This book is a compelling and insightful rebuke of perhaps the most famous and long lived propaganda campaign in history. Piece by piece the author examines and refutes the story we've all been fed since childhood about the conquest of the Aztec empire; that Hernando Cortez was a brilliant and ambitious conquistador who, through determination, cunning, and superior intellect almost single handedly overthrew the bloody Aztecs. Read this interesting and well researched book for a far more factual, if less cut and dry, account of what actually happened. ( )

I think this is an important one. I recommend reading it before reading "Fifth Sun" by Camilla Townsend. Where "Fifth Sun" is detailed about the the Nahua and Indigenous historical perspective, Restall takes a broad and comprehensive perspective. I wish I had read this book before Townsend's, I feel it would have helped me understand the environment and circumstances more clearly.
Restall has cracked my heart open, but this time it's a healing. A healing of history and memory. His research is extensive and well documented leaving a fourth of the book to notes, references and bibliography. Restall expertly draws not only on first person historical, and legal documents, but he also evaluates the historical record through its art, performance, and culture, giving us a grounded perspective in ideas, and the social psyche.
I am Mexican, born and raised on stolen and raped land and I have always been mystified and angry about the "conquest". Restall has given me an understanding my whole self and my ancestors can rest with.
Restall reviews the evidence and repositions conquest as war, the Spanish-Aztec war. As well, he reveals the genocidal and racist motives that undergirded that war and devastated one of the most civil and advanced societies in the Americas.
This book is literally a work of decolonial action. ( )

An interesting book, about what really occurred when Montezuma met Cortés, and the genecide which occurred after. I listened to the audiobook version which was well read. ( )

Restall demonstrates that the meeting between Montezuma and Cortés at Tenochtitlan in November 1519 has been falsely represented and grossly misunderstood for 500 years. Early accounts by conquistadors and royal chroniclers depicted Montezuma’s surrender, arrest and captivity at the hands of Cortés—the Conquest of Mexico abetted by the Aztec emperor’s submission to the Great Conquistador. Restall carefully debunks the ‘mythistory’ of the Conquest of Mexico then constructs a radically different but more credible version of events.

Restall makes his case by bringing his scholarly work to the fore. He compiles and compares a variety of accounts, revealing inventions and inconsistencies and dubious interpretations. His is not a synthesis of previous accounts but an interrogation and reassessment of the traditional narrative sources. The first printed account of the Spanish arrival in Tenochtitlan appeared in a newsletter from the presses of Jacob Fugger in Augsburg in 1521, and versions of the Conquest story published in the 21st c. reproduce the falsehoods that have accumulated since then. (The beautiful collection of color plates included here shows the presentation of the conventional narrative in various forms).

The surrender and captivity of Montezuma as depicted in the traditional sources never happened. Cortés’ own account of the meeting with Montezuma and its aftermath, described in his Second Letter to Charles V, included a speech attributed to Montezuma but invented by Cortés (who had no understanding of the complexity or subtleties of Nahuatl)—a speech that later accounts used as a kind of justification for the war against the Aztecs. The surrender speech was explained by the claim that Montezuma believed that the arrival of the Spanish had long been prophesied and anticipated, but there was no such prophecy. Restall traces the source of the prophecy fable to a 1555 Tlatelolca-Franciscan account now known as the Florentine Codex. And, rather than marking the beginning of Montezuma’s confinement by Cortés, the Meeting initiated a 235-day long interlude in the Spanish-Aztec War that Restall calls the Phony Captivity, since all evidence indicates that Montezuma continued in his position as emperor unimpeded until his murder. As for the Great Conquistador, Restall’s interrogation of the sources effectively dismantles the myth of Cortés’ exceptionalism; he did very little on his own, and was a typical conquistador who did what Spaniards of the era did (rape, pillage, enslave) all over the Americas.

Restall breaks down a wide range of myths perpetuated by the invented history of the Conquest of Mexico, from indigenous cannibalism and human sacrifice to the elevation of Quetzacoatl (based on the postconquest elaboration of a misunderstood Mexica tradition) and the many meanings of Malintzin (who has appeared in a variety of roles since the early 19th c). As a consequence, we are forced to see the confrontation between the Spanish and the Aztecs differently.

Restall’s original lines of investigation make for fascinating reading. He derives great insight from his consideration of the zoo-collection complex in the heart of Tenochtitlan, assembled and maintained by Montezuma during his 17-year reign. Holding mammals, birds and reptiles from throughout the region, along with featherworks, armor and weaponry, metalworked jewelry and figurines, painted scrolls and pictographs, annals and tribute lists, the collection gives us new ways of looking at the emperor, his empire and his response to the arrival of conquistadors. In addition, Restall’s account of internecine conflict among the Aztecs and the chance timing of a succession dispute in one branch of the Triple Alliance gives us a more complete understanding of how the (constantly replenished and resupplied) conquistadores prevailed. ( )

See review in NYRB 24 May 2018