The early history of Mexico is often told in terms of Conquest, Secular Conquest by Cortes and his soldiers and Spiritual Conquest by the Spanish missionaries. Unfortunately the story is told mainly from the point of view of the so-called conquerors. The invaders justified the overthrow of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan by reason of the European concept of the Aright of discovery and conquest. After the defeat of the Muslims in 1492 Spain had the greatest war machine in Europe. Under the Catholic despots Ferdinand and Isabella the Spaniards had both secular and religious motives for territorial expansion. Ferdinand wanted a new route to the East for spices, silks, gold, slaves, and other trading commodities, Isabella wanted souls for the Catholic church. The stage was set for the double conquest not only of Mexico but of all of Middle America, including Guatemala.
The military conquest began with early violent contact between the Spaniards and the Maya of Yucatan and proceeded through a series of treacherous acts by the Spaniards down to the final destruction of Tenochtitlan in 1521, after which Mexico became a colony of New Spain until Mexican independence in 1821. The spiritual conquest followed soon after the military conquest with the systematic destruction of indigenous religion by any means available. The Spaniards tore down temples, overthrew idols, burned books, and committed other acts of violence which were extreme even for the 16th century, the time of the Spanish inquisition in Europe.
The early Franciscans, Dominicans, Jesuits and other Spanish missionaries had a very clear notion of their self-imposed mission to the Indians of New Spain to wipe out every vestige of indigenous religion by any means. In his Historia Eclesiastica Indiana the Franciscan priest Mendieta (1528-1604) included papal bulls (in Latin) giving the Spanish priests full license to deal with the Indians as they saw fit. In stating his purpose in converting the Indians of New Spain to Christianity Mendieta described the Indians as somewhat less than human, wretched creatures in imminent need of redemption.
Sahagun (1499-1590), indisputably the greatest of the Spanish missionary ethnographers, recorded Aztec religion, history, and culture in great detail primarily to assist other priests in identifying backsliding Indian converts. There were many others, but perhaps the most famous/infamous of all was Bishop Diego de Landa (1524-1579), a Franciscan friar who came to Mexico in 1549 and became bishop of Yucatan in 1572. His Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan is considered by many to be the classic text on all aspects of Maya life and culture from pre-Conquest times onwards. But he it was who did perhaps the most to destroy the religious and intellectual life of the Maya. When he found evidence of human sacrifice in a cave he ordered all the Maya books he could find burned at the infamous auto de fe at Mani. Consequently only four Maya books or codices survived the pious fury of the zealous priests in early Mexico
The wonder is that any trace of the old beliefs and practices has survived to the present day. But in fact much of present day Mexican Catholicism is simply a thin veneer of Christianity over native deities and ceremonies, especially among the the Huichol Indians of Jalisco and Nayarit and the Highland Maya of Guatemala. Many aspects of pre-Hispanic religion among the Aztecs and the Maya were so similar to the form of religion propagated by the friars that they believed it had to be the work of the Devil. The Aztec exhortations and admonitions recorded by Sahagun in the Florentine Codex were certainly far above the moral level of the Spanish soldiers who were interested only in conquest and plunder.
Fray Diego Duran (1537-1588), who came to New Spain as a child and grew up in Mexico speaking Nahuatl, was perplexed by the many similarities between Aztec religion and the Old Testament. For example, the Aztecs worshiped a Trinity revered as the Father, the Son, and the Heart of Both (Tota, Topiltzin, and Yolometl) very much like the Christian Trinity. Today the Huichol Indians, who claim the Aztec as their spiritual ancestors, preserve their own concept of the Trinity in the form of the Deer, the Maize, and the Peyote, a motif which you may still see on traditional yarn paintings. Many Aztec deities also had parallels in the Christian Bible and were therefore easily assimilated into the Aztec form of worship.
Some pre-Hispanic ritual practices have survived almost intact to the present day. The spiritual temascal or sweat bath, along with many rituals, is still practiced by professional temascaleros. The weekly tianguis is a cultural heritage from the pre-Hispanic Great Market at Teotihuacan, and so on. Even the most solemn Catholic religious processions are highlighted by Aztec dancers to the accompaniment of the traditional flute and drum. Who conquered whom in the long run?
