They say a picture is worth a thousand words; but what if I told you what you know about the Spanish conquest based on these images are not entirely true. The artwork associated with the spanish conquest is surrounded by triumph and destruction. The image of thousands of soldiers rushing onto defenseless natives is one such aspects. The image of Conquistadors being wealthy and scholarly men is another untrue aspect. We’ll take a journey into the misconceptions associated with the Spanish Conquest.

Background: The Spanish Conquest began in 1519, due to the Spanish Empire’s wanting to expand their empire. Years prior in 1492 the Spanish crown committed itself in the removal of Muslims from the Iberian peninsula, and the institutionalization …show more content…
In image C-created by an unknown artist- “the Folding screens of the Spanish Conquest of Mexico, 17th century”, the image depicts the interaction between Cortes’ army and the emperor Montezuma’s people in Tenochtitlan. The interaction varies between scholars, however the overall opinion is that the interaction was a bloody one. The image of the conquistadores depicts those in armor, with guns and cutlasses; although statistically speaking this phenomenon did not occur. According to the book Seven myths of the Spanish Conquest, a small minority of the conquistadores actually had military background, while the vast majority of the Conquistadores were middle class workers such as farmers and sailors-cite. There were a couple of reasons why these middles class workers joined the Conquistadores some of those reasons were due to financial opportunity provided by the Crown such as encomiendas (which as land with indigenous labor) and money grants. A small portion of the people who came were priests, whose main purpose was to convert the natives to …show more content…
This myth stems from the idea that all the Conquistadores came from Spain and conquered the land; when in reality there were two major groups also in play. These groups were the indigenous and african populations. Although many indigenous people were killed by Conquistadores, the vast majority of indigenous were actually killed by other indigenous groups who were converted to Catholicism. The Conquistadores were able to befriend native tribes with the promise of extending their lands and power. The newly converted indigenous group became so vast that they outnumbered the Conquistadores, however due to the promises they made with the Conquistadores as well as the Catholic undertones that white’s were superior to them, the indigenous did not revolt. The african population which came with the Conquistadores were brought as slaves in order to help with the conquest of the new world. Although, overtime many due to their hardwork and dedication to the cause were given freedom and