page_title: La Malinche
section_title: The conquest of Mexico
hierarchical_section_title: La Malinche / Life / The conquest of Mexico
caption_attribution_description: Español: Tenochtitlan. Tierra del nopal. Entrada de Hernan Cortes, la cual se verifico el 8 de Noviembre de 1519 English: Tenochtitlan, Entrance of Hernan Cortes. Cortez and La Malinche meet Moctezuma II. , November 8, 1519 The imasge is from the "Lienzo de Tlaxcala", created by the Tlaxcalans to remind the Spanish of their loyalty to Castile and the importance of Tlaxcala during the Conquest. The text mixes European and native styles and includes anachronisms, such as the European-style chairs included in this image.
context_page_description: Marina or Malintzin, more popularly known as La Malinche, was a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, who played a key role in the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, acting as an interpreter, advisor, and intermediary for the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés. She was one of 20 women slaves given to the Spaniards by the natives of Tabasco in 1519. Later, she gave birth to Cortés's first son, Martín, who is considered one of the first Mestizos.
  The historical figure of Marina has been intermixed with Aztec legends. Her reputation has been altered over the years according to changing social and political perspectives, especially after the Mexican Revolution, when she was portrayed in dramas, novels and paintings as an evil or scheming temptress. In Mexico today, La Malinche remains iconically potent. She is understood in various and often conflicting aspects as the embodiment of treachery, the quintessential victim, or simply as symbolic mother of the new Mexican people. The term malinchista refers to a disloyal compatriot, especially in Mexico.
context_section_description: Early in his expedition to Mexico, Cortés was confronted by the Mayas at Potonchán. After suffering a significant loss of lives in the battle that ensued, the Mayas asked for peace, and in the following days, presented the Spaniards with gifts of food and gold, as well as twenty slave women. Malinche was one of the women presented to the Spaniards. She and the other women were baptized and subsequently distributed among Cortés's men, not only as servants, but also to provide sexual services. Malinche was given to Alonso Hernández Puertocarrero, one of Cortés's captains who was also a first cousin to the count of Cortés's hometown, Medellín.
  Malinche's linguistic gift went undiscovered until the Spaniards first encounter with the Nahuatl-speaking people at San Juan de Ulúa. Moctezuma's emissaries had come to inspect them, but Aguilar found himself unable to understand their words. When it was realized that Malinche was able to converse with the emissaries, she and Aguilar were set aside by Cortés, who, according to Gómara, promised her “more than liberty” if she would assist him in finding and communicating with Moctezuma. Cortés took Malinche back from Puertocarrero, who was later given another indigenous woman before he was sent back to Spain. Through Aguilar and Malinche, Cortés talked with Moctezuma's emissaries. The emissaries also brought artists to make paintings of Malinche, Cortés, and the rest of the group, as well as their ships and weapons, to be sent as records for Moctezuma. Díaz later said that the Nahuas also addressed Cortés as "Malinche"; they apparently took her as a point of reference for the group.
  From then on, Malinche would work together with Aguilar to bridge communication between the Spaniards and the Nahuas; Cortés would speak Spanish with Aguilar, who then translated into Yucatec Maya for Malinche, who in turn translated into Nahuatl, before reversing the process. The translation chain grew even longer when, after the emissaries left, they met the Totonacs, whose language was unintelligible to both Malinche and Aguilar. There, Malinche asked for Nahuatl interpreters. Karttunen remarks that "it is a wonder any communication was accomplished at all", for Cortés's Spanish words had to be translated into Maya, Nahuatl, and Totonac before reaching the locals, whose answers then went back through the same chain. It was from the meeting with the Totonacs that the Spaniards first learned of those who were hostile to Moctezuma. After founding the town of Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz in order to be freed from the legal restriction of what was supposed to be an exploratory mission, the Spaniards stayed for two months in a nearby Totonac settlement, securing a formal alliance with the Totonacs and prepared for a march towards Tenochtitlan.
  The first major polity that they encounter on the way to Tenochtitlan was Tlaxcala. Although the Tlaxcalans were initially hostile to the Spaniards and their allies, they later permitted the Spaniards to enter the city. The Tlaxcalans negotiated an alliance with the Spaniards through Malinche and Aguilar. Later Tlaxcalan records of this meeting feature scenes where Malinche appears prominent, bridging the communication between the two sides as the Tlaxcalans presented the Spaniards with gifts of food and noblewomen to cement the alliance. After several days in Tlaxcala, Cortés continued the journey to Tenochtitlan by the way of Cholula, accompanied by a large number of Tlaxcalan soldiers.
  The Spaniards were received at Cholula and housed for several days, until, as the Spaniards claimed, the Cholulans stopped giving them food, dug secret pits, built a barricade around the city, and hid a large Aztec army in the outskirt in preparation for an attack against the Spaniards. Somehow, the Spaniards learned of this plot, and, in a preemptive strike, assembled and massacred the Cholulans. Later accounts specifically claimed that the plot was uncovered by Malinche. According to the version provided by Díaz, she was approached by a Cholulan noblewoman who promised her a marriage to
caption: The meeting of Cortés and Moctezuma II, with Malinche acting as interpreter.
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