Publisher's Synopsis
At age 19, Hernan Cortes, an only son, begins a journey from Spain to The New World to the east. After disappointing his parents while attending the university in Salamanca, his father gave him a choice; he could join in the war in Italy or leave to a 'New World' in the West Indies. The reader will take a journey to Hispaniola in 1504 where Cortes made a profitable new life. After 8 years as an accountant, he, with another Castilian fortune hunter, Diego Velazquez, moved from Hispaniola to Cuba where the native Taino were suppressed. After building resources and an apparently loveless marriage in Cuba, he planned and organized his conquest of Mexico. Velazquez had been appointed governor of Spanish Cuba and he wanted to maintain sole control and power over the entire Caribbean region. After defying the wishes of Governor Velazquez, the 35-year-old Cortes departed Cape San Antonio Cuba in February of 1519, bound for the Yucatan Peninsula. Here, he meets Malinche, a bright attractive Mexican girl sold into slavery by her family to a Mayan chieftain. From Yucatan, he, with 400 conquistadores, fought his way into Mexico from the coastal Mayan and Totonac lands. It was foretold; the avenging god Quetzalcoatl would return from the east to put a stop to human sacrifice in the new world. Cortes leads an insurrection against the hated Mexican overlords and goes on to meet the complex Emperor Montecucuma, and The Blue Hummingbird on the Left [Huitzilopochtli]. The desire for riches and the aim to spread the word of Roman Catholicism remained his sworn task. By August 13, 1521, Lord Falling Eagle [Lord Quauhtemoctzin], the last Emperor of the Mexican Empire was captured. Cortes' had control of Tenochtitlan, the Mexican capital. He would go back to his family with riches and in triumph from his mission in New Spain."
