When Montezuma met Cortés : the true story of the meeting that changed history

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The work When Montezuma met Cortés : the true story of the meeting that changed history represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in European University Institute Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

When Montezuma met Cortés : the true story of the meeting that changed history

Title remainder

the true story of the meeting that changed history

Statement of responsibility

Matthew Restall

Creator

• Restall, Matthew, 1964-

Subject

• Cortés, Hernán, 1485-1547
• Mexico -- History -- Conquest, 1519-1540
• Montezuma, II, Emperor of Mexico, approximately 1480-1520

Language

eng

Summary

"On November 8, 1519, the Spanish conquistador Hernando Cortés first met Montezuma, the Aztec emperor, at the entrance to the capital city of Tenochtitlan. This introduction--the prelude to the Spanish seizure of Mexico City and to European colonization of the mainland of the Americas--has long been the symbol of Cortés's bold and brilliant military genius. Montezuma, on the other hand, is remembered as a coward who gave away a vast empire and touched off a wave of colonial invasions across the hemisphere. But is this really what happened? In a departure from traditional tellings, When Montezuma Met Cortés uses "the Meeting"--as Restall dubs their first encounter--as the entry point into a comprehensive reevaluation of both Cortés and Montezuma. Drawing on rare primary sources and overlooked accounts by conquistadors and Aztecs alike, Restall explores Cortés's and Montezuma's posthumous reputations, their achievements and failures, and the worlds in which they lived--leading, step by step, to a dramatic inversion of the old story. As Restall takes us through this sweeping, revisionist account of a pivotal moment in modern civilization, he calls into question our view of the history of the Americas, and, indeed, of history itself" --

Assigning source

Provided by publisher

Illustrations

• illustrations
• maps
• plates
• genealogical tables

Index

index present

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

bibliography