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Heran Cortes And The Collapse Of The Aztec Civilization

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Introduction: The Aztec civilization was one of the most significant and advanced civilizations in world history. In 1325 AD, the Aztec civilization was created and ruled by Montezuma II. However, Heran Cortes along with his army of 500 Spanish conquistadors landed on the coast and made their way into Tenochtitlan in 1519 AD. They arrived at Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital which at the time was ruled by Montezuma II and were committed to cause the Aztec civilization to collapse. But it only took two years before Cortes and his small army conquered and destroyed the mighty civilization. Disease was a significant factor in the collapse of the Aztec civilization due to the lack of immunity the Aztecs had against European disease, Spanish using …show more content…

However, only twenty-one months from that moment, the city lays in ruins. This primary source, called ‘1794 Map of Mexico City’, shows us a map of the Valley of Mexico in 1794 after it was destroyed by the Spanish conquistadors under Hernan Cortes in 1521. This source demonstrates the general order of its streets, neighborhoods, alleys without thoroughfare, ruins, and the beauty. (Luis, 2021) Text can be seen all down the left side and shows Valleys of Mexico now known as Mexico City after the collapse of the Aztec civilization. This source justified how the Valley of Mexico drastically changed after the founding of Mexico City continued the violence of the fall with the lake completely dried out and the “cityscape. towering pyramids now raised crosses to the heavens” (Luis, 2021). These sources imply that the city Tenochtitlan was a very beautiful place that seemed like a dream until the Spanish conquistadors and Hernan Cortes and his army came and conquered the city and destroyed the Aztec empire to take control. Therefore, the layout of the city led to the downfall of the Aztec …show more content…

This secondary source by Britanica states “When the Spanish arrived, they brought with them smallpox. The Aztecs had no immunity to European diseases. Smallpox spread among the indigenous people and crippled their ability to resist the Spanish. The disease devastated the Aztec people, greatly reducing their population and killing an estimated half of Tenochtitlán’s inhabitants.” (Britanica, n.d.). The source explicitly states that the Aztecs had no immunity towards the Spanish diseases and how smallpox crippled their ability to resist the Spanish as the disease greatly reduced their population. From this information, it is implied that the Spanish could have purposely brought smallpox to the New World to make the Aztecs weaker and to lower their population so the Spanish could take over easier. This shows that the Aztec had no immunity to smallpox and had never encountered a disease like that as the disease devastated and greatly reduced the population of Aztecs. Furthermore, the introduction of disease to the Aztecs who had very low immunity was a very important part in the collapse of the Aztec Empire. Historical evidence suggests that the collapse of the Aztec civilization was due to the introduction of disease and how the Spanish used it to their advantage. The smallpox

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Tenochtitlán was the capital city of the Aztec civilization. It was founded in AD 1325 by the Mexica people. This city was built on a cluster of small natural islands on Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico. The small island was gradually enlarged as Tenochtitlán grew. It became one of the largest and most powerful cities in Mesoamerica.

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This was the smallpox virus and because the people there had a lack of resistance for Old World diseases it destroyed them. Even though they were healthy compared to conquistadors, they had no chance to pass on any genetic resistance or to become immune from childhood. The first smallpox epidemic in the New World was among the Taino, the first people Columbus encountered, was in 1518. Eventually, up to 50-90% of the Native people died from the virus, even striking the people before the Spanish entered new lands in South and Central America. This made the people weak and easy to take over resulting in Spain taking over lands very quickly and

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