How did the Spanish first administer the Aztec/Inca Empires?

I've been reading a bit recently about Cortes' conquest of the Aztec Empire. One thing I can't seem to find is anything about how he, the audienca that followed him, and the viceroy that followed that actually administer the damn thing?

I mean they had defeated them militarily, but even that military dominance depended on alliances with other natives. The inhabitants they now rule over speak another language and see the Spanish as traitorous infidels. Plus they are few in number and their backup support is thousand of miles away. How did the Spanish rulers at the top actually get their orders followed? How did the chain of command work?

I haven't read up on the Incas, but I would imagine there would be similar issues there.
 

NothingNow

Banned
I've been reading a bit recently about Cortes' conquest of the Aztec Empire. One thing I can't seem to find is anything about how he, the audienca that followed him, and the viceroy that followed that actually administer the damn thing?

I mean they had defeated them militarily, but even that military dominance depended on alliances with other natives. The inhabitants they now rule over speak another language and see the Spanish as traitorous infidels. Plus they are few in number and their backup support is thousand of miles away. How did the Spanish rulers at the top actually get their orders followed? How did the chain of command work?

I haven't read up on the Incas, but I would imagine there would be similar issues there.

In short they married into and co-opted existing power structures, and then the viceroyalty proper developed out of that. Plus, with Religion and the general deviousness of Cortez, Pizarro et al they could play that sort of balancing act while everything got solidified.
 
I think they mainly ruled using puppet rulers. Tenochtitlan and a couple of other cities still had their own rulers for several decades after the Conquest. Some of the prominent members of the old Aztec order like Isabel de Montezuma were given huge swathes of land under their ownership, and of course were paired off to be married.

This is a good question though.
 
I think they gave allied Indian nobles Spanish titles, although Indian commoners from the allied tribes still got sent to the mines.
 
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