Visual Source: Meeting of Cortés and Xicotencatl, El Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1550)

European Exploration, Perception of the Other, and the Columbian Exchange

How did Europeans perceive the new people they encountered and how were they in turn perceived?

This image depicts the meeting of Cortés and Xicotencatl, leader of Tlaxcala from the History of Tlaxcala. The Tlaxcalans would become the allies of the Spanish in their later destruction of the Aztec empire.

Meeting of Cortés and Xicotencatl, <i>El Lienzo de Tlaxcala</i> (1550)

. Why might Cortés and Xicotencatl both have been interested in a friendly encounter?

Both saw benefits of working as allies against the Aztecs.

Neither side had enough soldiers to win a war.

They both saw benefits of a trade deal involving horses in exchange for captured Aztecs.

. What does this say about how each viewed the other?

Both were suspicious of one another despite their alliance.

Economic motivations are more important than military or cultural ones.

The self-interest of an alliance overcame any sense of difference.

Visual Source: Meeting of Cortés and Xicotencatl, El Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1550)

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