Like most of the first European visitors to the New World, Cortés is driven by the desire to find a route to Asia and its immense riches in spices and other resources.Ĭortés sets sail from Cuba with 11 ships, more than 450 soldiers and a large number of supplies, including 16 horses. Córdoba’s reports on his return to Cuba prompt the Spanish governor there, Diego Velásquez, to send a larger force back to Mexico, under the command of Hernán Cortés. Members of the local native population clash with the Spanish explorers, killing some 50 of them and capturing several more. In the great cities of the Aztec empire, magnificent temples and palaces and imposing stone statues decorating most street corners, plazas and landmarks all embody the civilization’s unfailing devotion to its many gods.įrancisco Hernández de Córdoba, the first European to visit Mexican territory, arrives in the Yucatán from Cuba with three ships and about 100 men. Distinctive examples of the Aztec artistic style include exquisitely feathered tapestries, headdresses and other attire finely worked ceramics gold, silver and copperware and precious stones, particularly jade and turquoise. Their language, Nahuatl, is the dominant language in central Mexico by mid-1350s, although numerous other languages are spoken. The Aztec civilization is also highly developed socially, intellectually and artistically. Early forms of currency include cacao beans and lengths of woven cloth. They develop an intricate social, political, religious and commercial organization, with an economy driven by bustling markets such as Tenochtitlán’s Tlatelolco, visited by some 50,000 people on major market days. The mighty Aztecs conquer their chief rivals in the city of Azcapotzalco and emerge as the dominant force in central Mexico. By the early 15th century, the Aztecs and their first emperor, Itzcoatl, form a three-way alliance with the city-states of Texcoco and Tlatelóco (now Tacuba) and establish joint control over the region. Following the prophecy of one of their gods, Huitzilopochtli, they found a settlement, Tenochtitlán, on the marshy land near Lake Texcoco. The nomadic Chichimecha tribe of the Mexica, more commonly known as the Aztecs, arrive in Mexico’s central valley, then called the Valley of Anahuac, after a long migration from their northern homeland. Over the next 300 years, internal conflict combined with the influx of new invaders from the north weaken Toltec civilization, until by 1200 (the late Post-Classic period) the Toltecs are vanquished by the Chichimecha, a collection of rugged tribes of undetermined origin (probably near Mexico’s northern frontier) who claim the great Toltec cities as their own. The early Post-Classic period begins with the dominant Toltecs headquartered in their capital of Tula (also known as Tollan). The rise of the Toltecs, who used their powerful armies to subjugate neighboring societies, is said to have marked the beginning of militarism in Mesoamerican society. The warlike Toltec, who migrated from north of Teotihuacán, become the most successful, establishing their empire in the central valley of Mexico by the 10th century. With Teotihuacán and Mayan dominance beginning to wane, a number of upstart states begin to compete for power. By 600 A.D., the Mayan alliance with the Teotihuacán, a commercially advanced society in north-central Mexico, had spread its influence over much of Mesoamerica. The Mayas excelled at pottery, hieroglyph writing, calendar-making and mathematics, and left an astonishing amount of great architecture the ruins can still be seen today. The Mayan civilization, centered in the Yucatán peninsula, becomes one of the most dominant of the area’s regional groups, reaching its peak around the sixth century A.D., during the Classic period of Mesoamerican history. This agricultural development process, which continues slowly over thousands of years, will form the basis of the first villages of Mesoamerica (including Mexico and Central America). The first human experiments with plant cultivation begin in the New World during the early post-Pleistocene period.
This detailed timeline of Mexican history explores such themes as the early civilizations that left their mark on the region’s landscape and society, the 300-year period of colonial rule, the struggle for independence in the early 1800s and the country’s rebuilding in the 20th century.