History?

William Prescott’s History of the Conquest of Mexico is a tale of bravado and chivalry worthy of standing alongside stories of King Arthur and the Homeric Epics. He portrays Cortes and his intrepid band of men as fearless adventurers who came to civilize Mexico in the name of God and country. Whereas Cortes comes across as a manipulator at best in other narratives, Prescott portrays him as a military genius fighting a holy war.

Prescott buys into the myths presented in the handful of texts he examines as his sources, the firsthand accounts of the conquistadors and the subsequent Spanish histories written in their wake. The conquistadors are mighty men who tame a vast nation with little outside help. Their motives, if not pure, are at least well-intentioned. In fact, the only myth that Prescott doesn’t perpetuate is that the conquest was made possible by the will of God. The conquistadors were far too talented for that assessment. As something of an apologist, he claims that we must understand and judge Cortes and his men on their terms, not ours. And by their standards, they were doing the Native Americans a favor by conquering them and bringing them to Christ and king.

Judging Prescott by his own terms, he probably wrote the best history of the conquest possible in his era. He used all the sources available, or at least all the available sources considered worth examining. While all he did was consolidate a handful of texts, that was the expectation of a historian of his era. And his writing is brilliant. Indeed, it is his strength, though without his colorful and charming language the book might be half its size. Still, his writing is better than all but the best of narratives of any kind. Its strength is its vivaciousness. He makes the characters come alive, their deeds seem as if they are performed before you, and the landscape as if it is painted on the inside of your eyelids and you can travel there if you close them. If he had published his gripping tale in this era, Hollywood would be clamoring for the movie rights. Indeed, he tells his tale so well, I almost believed it.