Moctezuma II

Moctezuma had many wives and concubines but only two women held the position of queen – Tlapalizquixochtzin and Teotlalco. He was also a king consort of Ecatepec because Tlapalizquixochtzin was queen of that city.

His many children included Princess Isabel Moctezuma — and sons Chimalpopoca (not to be confused with the previous huey tlatoani) and Tlaltecatzin.[3]

Modern reproduction of the Aztec feather headdress attributed to Moctezuma II exhibited at the Museo Nacional de Antropología e Historia, Mexico City. Original in the Museum of Ethnology, Vienna.

The Nahuatl pronunciation of his name is [motekʷˈsoːma]. It is a compound of a noun meaning "lord" and a verb meaning "to frown in anger", and so is interpreted as "he is one who frowns like a lord"[4] or "he who is angry in a noble manner."[5]

His name glyph, shown in the upper left corner of the image from the Codex Mendoza above, was composed of a diadem (xiuhuitzolli) on straight hair with an attached earspool, a separate nosepiece and a speech scroll.[6]

Aztec civilization
Aztec society
Nahuatl language
Religion · Mythology
Calendar · Medicine
Human sacrifice
Tenochtitlan · Templo Mayor
Aztec history
Aztlán · Warfare
Codices · Aztec writing
Aztec Empire · Tlaxcallan
Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire
Moctezuma II · Hernán Cortés

Moctezuma II, from Historia de la conquista de México by Antonio de Solis

The firsthand account of Bernal Díaz del Castillo's True History of the Conquest of New Spain paints a portrait of a noble leader who struggles to maintain order in his kingdom after he is taken prisoner by Hernán Cortés. In his first description of Moctezuma, Díaz del Castillo writes:

The Great Montezuma was about forty years old, of good height, well proportioned, spare and slight, and not very dark, though of the usual Indian complexion. He did not wear his hair long but just over his ears, and he had a short black beard, well-shaped and thin. His face was rather long and cheerful, he had fine eyes, and in his appearance and manner could express geniality or, when necessary, a serious composure. He was very neat and clean, and took a bath every afternoon. He had many women as his mistresses, the daughters of chieftains, but two legitimate wives who were Caciques[N.B. 2] in their own right, and only some of his servants knew of it. He was quite free from sodomy. The clothes he wore one day he did not wear again till three or four days later. He had a guard of two hundred chieftains lodged in rooms beside his own, only some of whom were permitted to speak to him.[8]

When Moctezuma was allegedly killed by being stoned to death by his own people "Cortés and all of us captains and soldiers wept for him, and there was no one among us that knew him and had dealings with him who did not mourn him as if he were our father, which was not surprising, since he was so good. It was stated that he had reigned for seventeen years, and was the best king they ever had in Mexico, and that he had personally triumphed in three wars against countries he had subjugated. I have spoken of the sorrow we all felt when we saw that Montezuma was dead. We even blamed the Mercederian friar for not having persuaded him to become a Christian."[9]

The Florentine Codex, made by Bernardino de Sahagún, relied on native informants from Tlatelolco, and generally portrays Tlatelolco and Tlatelolcan rulers in a favorable light relative to those of Tenochtitlan. Moctezuma in particular is depicted unfavorably as a weak-willed, superstitious, and indulgent ruler.[10] Historian James Lockhart suggests that the people needed to have a scapegoat for the Aztec defeat, and Moctezuma naturally fell into that role.[11]

Codex Duran.

Moctezuma II, from Les vrais pourtraits et vies des hommes illustres, París 1584

Unlike Bernal Díaz, who was recording his memories many years after the fact, Cortés wrote his Cartas de relación (Letters from Mexico) to justify his actions to the Spanish Crown. His prose is characterized by simple descriptions and explanations, along with frequent personal addresses to the King. In his Second Letter, Cortés describes his first encounter with Moctezuma thus:

Moctezuma [sic] came to greet us and with him some two hundred lords, all barefoot and dressed in a different costume, but also very rich in their way and more so than the others. They came in two columns, pressed very close to the walls of the street, which is very wide and beautiful and so straight that you can see from one end to the other. Moctezuma came down the middle of this street with two chiefs, one on his right hand and the other on his left. And they were all dressed alike except that Moctezuma wore sandals whereas the others went barefoot; and they held his arm on either side.[12]

Anthony Pagden and Eulalia Guzmán have pointed the Biblical messages that Cortés seems to ascribe to Moctezuma's retelling of the legend of Quetzalcoatl as a vengeful Messiah who would return to rule over the Mexica. Pagden has written that "There is no preconquest tradition which places Quetzalcoatl in this role, and it seems possible therefore that it was elaborated by Sahagún and Motolinía from informants who themselves had partially lost contact with their traditional tribal histories".[13][14]

Fernando Alvarado Tezozómoc, who may have written the Crónica Mexicayotl, was possibly a grandson of Moctezuma II. It is possible that his chronicle relates mostly the genealogy of the Aztec rulers. He described Moctezuma's issue and estimates them to be nineteen – eleven sons and eight daughters.[15]

The Spanish take control of Montezuma in Mexico. Illustration from Philosophical and political history of and trade of Europeans, Jean-Léonard Pellet, Genève, 1780.

Moctezuma's Palace from the Codex Mendoza (1542)

Some of the Aztec stories about Moctezuma describe him as being fearful of the Spanish newcomers, and some sources, such as the Florentine Codex, comment that the Aztecs believed the Spaniards to be gods and Cortés to be the returned god Quetzalcoatl. The veracity of this claim is difficult to ascertain, though some recent ethnohistorians specialising in early Spanish/Nahua relations have discarded it as post-conquest mythicalisation.[16]

Much of the idea of Cortés being seen as a deity can be traced back to the Florentine Codex, written some 50 years after the conquest. In the codex's description of the first meeting between Moctezuma and Cortés, the Aztec ruler is described as giving a prepared speech in classical oratorial Nahuatl, a speech which as described verbatim in the codex (written by Sahagún's Tlatelolcan informants) included such prostrate declarations of divine or near-divine admiration as, "You have graciously come on earth, you have graciously approached your water, your high place of Mexico, you have come down to your mat, your throne, which I have briefly kept for you, I who used to keep it for you," and, "You have graciously arrived, you have known pain, you have known weariness, now come on earth, take your rest, enter into your palace, rest your limbs; may our lords come on earth." While some historians such as Warren H. Carroll consider this as evidence that Moctezuma was at least open to the possibility that the Spaniards were divinely sent based on the Quetzalcoatl legend, others such as Matthew Restall argue that Moctezuma politely offering his throne to Cortés (if indeed he did ever give the speech as reported) may well have been meant as the exact opposite of what it was taken to mean, as politeness in Aztec culture was a way to assert dominance and show superiority.[17] Other parties have also propagated the idea that the Native Americans believed the conquistadors to be gods, most notably the historians of the Franciscan order such as Fray Gerónimo de Mendieta.[18] Bernardino de Sahagún, who compiled the Florentine Codex, was also a Franciscan priest.

The Spaniards were forced to flee the city and they took refuge in Tlaxcala, and signed a treaty with them to conquer Tenochtitlan, offering to the Tlaxcalans freedom from any kind of tribute and the control of Tenochtitlan.[28]

Moctezuma was then succeeded by his brother Cuitláhuac, who died shortly after during a smallpox epidemic. He was succeeded by his adolescent nephew, Cuauhtémoc. During the siege of the city, the sons of Moctezuma were murdered by the Aztecs, possibly because they wanted to surrender. By the following year, the Aztec empire had fallen to an army of Spanish and their Native American allies, primarily Tlaxcalans who were traditional enemies of the Aztecs.

Following the conquest, Moctezuma's daughter, Techichpotzin (or Tecuichpoch), became known as Isabel Moctezuma. She was given a large estate by Cortés, who also fathered a child by her, Leonor Cortés Moctezuma.[29][30] Isabel was married and widowed by a conquistador in Cortés's original group, Alonso Grado (died. ca. 1527) a poblador (a Spaniard who had arrived after the fall of Tenochtitlan), Pedro Gallego (died ca. 1531), and conquistador Juan Cano, who survived her.[31]

Anonymous portrait of Moctezuma II, 17th century

Engraving of Hernan Cortes, 19th century.

Coat of arms of the Dukes de Moctezuma de Tultengo (Descendientes del Emperador Mexica Moctezuma II).

Moctezuma had many wives and concubines by whom he fathered an enormous family. Though the exact number of his children is unknown and the names of most of his children were lost to history, according to a Spanish chronicler, by the time he was taken captive, Moctezuma had fathered 100 children and fifty of his wives and concubines were then in some stage of pregnancy, though this estimate may have been exaggerated.[32] As Aztec culture made class distinctions between the children of senior wives, lesser wives, and concubines, not all of his children were considered equal in nobility or inheritance rights.

Genealogy of Tecuichpoch

Of his many wives may be named the princesses Teitlalco, Acatlan, and Miahuaxochitl, of whom the first named appears to have been the only legitimate consort. By her he left a son, Asupacaci, who fell during the Noche Triste, and a daughter, Tecuichpo, baptized as Isabel, married consecutively to Cuauhtemoc (the last Mexican sovereign), to visitador general Alonso Grado, to Pedro Andrade Gallego, and to Juan Cano de Saavedra. She had children by the latter two, from whom descend the illustrious families of Andrade-Montezuma and Cano-Montezuma. By the Princess Acatlan were left two daughters, baptized as Maria and Marina (also known as Leonor). The latter alone left offspring, from whom descends the Sotelo-Montezuma family.[33]

Several lines of descendants exist in Mexico and Spain through Moctezuma II's son and daughters, notably Tlacahuepan Ihualicahuaca, or Pedro Moctezuma and Tecuichpoch Ixcaxochitzin, or Isabel Moctezuma.

The grandson of Moctezuma II, Pedro's son, Ihuitemotzin, baptized as Diego Luis de Moctezuma, was brought to Spain by King Philip II. There he married Francisca de la Cueva de Valenzuela.[34] In 1627, their son Pedro Tesifón de Moctezuma was given the title Count of Moctezuma (later altered to Moctezuma de Tultengo), and thus became part of the Spanish nobility. In 1766, the holder of the title became a Grandee of Spain. In 1865, (coincidentally during the Second Mexican Empire) the title, which was held by Antonio María Moctezuma-Marcilla de Teruel y Navarro, 14th Count of Moctezuma de Tultengo, was elevated to that of a Duke, thus becoming Duke of Moctezuma, with de Tultengo again added in 1992 by Juan Carlos I.

Descendants of Pedro Tesifón de Moctezuma included (through an illegitimate child of his son Diego Luis) General Jerónimo Girón-Moctezuma, 3rd Marquess de las Amarilas (1741-1819), a 9th generation descendant of Moctezuma II, who was commander of the Spanish forces at the Battle of Fort Charlotte, and his grandson, Francisco Javier Girón y Ezpeleta, 2nd Duke of Ahumada and 5th Marquess of the Amarillas who was the founder of the Guardia Civil in Spain.[35]

Other holders of Spanish noble titles that descend from the Aztec emperor include Dukes of Atrisco.[36]

Isabel Moctezuma was by Hernán Cortés the mother of Leonor Cortés Moctezuma, who was the mother of Isabel de Tolosa Cortés de Moctezuma.

A nephew of Moctezuma II was Diego de Alvarado Huanitzin.

Many Indigenous peoples in Mexico are reported to worship deities named after the Aztec ruler, and often a part of the myth is that someday the deified Moctezuma shall return to vindicate his people. In Mexico, the contemporary Pames, the Otomi, Tepehuán, Totonac, and Nahua peoples are reported to worship earth deities named after Moctezuma.[37] His name also appears in Tzotzil Maya ritual in Zinacantán where dancers dressed as a rain god are called "Moctezumas"[38]

Hubert Howe Bancroft, writing in the 19th century (Native Races, Volume #3), speculated that the name of the historical Aztec Emperor Moctezuma had been used to refer to a combination of different cultural heroes who were united under the name of a particularly salient representative of Mesoamerican identity.

Map showing the expansion of the Aztec empire through conquest. The conquests of Moctezuma II are marked by the colour green (based on the maps by Ross Hassig in Aztec Warfare)

As a symbol of resistance towards Spanish the name of Moctezuma has been invoked in several indigenous rebellions.

One such example was the rebellion of the Virgin Cult in Chiapas in 1721, where the followers of the Virgin Mary rebelled against the Spanish after having been told by an apparition of the virgin that Moctezuma would be resuscitated to assist them against their Spanish oppressors. In the Quisteil rebellion of the Yucatec Maya in 1761 the rebel leader Jacinto Canek reportedly called himself "Little Montezuma".[39]

• Historic recurrence
• List of unsolved murders
• Moctezuma I
• Moctezuma's Table
• Montezuma's headdress
• Qualpopoca

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Moctezuma II.

• A reconstructed portrait of Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin, based on historical sources, in a contemporary style.
•  "Montezuma I." . Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. 1900.