Long before the Spanish expansion of America, there were tribes with highly developed cultures and politics. The Columbus arrival brought these peoples problems, complicated to the dissolution of their civilization. David Stannard devoted his book “American Holocaust” to the research of the question of Spanish interference into the Mayas’ and Aztecs’ life, and the war which led to the empires’ destruction. The point of this essay is to retrace the development of Mayas and Aztecs to their total extermination.
Fifteen centuries before the Columbian discovery of America, it was settled by the powerful and developed empires of the Maya and Aztecs. The Maya tribes occupied the territories of southern Mexico and North Guatemala jungles. Their culture was on a high level. They invented the exact solar calendar and created an advanced hieroglyphic script, they prognosticate the exact time of the eclipse of the Sun and the Moon. In the first centuries AD, they achieved staggering perfection in architecture and art. At the beginning of Spanish expansion in the sixteenth century, Maya Indians occupied vast and rich space. Spaniards were interested in gold and silver, gaining great wealth. But resources of precious metals in Maya lands were poor. Moving further to Mexico and Peru, the conquerors subdued the Indians for slave work. “The master was free to do what he wished with his people – have them plant, have them work in the mines, have them do anything without limit or benefit of tenure” (Stannard, 73). In Guatemala, the native population was the Aztecs. There was the Union of three city-states with the center in Tenochtitlan. This town underwent destruction by conquistadors in 1519-1521. A great number of the population died from starvation and diseases. In 1494 Spaniards suffered from the epidemic. The disease was rapidly spread among the Aztecs. “If, as the Spanish physician and medical historian Francisco Guerra now contends, the epidemic that ravaged Hispaniola in 1494 was swine influenza, it would have been a pestilence of devastating proportions” (Stannard, 68). A new wave of aggression was directed to Indians, as they were accused of contagion and were killed as infection carriers. The Aztecs were exposed to the holocaust, and Tenochtitlan was ruined. After three months of siege and vehement strife, the city was kept by Cortes in 1521. About the war experience of Indians Stannard writes, “The Aztecs’ battlefield experience was the result of complex political rivalries that had existed in the region for centuries, rivalries the Spanish under Hernando Cortes were able to turn to their advantage” (Stannard, 75). From the ruins of the Aztec capital Spaniards built a new city – Mexico City.
The result of Spanish expansion was the Holocaust of the native population of America. The World History names three cases of the genocide directed against Jews during World War II, Armenians during Turkish usurpation, and Ukrainians during starvation of 1932-33. But the work “American Holocaust” sets thinking about the real genocide of the native population of America. As a result of the expansionist policy of Spain, two of the most original and significant civilizations were wiped off the face of the earth.
Word Count – 514 words.
Works Cited
Stannard, David. American Holocaust: The Conquest of the New World. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.