46 Fun Facts About Montezuma II

Montezuma II was the ninth tlatoani, or ruler, of which Mesoamerican civilisation?

Montezuma II ruled the Aztec Empire, the Triple Alliance of three cities on and around Lake Texcoco, which reached its greatest extent under him.

Which Spanish conquistador led the men who seized Montezuma's capital?

Hernán Cortés landed on the Gulf coast in 1519, marched inland, and in 1521, with a host of Tlaxcalan and other indigenous allies, took the city after a siege.

What was the name of the Aztec capital where Montezuma ruled?

Tenochtitlan, founded on an island in Lake Texcoco in 1325, was linked to the shore by causeways and ranked among the world's largest cities when the Spanish arrived in 1519.

A Spanish soldier reported that when Montezuma dined he drank nothing but which beverage, served in a golden goblet?

The soldier-chronicler wrote that Montezuma took only chocolate, a frothed cacao drink served in fine gold cups, and that dozens of jugs of it were prepared at each meal.

'Montezuma's revenge' is a colloquial name for what?

Traveller's diarrhoea picked up in Mexico earned the nickname Montezuma's revenge, as if the emperor were punishing visiting foreigners; 'Delhi belly' is the Indian equivalent.

The opening line of the US Marines' Hymn, 'From the Halls of Montezuma', refers to which 1847 engagement?

Marines stormed Chapultepec Castle in Mexico City during the Mexican–American War of 1846–48.

Montezuma's name in the Aztec language combines a noun meaning 'lord' with a verb meaning what?

It is usually rendered 'he frowns like a lord' or 'he who is angry in a noble manner'.

The Aztecs called him Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin. What does Xocoyotzin mean?

It distinguished him from the first Moctezuma, called Ilhuicamina or 'Old Moctezuma'; the regnal numbers were added by later historians.

Montezuma II was the great-grandson of Moctezuma I and the son of which emperor?

Axayácatl, who ruled from 1469 to 1481, was his father; Axayácatl's brothers Tízoc and Ahuitzotl reigned in turn before the throne passed to Montezuma.

Before his election, Montezuma was a priest at the temple of which god?

Huitzilopochtli, the Mexica war and sun god: the chronicler Durán says the electors found Montezuma serving as a priest in his temple, and he was also a proven warrior.

Most historians date Montezuma's coronation to which year?

1502 is the usual date; the Stone of the Five Suns in the Art Institute of Chicago carries the year 11 Reed (1503), which some take as his accession year instead.

Montezuma's reign opened with a natural disaster in 1505. What was it?

It lasted three years, and some nobles sold their children as slaves for food until Montezuma ordered the children freed.

Montezuma widened the gap between nobles and commoners by banning commoners from doing what?

He barred commoners from serving in the royal palaces, reversing his predecessors' habit of promoting on merit, replaced much of the court with nobles and made them live in the capital.

Montezuma's palace included the Totocalli, a famous facility of what kind?

Its name means House of Birds, but it also held jaguars, wolves and snakes; Cortés admitted enjoying it before burning it in 1521.

What was the windowless, all-black room in Montezuma's palace used for?

The Casa Denegrida was Montezuma's room for meditation, where he reflected on the omens his seers reported; its remains were found in 2008 under central Mexico City.

Which modern Mexico City building stands on the site of Montezuma's palace?

The National Palace on the Zócalo stands where Montezuma's 'New Houses' stood; Cortés rebuilt the site as his own residence, and it later became the viceroys' palace.

Through marriage to Queen Tlapalizquixochtzin, Montezuma was also king consort of which city-state?

Ecatepec, a city-state on the northern shore of Lake Texcoco, was ruled by his wife Tlapalizquixochtzin in her own right, which made Montezuma its king consort.

Under Montezuma the empire expanded as far south as Xoconosco in which modern Mexican state?

Xoconosco, today's Soconusco on the Pacific coast of Chiapas, was the empire's southernmost province, valued for its cacao tribute.

Montezuma received the first reports of Europeans landing on his coast in 1518, from the expedition of whom?

Grijalva landed at San Juan de Ulúa, in Totonac territory under Aztec sway, a year before Cortés arrived.

On what date in 1519 did Montezuma meet Cortés on the causeway into his capital and exchange gifts?

On 8 November 1519 Montezuma, borne in a litter, met Cortés on the Iztapalapa causeway, exchanged necklaces with him and lodged the Spaniards in his late father's palace.

Some Aztec sources say Montezuma feared the Spaniards because he believed Cortés might be which returning god?

Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, was said to have sailed east and promised to return; scholars such as Anthony Pagden argue the story was elaborated after the conquest.

According to Cortés's own letters, Montezuma volunteered to cede his entire realm to which monarch?

In his Second Letter of 1520, Cortés told Charles V of Spain that Montezuma had acknowledged him as rightful lord and handed over his realm, a claim historians treat with suspicion.

The Massacre in the Great Temple on 22 May 1520 took place during which Aztec festival?

Toxcatl, the late-spring festival of Tezcatlipoca and the war god, was being danced in the temple precinct when the Spanish garrison fell on the unarmed celebrants.

Which captain did Cortés leave in charge of the capital when he marched to confront Narváez?

Pedro de Alvarado, the red-haired captain the Mexica called Tonatiuh ('the Sun'), was left in command; his attack on the festival set off the revolt.

How do Spanish accounts say Montezuma was fatally injured while addressing his people from a rooftop?

Spanish chroniclers wrote that he was hit by three stones thrown by the crowd, one striking his head, and that he refused treatment and died within days.

After the Aztecs renounced Montezuma, which brother of his was named tlatoani in his place?

Cuitláhuac, lord of Iztapalapa and Montezuma's brother, led the resistance, drove the Spaniards from the city in June 1520, and was formally installed as tlatoani later that year.

Who was the last Aztec emperor, ruling from 1520 until the city fell in 1521?

Cuauhtémoc, Montezuma's nephew and son-in-law, held out until the city fell; Cortés had his feet burned to find gold, then hanged him in 1525 on the march to Honduras.

What did Mexico City officially rename La Noche Triste, the Spaniards' 1520 flight, in 2021?

Victorious Night (Noche Victoriosa) was the name Mexico City's government adopted in 2021, recasting the Spaniards' flight along the Tlacopan causeway on 30 June 1520 as a Mexica triumph.

The famous feather headdress attributed to Montezuma is held in a museum in which city, and Mexico wants it back?

The headdress is in Vienna's Weltmuseum; first recorded in 1596 in Archduke Ferdinand's collection at Ambras Castle, it has been in Austrian hands ever since.

Montezuma's daughter Tecuichpoch, baptised Isabel, was married how many times, to Aztec emperors and Spaniards alike?

Six: three Mexica lords, including two successive tlatoque, then the Spaniards Alonso de Grado, Pedro Gallego and Juan Cano; she was widowed five times and held the Tacuba encomienda.

Which Nahua woman served as Cortés's interpreter and bore him a son, Martín, one of the first mestizos?

La Malinche, also called Malintzin or Doña Marina, interpreted for Cortés from the Mexica tongue via Maya and then directly into Spanish, and bore him Martín in 1522.

Which conquistador wrote The True History of the Conquest of New Spain, the eyewitness memoir describing Montezuma's court?

Bernal Díaz del Castillo, a foot soldier under Cortés, finished his True History around 1568 as an ageing encomendero and town councillor in Santiago de Guatemala.

Which Baroque composer wrote the 1733 opera Motezuma about the Aztec emperor?

Antonio Vivaldi's Motezuma premiered in Venice in 1733; its score was lost until much of it resurfaced in a Berlin archive in 2002.

After his coronation Montezuma reorganised the empire into how many additional provincial divisions to centralise control?

He created thirty-eight new provincial divisions, each run by bureaucrats backed by garrisons who collected tribute, enforced the law and judged local cases.

During a rebellion at Tlachquiauhco, Montezuma ordered the killing of all adults over what age, blaming them for the revolt?

He had every adult over 50 put to death at Tlachquiauhco, blaming the elders for the rising, in a campaign that opened his wider conquests in the Mixteca.

Montezuma's envoys gave Cortés two great discs of gold and silver representing what?

Montezuma's gifts included a gold disc for the sun and a silver disc for the moon, each as large as a cartwheel, which Cortés shipped to Spain in 1519.

Which lord of Texcoco is said by chronicler Diego Durán to have warned Montezuma that omens foretold the empire's destruction?

Nezahualpilli, ruler of Texcoco from 1472 to 1515 and famed as a seer, is the lord Durán has warning Montezuma that the signs foretold the empire's ruin.

The 2005 opera La Conquista by Lorenzo Ferrero has Montezuma's part written in which language?

Montezuma sings in Nahuatl, the language of the Mexica, while the Spanish roles sing in Spanish; the opera was premiered in Prague in 2005.

On what date in 1519 did Tlaxcala decide to ally with Spain against Montezuma's empire?

On 23 September 1519 Cortés entered the city of Tlaxcala in peace after weeks of fighting; the Tlaxcalans, long at war with the Mexica, became his most important allies.

On what date in 1521 did the Aztec Empire fall to the Spanish, a year after Montezuma's death?

The city fell on 13 August 1521 after a siege of roughly three months, when the last tlatoani was captured trying to escape across the lake by canoe.

According to a Spanish chronicler, how many children had Montezuma fathered by the time he was taken captive?

Gómara put the tally at 100 children, adding that dozens of his wives and concubines were pregnant when he was seized, figures historians treat as exaggerated.

Which Spanish king brought Montezuma's grandson Diego Luis de Moctezuma to Spain?

Philip II brought Diego Luis de Moctezuma to Spain, where he married Francisca de la Cueva; their son Pedro Tesifón was created Count of Moctezuma in 1627.

How many omens of disaster before the Spanish arrival does Sahagún list in Book 12 of the Florentine Codex?

Eight: they include a comet 'like a tongue of fire', the temple of the war god catching fire, a weeping woman wailing at night and a bird with a mirror in its head.

Which composer wrote the 1963 dodecaphonic opera Montezuma?

Roger Sessions worked on Montezuma for two decades, finishing the twelve-tone score in 1963; it was first staged in West Berlin in 1964.

What killed Montezuma's brother and successor Cuitláhuac shortly after he took power?

Smallpox, brought by an infected member of the Narváez expedition, reached the capital in late 1520 and killed the new tlatoani within weeks of his installation.

Which German artist marvelled at Montezuma's treasures when they were displayed in Brussels in 1520?

Albrecht Dürer saw the first shipment of Montezuma's gifts to Cortés on display in Brussels in 1520 and wrote that nothing had ever so gladdened his heart.