While the idea that the arrival of Europeans to “The New World” brought upon the indigenous cultures of America no small amount of strife and misery, as well as fame and fortune upon the Spanish is widely accepted as fact, there is limitless dissention among historians about the true history of the conquest of “New Spain”. One event that exemplifies this dissention is that of the Siege of Tenochtitlan. In the following analysis I will describe and discuss two conflicting accounts that document this occasion (The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico and The Conquest of New Spain by Bernal Diaz). The accounts are conflicting in the way each author presents certain events of the siege and manipulates them to represent their
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Diaz writes his lengthy account because he’s tired of everyone else writing about what went down in Mexico and getting it all wrong, and so tries to remedy this by writing his own version. We can see from Diaz’s writing about the starvation of the Natives that he too wishes to gather support for his and his countrymen’s actions in the Siege; just as the Mexicas would benefit from making themselves look like victims in their retelling, so would Diaz benefit from making the cruelty of the Spaniards simply look strategic, as though the measures they took were necessary to provide for their king and country, to assure each soldier’s well-being, and to fulfill the wishes of God. Diaz relates the “decision” of the Spanish to cut off the city’s water supply directly after “Father Diaz [said] mass and [they] had commended [themselves] to God”, setting aside specific space to tell his audience of “the advantage… gained by preventing food and water getting to the enemy”, how the Spaniards “broke the pipes which supplied the city, and the water did not flow into Mexico again”, how they, to “interrupt” outside supplies into the city, “agreed… that two launches patrol the lake by night and destroy all the canoes”, praising this as a “good plan” (pg. 359 & 369). It’s no accident that Diaz and his company first consult with God and then come to the conclusion that their best plan of action is to sever Tenochtitlan’s water and food supply. These events happening so close together in the narrative causes the reader to subconsciously believe that this plan is approved by God himself, and thus that the Spaniards acted righteously in attempting such genocide. This adds to Diaz’s underlying argument and bias that the cruelty imposed on the indigenous people was not actually cruelty, partially because it was the will of God (who can argue that they acted wrongly if it was God’s plan).
Diaz writes his lengthy account because he’s tired of everyone else writing about what went down in Mexico and getting it all wrong, and so tries to remedy this by writing his own version. We can see from Diaz’s writing about the starvation of the Natives that he too wishes to gather support for his and his countrymen’s actions in the Siege; just as the Mexicas would benefit from making themselves look like victims in their retelling, so would Diaz benefit from making the cruelty of the Spaniards simply look strategic, as though the measures they took were necessary to provide for their king and country, to assure each soldier’s well-being, and to fulfill the wishes of God. Diaz relates the “decision” of the Spanish to cut off the city’s water supply directly after “Father Diaz [said] mass and [they] had commended [themselves] to God”, setting aside specific space to tell his audience of “the advantage… gained by preventing food and water getting to the enemy”, how the Spaniards “broke the pipes which supplied the city, and the water did not flow into Mexico again”, how they, to “interrupt” outside supplies into the city, “agreed… that two launches patrol the lake by night and destroy all the canoes”, praising this as a “good plan” (pg. 359 & 369). It’s no accident that Diaz and his company first consult with God and then come to the conclusion that their best plan of action is to sever Tenochtitlan’s water and food supply. These events happening so close together in the narrative causes the reader to subconsciously believe that this plan is approved by God himself, and thus that the Spaniards acted righteously in attempting such genocide. This adds to Diaz’s underlying argument and bias that the cruelty imposed on the indigenous people was not actually cruelty, partially because it was the will of God (who can argue that they acted wrongly if it was God’s plan).