but, by some malicious twist of fate, were now to be greeted as honored guests. In the lead were 15 horsemen, resplendent in their European finery and mounted on the fearsome beasts that had inspired such terror in battle.
     Behind them came ranks of cross-bowmen, arquebusiers, swordsmen and artillery men who, though pitifully few in number, had triumphed over every force sent against them. The polished steel of helmets, breastplates and lance tips glinted in the sunlight. Several thousand Tlascalan warriors, traditional foes of the Aztecs, brought up the rear.
     The procession moved slowly, delayed time and again as the leader accepted the homage of the Aztec nobles who flocked to greet him. They were the vanguard of another procession, moving out from the great island city. Here, too, the banners flew over a military escort surrounding a group of courtiers and high officials who accompanied their sovereign lord and the sunlight danced off gold and silver ornaments, precious stones and obsidian-bladed weapons.
     Inevitably, East and West met yet again as Hernan Cortez, Captain-General of Spain, dismounted and Moctezuma, First Speaker and absolute monarch of the Aztec Empire, stepped down from his gilded litter to stand face to face at last. This formal meeting was the climax of a series of exchanges between the two men who were, each in his own way, perfect representatives of the cultures which had shaped them.
     They had much in common and might, under other circumstances, have become friends. The Spaniards were astonished at the urbanity and refinement displayed by their "savage" host. Both men were intelligent, charismatic, skilled in diplomacy and accustomed to command. Both were also autocratic, arrogant and, as true believers in their respective gods, quite capable of committing or condoning unspeakable atrocities in the name of religion. It was this blind faith in his gods that was Moctezuma’s undoing.
     One of those gods, Quetzalcoatl, had predicted his triumphant return in a year One Reed. 1519 was such a year. Convinced that Cortez was the god come to replace him as ruler, Moctezuma had tried desperately to avoid the meeting. Unfortunately, his initial attempt to bribe the intruders with princely gifts of gold and silver had backfired, succeeding only in demonstrating conclusively that so wealthy a land was, indeed, well worth the taking.
     Neither pitched battles, bloody ambushes nor even more lavish offerings of treasure had halted the inexorable march on his capitol. There was nothing left but to accept defeat with stoic resignation. Despite the bitter opposition of many of his nobles (who had fought the Spanish and knew they were mere mortals), Moctezuma had come to this meeting fully prepared to hand over his realm to its "rightful" ruler.
     Native accounts of the momentous encounter relate that, after an exchange of gifts, Moctezuma addressed Cortez in fawning terms, ending with, "You have come here to sit on your throne, to sit under its canopy. You have come back to us; you have come down from the sky. Rest now, and take possession of your royal houses. Welcome to your land, my lords."
     Cortez, not fool enough to accept that surrender for himself, countered with bland assurances of peace and friendship. Any conquest must be in the name of Charles V of Spain. Though he knew, and had taken full advantage of, the superstition that had made his task so much easier, he was all too well aware that he was on very shaky ground, both legally and militarily.
     Not only was he not Quetzalcoatl, but he lacked any authority to act for Charles and was, in fact, here in direct defiance of his superior, the Governor of Cuba. They may have been housed in a palace and treated as honored guests, but he and his tiny army were virtually prisoners in a hostile city; their safety dependent on the continued support and authority of Moctezuma.
     Indeed, within a short time the arrogance and greed of the Spanish dispelled any illusions of divinity. Moctezuma was taken hostage, under the thin pretext of guesthood, Cortez was called away to confront an army sent by the Cuban Governor to capture his errant Captain-General, and the stage was set for Alvarado’s senseless and tragic massacre of unarmed worshippers. The erstwhile guests were immediately besieged by a howling mob of outraged natives who did not hesitate to stone their own Emperor when he attempted to appease them.
     By June 30, 1520, Moctezuma was dead at the hands of his own people and Cortez was fighting his way out of a city that had become a trap. The bloody retreat along yet another causeway became known as the Noche Triste, and for good reason. All their guns, most of their horses and the bulk of the treasure they had collected were lost.
     Cortez was to write, "It was a miracle that any of us escaped." Fully half the Spanish forces and thousands of their Tlascalan allies had perished. With them died all hope of the peaceful and bloodless take-over of the New World that had seemed within their grasp on that other causeway a few short months before.