Christopher Columbus made the island of Hispaniola, present-day Haiti, and the Dominican Republic the base of Spanish operations in the Caribbean. Within a few years of Spanish arrival, it became clear that the Caribbean did not offer silks or spices demanded by European markets. If Spanish settlers wanted to maintain their presence in the New World, they would need to find new ways to earn profits. The Spanish shifted their focus onto the American continent and began a relatively swift and sometimes brutal conquest of Central and South America. How did the Spanish conquer Mexico? Or South America? And what were the effects of this rapid expansion?
Spanish Colonization Timeline
Below is a brief timeline of the Spanish colonization of Central and South America.
1492: Christopher Columbus arrived in the Americas, landing in the Bahamas, Cuba, and Hispaniola in the Caribbean
1519: Hernan Cortes arrived in the Aztec empire and entered the city of Tenochtitlan
1520: Cortes and his men massacred Aztecs in Tenochtitlan, and Moctezuma died; Cortes was driven out of the city, and smallpox spreads, killing thousands
1521: The Aztecs are defeated, and Tenochtitlan was destroyed after a three-month city siege
1530: Francisco Pizarro made first contact with the Incas
1532: Pizarro returned with a small force; the Inca capital of Cuzco fell to the Spanish the following year
1565: The city of St. Augustine was found
1572: The Spanish defeated the last pockets of Incan resistance, which ended all resistance to Spanish colonization in South America
Spanish Colonization of Mexico
Spanish interest shifted from the Caribbean to the American mainland, where settlers hoped to find more resources to exploit. During the early 1500s, Spanish “conquistadores” or conquerors pressed beyond the Caribbean islands, moving west into Mexico. Between 1519 and 1521, Hernan Cortes and a small group of men would bring down the Aztec Empire.
Fig. 1 - A Portrait of Hernan Cortes. Source: Wikimedia Commons (public domain).
The invasion of Mexico began as a hunt for gold on the American continent. In 1519, Cortes led approximately 500 soldiers into Mexico, from Veracruz's coastal city to the Aztec Empire's capital, Tenochtitlan. Allied with rival tribes of the Aztec Empire, the Spanish seized Emperor Moctezuma II, gaining control of the city until he died in 1520.
Aztec forces, led by Moctezuma's nephew, soon drove the conquistadores out of the city, but Cortes acted swiftly. As the Aztecs built the capital city on a lake, Cortes built a small fleet of ships and placed the enormous city under siege, and in 1521 starved the city to the point of surrender. Cortes completed his conquest of the Aztec territory by 1522.
Fig. 2 - A depiction of the Fall of Tenochtitlan painted in the late 1600s. Source: Wikimedia Commons (public domain).
Spanish Colonization of the Americas
Francisco Pizarro experienced similar results when leading a Spanish expedition from Central America to present-day Peru in South America. Pizarro set out in 1530 with close to 600 men. Pizarro had perfect timing, as he arrived in the territory during a bitter dispute between two brothers of the ruling family of the Incan Empire. Pizarro’s forces exploited the differences between the two factions.
Fig. 3 - A Portrait of Francisco Pizarro. Source: Wikimedia Commons (public domain).
By 1533 Pizarro and his men had taken the Inca capital at Cuzco. Under the guise of holding a conference, they called the Inca rulers, seized them, and killed most of them. They spared one of the disputing brothers until he delivered a large quantity of gold to the conquerors. The brother was killed shortly after.
The search for treasure continued after the end of the Inca rule. Pizarro and his men looted gold and silver from Cuzco’s temples and buildings, melted down statues, and took jewelry and gold from tombs. Though it took longer than the conquest of Mexico, Spain conquered the Inca by 1572.
Fig. 4 - A map by William R. Shepherd from 1923 shows Pizarro's Conquest of Peru from 1531 to 1533. Source: Wikimedia Commons (public domain).
Effects of Spanish Colonization of the Americas
How did Cortes and Pizarro conquer these large empires with such apparent ease? Steel swords, muskets, cannons, and horses offered Cortes and Pizarro some advantage over the forces they met and helped account for the Spanish conquest of the Aztecs and Inca. Yet weaponry alone is not enough for these small Spanish forces to overcome the large, densely populated societies. The Spanish exploited local rivalries to gain and maintain power in those territories.
Negative Effects of Spanish Colonization
The Spanish Colonization downright altered the indigenous peoples and their societies. Many times for the worse.
Internal Division
The Spanish invasion of the mainland exploited and intensified division among the indigenous peoples of Mexico and Peru. For example, Cortes forged alliances with peoples who resented the domination of the Aztecs, who reinforced his small army with thousands of veteran warriors. Native allies also provided their forces with logistical support and friendly territories. As mentioned before, Pizarro exploited the divisions within the Incan Empire to gain an advantage over the ruling elite. In addition, many subjects of the Incan empire despised the ruling class and the Incan overlords. These subjects put up little resistance to Pizarro’s forces, and some allied themselves with the Spanish invaders.
Smallpox Epidemic
The most significant effect was epidemic disease. Smallpox had ravaged the indigenous population of the Caribbean since the arrival of Columbus, and the same ailments swept through the people on the continent. During the siege of Tenochtitlan, smallpox raged through the city, killing inhabitants by the tens of thousands and sapping the strength and manpower of defensive forces. Smallpox rapidly spread beyond the city walls, raced through Mexico, and wiped out so many people that Aztec society could not function. The epidemic disease also discouraged resistance against Pizarro; smallpox had spread from Mexico and Central America to Peru in the 1520s, long before Pizarro’s arrival. It took a heavy toll on the indigenous peoples of the region. Only in the context of this horrific effect of Spanish colonization is it possible to understand the Spanish conquest of Mexico and Central America.
Other Effects of Spanish Colonization
As the possibility of quick profit for Spain grew, so did the size of their territorial claims in the Americas. By 1565 the area controlled by Spain, called “New Spain,” or the "Virreynato de la Nueva España," spanned from present-day Mexico and the U.S. Southern States–from California to Florida–in the north to Central America into present-day Costa Rica in the South. And the territory controlled by Spain in the American Continent throughout Colonial times reached most of the east of the Mississippi in North America to Argentina and Chile in the south, encompassing all of South America–except Brazil, which the Portuguese controlled.
Fig. 5 - Map of Spanish North America from 1492 to the eighteenth century. Source: Wikimedia Commons.
Cities in the Spanish empire became centers of European-style society in the Americas: the spires of churches and Catholic cathedrals jutted from the skylines, and Spanish became the official language for government, business, and society. However, indigenous ways of life for those who survived disease and conquest persisted outside these urban centers. For example, peoples of the Amazon basin, whose land had little mineral and agricultural value, did not attract Spanish settlers. Other indigenous peoples adapted to the Spanish lifestyle while retaining traditional cultures and languages.
The Spanish viewed the New World as a territory to exploit and administer rather than settle. Even so, large numbers of Spanish settlers migrated to New Spain. Between 1500 and 1800, nearly half a million Spanish crossed the Atlantic to the Americas. Their presence contributed to creating a new world characterized by the interaction between the people of Europe, Africa, and the Americas.
Spanish Conquest - Key takeaways
- Spanish interest shifted from the Caribbean to the American mainland, where settlers hoped to find more resources to exploit.
- The invasion of Mexico began to search for gold on the American continent. In 1519, Cortes led approximately 500 soldiers to Mexico, from Veracruz's coastal city to the Aztec Empire's capital, Tenochtitlan. By 1522, Cortes conquers the Aztec Empire.
- Francisco Pizarro experienced similar results when leading a Spanish expedition from Central America to present-day Peru in South America, conquering the Inca by 1572.
- The Spanish invasion of the mainland exploited and intensified division among the indigenous peoples of Mexico and Peru.
- The most significant effect was epidemic disease.
- As the possibility of quick profit for Spain grew, so did the size of their territorial claims in the Americas. By 1565 the area controlled by Spain spanned from present-day Buenos Aires in South America up through Mexico into central and southwestern North America to St. Augustine in present-day Florida.
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