History of Mexico, Volume 1, 1516-1521Bancroft, Hubert Howe
History
History of Mexico, Volume 1, 1516-1521
Bancroft, Hubert Howe
Mexico -- History
[136] Two Spaniards fell, and over 800 Indians lay dead,
so said their countrymen. _Bernal Diaz_, _Hist. Verdad._,
22-3. Over 70 Spaniards were wounded, and more than 300
Indians were slain in the pursuit alone. Over 100 men fell
sick from heat and bad water, but all recovered. _Gomara_,
_Hist. Mex._, 33. Herrera, dec. ii. lib. iv. cap. xi., allows
no killed among the Spaniards, while over 1000 Indians are
laid low. _Torquemada_, i, 375. Three Spaniards are killed
and 60 wounded. _Vetancvrt_, _Teatro Mex._, pt. iii. 113.
The Ayuntamiento of Vera Cruz, in its letter to the Emperor,
10 July, 1519, for obvious reasons lowers the figures to
twenty wounded Spaniards, of whom none died, and to 220
dead Indians, out of 40,000 engaged. _Cortés_, _Cartas_,
17. Finally comes Las Casas with the other extreme of 30,000
souls, said to have been cruelly slaughtered in this first
great battle of Cortés. _Hist. Ind._, iv. 477. Quite a list
of misdeeds are here raked up, or invented rather, against
the Spaniards in the _West-Indische Spieghel_, Amsterdam,
1624, a curious little quarto, designed for Dutch traders
in America, and dedicated to their West India Company. The
author is called Athanasium Inga. ‘_Peruaen_, uyt Cusco
gheboren, die dit alles, soo door onder vindinghe als door
transpositie en overset tinghe sijnder Voor-Ouderen, hier
te Lande ons overghedraghen heeft,’ says Wachter, in the
preface. The volume opens with a lengthy description of
the Antilles, but the remaining text is wholly devoted to
the Spanish colonies on the main, mingled without order,
and interspersed with special chapters on navigation and
coast routes for the benefit of traders. Beside the usual
description of physical and political geography, with
particular reference to natural resources and aboriginal
customs, several voyages are described, mainly to point out
sailing directions and the progress of discovery, while the
conquest period is told with some minuteness, but garbled
with the idea of exposing the avarice and cruelty of the
hated Spaniards. This is also the object of nearly all the
neatly engraved copper-plates. The map extends Hudson Bay
very close to the Pacific coast, where a faintly outlined
strait is visible some distance above California Island.
The part relating to Mexico, including some brief references
to Central America, occupies about one third of the volume,
and treats chiefly of the Conquest. The book is remarkable
for its black-letter text, with marginals in the same type,
and for its title-page, with the figures of ‘Montenchuma’
and ‘Atabaliba’ surrounded by battle-scenes and Indian
industrial operations.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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