Marina or Malintzin, more popularly known as La Malinche, a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, became known for contributing to the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire (1519–1521), by acting as an interpreter, advisor, and intermediary for the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés. She was one of 20 enslaved women given to the Spaniards in 1519 by the natives of Tabasco. Cortés chose her as a consort, and she later gave birth to his first son, Martín – one of the first Mestizos in New Spain.
Malintzin, in an engraving dated 1886.
Codex Azcatitlan, Hernán Cortés and Malinche (far right), early 16th-century indigenous pictorial manuscript of the conquest of Mexico
Malinche depicted with weapons during the Battle of Tepotzotlán.
The meeting of Cortés and Moctezuma II, with Malinche acting as interpreter.
Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire
The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was a pivotal event in the history of the Americas, marked by the collision of the Aztec Triple Alliance and the Spanish Empire, ultimately reshaping the course of human history. Taking place between 1519 and 1521, this event saw the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés, and his small army of soldiers and indigenous allies, overthrowing one of the most powerful empires in Mesoamerica.
Cortés and his counselor, the Nahua woman La Malinche, meet Moctezuma in Tenochtitlan, 8 November 1519
The death of Moctezuma, depicted in the Florentine Codex
Smallpox depicted in Book XII on the conquest of Mexico in the Florentine Codex
The Capture of Cuauhtemoc, 17th century, oil on canvas.
