The reality of the wars against the south american indians.

I would like to know the numbers of the main three indian tribes who stood against the European (Conquistador) invasion. Many say that the Spanish destroyed the Aztecs and Incas with 200-500 cavaliers, but that is a crock of bull. So i would like to know how many  indian allies fought on the Spanish side and name me some major battles too. And i would like to learn more about the names of other tribes, other than the major three.

yes the Inca conquest was much more political and hostage related than battle realted, although Pizzarro did have Indian allies he didnt have many, he did have the added advantage that

1.  He captured the leader fromt he first place, not slightly after the fact like Cortes

2.  Inca society was so rigid it could not function without its leader

3.  The Inca had just concluded a massive and devastating civil war

4IUn both cases disease played a huge part, coupled with iron and horses and guns or course, but mostly dieases, Eurasian diseases (aquired through dometicated animal contact) was totally aliena and devestating , effecting as much as 90% of the native population, deadly than bubonic plague easily, esoecially as they all came at once.

5.  Im pretty sure Cortez had at least 10,000 allies.  The Aztecs were certainly nto popular, especially because they were really the first unified empire in the region that we know for sure existed since Teotihuacan.  The Maya and the Olmec and others were all individual city states.

CAPTAINS OF THE FINAL CONQUEST:

AT TACUBA

Don Pedro de Alvarado 30 Cavalrymen
170 Spanish Soldiers
3 Cannons
30,000 Allied Indians
AT COYOACAN
Don Cristobal de Olid 33 Cavalrymen
180 Spanish Soldiers
2 Cannons
30,000 Allied Indians

AT IXTAPALAPA
Don Gonzalo de Sandoval 23 Cavalrymen
160 Spanish Soldiers
2 Cannons
40,000 Allied Indians

IN THE BOATS/BRIGANTINES

Hernan Cortes with 200 Spaniards/Indian Allies (13 Ships)


In 1519, the Aztec Empire was the most powerful Mesoamerican kingdom of all time. The Mexica capital of Tenochtitl�n had become a city of about 300,000 citizens. And the Aztec Empire itself ruled over about 80,000 square miles of territory extending from the Gulf of Mexico to the Pacific Ocean, and southward to Oaxaca and Chiapas. This empire contained some 15 million people, living in thirty-eight provinces. In all, the Emperor received the tribute of 489 communities.

Although the Mexica put together an extensive and powerful empire, Tlaxcala never fell into their hands. When the Spanish conquistadors, under the command of Captain-General Hern�n Cort�s, reached the Tlaxcalan republic in 1519, Tlaxcala was an independent enclave deep in the heart of the Mexica Empire. At this time, the Tlaxcalan Confederation ruled over some 200 settlements, boasting a total population of about 150,000. Surrounded on all sides and economically blockaded, they had never yielded to the Mexica and had been subjected to almost continuous warfare and human sacrifice for many decades.

Some historians believe that Tenochtitl�n could have overwhelmed Tlaxcala without too much difficulty, and the reason it did not is probably that it wanted a nearby source of victims for the human sacrifices. The clashes between the Tlaxcalans and Mexica were called the "Flower Wars" (Xochiyaoyotl). The chief purpose of these "ceremonial battles" was to furnish captives to be used in their sacrificial rites. It is likely that both the Mexica and Tlaxcalan also saw war as a convenient way of testing and training young warriors for future wars. During this time, it was a common belief in Central Mexico that offering human sacrifice to their gods would ensure the continued movement of the sun and hence the other processes needed to maintain life.

Because of their economic isolation, the Tlaxcalans had no cotton with which to make their clothes. Neither did they have any salt. The salt lakes of Alchichica, not far from Tlaxcala, lay close by but they could not benefit from this. No feathers or precious stones made their way into Tlaxcala. This state of unrelenting warfare had become very hateful to the Tlaxcalans and by the time that Cort�s arrived in Tlaxcala, the confederation represented fertile grounds for an anti-Mexica alliance.




The First Occupation of Tenochtitlan

On the Aztec Day of 1 Wind, the Spanish entered the city of Tenochtitlan to meet Montezuma. Coincidentally, 1 Wind is Quetzalcoatl's Day, attributed to the whirlwind when robbers and wizards are supposed to do their worst, robbing and violating. Montezuma greeted the Spanish with an elaborate ceremony and thousands of attendants. "This is what our kings and those who ruled this city told us: that you would come to assume your rightful place. Welcome to your kingdom, lords!" Montezuma said on first meeting Cortes.

The Aztecs housed the Spanish in a wondrous palace. When Montezuma asked Cortes what it would take to make the Spanish leave his empire, Cortes replied, "We Spanish suffer from a disease of the heart, which can be cured only by gold." Cortes decided to take Montezuma hostage, falsely claiming that the emperor had ordered an attack on his forces on the coast.

When Governor Velazquez of Cuba realized that Cortes was no longer following his orders, he sent a large army to arrest him. Cortes took 100 of his men and returned to the coast, where he easily defeated Velazquez's army, ensuring his free reign in Mexico.

Back in Tenochtitlan, Cortes' captain, Pedro de Alvarado, gave permission for the Aztecs to celebrate a festival. As the unarmed worshippers danced and sang, the Spaniards suddenly attacked the Aztecs. Alvarado later explained the attack by stating that he thought the Aztecs were going to try to free Montezuma.

The Aztecs Fight Back

The Aztecs quickly cut off supplies of food from the Spanish and attacked the palace where they were holding Montezuma. When Cortes received news that the Aztecs had attacked and imprisoned his soldiers, he returned from the coast to Tenochtitlan. Wave after wave of Aztec warriors charged the Spanish palace. Many Spaniards tried to escape along the causeway, but Cortes and some of his men escaped to the Great Pyramid and set fire to the idols in the temples. The next day, Cortes took Montezuma to the palace roof to try to negotiate with the Aztec soldiers, who attacked them with stones, injuring Montezuma.

In a desperate move, the Spanish and their Tlaxcalan allies decided to take advantage of a dark, rainy night to escape from Tenochtitlan. Cortes loaded seven horses and 80 Tlaxcalan porters with gold from the treasure house and gave the rest of the heavy gold to his soldiers. A woman getting water from the lake spotted the escaping Spaniards and the Aztecs quickly launched a surprise attack. To prevent the Spaniards from escaping, the Aztecs removed the drawbridges on the causeway, but Cortes' carpenters had built portable bridges.


"La Noche Triste," the Night of Sorrow, began. Two-thirds of the Spanish soldiers and 4,000 Tlaxcalans died in battle. Weighed down by the gold they were carrying, many Spanish soldiers drowned in the lake.


Cortes' Return to Tenochtitlan

Cortes retreated to Tlaxcala, where he gained new troops and supplies from Cuba, trained new Tlaxcalan allies, and planned an attack by water on Tenochtitlan. Cortes gained control of the towns around the lakeshore. After Christmas 1520, Cortes led an army of 16,000 men back to Tenochtitlan.

The Aztecs, under their new leader Cuauhtemoc, were ready and had built barricades of rubble and removed the bridges in the causeways. They had also put sharpened stakes underwater in the canals. As the Aztecs prepared for war, smallpox continued to devastate the native population of Tenochtitlan.

Cortes attacked Tenochtitlan from three directions at once with 13 new ships. The Aztecs had more than 200,000 canoes. It took Cortes three months to reach the sacred center of Tenochtitlan. The fighting was so fierce that the lake water turned red with blood. Aztec soldiers sacrificed Spanish soldiers and rolled their heads along the causeways. The Spanish could not move "without treading on the bodies and heads of dead Indians."

In the final all-out attack on the center of the city, 15,000 Aztecs died that day alone. Emperor Cuauhtemoc and his last few supporters tried to escape in a canoe, but were captured by the Spaniards. The siege of Tenochtitlan was over. In the Aztec calendar, this was the first day of the Great Feast of the Dead, a month of traditional lamentation and remembrance.



The Attack Fleet.
In order to build a fleet of ships for the attack on the Aztecs, the Spanish army carpenters and shipbuilders cut trees from the Mexican forests for wood, and boiled pine resin to seal the planks. Each of the planks was marked to show where it fit into the ship. 1,000 Indians were sent back to the coast to get iron, ropes and sails that Cortes had salvaged from the ships that he sank. Over 8,000 men carried the parts 50 miles to the lake to be reassembled. For seven weeks, thousands of Tlaxcalans worked to dig a canal from the construction site to the lake


Edited by Jalisco Lancer