Now that we have our little history lesson (which came at the expense of the paper I am trying to write on the subject) I will add my two cents about the song.
I find it completely accurate in that it rings true with the bittersweet sense of loss. To me, it is about the loss of innocence- the people of Mexico had never known disease or poverty or hunger before. As much as there was a caste system, the "wealthy" (in this case, nobles) were not living at the expense of the others. You were assigned a role due to your family history, and you did it, but everyone was well fed and lived in peace. Unlike the song says, war was known, as was hate, as that was what Cortez used to ensnare the rival tribes that resented the Aztec rule.
In reading about this history, I am left wondering how much more they would have accomplished had they not been wiped out by the Spanish. And by wiped out, I mean literally, wiped out. 25 Million people lived in Mexico before the Spanish came, and within 100 years only 1 million were left. This was due to massacres, brutal labor (Most spanish slave-owners were described as brutal and unkind- one even had 6 tribal leaders hung because they did not sweep the path before his arrival) and most of all disease. The interesting note to this- it is also due to their pride. Some tribes forbid their women to give birth, choosing to quietly end their existence as opposed to living under the rule of the Spanish.
That is why I feel the innocence lost and the oppression aspect of the song. Montezuma ended his reign by giving a gift- he hoped to appease Cortez and so sent him two large gold disks. Picture wagon wheels of solid gold, a noble gift to anyone, but to Cortez it showed the wealth that was still to be had. (One other note- the Governor who sent Cortez was actually annoyed by the way Cortez carried himself after being appointed Conquistador- he became full of himself and was irreverent to any authority, and so the Governor had named a successor and was replacing Cortez. Cortez heard of this and left port early, thus keeping his position and not letting his men know of the plan. That is why, upon reaching Mexico, he was able to burn the ships as a motivational tool for his men- he didn't want to go back. That pivotal moment was what prompted everything that happened afterwards.)
As for what they could have accomplished, it is all speculation. The Chinese reached Mexico before the Spanish did, around 1423 or so, and they described it as the most developed culture they had yet discovered. Pottery was as well made as the Chinese, they were adept at Astronomy and were able to build rather large monuments such as the pyramids. Even just the city and palace- the capital of the Aztec Nation was built on a lake, with the inner circle perfectly placed in the middle for the nobility and each successive circle a slightly lower caste. It was both well designed and well built and beautiful. With all of this, had the Chinese maintained trading relations and given them gunpowder or other advances, they would have been able to hold their own against the most of the Western Nations that were to come. (The Chinese aspect of this story is related in the book 1421, which is about the massive fleets sent out by the Chinese in the year 1421- they discovered the New World nearly 70 years before Columbus, but while they were at sea the Emperor of China died and his son decided that all travel must cease, going so far as to erase most record of the voyages. He left all of the ships to rot in the harbor, forbidding any ships to be built large enough to travel overseas, and thus another empire was thwarted from developing.)
Now that we have our little history lesson (which came at the expense of the paper I am trying to write on the subject) I will add my two cents about the song.
I find it completely accurate in that it rings true with the bittersweet sense of loss. To me, it is about the loss of innocence- the people of Mexico had never known disease or poverty or hunger before. As much as there was a caste system, the "wealthy" (in this case, nobles) were not living at the expense of the others. You were assigned a role due to your family history, and you did it, but everyone was well fed and lived in peace. Unlike the song says, war was known, as was hate, as that was what Cortez used to ensnare the rival tribes that resented the Aztec rule.
In reading about this history, I am left wondering how much more they would have accomplished had they not been wiped out by the Spanish. And by wiped out, I mean literally, wiped out. 25 Million people lived in Mexico before the Spanish came, and within 100 years only 1 million were left. This was due to massacres, brutal labor (Most spanish slave-owners were described as brutal and unkind- one even had 6 tribal leaders hung because they did not sweep the path before his arrival) and most of all disease. The interesting note to this- it is also due to their pride. Some tribes forbid their women to give birth, choosing to quietly end their existence as opposed to living under the rule of the Spanish.
That is why I feel the innocence lost and the oppression aspect of the song. Montezuma ended his reign by giving a gift- he hoped to appease Cortez and so sent him two large gold disks. Picture wagon wheels of solid gold, a noble gift to anyone, but to Cortez it showed the wealth that was still to be had. (One other note- the Governor who sent Cortez was actually annoyed by the way Cortez carried himself after being appointed Conquistador- he became full of himself and was irreverent to any authority, and so the Governor had named a successor and was replacing Cortez. Cortez heard of this and left port early, thus keeping his position and not letting his men know of the plan. That is why, upon reaching Mexico, he was able to burn the ships as a motivational tool for his men- he didn't want to go back. That pivotal moment was what prompted everything that happened afterwards.)
As for what they could have accomplished, it is all speculation. The Chinese reached Mexico before the Spanish did, around 1423 or so, and they described it as the most developed culture they had yet discovered. Pottery was as well made as the Chinese, they were adept at Astronomy and were able to build rather large monuments such as the pyramids. Even just the city and palace- the capital of the Aztec Nation was built on a lake, with the inner circle perfectly placed in the middle for the nobility and each successive circle a slightly lower caste. It was both well designed and well built and beautiful. With all of this, had the Chinese maintained trading relations and given them gunpowder or other advances, they would have been able to hold their own against the most of the Western Nations that were to come. (The Chinese aspect of this story is related in the book 1421, which is about the massive fleets sent out by the Chinese in the year 1421- they discovered the New World nearly 70 years before Columbus, but while they were at sea the Emperor of China died and his son decided that all travel must cease, going so far as to erase most record of the voyages. He left all of the ships to rot in the harbor, forbidding any ships to be built large enough to travel overseas, and thus another empire was thwarted from developing.)