Doña Marina, Translator, 'Bridge-Maker', Was A Local, And A Woman

Doña Marina was a local woman that the Spaniards had acquired in Yucatan, probably in March, 1519, soon after first landing there. In many ways, as it turns out, these europeans with Cortes would not likely have made it as far as they did without her. In six months she had become so essential that Bernal Diaz gives her much of the credit for the real breakthrough, winning over the Tlaxcalans, outside of their city. As the Cortes faction stayed in the city, after first entering it the week before, negotiations were continued as the parties got to know each other. But the actual person behind the name, this woman who was central to negotiations as translator of the Nahua languages that the locals spoke, the one sleeping with and caring for Cortes himself as well, has been almost lost in stories told about her, long after it all happened. The truth or falsity of stories notwithstanding, some women get talked about a lot without ever getting to tell their side of it.

This is the case with Doña Marina, called Malintzin and much worse, by the locals even today. Born in a house that was run by or related to some local chief or noble, she was educated and could speak well the language of the local ruling elite near the Coatzacoalcos  River. She was also, according to people who knew her, like Cortes, 'stolen by merchants' when a child and taken elsewhere to be a menial servant until 'the boat people arrived'. She herself did not leave any written accounts herself, which has generated it's own wounds and real sense of shame over the centuries.

Still, a symapthetic look at her life can be found in a 2006 academic work, called "Malintzin's Choices". The author Camilla Townshend took the time to learn the Nahua language, as we understand it, whcih gave her insight she says to the cultural environment that Malintzin grew up in.  She stresses that this woman's own cultural contexts are what we need foremost to understand a foreign culture as well as a foreign time. Of course, she admits we have very little to go on in the written record. But she lays out what records we do have admirably, and clearly in her extensive footnotes, showing stunning modern-day scholarship. She sees the necessity of understanding, and develops in her telling, the web of interrrelations that Malintzin and women in general lived in, there, and in those times. After centuries of misunderstanding and even hatred toward Malintzin, false-stories, Ms Townshend thinks it long past time to set the record straight and show this woman thru the lenses of personal choices and their outcomes, rather than as merely a victim or as a deceptive, manipulative traitor.

Indeed, the case can be and has been made over and over, fairly or not, that she betrayed all her fellow local people to the ravages and eventual conquest by the europeans. Ms Townshend quotes Otavio Paz who, when writing of La Malinche, said that calling her Chingada, the 'fucked one', or 'the one used' was appropriate in talking of the conquest. It could even explain, he went on, the then current term, malinchista, itself as used by the papers in his day, to describe someone who would allow foreign influence to breed corruption. The influence of this shameful idea he said, perpetuated a reactionary xenophobia during his time in the 1930's, -'40's. Not that Paz believed in this hurtful transferral of guilt or subsequent alienation, nor does Ms Townshend seem to at all. She is merely remarking that these sorts of ideas have widespread and longlasting influences.  And that it might be really good to have a way of disentangling these ideas and healing the wounds generated by these old, deep ideas of betrayal, violation, treachery. Poverty can be bad, but ignorance is often worse, for example. So Camilla Townshend wishes to provide some understanding about this woman by explaining some of her times and locale.

First of all, women in the Yucatan of a certain background had privileges to an extent, and a certain amount of respect could be granted to them and demanded by them. The men needed women and knew it. Women could exert power, but also could be sold into slavery. Theirs was not like our time or our culture's understanding, however. She didn't set out to build bridges. Maybe, she just did the best she could and survived as long as she could. Townshend continues in her introduction that the paucity of evidence makes an interior view of her life nearly impossible, yet we can still see a range of possibility with Malintzin, the kinds of thoughts she may have had, if we understand the world in which she lived in, better. In her introduction, she writes,

"It thus becomes important to lay out the full panoply of possibility, to render the context so vibrantly real that the range of Malinche's potential reactions becomes an interesting subject of thought, and her actual decisions and actions resonate more meaningfully.... sources must be read carefully and without naive acceptance of their assertions, but taken together, they provide a window ... into the world in which Malintzin lived and breathed." [p. 7]

Townshend also describes in her introduction to this work that the lengthy footnotes act as a kind of 'parallel book' that describes her own journey along the way of discovering the world that Malintzin lived in. She tells us it is of 'absolute importance' not to project 'modern concerns' onto that world. Townshend wants to ask 'how she mattered in her own time', and 'what did the events in her life mean to her'. [p. 5-6]
The scope of these questions posed for anyone's life seems already too broad. But it seems, we know so little, the questions that guide the inquiry, must be broad, in order to get any sense at all.
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quotes and pagination from Malintzin's Choices: an Indian Woman In The Conquest of Mexico, Camilla Townshend, University of New Mexico Press, as part of the series Dialogos, 2006

Elected To Senate's zonta: Sanudo Diaries: September 26, 30, 1518

In September, the Venetian Senate voted on new members of the Council of Ten. In 1518 an extra vote was held against precedent for one Francesco Donado. He, an old friend of Sanudo was granted the extra procedure and, on this second vote, beat a newcomer, Francesco Foscari, Donado's rival who in the previous vote had beaten Donado by sixteen votes. Foscari, a member of the Great Council had previously been accused of 'contraband with steel' but not arrested for it.

State legal counsel spoke up about the additional procedure and the Great Council asked for their opinion. But that was split into two equal groups, those that said the additional vote was valid and those who said it was not. Then, Sanudo himself spoke up and gave a rousing speech in the Council though he knew the Great Council could not really be held to task on this issue: Foscari was unpopular and, having served with Donado years before as savi ai ordeni was an old friend of his.
This seemed a conflict of interest to Sanudo so he reminded them of his name and his father who was well remembered for his patriotism and government service. This speech of Sanudo's was so well received that they immediately took up his proposal and the original vote was accepted and the second vote rescinded.
A few days later, they elected Sanudo to the Senate's zonta. The Editors tell us he thought this body was 'at the heart' of Venetian government. He was elated.

Sanudo Diaries: September 30, 1518 (26:72); "The election for the zonta was held.... Only fifty-two were elected, among whom I, Marin Sanudo, formerly of the Senate, was included by a wide margin, thanks to this most excellent Great Council, and with so muich glory and honor that no one, in a number of years, has enetered the zonta more favored than I was and, one might say, "without entitlement," because my title of Senator was through a loan."

Editor's note: "The coveted title senator ... was not awarded if the entry to the Senate had been facilitated by a loan, as had Sanudo's entry in 1516."

Sanudo Diaries (con't): "But now I have been chosen because of the speech I gave Sunday, which pleased the Great Council, whom I shall serve for all eternity. I consider myself repaid for my every labor, since they have received me into the most excellent Senate with such great honor. Present in the Great Council were 985 members."

Editor's footnote: "A few days later, on 3 October, Francesco Danado's supporters were able to get him elected to the Council of Ten to finish out the term of a member elected to the Collegio as a savio grande." [p. 20]

This story is much longer and more detailed in, and
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All quotes as Sanudo Diaries or Editor's notes or Editor's Footnotes from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll,  editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008

late update sept13

UPDATE: #shutstorm happened, 0000 EST 01October2013. Great piece on how gerrymandered voting districts helped allow this to happen.

Late Friday came word that the UN had voted on supporting the cataloguing, removal and destruction of Syria's chemical weapons. Last week it seemed an intractable situation and now it is as good an outcome as could be hooped for. In a surprise press briefing late in the aftrenoon, Obama announced he had spoken to the new President of Iran: the first time that's happened since 1979.

Seymour Hersh was on a roll, captured by the guardian, where he advocates firing 95% of media. They're far too easy on this WH, he says. Especially about surveillance and what the spooks do in our name. There was an open hearing in the Senate yesterday led by Intelligence Committee Chair, the CA Sen Diane Feinstein. Watching it on cspan3 yesterday was informative. You could see the heads Clapper and Alexander working to establish the foundation of a 'rapport' about the hot issues they claim to be responsible for. Acknowledging public perception (blaming the media), acknowledging the usefulness of hearings before Congress, welcoming criticism and emphasizing internal and external checks. The only real critic of this mass of secret USGOV activities was OR Sen Ron Wyden who was allowed five minutes to question the officials. Emptywheel talks about some of what was interesting about that.

some on the right-wing fever dream to get rid of the CFPB in three minutes on chrishayes

They're so scared it will work, that sabotaging healthcare is now big business for the usual suspects. Reporting by the Nation.

news on 25sept13

today I got up mid morning and checked doonesbury, the news sites I regularly use (on the internet) and ended up after a brief listen to the BBC worldservice (via a local NPR radio station on the FM dial) where there was much about the siege ending at the Westgate Mall in Nairobi, Kenya, and followed that with catching last night's DailyShow w/ Jon Stewart (on the internet). I get the internet thru ATT. I pay $46 /month for that, that's $552 per annum. I'd rather give all that money to NPR or my local FM stations. But that's not how the process is set up. Locally based internet services are more expensive.

Then while NPR's Morning Edition played in the background, I started watching the twitterfeed. That's an internet sytem that 'feeds'you  tweets up to 140 characters long, of all the people, organizations, etc. you follow. This morning that virtual world was a-twitter with comments on TX Senator Ted Cruz' attempt to do something ineffectual, except putting himself in the spotlight. Which he succeeded doing. He says he wants to repeal the Affordable Care Act of 2009. So I watched the last bit of that on CSPAN2 this morning and sent a bunch of tweets in response to KY Sen Rand Paul who was repeating the memes that Cruz was espousing. Of course I told him to quit lying and do his job. Not likely he saw my tweet. They get plenty of responses when they are on. Immediately after the Cruz talkathon, the Senate voted unanimously to avert a USGOV shutdown.

But there are lots of actual news stories that need mention/ attention.

Noted microphone holder Chuck Todd who works on msNBC says it's not his job to refute inaccuracies that politicos opposed to the ACA repeat. Many are saying this disqualifies him from the job-title 'journalist'.

Even after lying about it, NSA warns Congress, it still knows best, so they should do what their "... " told them to do.

Brasilia is suing the US for spying after news of NSA Surveillance of office of president, top oil co's etc. revealed. Brasilian president Dilma Rousseff spoke out about it at the UN. In fact, she opened up the General Assembly about it. Yesterday, world leaders went and spoke at the UN. The US press acted like they hoped there would be a sighting of US and Iran leaders meeting, even if by chance. How the world seems so topsy-turvy. On the weekend, The Phillipine Islands, Hong Kong and southern China were rocked by typhoon Usagi. Weeks or months it will take to recover.

UPDATE: At the end of the day, Kevin Gosztola posted this article about the Yemeni lawyer that represents victims of drone strikes in Yemen who is currently barred from the US.

Somebody floats an $11 billion settlement with JP Morgan Stanley over their dealings in mortgage-backed securities in the lead up to the 2008 crash. Gee, wonder what it's really worth to them? How is this guy involved?

Hundreds already reported lost in yestreday's 7.7 earthquake in Pakistan. Death toll and destruction estimates expected to rise considerably.

DailyKos comics are great this week, at least. Especially Mark Fiore in 'Concealed Carry Control'. But I still think TomTomorrow should get one of those genius grants.

In Tlaxcala: Diaz On Marriages, Proseletyzing: September 1519

In the days following the entry into Tlaxcala, Cortes and the europeans were offered a number of the daughters of certain Tlaxcalan chieftains, in addition to all the food and provisions, as Bernal Diaz continues his tale. First they brought some small gold pieces and 'stones of little value' and heaps of maguey fiber. They explained that all their riches had previously been stolen, taken for the 'price of peace and truces' with the Mexica.

The Tlaxcaltecas wanted these gifts to be accepted as 'showing goodwill as something from friends and servants'. Cortes was delighted. The elder Xicotencatl then offered 'among their daughters and nieces, the most beautiful'. He wanted to cement their alliance. All the rest of the cieftains said they, too, would bring their daughters the next day. Cortes thought this 'a good time to get these chiefs to give up their idols and not to sacrifice'.  The Mercedarian friar with them replied, according to Diaz:

"Sir, that's all very well, but let's leave it until they bring the daughters, and then we'll have an occasion to talk about it. You'll say that you don't want to accept the women until they promise not to sacrifice any longer; if that works, good; if not, we'll do what we're obliged to do." [ch. lxxvi]

The next day, Diaz says, the chiefs brought five beautiful young maidens, each with their own servant, all daughters of chiefs. Xicotencatl offered his own daughter to Cortes. He accepted them, 'pleasantly', but said they should stay with their parents, for now. They asked why he would not 'take them now'. This is what Diaz says Cortes told them:

"Because I want first to do what is ordered by Our Lord God, in whom we believe and whom we worship, and what the king our lord sent us to do"--..."and believe in what we believe, which is one true God alone...."

Here Diaz explains that many other good things were said by the interpreters as 'they were already so expert with it', saying they should 'first leave their idols and believe in and worship Our Lord God'.

"Their reply to this was to say: "Malinche, we have already understood you before now ... look, you have only just now come to these our houses; as time goes on we will understand more clearly your beliefs, and we will see how they are and we will do what is best. How can you want us to leave our teules, whom our ancestors have considered as gods for many years and have worshipped and sacrificed to them?"

They wondered out loud what would their children or their allies in neighboring provinces think if they abandoned their way of life and idols now? They had already said they would 'destroy this whole province'. This response, Diaz says this was given 'in earnest and without fear'. The Mercaderian friar 'a learned man and a theologian', stepped forward and spoke to Cortes.

"Sir, don't try to press them hard on this any more, because it's not right for us to make them Christians by force, and I wouldn't want you to do what we did in Cempoala, throwing down their idols, until they have knowledge of our holy faith.... It's better that they continue hearing our admonitions, which are holy and good, so that they recognize going forward the good advice we give them."

Three captains of Cortes also came forward and told him the friar was right, that Cortes had fulfilled his duty and not to  'touch on this matter with these chieftains anymore'. But the Tlaxcala agreed that a cross and imge of Mary could be erected there where baptisms occurred. The daughter of Xicotencatl was one baptized and then Cortes gave her to Pedro de Alvarado. And there were many others, Diaz says.[ch. lxxvii]
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all quotes from chapter lxxvi-vii of Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

Entering Tlaxcala: Cortes: September 1519

There are three different versions, of course, of how the europeans first entered the city of Tlaxcala. Bernal Diaz has one that gives remarkable, picturesque first-person details of how their troop entered the city and the amazing reception that he says they received. The local's tale documented by Sahagun decades later, had a remembered version that is just as remarkable for how different it is than both that of Diaz and the one Cortes offered in his second letter to the young King and Emperor Charles V. The version that Cortes told is almost entirely about geography and local economics.

Due to the stark differences, it is worth quoting them at length and verbatim.

After concluding the negotiations, accepting the friendship of the Tlaxcala and after much pleading from them, he says, Cortes and Co. went to the city "six leagues from our camp". He writes to the King:

"The city is so big and so remarkable that, although there is much I could say of it which I will omit, the little I will say is, I think, almost unbelievable, for the city is much larger than Granada and very much stronger, with as good buildings and many more people than Granada had when it was taken, and very much better supplied with the produce of the land, namely, bread, fowl and game and fresh-water fish and vegetables and other things they eat which are very good. There is in this city a market where each and every day upward of thirty thousand people come to buy and sell, without counting the other trade which goes on elsewhere in the city. In this market there is everything they might need or wish to trade; provisions as well as clothing and footwear. There is jewelery of gold and silver and precious stones and other ornaments of featherwork and all as well laid out as in any square or marketplace in the world. There is much pottery of many sorts and as good as the best in Spain. They sell a great deal of firewood and charcoal and medicinal and cooking herbs. There are establishments like barbers' where they have their hair washed and are shaved, and there are baths. Lastly there is amongst them every consequence of good order and courtesy, and they are such an orderly and intelligent people that the best in Africa cannot equal them.

In this province, which is in size ninety leagues or more about, there are many beautiful valleys and plains, all cultivated and harvested, leaving no place untilled; and the orderly manner in which, until now, these people have been governed is almost like that of the states of Venice or Genoa or Pisa, for they have no overlord. There are many chiefs, all of whom reside in this city, and the country towns contain peasants who are vassals of these lords and each of whom holds his land independently; some have more than others, and for their wars they join together and together they plan and direct them."

 Cortes continues to give an account of them dispensing justice, as a demonstration. A local had stolen some gold from a Spaniard. They caught him, brought him to Cortes and asked what they shoudl do with him. He thanked them for their 'diligence' and said they should do with him as they normally would since they were in their own land. He was marched through the big market with a crier announcing his crime.

"They made him stand below a kind of stage which is in the middle of this marketplace, and the crier climbed to the top of the stage and in a loud voice again announced his crime; when they saw him they all beat him over the head with cudgels until he died. Many others we have seen in captivity, where they say they are held for thefts and other crimes. There are in this province, according to the investigation I had made, 150,000 inhabitants together with another small province which is adjacent, called Guasyncango, and there they live as thse do with their natural lord; and these are no less Your Highness's vassals than those of Tascalteca."

This generous and generally revealing depiction is also quite surprisingly, admiring. In addition, Anthony Pagden offers a couple notes to this story. He says trade was conducted by barter. That money was not used except sometimes in cacoa beans 'to balance an exchange'. "Quills of gold dust and crescent-shaped knives were also used, and among the Maya red shells or beads and copper bells were common" [n 21, p 463].

Also, of course, Tlaxcala and the Mexica empire had a history that went back since before the Aztec began expanding outward from the Great Basin, perhaps as early as 1428. Tlaxcala had been wealthy, benefitting from this great market and the roads all around to all the different regions they reached. Over decades, eventually, the Mexica had this region surrounded. Literally, all the surrounding areas paid their portions to the Aztecs. With Cholula and Huexotzinco - what Cortes calls Guasyncango - Tlaxcala had reached an arrangement with the Aztecs where they fought staged battles with each other which provided frequent sacrificial victims for the victors of these contests. As Pagden says, "...the appearance of open hostility was maintained for the benefit of the common people, and neither side would have passed over an opportunity such as Cortes offered to overthrow the other." [n 13, p 461]
Pagden points out the main sources for all this is found in La Historia de Tlaxcala, a single manuscript found in the Glasgow University Library and in La Historia Chichimeca, vol II, lxxxiii et seq.
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all quotes from pp. 67-69, and notes, pagination, from Hernán  Cortés: Letters From Mexico, translated, edited and with a new intro by Anthony Pagden, as a Yale Nota Bene book, Yale University Press, USA 2001

Entering Tlaxcala: Codex Florentinus: A Welcome In Fear: September 1519

There are three different versions, of course, of how the europeans first entered the city of Tlaxcala. Bernal Diaz has one that gives remarkable, picturesque first-person details of how their troop entered the city and the amazing reception that he says they received. The local's tale documented by Sahagun decades later, had a remembered version that is just as remarkable for how different it is than both that of Diaz and the one Cortes offered in his second letter to the young King and Emperor Charles V. The version that Cortes told is almost entirely about geography and local economics.

In the Codex Florentinus, Friar Sahagun's informants painted a simpler picture. They assert the Cempoala did help the Spaniards showing the best routes inland and even led their party. They also say it was Otomies who attacked the europeans in Tlaxcala, not mentioning Xicotencatl the younger whom Diaz said led those attacks. It was, to be fair, the Otomies and chontales - wild, unreasonable people - that the Tlaxcala claimed who had attacked them at first. But when the Tlaxcala chiefs spoke among themselves, according to the informants telling the story many years later, they were very afraid.

"They felt premonitions of death: terror overwhelmed them, and they were filled with foreboding.... the captains met together in a council. They talked about what had happened, and said: "What shall we do? Shall we go out to meet them? The Otomi is a brave warrior, but he was helpless against them: they scorned him as a mere nothing! They destroyed the poor macehual with a look, with a glance of their eyes! We should go over to their side: we should make friends with them and be their allies. If not they will destroy us too...." 

As a result, the welcome into Tlaxcala was warm and full of gifts.

"Therefore the lords of Tlaxcala went out to meet them, bringing many things to eat: hens and hens' eggs and the finest tortillas. They said to the strangers: "Our lords, you are weary."

The strangers replied: "Where do you live? Where are you from?"

 They said: "We are from Tlaxcala. You have come here, you have entered our land. We are from Tlaxcala; our city is the City of the Eagle, Tlaxcala." (For in ancient times it was called Texcala, and its people were known as Texcaltecas.)"

The editor here tells us that the Aztecs called it 'The Place of Rocks' while the Tlaxcala themselves called it 'The Place of Corn'. What this tells us, at least, is that the informants credited with this story were not likely Tlaxcalans themselves. But to this day, the outstretched wings of an eagle are on the official coat of arms of the province of Tlaxcala. But this short version of the meeting of the Tlaxcalan people with the first europeans  thus far, ends very simply.

"Then they guided them to the city; they brought them there and invited them to enter. They paid them great honours, attended to their every want, joined them as allies and even gave them their daughters.

The Spaniards asked: "Where is the City of Mexico? Is it far from here?"

They said: "No, it is not far, it is only a three day march. And it is a great city. The Aztecs are very brave. They are great warriors and great conquerors and have defeated their neighbors on every side."

At this time the Tlaxcaltecas were enemies of Cholula. They feared the Cholultecas; they envied and cursed them; their sould burned with hatred for the people of Cholula. This is why they brought certain rumors to cortes, so that he would destroy them. They said to him: "Cholula is our enemy. It is an evil city. The people are as brave as the Aztecs and they are the Aztecs' friends." When the Spaniards heard this, they marched against Cholula."

It appears that these voices of locals (set down when Friar Sahagun collected them c 1555), either didn't know these Tlaxcalans, weren't in communication with or heard from (or remembered) them much, or perhaps, simply knew just a few elements, and built a story around those. Namely that, the Tlaxcalans hated the Cholula and feared the Spaniards more than anyone else at hand. 
But these informants even so, managed to convey the general tone, intentions, as well as the major effects of these interactions, compared with the Diaz and Cortes accounts. If we can believe them any more than Diaz or Cortes, because we can't even really know if these are the same witnesses that knew the details of the first eyewitnesses sent by Motecuhzoma, for comparison. If they were and knew the messengers that boarded ship, or saw the boats at sea from the treetops, and therefore had some knowledge of Mexica state affairs as those earliest witnesses must have had, then they would have known about the independence of Tlaxcala, from a Mexica point of view. Even if they could not sympathize exactly with the Tlaxcala. Tlaxcala was for generations, effectively under siege by the Mexica of the interior Great Basin of Mexico. They lived without salt or cotton because of the continued antagonism with the Mexica. And these Mexica informants were very likely to know of these age-old antagonisms.
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all quotes from pages thirty-eight - forty in  The Broken Spears: the Aztec account of the conquest of Mexico, translated, edited with an introduction by Miguel León-Portilla, expanded and with a postscript, Boston, Beacon Press, 2006.

Entering Tlaxcala: Diaz: The Approach: September 22-3, 1519

There are three different versions, of course, of how the europeans first entered the city of Tlaxcala. Bernal Diaz has one that gives remarkable, picturesque first-person details of how their troop entered the city and the amazing reception that he says they received. The local's tale documented by Sahagun decades later, had a remembered version that is just as remarkable for how different it is than both that of Diaz and the one Cortes offered in his second letter to the young King and Emperor Charles V. The version that Cortes told is almost entirely about geography and local economics.

Due to the stark differences, it is worth quoting them at length and verbatim. First is the story of Bernal Diaz, which begins his chapter lxxv.

"When the caciques saw that our baggage was on its way to their city, they immediately went on ahead to make sure everything would be ready to receive us and to have the lodgings adorned with boughs. When we were within a quarter of a league of the city, the same caciques who had gone ahead came out to greet us, and they brought their sons and nephews and many leading people, each kin group, faction, and party as a unit; in Tlaxcala, there were four parties, not counting that of Tecapaneca, lord of Topeyanco, which makes five. Also the people came from all the places that were subject to them and wore their different liveries, which, although they were of maguey fiber because they could not obtain any cotton, were very delicate, with good embroidery and painting. Then came the papas from throughout the province, and there were many of them because of the great adoratorios they had, which, as I have said, they call cus, where they have their idols and make their sacrifices. Those papas brought fire pans burning with coals and, with their incense, perfumed all of us. Some wore very long robes like surplices, which were white and had hoods, like those the canons wear, their hair very long and tangled so it could not be separated without being cut, full of blood coming from their ears, which they had cut in sacrifice that day. When they saw us, they lowered their heads as if in humility, and they wore their fingernails very long. We heard it said that those papas were seen as devout men of very good living.

Many chieftains came near Cortes, accompanying him, and when we entered the town, there was no room in the streets and on the roofs because so many Indian men and women came out to see us with very happy faces."

This is how Diaz describes the great welcoming of the europeans into the city of Tlaxcala.
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all quotes from chapter lxxv of Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

Cortes Reveals Strategy With Tlaxcala: Second Letter

Cortes does describe one other specific encounter with Mexica messengers 'in the camp' that at least paralells the story told by Bernal Diaz. But this one, in the second letter of Cortes came after a description of the city of Tlaxcala and their way of doling justice, thus an anachronism in chronology. This story is used as preparation to outline his eventual strategy. Here then, it is lain out as both foresight and direct action by himself, for the greater glory of His Majesty King Charles of Spain.

The justification for this, Anthony Pagden posits is that in this second letter, Cortes was asserting not only what he had done, but what his intentions were - at large, so to speak - and how he felt that both of these needed to be justified to the king. Efforts that Cortes felt would most maximally profit both of them. Pagden says this point is made in what he calls a 'throw-away line', where on this occasion that the Mexica messengers came to Cortes and offered  to be made vassals of the King of Spain and the ally of Cortes, and for Cortes to essentially name his price for yearly offerings in gold and jewels. Pagden says it is the "... key to understanding Cortes political objectives and how he viewed both what he always thought of as his conquest and the larger political domain of Charles V which he had, as he insisted time and again, enormously increased...". Pagden makes the claim in an extended introductory essay in the revised edition of his translation to Cortes' letters, published in 1986. Cortes wrote to the King:

"Most Catholic Lord, while I was in the camp which I had in the country during the war with this province [Tlaxcala], six... vassals of Mutezuma, came ... with ... two hundred men in attendance. They told me that they had come on behalf of Mutezuma to inform me how he wished to be your Your Highness's vassal and my ally, and that I should say what I wished him to pay as an annual tribute to Your Highness in gold and silver and jewels as well as slaves, cotton, clothing and other things which he possessed; all of which he would give, provided that I did not go to his land, the reason being that it was very barren and lacking in provisions and it would grieve him if I and those who came with me should be in want. With them he sent me almost a thousand pesos de oro and as many cotton garments, such as they wear."

Placing this throw-away line back in it's original context, provides both the occasion of the meeting and a clear, although brief, exposition of Cortes' strategy. But it is important to remember this second letter was written after Montezuma was 'captured' and the 'conquest' all but complete. In other words, his strategy he is explaining to the king as before the fact, was written after that 'strategy' was already successful. Very little hint of this strategy is in Bernal Diaz' account until later.

Farther in this description of this encounter, Cortes explained that the Mexica warned him against the deceptive Tlaxcala and also, the Tlaxcalan warnings against the Mexica. In the very next paragraph after the one quoted above, the Mexica complain about the Tlaxcala,

"... saying that they were not speaking the truth nor was the friendship they offered me sincere, but that all this was done so that they might dispel my suspicions and thus betray me with impunity. The people of Tlaxcala, on the other hand, warned me many times not to trust Mutezuma's vassals, for they were traitors and everything they did was done with treachery and cunning; and that in this manner they had subjugated the whole land."

With this revelation of the enmity between the two groups, Cortes admits he 'was not a little pleased',

"... for it seemed to further my purpose considerably; consequently I might have the opportunity of subduing them more quickly, for, as the saying goes, "divided they fall." . . . And I remember that one of the Gospels says, "Omne regnum in seipsum divisum desolabitur." So I maneuvered one against the other and thanked each side for their warnings and told each that I held his friendship to be of more value than the other's."

The Gospel here quoted is from Matthew 12:25 where Jesus then goes on to explain to the Pharisees after curing a blind/mute man, that Satan cannot drive Satan out. So it's not a stretch to see that Cortes is likening his abilities to those of Jesus.
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quotes from pp 69-70 in the Second Letter, of Hernán  Cortés: Letters From Mexico, translated, edited and with a new intro by Anthony Pagden, as a Yale Nota Bene book, Yale University Press, USA 2001

Cortes Outside Tlaxcala; Beset By Both Sides, With Fever: Diaz, September 1519

Bernal Diaz writes that the first europeans spent twenty-four days in the surrounding province of Tlaxcala before entering that city of the same name. There was the ambush and attacks early in the month. There was the counterattacks and daytime negotiations and mutilations. But in the days leading up to and before entering the city of Tlaxcala, as Diaz tells it, there was a fair bit of drama that Cortes in particular endured and set up.

Twice, chieftains from Motecuhzoma brought much gold and entreaties to not go to the city, whether Tlaxcala or Tenochtitlan, because the way there was hard, they said.
Twice, the Tlaxcala named Xicotencatl returned to Cortes, both the elder and the younger, to ask Cortes to ignore the chietains from Motecuhzoma and instead, for him to come to their city. These entreaties were witnessed by the Mexican messengers who countered, urging Cortes not to trust them and not go to their city.
Twice, in providing all these details, including speeches offered, and even a clear physical description of the younger Xicotencatl, Bernal Diaz felt the need to explain that Cortes was suffering from fever. Cortes also felt the need to write a letter to Juan de Escalante in Villa Rica (Vera Cruz), to send more wine and communion wafers, and men. [ch lxxiii]

The first time emissaries from Motecuhzoma arrived, before they entered Tlaxcala, 1000 gold pieces were brought and much fine cloth. Cortes does mention this detail at this point in his second letter. But he doesn't go into their return or their staying with them before entering Tlaxcala as Diaz does. The first set of messengers though, from Motecuhzoma, Diaz tells us, wanted to be vassals of Cortes and offered that Montezuma wanted to be a vassal of 'our great emperor'. They also, Diaz says, tell how Montezuma wanted Cortes to receive their gifts as tribute and as a kind of promise that he would not try to go to Tenochtitlan. Cortes received their gifts warmly, grateful for their goodwill and the offer "to give tribute to His Majesty." This itself  is not what Diaz himself had just written and is not described by Cortes either. But Cortes encouraged them to stay until they entered the city and explained that he was sick: "... the day before he had purged himself with chamomiles from the island of Cuba, which are very good for anyone who knows how to take them." [ch lxxii]

Then, despite Cortes's sickness he got word that Xicotencatl had arrived and wished to speak to him. He was received, and with many bows and much burning of incense, had arrived with 'fifty other chieftains' dressed in 'red and white cloaks'. The Mexica then heard Xicotencatl explain to Cortes how deceptive the Mexica were, how steadfast they were now to Cortes because they knew he would kill them if they betrayed him and so, would remain as hostages if necessary rather than return to war. So the Tlaxcala would keep the peace with Cortes. At this Diaz says the Mexica chieftains felt great concern and 'nothing good would come for them because of it'.

"When Xicotenga [Xicotencatl the younger] had taken his leave, the ambassadors of Montezuma asked Cortes, half laughing, if he believed any of these promises they had made on behalf of all Tlaxcala; that it was all a trick; that we should not believe them; that they were the words of traitors, decietful; that they said them so that after they had us in their city, in a place where they could safely take us, they would attack and kill us; that we should remember how many times they had come to kill us with all their forces, and as they could not, and they lost many dead and wounded, they now wanted to avenge themselves by asking for a fake peace. Cortes answered them with a very brave expression, saying he did not care in the least whether they should have had such a thought as the Mexicans had said, and even if everything they said was true, he would take satisfaction in punishing them by taking their lives, and that this would be true whether they attacked by day or by night, in the fields or in the city, that it was all the same to him, and the reason he is determined to go there [Tlaxcala] is to see if it is true." [ch. lxxiii]

 The messengers asked Cortes to wait six days until word could be sent and received back from Montezuma.

"Cortes promised to do so, first, because as I have said, he had a fever, and also, even though he appeared not to heed the things those ambassadors [the Mexica] said to him, he understood that, if they were true, he had to take them into account until he saw greater certainty of peace." 

Taking stock, Cortes wrote a letter to Juan de Escalante and then ordered some from Cingapancingo to build a cross in camp and plaster it with lime and decorate it. In a few days, the Mexica messengers returned bringing more precious gifts and earnestly entreating Cortes not to to go to the city of Tlaxcala or trust them. They just wanted to rob him of his gold and cloth, he was told. Cortes again, Diaz tells us, received the gifts, said he was grateful, and

"... will repay the lord Montezuma with good deeds, that if he sensed that the Tlaxcalans had in their thoughts what Montezuma sent to warn them, he would pay them for it by taking all their lives; but he said with certainty they would not attempt such vile deeds and that he still wanted to go to see what they might do." [ch lxxiii]

But, as Diaz goes on, many more of the local chiefs and cacique came 'in litters, in hammocks, on men's backs' and with many other chiefs, 'with great respect' and burning of incense,

"... touched the ground with their hands, and kissed the earth." [ch lxxiv]

They called Cortes, 'Malinche', according to Bernal Diaz. Remember, that is the local name for Doña Marina, the translator they had acquired in Yucatan. Bernal Diaz spends some time explaining that this became the name used by the locals not just for her, but Cortes, as well as another, Juan Perez, but later. He will use these names interchangeably for Cortes and 'La Malinche'. Elsewhere Diaz says, he took her as his wife.
All these additional local chieftains had come in order to petition Cortes, personally, calling him Malinche, to come to their city where they would share with him everything they had. To serve him with their people and property.
In response, as Diaz tells, Cortes said he knew these were good people and explained that this was why he was astonished that they had attacked him before. He thanked them all for the provisions and courtesies and good deeds. Then he told them he had been waiting to go to the city but did not know who would carry the tepuzques,

"... which are the cannons. When they heard those words, they felt such pleasure that it showed on their faces, and they said: "So for this you have stayed and not told us?" In less than half an hour they brought more than five hundred Indian bearers. Very early the next day we began to march along the road to the head town of Tlaxcala in good order, ... Montezuma's messengers had already begged Cortes to let them go with us to see how this came out ... and put them in his lodging... not [to] be dishonored in any way, because... they were afraid of the Tlaxcalans." [ch lxxiv]

 Twice, Cortes had asked both sides to wait as he had to talk to their opponent. Even as they both tried to ensure that they were the party most in Cortes' favor. He had also set up a bit of theater for these messengers from Motecuhzoma. They were to witness his welcome into the city and the Tlaxcala would carry his great and terrifying guns in, for him. What an incredible way to project his personal power.
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All quotes, not otherwise listed are from Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

John Colet Goes To Oxford: London: 1483

John Colet was an English humanist. Born in London and eldest son of Sir Henry Colet - an alderman who later became Lord Mayor of London twice - John would use his substantial inheritance to become founder and dean of the School of St Paul's in London. Along the way he was also chaplain to King Henry VIII. Colet was a friend and teacher of Erasmus, a friend to Thomas More, he wrote sermons, gave lectures on divinity and preached at the ceremony when Thomas Wolsey became Cardinal. He was also a traveller of Europe. When he came of age, probably in 1483, he went to Oxford to study.

That year King Edward IV had died and his brother Richard of York, Duke of Gloucester became Lord Protector of Edward's son and heir. This Richard's first duty was to escort the prince to London and make arrangements for the prince's coronation. This coronation never happened. Instead, Edward's Queen, Elizabeth Woodville was deemed incompetent by a court who annulled the marriage. Conveniently for Richard, this also made Edward's heir no longer fit to be king. Richard assumed the role, was crowned in July and became history's Richard III. The prince who would be Edward V was never seen again in public after August, 1483. By October, a number of his brother's men began moving against Richard.

For decades, what is now called the Wars of the Roses had ravaged Britain. Even so, London was a bustling, busy city, full of excitement and intrigue. This was the year that Edward died, that Richard was crowned and young John Colet went to Oxford. The following is a description of the city in that year by a modern day author who wrote the widely acclaimed biography of Richard III, first published 1955. The title of his chapter is "England: 1483".

"Though the walls and spires of London stood in Richard's [III] sight as they had for centuries, new forces and transformations, decay and fresh growth of which Richard could only sense the first effects, coursed in the blood of the giant that, beyond the east windows of Westminster Palace, lay sprawled beside the tidal water that gave it life.
The London of King Richard more nearly resembled, perhaps, the town of Edward III than the city of Elizabeth, since the daily pageantry of the Church was yet to be shorn and suburbs would blot out environing fields and farms; but in its riches, energy and self-esteem London was far more like what it was to become under Gloriana than what it had been. It was the principle home of the king; it was now the seat of Parliament, which at the bidding of the house of York had ceased to wander from town to town; it housed the great lawyers in their inns, courtiers, bishops, foreign merchants and envoys despatched by the European princes. All the highways of the island led to the capital; its broad estuary enticed the traffic of the Channel and the seas; around it lay some of the most fertile lands in the kingdom. To the marvel of continental visitors, London blazed on the far perimeter of civilization the Queen City of the Oceans. If Paris was the largest and Rome or Venice the grandest, London was the richest and busiest of towns.
It was a filthy, crowded, clamorous hive of human activity -- its narrow streets, many unpaved, running all hugger-mugger, darkened by the leaning upper storeys of gilt and gabled houses and thick with refuse which was left to be scavenged by flocks of kites and ravens. . . .
dirty the city certainly was. It was also an architectural hodgepodge. So thought Italian visitors, accustomed to their sharply defined cities of stone. They found the homes quaint and crazy, comfortable and often opulent on the inside but built every which way as fancy and convenience dictated -- houses with ground floor of stone supporting wooden eaves and 'pentices'; houses of half-timber and whitewashed plaster; here and there a building of brick, or a thatched roof, or a stone mansion. London architecture was like the English law: traditional, eccentric and mysterious. Yet, despite themselves, these visitors were impressed, even awed. A double wonder invests their comments: their marvelling at London and their marvelling at their own enchantment.
The heart of the city -- its chief highway and its means of life -- was the clear flowing river. Small boats plied up and down like restless water bugs. The barges of the great glided westward to Westminster or down to Greenwich, floating caravans of carved wood and gilding, gay with banners, with the liveries of the oarsmen, with burnished armour or scarlet gowns. The barges slid between the traffic of the seas. The greatest vessels -- carracks of Genoa or the Flanders galleys -- had to tie up five miles below the city; but ships of a hundred tons -- and many whose prows split the oceans were no larger -- sailed up past the Tower to the city's heart. On many of these the old leg-of-mutton sail had given way to a rigging of several sails which permitted them to navigate closer to the wind and to hold their courses in heavy weather. A forest of masts and tackle grew thick along the river bank. Great cranes -- amazing to the Italians -- swung bales from ship to shore. From the Tower to Blackfriars stretched the wharves and warehouses, broken by the battlements of Baynard's Castle and by the stone bulk of the Steelyard, the shop-warehouse-legatine compound of the Easterlings which stood where Cannon Street Station stands now.
The crown of the river was the Bridge, known throughout Christendom as one of the wonders of the world. It was grander, longer and more exciting than the Rialto, the Ponte Vecchio, the Pont Neuf. With stone gates at both ends and a towered gate in the middle from which the drawbridge was worked (kept permanently lowered after 1481), London Bridge supported on its twenty pillars of bright white stone a piece of the city itself. Its ancient roadway was hemmed on both sides by the ground-floor shops of mercers and haberdashers who dwelt in the storeys above. Underneath, the current rushed with a low roar through nineteen arches; 'shooting the bridge' was only for the experienced waterman. The dwellings and the drawbridge still bore scars of the great night battle the citizens had fought with Jack Cade's rabble in the summer of 1450 and of the Bastard of Fauconberg's attack in the spring of 1471.
By present-day standards London was neither large nor populous. It housed between fifty and seventy-five thousand inhabitants -- four times the number of its nearest rivals, York and Bristol, and, in the opinion of an Italian visitor, no fewer than Florence or Rome. It stretched little more than a mile along the river and less than that from the river to its northern walls. Its extent is recalled today in the names of streets and Underground stations." bk ii, ii, I

Paul Murray Kendall, Richard III, Folio Society, St Edmondsbury Press, Bury St Edmonds, UK 2005

Cortes Weighs Options: Tlaxcala, 1519

There is much more in Bernal Diaz concerning the negotiations and actions with the Tlaxcala and their various forces, than Cortes spends dwelling on them. In Diaz, a trip to a nearby town is completed [ch 68] to quell disturbances and make allies. Cortes doesn't tell that story. Diaz also gives a long telling [chs. 70-71] of the Tlaxcala who came to spy on the europeans, to see what they ate, how they acted with women, whether they received feathers as sacrificial items, as they thought teules would receive them. This is where Diaz concludes that the story of the spies being mutilated and sent back was the ultimate reason that the younger Xicotencatl of the Tlaxcalans finally agreed to ask for peace.

After the conclusion of this story, Cortes, in his second letter, explains how he dealt with those in the camp who no longer wished to advance into the Mexica interior. The men were frightened, many had perished. Still more suffered from their wounds, were claimed by fever or, saw little benefit in trusting the locals either, in front of, or behind them. Cortes argued there could be no turning back. They had a duty to the King, to God, to themselves and each other. They had promised their new allies, the Cempoala and now the Tlaxcala, that they would fight the tyranny of Motecuhzoma for them, with them, and free them from their servitude. If they turned back now, they would make enemies of their new-found friends. And that would be their end. Further, he argued, they should depend on their faith in God to carry the message of Christ and the love of God, converting the locals and spreading the word of God to all, and this would sustain them, or at least, grant them benefits in heaven aplenty. This was persuasive enough. Diaz said they enetered the city of Tlaxcala at last, on September 23, 1519.

The story of this potential mutiny instead, is told very plainly, yet heartfelt, in the account of Cortes and is then  followed by petitions from the locals for peace. But maybe these were different locals. There is a paucity of names in Cortes when referencing the many factions and groups of the locals. At one point he does seem to recognise there were differnt groups headed by different chiefs among the Tlaxcala but he doesn't seem to understand the sharing of power among their chiefs either. His brief descriptions show local chieftains petitioning him, seeking his approval, in group after group.

When finally in Tlaxcala, Cortes says 'messengers from Montezuma' were following him around all the time, advising, and observing. These Mexica had returned and spoken directly to Cortes offering much gold and silver, stating that their capital was far away and inaccessible. Cortes, Anthony Pagden tells us did not take their advice at face value, at all. He also still maintains that leaders of the Cempoala and now, the Tlaxcala remained as chief advisors, calling them friends.
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All  mention of chapter sources from Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

All other material not listed as from Diaz from, the Second Letter, pp. 63-7 of Hernán  Cortés: Letters From Mexico, translated, edited and with a new intro by Anthony Pagden, as a Yale Nota Bene book, Yale University Press, USA 2001

some news mid September, 2013

Two powerful storms hit Mexico on both sides this weekend causing massive floods, mudslides and at least 34 deaths. In Acapulco, 21 were killed as buildings collapsed and roads became rivers. In Veracruz a mudslide swallowed a bus and two homes, killing a dozen people. Rain also continues to fall especially in higher elevations creating perfect conditions for further landslides and damage.

Torrential rains also fell in Denver, CO and surrounding areas all this last week. Eight people are so far confirmed dead in '100 year' floods.

UN Chief Ban Ki Moon released official UN inspection report calling sarin gas attack in Syria 'a war crime'. What passes as diplomacy between US and Russia includes force in response, they agree, as an option.

Five years ago, Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy and the world leading US Economy was in freefall. Heidi Moore and others, look back, look ahead with particular lenses of where we're at.

Impact of Inequality in US is told at least in Japan.

An ex-Navy serviceman, somehow entered the National Naval Yard in Washington, DC wih a shotgun and killed at least one guard, taking his weapon and then shot dozens of people. Thirteen are dead as well as the shooter.

The downed cruise liner Costa Concordia was pulled up and set back onto it's keel. Time lapse from Reuters.

Voyager space probe leaves the solar system

Sanudo Digest: mid September

These pieces should at least be mentioned. They aren't connected technically by anything more than calendric proximity and Sanudo's authorship. But to me, this week looks like a tabloid's contents. Crime stories, stories of blasphemous witchcraft; a careful reading over laws for deciding how the executive power of the doge might decide capital punishments in the City; the electoral fraud case of 1496; fighting the war against the Emperor; as the war winds down, discussing refunding of the University at Padua; finding a resolution for the mess produced forcing the merger of convents.

It's all interesting. But mostly unrelated. Strong whiffs of how the state and City handled things, decisively and some dithering and deliberation. Each of those above mentioned stories get ample coverage in the selections and context provided by our editors. So I don't have to.

But offhand, one of the nuns that came to testify in 1521 against the merger was 106, according to Sanudo who is also careful enough to mention how much the salaries for the university professors in Pisa were and how many that voted for funding. He could see those fires of that war on land when he climbed up in the campanile in Venice. Fires set by the forces of emperor Maximillian I and the French in the longlasting Italian Wars.
Two years later, the new French king Francis I, would (in 1515) aid the Venetians in taking back Marignano. He would work out a deal, with the new pope Leo X, the nephew of Lorenzo de'Medici who said he wanted a crusade against the menacing Turk.
Largely depending on the efforts of appeals by their families, three  convicted thieves escaped death by hanging and instead, each had one eye gouged out and one hand cut off.
On the 17th of September, 1521,the Council, after heavy deliberation, finally decided that three patricians - three more elite men - would join the patriarch to decide the fate of the Conventual nuns.

And it goes on and on and on.
For reference:

Sep 11, 1518: tale of witches and demons, pp 408-11

Sep 13, 18, 29, 1496: case of electoral fraud, pp 138-9

Sep 13, 1515: fighting the war at home, getting the vote, pp 12-13; Marignano p 189

Sep 13, 1517: Sanudo gives best speech ever, p 15-16

Sept 14, 1499: what M Sanudo did as savi ai ordeni, pp 9

Sep 14, 1520: doling justice, pp 144-5

Sep 15, 1517: discussing reopening of University at Padua as war winds, p 452

Sep 17, 1521: a resolution to the convent mess, p 391

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All pagination from Venice, Cita Excellentissima, Selection from the Renaissance Diaries of Marin Sanudo translated by Linda L Carroll,  editors: Patricia H LaBalme and Laura Sanguineti White, published by Johns Hopkins University Press, 2008

Cortes, Diaz Accounts Differ Concerning Tlaxcalans: September 7, 1519

There was another day or two of intense fighting in Tlaxcala following a couple previous days of the same. Bernal Diaz went into detail discussing how they would prepare, how the fight would commence, the fields full of warriors arrayed against the relatively small band of europeans and how 'many sword thrusts' and horsemen, cannon and escopetera, efficient use of crossbows and lances all contributed to the daily retreating of the Tlaxcalans and the nighttime necessity of sentries.

But by the seventh or eighth of September, Diaz tells us, the skills that Doña Marina brought as a native, to negotiate with the Tlaxcalans had become essential. Her strength and fearless attitude may indeed have changed the balance in these negotiations and the battles [p. 125]. Her story will be looked at in some detail, later. Eventually, in a few days, the Tlaxcalans were brought over to become allies with the Cortes faction. Their role in the battles against the Mexica of Motecuhzoma would become, perhaps, the most crucial role in overcoming the dominance of those at the center of power in Tenochtitlan.

Cortes does not explain it this way at all. Undeniably by the hand of Cortes himself, after the capital was taken in 1520 and with power firmly in his hands, he wrote his own take on the march west. But again, there are many differences in the stories. In addition to variations in numbers vanquished and villages burnt, the second letter of Cortes, looking back, details these crucial conflicts with the Tlaxcala with a different focus. The time it took, simple details of where and how their camp was maintained, the early ambush, the fierceness of the warriors, the dependency on God in all things for the Christians, all are told in just the same manner as the story in Bernal Diaz, written and published years later. But Cortes makes little mention of negotiation at all with the Tlaxcalans. What he describes is much more like capitulation, a surrender by the Tlaxcalans after days of fighting.

These are days described by Cortes, going out before dawn with over a hundred men or sometimes hundreds more, to set fire to as many villages as they could. These morning sorties setting fire to first, five or six villages one morning (perhaps September 4), then, in the next day, ten more, is not described by Diaz at all.

When chieftains are described as coming to negotiate with Cortes, perhaps on the fifth of September, he is warned, so he says, by the friendly Cempoala that these were really spies trying to find the weaknesses of the Spaniards. With this knowledge, Cortes captured one, then some more and then some more, and they all told the same story. They had come to find out strengths and weaknesses and also were forced to reveal that there were many, many more in the valley beyond and that the forces of Xicotencatl would come at night in a sneak attack. Cortes says he had all their hands cut off and sent them back. This entire story is not described by Diaz until later, after the nighttime attack.

The nighttime sneak attack occurred (perhaps, by Diaz' chronology on the night of Sep 6/7), but Cortes says he knew it was coming and with horsemen and cannon, took the element of surprise himself and ran first at these forces of the younger Xicotencatl, who turned around and escaped. Diaz does not describe Cortes as leading this nighttime counter-attack. Rather, he says the whole camp was ready [lxvi, pp 123-4] and that while the horsemen did give chase and about twenty of the foes were killed, he only found out about this the next day.

Diaz also didn't seem to know this nighttime attack was coming, but instead tells it as part of what the messengers were told in their negotiation with the Tlaxcalans. A kind of parallel narrative told as happening away from where he was at the time. This is where the stories of Diaz and Cortes diverge.

Diaz, after the story of the nighttime attack, goes on at length, exasperated, in a run-on sentence of the desperation of the Spaniard's state [p. 124]. Then, he consolingly assures us that Cortes listened to his men, seeking their counsel in all things, hearing them when they told him to release the prisoners and sue for peace [p. 125].

Cortes tells a different story. In his version, after that attack, and they 'had rested somewhat', Cortes and his men set out at night, attacked a couple small towns, but did not set fire to them, he says, and then attacked a town with more than 20,000 houses. This caused such a tumult that the locals immediately sued for peace.

For Diaz this day also came, but as a result of negotiation and after a speech by the elder Xicotencatl and a glowing description of Doña Marina. The nighttime attack of Cortes is not mentioned at all.

The Tlaxcalans would offer their allegiance to Cortes and would welcom them into the city where the Europeans would stay for a couple weeks. The nature of this alliance as well as the reasons for it, whether borne from pragmatism or from fear still depends on which of the accounts one follows.
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All quotes and pagination fromthat of Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

material from the Second Letter, of Hernán  Cortés: Letters From Mexico, translated, edited and with a new intro by Anthony Pagden, as a Yale Nota Bene book, Yale University Press, USA 2001

Tlaxcalans Frighten Cortes Faction: September 4, 1519

The europeans had entered the region known as Tlaxcala on their journey into the interior of Mexico. The day before they had encountered fortifications and had been ambushed. The next day after negotiations failed, a larger battle began. Our Editors summarize chapters lxiii-iv of Bernal Diaz, explaining that one Xicotencatl el mozo (the younger) was waiting with 'more than 40,000 warriors' [p. 117]. The battle raged on until 'eight important chieftains' were killed and 'the Indians retreated in good order' [p. 118]. The story of a horse that was captured and killed and that of its rider Pedro de Morón gets quoted at length by the editors. Many people were killed and some prisoners taken. The next day, they say, Cortes tried to negotiate with some of the prisoners. But the Tlaxcalans would not agree, listing five more chieftains each with 10,000 warriors, waiting to be able to honor their gods with the blood of the newcomers [p. 119].
Immediately after this, in the text of Diaz that the editors provide, a presentation by the locals, of their colors - literally - banners with insignia are shown and explained to Cortes and his men, in this negotiation. Diaz himself doesn't draw out or dwell on the conclusions of what this seemed to mean to the europeans, but this presentation following two days of battle, seems to have literally put the fear of God into many of them.

"They said that they brought out their banner and standard, which was a white bird that looks like an ostrich with its wing outstretched as if ready to fly; each captaincy had its device and livery, because this is how the caciques differentiated themselves from one another, as do the dukes and counts in our Castile. Everything I have said here we took to be true, because some Indians from among those we had taken prisoner, whom we released that day, said the same thing very clearly, although we had not believed it at that time. When we understood that, because we are men and fear death, many of us, even the majority of us, confessed to the Mercerdarian father and the secular priest Juan Diaz, who were hearing cofessions the whole night; and we commended ourselves to God, that he might protect us from being defeated. This is what we did until the next day."

The statement, by Diaz in the middle of this paragraph is not easy to interpret.  What could it mean, when he says that, "Everything ... we took to be true ... although we had not believed it at the time", except that they learned something new here? That the forces that were attacking them were not only vast in number, but very highly organized, even 'as the dukes and counts in our Castile'. This must have been a sobering realization for them, made more devestating if they hadn't thought this vast organization was possible, before.
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All quotes and pagination from Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012

Tlaxcalans Attack: Diaz On The Road West; September 2, 1519

After leaving Zautla, the Cortes faction first came to a small town that Bernal Diaz called Xalacingo. There he said, a letter was written to send onward, by way of their friends from Cempoala, stating that they came in peace and wished to be friends with those that called the region Tlaxcala. The europeans knew, Diaz reminds, that they would not be able to read it en español. Still, he assures us, the Tlaxacalans would see this different form of paper and thereby know it was a message from a different source. This letter was sent with a red felt hat of Flanders along with a couple chieftains from Cempoala.
They waited there for a response, a couple days and no one returned. But these locals in Xalacingo explained that the Tlaxcalans were expecting a fight. They had guessed, it was surmised, that the word they heard about the advancing europeans, was just another form of trickery from Motechuhzoma, come to extract their goods and livelihood again, in just another form. So they were ready for that.
There was the exchange of gifts and the hospitality shown by the locals to the europeans. Cortes explained about religion, promised to help the locals and asked for twenty chiefs to go with them.

"Trusting in our good fortune, commending ourselves to God, we left the next day for Tlaxcala. As we were going on our way, our two messengers who had been taken prisoner appeared, ... so frightened by what they had seen and heard that they could hardly speak of it." pp [113-4]

The messengers had been captured and despite their entreaties, the Tlaxcala would not hear any arguments. The messengers were told that they would 'kill and eat the flesh of those you call teules' because they were not to be fooled by the 'treachery and lies' of Motecuhzoma. Further on, the europeans found a strong fortress built with hardened mortar. This was explained as necessary to defend against the forces of Montezuma that the Tlaxcalans were constantly at war with. Here they stopped briefly.

"We rested awhile, and this information and the fortress gave us much to think about. Cortes said: "Gentlemen, let us follow our banner, which is the sign of the holy cross, and with it we will be victorious." And all of us to a person replied that, trusting in our fortune we should go, that God is the true strength." [p. 115]

When they continued, scouts were seen and scouts were sent with orders to try to capture those found on the road. Five horsemen were also sent ahead. By now, their friends from Cempoala were telling them 'for sure, there will be an ambush'. There was a skirmish, then the ambush came. Diaz says there were 3000 waiting,

"... and they began to shoot arrows at our horsemen who were now all together, showered arrows and fire-hardened spears on them, and worked marvels with their two-handed swords. In that instant we arrived with our artillery, escopetas, and crossbows. Little by little the Indians began to turn away, although they stayed a good while fighting in good order." [p. 117]

Diaz reports four men wounded and later, that one of those died. The Tlaxcalans left seventeen dead and many more wounded. There he also noted, the ground was flat and there were many houses and maize fields and maguey plants. They stayed near a stream and treated their wounds 'with grease from a fat Indian, killed and opened there'. The europeans ate dogs from the neighborhood that they had captured and killed that night. Diaz called it a 'good dinner', that the dogs 'made very good eating.'

"We were very alert the entire night, with sentries, good patrols, scouts, and the horses saddled and bridled for fear the Tlaxcalans might attack us." [p. 117]

This conflict continued but this is how Diaz ends his chapter lxii, and this story, is likely to have occured, on either the first or second of September, 1519.
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All quotes from Bernal Díaz de Castillo: The True History of the Conquest of New Spain translated with an introduction and notes by Janet Burke and Ted Humphrey, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing Co, Inc. 2012