I was in the country for more than a year and never wanted to taste [chocolate], and whenever I passed a settlement, and some Indian would offer me a drink of it, and would be amazed when I would not accept, going away laughing. But then, as there was a shortage of wine, so as not always to be drinking water, I did like the others.” —GIROLAMO BENZONI, La Historia del Mondo, 1565 CAPTAIN-GENERAL HERNáN CORTéS WAS QUICK TO PUT his conquered colony to work, using Indian labourers to mine gold and Indian farmers to supply food. They reconfigured Tenochtitlán as a European city, erecting a cathedral in honour of St. Francis on the site of an Aztec temple that Cortés’s soldiers had destroyed. They laid the foundations for a new colony that would appeal to Spaniards living in the Caribbean and abroad, inducing them to settle and build grand estates. Over time colonists did just that, and the old Aztec stronghold became a modern urban capital: Mexico City. The transformation from conquistador to colonist didn’t lighten the heavy hand of the Spanish.
