hernan cortes voyage route

Hernán Cortés

Hernán Cortés was a Spanish conquistador who explored Central America, overthrew Montezuma and his vast Aztec empire and won Mexico for the crown of Spain.

(1485-1547)

Who Was Hernán Cortés?

He first set sail to the New World at the age of 19. Cortés later joined an expedition to Cuba. In 1518, he set off to explore Mexico.

Cortés strategically aligned some Indigenous peoples against others and eventually overthrew the vast and powerful Aztec empire. As a reward, King Charles I appointed him governor of New Spain in 1522.

Cortés, marqués del Valle de Oaxaca, was born around 1485 in Medellín, Spain. He came from a lesser noble family in Spain. Some reports indicate that he studied at the University of Salamanca for a time.

In 1504, Cortés left Spain to seek his fortune in New World. He traveled to the island of Santo Domingo, or Hispaniola. Settling in the new town of Azúa, Cortés served as a notary for several years.

He joined an expedition of Cuba led by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar in 1511. There, Cortés worked in the civil government and served as the mayor of Santiago for a time.

Aztec Empire

In 1518, Cortés was to command his own expedition to Mexico, but Velázquez canceled it. In a mutinous act of defiance, Cortés ignored the order, setting sail for Mexico with more than 500 men and 11 ships that year.

In February 1519, the expedition reached the Mexican coast. By some accounts, Cortés then had all his ships destroyed except one, which he sent back to Spain. This brazen decision eliminated the possibility of any retreat.

Cortés became allies with some of the Indigenous peoples he encountered, but with others, he used deadly force to conquer Mexico. He fought Tlaxacan and Cholula warriors and then set his sights on taking over the Aztec empire.

He marched to Tenochtitlán, the Aztec capital and home to ruler Montezuma II . After being invited into the royal palace, Cortés took Montezuma hostage and his soldiers plundered the city.

But shortly thereafter, Cortés hurriedly left the city after learning that Spanish troops were coming to arrest him for disobeying orders from Velázquez.

After fending off the Spanish forces, Cortés returned to Tenochtitlán to find a rebellion in progress, during which Montezuma was killed. The Aztecs eventually drove the Spanish from the city, but Cortés returned again to defeat them and take the city in 1521, effectively ending the Aztec empire.

In their bloody battles for domination over the Aztecs, Cortés and his men are estimated to have killed as many as 100,000 Indigenous peoples. King Charles I of Spain (also known as Holy Roman Emperor Charles V) appointed him the governor of New Spain in 1522.

Later Years and Death

Despite his decisive victory over the Aztecs, Cortés faced numerous challenges to his authority and position, both from Spain and his rivals in the New World. He traveled to Honduras in 1524 to stop a rebellion against him in the area.

In 1536, Cortés led an expedition to the northwestern part of Mexico, in the process exploring Baja California and Mexico's Pacific coast. This was to be his last major expedition.

Back in the capital city, Cortés found himself unceremoniously removed from power. He traveled to Spain to plead his case to the king, but he was not reappointed to his governorship.

In 1541, Cortés retired to Spain. He spent much of his later years desperately seeking recognition for his achievements and support from the Spanish royal court. Wealthy but embittered from his lack of support and acclaim, Cortés died in Spain in 1547.

QUICK FACTS

• Name: Hernán Cortés
• Birth Year: 1485
• Birth City: Medellín
• Birth Country: Spain
• Gender: Male
• Best Known For: Hernán Cortés was a Spanish conquistador who explored Central America, overthrew Montezuma and his vast Aztec empire and won Mexico for the crown of Spain.
• Politics and Government
• War and Militaries
• Nacionalities
• Death Year: 1547
• Death date: December 2, 1547
• Death City: Castilleja de la Cuesta
• Death Country: Spain

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The path taken by Hernán Cortés on his way to Tenochtitlan.

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How Hernán Cortés Conquered the Aztec Empire

By: Karen Juanita Carrillo

Updated: June 26, 2023 | Original: May 20, 2021

The Aztec Empire , Mesoamerica’s dominant power in the 15th and early 16th centuries controlled a capital city that was one of the largest in the world. Itzcoatl, named leader of the Aztec/Mexica people in 1427, negotiated what has become known as the Triple Alliance —a powerful political union of the city-states of Mexico-Tenochtitlán, Tetzcoco and Tlacopán. As that alliance strengthened between 1428 and 1430 it reinforced the leadership of the Aztecs, making them the dominant Nahua group in a landmass that covered central Mexico and extended as far as modern-day Guatemala.

And yet Tenochtitlán fell into decline after the siege and destruction of the city by the Spanish in 1521—less than two years after Hernándo Cortés and Spanish conquistadors first set foot in the Aztec capital on November 8, 1519. How did Cortés manage to overthrow the seat of the Aztec Empire?

Tenochtitlán: A Dominant Imperial City 

When Spanish conquistadors arrived in the Aztec imperial city in 1519, Mexico-Tenochtitlán was led by Moctezuma II. The city had prospered and was estimated to host a population of between 200,000 and 300,000 residents.

At first , the conquistadors described Tenochtitlán as the greatest city they had ever seen. It was situated on a human-made island in the middle of Lake Texcoco. From its central location, Tenochtitlán served as a hub for Aztec trade and politics. It featured gardens, palaces, temples and raised roads with bridges that connected the city to the mainland.

Other city-states were forced to pay periodic tributes to Tenochtitlán’s public markets and to its religious center, the Templo Mayor or “Great Temple.” Religious tributes sometimes took the form of human sacrifices . While the Aztec’s monetary and religious demands empowered the empire, it also fostered resentment among surrounding city-states. 

Hernándo Cortés Makes Allies with Local Tribes

Hernándo Cortés formed part of Spain’s initial colonization efforts in the Americas. While stationed in Cuba, he convinced Cuban Governor Diego Velázquez to allow him to lead an expedition to Mexico, but Velázquez then canceled his mission. Eager to appropriate new land for the Spanish crown, convert Indigenous people to Christianity and plunder the region for gold and riches, Cortés organized his own rogue crew of 100 sailors, 11 ships, 508 soldiers and 16 horses. He set sail from Cuba on the morning of February 18, 1519, to begin an unauthorized expedition to Mesoamerica.

Arriving on the Yucatán coast, Cortés encountered Indigenous people who told him about other Europeans who had been shipwrecked and captured by local Mayans. Cortes freed Jerónimo de Aguilar , a Franciscan friar, from the Mayans and made Aguilar part of his crew. Aguilar turned out to be an invaluable asset to Cortes due to his ability to speak Chontal, the local Mayan language. With Aguilar at his side, Cortés and his conquistadors continued traveling the region, battling Indigenous groups along the way.

Cortés and his men then acquired another asset when an Aztec chief gifted them some 20 enslaved young Mayan women, including Malinalli, a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast. Malinalli became baptized with the Christian name Marina and was later known as La Malinche. La Malinche spoke both the Aztec language of Náhuatl and Mayan Chontal and worked alongside the Spanish invaders, providing the conquistadors with the ability to communicate with any Indigenous groups they encountered.

With La Malinche and Aguilar in tow, the conquistadors made their way to the island city of Tenochtitlán where they were initially welcomed by Emperor Moctezuma II. When Cortés became concerned that Moctezuma's people would turn against his men, he placed Moctezuma under house arrest and Cortés attempted to rule through the detained Moctezuma.

Soon Cortés received word that the Cuban governor had sent a Spanish force to arrest Cortés for insubordination. Leaving his top lieutenant Pedro de Alvarado in charge of Tenochtitlán, Cortés took men to attack the Spanish forces at the coast. Cortes's men defeated the troops and took the surviving Spanish soldiers back with him as reinforcements to Tenochtitlán. In Cortés' absence, Alvarado had hundreds of Aztec nobles killed during a ceremonial feast, leading to further unrest among the Aztec people. 

Tenochtitlán residents demanded the Spanish be removed from the city. When the detained Moctezuma could no longer control Tenochtitlán’s residents, the Spaniards either allowed him to die during a skirmish in 1520 or killed him—depending on varying accounts .

Driven from the capital, the Spanish later circled back with a small fleet of ships. Working in alliance with some 200,000 Indigenous warriors from city-states, particularly the Tlaxcala and Cempoala (groups who had resented the Aztec/Mexicas and wanted to see them vanquished), the Spanish conquistadors held Tenochtitlán under siege from May 22 through August 13, 1521—a total of 93 days.

Disease Further Weakens the Aztec

With Tenochtitlán encircled, the conquistadors relied on their Indigenous allies for key logistical support and launched attacks from local Indigenous encampments. Meanwhile, another factor began to take its toll. Unbeknownst to the Spanish, some among their ranks had been infected with smallpox when they had departed Europe. Once these men arrived in the Americas, the virus began to spread—both among their indigenous allies and the Aztecs. (Some research has suggested that salmonella , not smallpox, had weakened the Aztecs.)

The first known case reportedly emerged in Cempoala—one of the city-states that had allied with the Spanish—when an enslaved African came down with the disease. The virus then spread. As the Spaniards and their allies later attacked Tenochtitlán, even when they lost battles, the smallpox virus infected the Aztecs. Aztec troops, members of the noble class, farmers and artisans all fell victim to the disease. 

While many Spaniards had acquired immunity to the disease, the virus was new in the Americas and few Indigenous understood it. The bodies of smallpox victims piled up in the streets of Tenochtitlán and, with the city under siege, there were few available ways to dispose of the bodies.

Spaniards and their allies were taken in as prisoners (the Aztecs tended to hold captured prisoners for sacrifice to the gods, rather than kill them in battle) and traces of the virus were left on the clothes, hair and on dead bodies of those who had had the disease. As Tenochtitlán residents contracted smallpox they had no place to turn for help. Aztec priests and medicinal practitioners knew of no remedy and Tenochtitlán residents had little immunity.

The Spanish Wielded Better Weaponry

The conquistadors arrived in Mesoamerica with steel swords, muskets, cannons, pikes, crossbows, dogs and horses. None of these assets had yet been used in battle in the Americas. The Aztecs fought the Spanish with wooden broadswords, clubs and spears tipped with obsidian blades. But their weapons proved ineffective against the conquistadors’ metal armor and shields.

When the Spanish arrived in the Americas they came from a war-oriented culture that had seen battle against other European nations for dominance and against North Africans for sovereignty. The conquistadors arrived in Mesoamerica with better guns and had been trained in tactical strategies. They deployed a cavalry that could chase down retreating warriors, dogs trained to track down and encircle enemies and horses capable of trampling adversaries.

Up against large armies of Spanish and Indigenous forces, surrounded and cut off from the mainland, and with a population succumbing to an unknown, devastating virus, the Aztec Empire was unable to fight off the invading Spanish conquistadors. The Aztecs, including members of the Aztec royal family—then were forced to adjust to life under Spanish rule.  

"Cada Uno En Su Bolsa Llevar Lo Que Cien Indios No Llevarían: Mexica Resistance and the Shape of Currency in New Spain, 1542-1552.”  by Allison Caplan, American Journal of Numismatics (1989-), vol. 25, 2013, pp. 333–356. JSTOR .

“Jeronimo de Aguilar,”  American Historical Association . 

“Aztec Warfare Imperial Expansion and Political Control,” by Ross Hassig, University of Oklahoma Pres s, 1988, p. 244. 

“Searching for the Secrets of Nature The Life and Works of Dr. Francisco Hernández,” by Dora B. Weiner, Stanford University Press , 2000, p. 86.

“Viruses, Plagues, and History Past, Present, and Future,” by Michael B. Oldstone, Oxford University Press , 2020, p. 46.

“So Why Were the Aztecs Conquered, and What Were the Wider Implications? Testing Military Superiority as a Cause of Europe's Pre-Industrial Colonial Conquests,” by George Raudzens. War in History, vol. 2, no. 1, 1995, pp. 87–104. JSTOR . Accessed May 18, 2021.

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Guns, germs, and horses brought Cortés victory over the mighty Aztec empire

The Aztec outnumbered the Spanish, but that didn't stop Hernán Cortés from seizing Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital, in 1521.

After the expedition led by Vasco Núñez de Balboa who crossed Central America to reach the Pacific in 1513, Europeans began to see the full economic potential of this "New World." At first, colonization by the burgeoning new world power, Spain, was centered on the islands of the Caribbean, with little contact with the complex, indigenous civilizations on the mainland.

It was not long, however, before the lure of wealth spurred Spain’s adventurers beyond exploration and into a phase of conquest that would lay the foundations of the modern world. Whole swaths of the Americas rapidly fell to the Spanish crown, a transformation begun by the ruthless conqueror of the Aztec Empire, Hernán Cortés. (See also: New clues to the lost fleet of Cortés   .)

Cortés beginnings

Like other conquistadores of the early 16th century, Cortés had already gained considerable experience by living in the New World before embarking on his exploits. Born to modest lower nobility in the Spanish city of Medellín in 1485, Cortés stood out at an early age for his intelligence and his restless spirit of adventure inspired by the recent voyages of Christopher Columbus.

In 1504, Cortés left Spain for the island of Hispaniola (today, home to the Dominican Republic and Haiti), where he rose through the ranks of the fledgling colonial administration. In 1511 he joined an expedition to conquer Cuba and was appointed secretary to the island's first colonial governor, Diego Velázquez.

During these years, Cortés developed the skills that would stand him in good stead in his short, turbulent career as a conquistador. He gained valuable insights into the organization of the islands’ indigenous peoples and proved an adept arbiter in the continual squabbles that broke out among the Spaniards, forever vying to enlarge their estates or snag lucrative administrative positions.

In 1518 Velázquez appointed his secretary to lead an expedition to Mexico. Cortés—as Velázquez was to discover to his cost—was set on becoming a leader rather than a loyal follower. He set off for the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in February 1519 with 11 ships, about 100 sailors, 500 soldiers, and 16 horses. Over the following months Cortés would take matters into his own hands, disobey the governor’s orders, and turn what had been intended to be an exploratory mission into a historic military conquest.

Aztec introductions

To the Aztec, 1519 was a year that began with their empire as the uncontested power in the region. Its capital city, Tenochtitlan, ruled 400 to 500 small states with a total population of five to six million. The fortunes of the kingdom of Moctezuma, however, were doomed to a swift and spectacular decline once Cortés and his men disembarked on the Mexican coast. (See also: Rare Aztec Map Reveals a Glimpse of Life in 1500s Mexico. )

Having rapidly imposed control over the indigenous population in the coastal region, Cortés was given 20 slaves by a local chieftain. One of them, a young woman, could speak several local languages and soon learned Spanish too. Her linguistic skills would prove crucial to Cortés’s invasion plans, and she became his interpreter as well as his concubine. She soon came to be known as Malinche, or Doña Marina. The conquistador had a son with her, Martín, who is often regarded as the first ever mestizo—a person of mixed European and American Indian ancestry. (See also: Call the Aztec midwife: Childbirth in the 16th century. )

The news of the foreigners’ arrival soon reached the Aztec emperor, Moctezuma, in Tenochtitlan. To appease the Spaniards, he sent envoys and gifts to Cortés, but he only succeeded in inflaming Cortés’s desires for more Aztec riches. Cortés once described the land near Veracruz, the city he founded on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico, as rich as the mythical land where King Solomon obtained his gold. As a mark of his ruthlessness, and to quash any misgivings his crew may have had in disobeying the orders of Governor Velázquez, Cortés ordered the destruction of the fleet he had sailed with from Cuba. There was now no turning back.

Mosaic mask of turquoise and lignite covers a human skull and represents an Aztec god, Tezcatlipoca.

Cortés had a talent for observing and manipulating local political rivalries. On the way to Tenochtitlan, the Spaniards gained the support of the Totonac peoples from the city of Cempoala, who hoped to be freed from the Aztec yoke. Following a military victory over another native people, the Tlaxcaltec, Cortés incorporated more warriors into his army. Knowledge of the divisions among different native peoples, and an unerring ability to exploit them, was central to Cortés’s strategy.

The Aztec had allies too, however, and Cortés was especially belligerent toward them. The holy city of Cholula, which joined with Moctezuma in an attempt to stall the Spaniards, was sacked for two days at Cortés’s command. After a grueling battle lasting more than five hours, as many as 6,000 of its people were killed. Cortés’s forces seemed invincible. In the face of their unstoppable advance, Moctezuma stalled for time, allowing the Spaniards and their allies to enter Tenochtitlan unopposed in November 1519.

Fighting on two fronts

Fear gripped the huge Aztec capital on Cortés’s entry, the chroniclers wrote: Its 250,000 inhabitants put up no resistance to Cortés’s small force of a few hundred men and 1,000 Tlaxcaltec allies. At first Moctezuma formally received Cortés. Seeing the value of the emperor as a captive, Cortés seized him and guaranteed his power over the city.

Establishing a pattern that would recur throughout his career, Cortés soon found himself as much at threat from his own compatriots as from the peoples he was trying to subdue. At the beginning of 1520 he was forced to leave Tenochtitlan to deal with a punitive expedition sent from Cuba by the enraged Diego Velázquez. In his absence, Cortés left Tenochtitlan under the command of Pedro de Alvarado and a garrison of 80 Spaniards.

The hotheaded Alvarado lacked Cortes’s skill and diplomacy. During Cortes’s absence, Alvarado’s execution of many Aztec chiefs enraged the people. After defeating Velázquez’s forces, Cortés returned to Tenochtitlan on June 24, 1520, to find the city in revolt against his proxy. For several days, the Spaniards vainly used Moctezuma in an attempt to calm tempers, but his people pelted the puppet king with stones. Moctezuma died a few days later, but his successors would fare no better than he did.

On June 30, 1520, the Spanish fled the city under fire, suffering hundreds of casualties. Some Spaniards died by drowning in the surrounding marshes, weighed down by the vast amounts of treasure they were trying to carry off. The event would come to be known as the Night of Sorrows.

Technology Triumphs

Although the Aztec had the superior numbers, advanced Spanish weaponry ultimately gave them the upper hand. With firearms and steel blades at his disposal, just one Spaniard might annihilate dozens or even hundreds of opponents: “On a sudden, they speared and thrust people into shreds,” wrote one indigenous chronicler, having witnessed the terrifying impact of European arms. “Others were beheaded in one swipe... Others tried to run in vain from the butchery, their innards falling from them and entangling their very feet.”

A smallpox epidemic prevented the Aztec forces from finishing off Cortés’s defeated and demoralized army. The outbreak weakened the Aztec while giving Cortés time to regroup. Spain would win the Battle of Otumba a few days later. Skillful deployment of cavalry against the elite Aztec jaguar and eagle warriors carried the day for the Europeans and their allies.“Our only security, apart from God,”Cortés wrote,“is our horses.”

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Victory allowed the Spaniards to rejoin with their Tlaxcaltec allies and launch the recapture of Tenochtitlan. Waves of attacks were launched on settlements near the Aztec capital. Any resistance was brutally crushed: Many indigenous enemies were captured as slaves and some were even branded following their capture. The sacking also allowed the Spaniards to build up their large personal retinues, taking captives to use as servants and slaves, and kidnapping others for exchanges and ransoms. Growing in number to roughly 3,000 people, this group of captives vastly outnumbered the fighting Spaniards.

Fall of the Aztec

For an assault on a city the size of Tenochtitlan, the number of Spanish troops seemed paltry—just under 1,000 soldiers, including harquebusiers, infantry, and cavalry. However, Cortés knew that his superior weaponry, coupled with the additional 50,000 warriors provided by his indigenous allies, would conquer the city, which was already weakened from starvation and thirst. In May 1521 the Spaniards had cut off the city’s water supply by taking control of the Chapultepec aqueduct.

Even so, the siege of Tenochtitlan was not a given. During fighting in July 1521, the Aztec held strong, even capturing Cortés himself. Wounded in one leg, the Spanish leader was ultimately rescued by his captains. During this setback for the conquistador, the Aztec warriors managed to regain lost ground and rebuild the city’s fortifications, pushing the Spanish onto the defensive for nearly three weeks. Cortés ordered the marshland to be filled with rubble for a final assault. Finally, on August 13, 1521, the city fell.

“Not a single stone remained left to burn and destroy,” one witness wrote. The loss of human life was staggering, both in absolute figures and in its disproportionality. During the siege, around 100 Spaniards lost their lives compared to as many as 100,000 Aztec.

Ladies' Man

According to the chronicler Francisco López de Gómara, Cortés was “very given to women and always gave into temptation.” His biography abounds in romantic entanglements. Throughout his career, Cortés's personal life held a selfish, manipulative streak. In 1514 he married a young Spanish woman named Catalina Suárez, a relative of Governor Diego Velázquez, who soon promoted Cortés after the wedding. But Cortés was not faithful. After the conquest of Mexico, he and Malinche, an Aztec woman who served as his interpreter, had a son together. The marriage to Caralina only ended when she was found dead under mysterious circumstances in 1522. Cortés was suspected of her murder, but nevery charged. Cortés then took as a consort Princess Isabel Moctezuma, the Aztec emperor's daughter. She and Cortés had a daughter, but he later abandoned them. In 1529 Cortés took a Spanish noblewoman, Juana de Zúñiga, as his bride and became a marquis, securing both a high social status and a rather rakish reputation.

The conquest of Tenochtitlan and the subsequent consolidation of Spanish domination over the former Aztec Empire was the first major possession in what became the Spanish Empire. This vast territory would reach its greatest extent in the 18th century, with territory throughout North and South America.

Cortés’s triumph would be short-lived. In just a few years, he would lose many of his lands in the New World. Despite being made a marquis years later, the Conqueror of Mexico did not have a glorious end. In 1547, at the age of 62, he died in a village near Sevilla, Spain, embroiled in lawsuits and his health broken by a series of disastrous expeditions. Decades of rapid expansion in the Americas seemed to have eclipsed his own exploits, and few bells tolled for the man whose ruthlessness and cunning transformed the Americas.

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Navigate between maps, north america 1519: cortés’ expedition to mexico.

Jan–?? 1518 Grijalva explores southern Gulf of Mexico

18 Nov 1518–22 Apr 1519 Cortés leads expedition from Cuba to Mexico

Dec 1518–May 1519 Smallpox devastates Taíno population of Hispaniola

Mar 1519 Cortés founds Santa María de la Victoria

Mar 1519–Jan 1520 De Pineda explores northern Gulf of Mexico

22 Apr 1519 Cortés founds Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz

22 April 1519

Conquistadors, north america, cortés’ expedition to mexico.

In 1518 and 1519 the Spanish colonies of Cuba and Santiago (Jamaica) sent expeditions to explore the Gulf of Mexico , establishing its extent and discovering the Aztec Empire . In late 1518 Governor Velázquez of Cuba gave the magistrate Hernán Cortés command of a follow-up expedition to secure a foothold on the mainland, but the ambitious Cortés soon broke away from Velázquez’s authority, gathering over 500 adventurers to join him. Sailing to Mexico, he established the town of Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz (Veracruz) on the coast of the Aztec Empire in April 1519.

Main Events

Jan– 1518 grijalva’s first expedition ▲.

In January 1518 Velázquez de Cuéllar, the Spanish governor of Cuba, sent his 28-year-old nephew Juan de Grijalva on an expedition to explore the lands recently discovered by Francisco Hernández de Córdoba. With four ships and over two hundred men, Grijalva sighted Cozumel island on the east coast of the Yucatán Peninsula in May, before traveling west to defeat the Maya of Chakán Putum in battle, discover the land of Tabasco, and briefly visit the previously-unknown Aztec Empire in June. Grijalva then continued north as far as Cabo Rojo before returning to Cuba, where he was reprimanded for not establishing any colonies. in wikipedia

18 Nov 1518–22 Apr 1519 Cortés’ expedition to Mexico ▲

In October 1518 Governor Velázquez of Cuba appointed the 34-year-old magistrate Hernán Cortés to lead an expedition to secure a foothold in Mexico. Cortés quickly mustered seven ships and more than 300 volunteers, leaving Santiago de Cuba in November in the face of Velázquez’s alarmed attempts to recall and replace him. Traveling to western Cuba, Cortés gathered more followers—11 vessels, 530 troops, 50 sailors, 16 horses, and 14 large artillery in total—before proceeding to Yucatán and then westwards along the coast. In April 1519 he landed on the mainland near the island of San Juan de Ullúa, where he was greeted by the local Totonac people, subjects of the Aztec Empire. in wikipedia

Dec 1518–May 1519 Hispaniola Smallpox Epidemic ▲

In December 1518 smallpox was noticed among the African slaves working in the mines of Hispaniola; the disease soon spread to the island’s indigenous Taíno population, who had no natural immunity. By May 1519 up to a third of Hispaniola’s Taíno had died from smallpox and the epidemic was already raging in the neighboring islands of Cuba and Puerto Rico. in wikipedia

25 Mar 1519 Santa María de la Victoria ▲

In March 1519 Hernán Cortés landed outside the Chontal Maya town of Potonchán, where he located a ship that had become separated from his fleet during an earlier storm. When negotiations broke down, the Spaniards used their horses and artillery to defeat the Maya at the Battle of Centla, destroying Potonchán and founding the village of Santa María de la Victoria in its place. As tribute, the Maya gave Cortés a number of slaves, including a woman, Malinche, who would soon become his translator and counselor (and later gave birth to his first son). Shortly after Cortés left, the Maya besieged Santa María de la Victoria; it would remain in a precarious situation until the Spanish conquest of Tabasco in 1528–37. in wikipedia

Mar 1519–Jan 1520 De Pineda’s expedition ▲

In March 1519 Alonso Álvarez de Pineda, financed by Governor Francisco de Garay of Santiago (Jamaica), set sail for Florida with four ships and 270 men. Pushed west by winds, de Pineda explored the mouth of a great and deep river—either the Mississippi or Mobile Bay and the Alabama River—before traveling along the coast from Texas to central Mexico. When he arrived in Veracruz, Hernán Cortés—who had arrived shortly beforehand—threatened him with arrest. De Pineda fled north to Huastec country, where he and all but 60 of his crew were massacred just before a relief expedition reached them in early 1520. in wikipedia

22 Apr 1519 Foundation of Veracruz ▲

Landing in Totonac land, part of the Aztec Empire, on Good Friday 1519, Hernán Cortés founded a settlement of palm huts as Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz (literally “Rich Town of the True Cross”). He then resigned as captain general of his expedition and established himself as mayor of the new town—a series of legal maneuvers which allowed Cortés to cut ties with Velázquez’s government in Cuba and report directly to the Spanish king. Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz would soon become known as Veracruz, Mexico’s most important port. in wikipedia

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A map depicting the invasion route taken by Hernán Cortés

This map represents the route Hernán(do) Cortés and his men followed during the Spanish Conquest of Mexico. Cortes and his men battled their way through Mexico from 1519 to 1521.

The Spanish Conquest of Mexico refers to the conquest of the Mexica/Aztec empire in particular. While the Yucatán Peninsula is part of modern-day Mexico, it was not part of the Spanish Conquest of Mexico.

Cortés was a member of the Spanish generation of conquistadors, a name referring to soldiers, explorers, and adventrures who were instrumental in the Spanish conolization of the Americas. Cortés, in particular, was a famous and particularly successful conquistador for Spain.

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Hernan Cortes Routes

Hernan cortes voyages and routes..