[Poll] With no Columbus, when would Mexico have been conquered?

Without Columbus, when will Europeans conquer Mexico?

  • 1521-1530

    Votes: 11 16.9%
  • 1531-1540

    Votes: 7 10.8%
  • 1541-1550

    Votes: 4 6.2%
  • 1551-1560

    Votes: 9 13.8%
  • 1561-1570

    Votes: 4 6.2%
  • 1571-1580

    Votes: 5 7.7%
  • 1581-1590

    Votes: 2 3.1%
  • 1591-1600

    Votes: 1 1.5%
  • 1601-1610

    Votes: 4 6.2%
  • 1611-1620

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1621-1630

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1631-1640

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1641-1650

    Votes: 1 1.5%
  • 1651-1660

    Votes: 2 3.1%
  • 1661-1670

    Votes: 1 1.5%
  • 1671-1680

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • 1681-1690

    Votes: 1 1.5%
  • 1691-1700

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • After 1700

    Votes: 5 7.7%
  • Without Columbus, Europeans would never have conquered Mexico

    Votes: 8 12.3%

  • Total voters
    65

raharris1973

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Columbus's arrival in the Caribbean, by sheer luck, hastened the conquest of Mexico significantly. Without his stupid ideas about the circumference of the Earth, it's quite likely that European colonization in the early sixteenth century would have happened only in Brazil and the northeast.

I commend you for asking the question and adding a poll as I think I have done in the past. I commend you even more for getting a spirited response from folks!

I disagree : Portguese explorers will map the coastline of the Americas in a few years (because why not) and even if they try to keep a secret, it will get out and by probably 1510, Europeans will know how huge this land mass is.

Does it really have to leak *that fast*?

---responding to the poll, I voted for a late one, 1661. Mainly I was just trying to be provocative. But let's say the discoveries of Newfoundland and Brazil are delayed beyond OTL. Not too hard. Cabot was probably only funded by Henry VII because Columbus showed the way. Fishermen's tales can take much longer to penetrate into royal minds and get people thinking of state-sponsored voyages in that direction.

Brazil could be delayed. In OTL the Portuguese accidentally bumped into Brazil on their second voyage to India. Now I don't know how many trading fleets the French sent to Africa every year, but the bump into Brazil could be easily butterflied away. Now say there was one Portuguese trade fleet per year every year after the Vasco Da Gama landfall in India in 1497. Now with that volume of fleets, it becomes *very* likely that at least one sites Brazil and comes back to tell the tale by 1507 (by the tenth fleet). It becomes *almost certain* that this will happen before 1517 (and 20 years of fleets rounding the Cape).

But as the OP pointed out, Newfoundland and Brazil do not scream out "El Dorado of gold", follow up exploration will be slower and less expansive, and meanwhile the Indian Ocean and East Asian coasts will be getting better and better mapped and European countries will be competing there and driving each other to greater efforts (Spain coming in as the first challenger, followed up by others eventually).

The big driver of further exploration will be sugar cultivation and the profits it makes. The Portuguese will start sugar plantations on a small scale from whenever they first get to Brazil. They will scale up a lot in a generation. Here's how wiki said it developed in the years after Brazil's discovery (1500) -
"The Portuguese took sugar to Brazil. By 1540, there were 800 cane sugar mills in Santa Catarina Island and there were another 2,000 on the north coast of Brazil, Demarara, and Surinam."

"The approximately 3,000 small sugar mills that were built before 1550 in the New World created an unprecedented demand for cast iron gears, levers, axles and other implements. Specialist trades in mold-making and iron casting developed in Europe due to the expansion of sugar production. Sugar mill construction sparked development of the technological skills needed for a nascent industrial revolution in the early 17th century.[29]"

So, by that point people are going to start heavily exploring the American coasts in the tropical areas simply to scout out possible sites for sugar cultivation, which will lead them quickly to the Caribbean.

A parallel driver of exploration, and settlement in particular, will be religious conflict and persecution. That is where the Reformation and Wars of Religion come in. Once Newfoundland is mapped, by the time you have religious wars occurring with frequency and at scale (by 1550 at latest), you will have people willing to explore and settle in northeastern North America. If Brazil or the Caribbean sugar boom attracts multiple colonizers to Brazil (likely) and the Caribbean (definitely), religious dissenters will seek to live in territories there, where the political situation permits (in Huguenot, English or Dutch colonies). Once the Caribbean is explored, the discovery of Mexico is going to come within 15 years tops, and conquests on some scale will begin shortly after.
 
Does it really have to leak *that fast*?

If we assume they discover Brazil in 1500, I think it will be hard for it to remain a secret for long. Especially since I think it is likely that they send a second expedition soon to determine how large the territory is and see if there is a passage to Asia.
 
If we assume they discover Brazil in 1500, I think it will be hard for it to remain a secret for a long. Especially since I think it is likely that they send a second expedition soon to determine how large the territory is and see if there is a passage to Asia.

The Portuguese actually had an approximate idea about the size of the earth. Columbus mistake about the distance involved was, as far as I know, unique to Columbus.

The whole notion that people would go screaming into the unknown like lemmings is a post-Columbus paradigm. Europeans knew about far-away lands for centuries. Vinland, Africa, Bjarmland, what have you. Unless there was something specific that they were looking for they were not interested. And for good reason, travel was not a safe option in those days, even if you knew where you were going.

But then, something changed. The Ottomans conquered Constantinople in 1453. And that meant the were squeezing the immensely profitable spice trade to India. And suddenly finding a way around the Ottomans to India was imperative.
That is why the Portuguese were going down Africa. They had actually sent scouts through Egypt and Yemen to India and Ethiopia gathering information. They bumped into Brazil accidentally, driven the wrong way.

It is also why Columbus tried to find India by going west. He had a very wrong-headed idea about the size of the Earth and thought it was about 1/3rd as big as it actually is. If he had not encountered land, he would have run out of supplies and died far from India.

His mistake is why Native Americans are often known as "Indians".

But he did end up in the Caribbean. And like I said, he was bankrolled by the people who started the Spanish Inquisition. He promised them a big return on investment. So he wrote in glowing, desperate terms about all the gold, the gold mines, the riches of this land.

Columbus arrived in Spain in march 1493. The letter was in print in Barcelona (in Spanish) in April. It was in Latin in Rome in May. The Latin version made it around Europe, Antwerp, Paris etc before the year was out. And it got a lot of attention.
Now if no gold or silver had actually been found, that would have been a flash in the pan, forgotten like a Prester John letter. But it so happened that the Spanish that followed Columbus did find precious metals -vast amounts of them. (Enough to completely ruin Spains economy eventually). And not just that, they found it in states that were weak due to vast epidemics. So Spain realized a vast, unexpected profit from the venture. Much larger that the actual spice trade.

Those two things -Columbus desperate, viral missive about treasure, and the fact that treasure were found in even vaster amounts- totally changed Europes paradigm on faraway lands.

Suddenly they represented riches and personal advancement. That was when people really started to explore coastlines and go into the unknown, and everyone wanted in on it. That is when we get the notion of exploring something because it is out there.

Without those two things, Columbus massive PR campaign and the treasure coming to prove him right, Europes view of exploration and colonization would have changed slowly over time. Not right away, and maybe not so much.
 
The Portuguese actually had an approximate idea about the size of the earth. Columbus mistake about the distance involved was, as far as I know, unique to Columbus.

The whole notion that people would go screaming into the unknown like lemmings is a post-Columbus paradigm. Europeans knew about far-away lands for centuries. Vinland, Africa, Bjarmland, what have you. Unless there was something specific that they were looking for they were not interested. And for good reason, travel was not a safe option in those days, even if you knew where you were going.

But then, something changed. The Ottomans conquered Constantinople in 1453. And that meant the were squeezing the immensely profitable spice trade to India. And suddenly finding a way around the Ottomans to India was imperative.
That is why the Portuguese were going down Africa.
They had actually sent scouts through Egypt and Yemen to India and Ethiopia gathering information. They bumped into Brazil accidentally, driven the wrong way.

It is also why Columbus tried to find India by going west. He had a very wrong-headed idea about the size of the Earth and thought it was about 1/3rd as big as it actually is. If he had not encountered land, he would have run out of supplies and died far from India.

His mistake is why Native Americans are often known as "Indians".

But he did end up in the Caribbean. And like I said, he was bankrolled by the people who started the Spanish Inquisition. He promised them a big return on investment. So he wrote in glowing, desperate terms about all the gold, the gold mines, the riches of this land.

Columbus arrived in Spain in march 1493. The letter was in print in Barcelona (in Spanish) in April. It was in Latin in Rome in May. The Latin version made it around Europe, Antwerp, Paris etc before the year was out. And it got a lot of attention.
Now if no gold or silver had actually been found, that would have been a flash in the pan, forgotten like a Prester John letter. But it so happened that the Spanish that followed Columbus did find precious metals -vast amounts of them. (Enough to completely ruin Spains economy eventually). And not just that, they found it in states that were weak due to vast epidemics. So Spain realized a vast, unexpected profit from the venture. Much larger that the actual spice trade.

Those two things -Columbus desperate, viral missive about treasure, and the fact that treasure were found in even vaster amounts- totally changed Europes paradigm on faraway lands.

Suddenly they represented riches and personal advancement. That was when people really started to explore coastlines and go into the unknown, and everyone wanted in on it. That is when we get the notion of exploring something because it is out there.

Without those two things, Columbus massive PR campaign and the treasure coming to prove him right, Europes view of exploration and colonization would have changed slowly over time. Not right away, and maybe not so much.

This is repeated a lot here but doesn't really reflect modern academic writing on the topic. For example, see The Portuguese in India by M.N. Pearson pages 6-7:

History writing always reflects prevailing needs and moods. Consequently, in the period between 1955 and 1985 the Portuguese discoveries have often been explained in almost purely economic terms. Several things do seem to be clear. In the early fifteenth century Portuguese expansion was in large part a search for food, for Portugal was always a grain importer. Hence the settlement of the Azores and Madeira, and the rapid expansion of cereal and sugar production there. Hence also large-scale grain production in the Portuguese enclaves in North Africa. The search for new fishing grounds, when successful, especially in the north Atlantic, provided not only protein but also maritime training. But political imperatives also played a part. In Portugal, as elsewhere in Europe, seigneurial revenues were falling, and one escape from the 'crisis of feudalism' was to provide alternative outlets for bastards, younger sons, and other disadvantaged nobles. Such people received land on feudal terms in the Atlantic islands, and could gain glory, even knighthoods, righting on the North African frontier.

Once started, the expansion fed on itself. As trade developed gold was needed; from the 1450s it came back in considerable quantities from West Africa. As sugar production expanded labour was needed; West Africa turned out to be a prime source of slaves and these flooded into the islands and metropolitan Portugal after 1443. But, ironically, one product not in short supply was spices, which of course became the leit-motif of the sixteenth-century empire. Until the 1470s there was no quest for Asian spices, for fifteenth-century Europe was well provided for by the traditional route through the Red Sea, to Alexandria and so to Venice.

The role of different social groups in Portugal in this expansion has been much debated. There is evidence, though this is a matter in dispute, that the rise of the Ottoman Turks in the eastern Mediterranean in the fifteenth century blocked some traditional Genoese investment areas. To compensate, great Genoese bankers turned to Portugal, and their investments provided some of the impetus and capital needed to finance the discoveries. The role of the peasantry is also controversial. Some historians have pointed to a population increase in the fifteenth century to compensate for the ravages of the Black Death; the expansion overseas was then necessary to provide a safety-valve. This however seems less convincing. Fifteenth-century Portugal was certainly a small and ppor country, yet with a population of less than one million any surplus rural population was easily absorbed in the towns. It does seem clear that this urban migration weakened further the power of the nobles on their landed estates. The nobility in fact suffered not only from a labour shortage but also from a comparatively disadvantageous position vis-a-vis the monarchy, the House of Aviz which ruled Portugal from 1385 to 1580. This royal domination, which in part reflected changing economic and social forces in Portugal itself, was also a result of events in 1385. In this year the Portuguese king beat off a Castilian attack, so establishing his new dynasty. Most of his nobles had sided with the foreigners, and were either executed or exiled for their bad choice. The Portuguese nobility were thus facing crises both in their positions in the countryside and in their unusual subservience to the monarchy. The latter was forcefully brought home to them in 1484, when an over-mighty noble, in fact the top noble, the Duke of Braganga, was executed for treason. Expansion, new lands and new paths to glory had an obvious, even if atavistic, appeal.

So spices seemed to have been a motivation very late in the game and the Ottomans don't seem to have had much to do with it.
 
EDIT: The Portugese were going down to Angola because like Colombus they were looking for a sea-route to India, and unlike him they had a good idea about the size of the earth. So they tried the much more reasonable circumnavigation of Africa. I expect they were aware of Hanno the Navigators writings. They succeeded in 1497. They were not just randomly exploring for the sake of it. They were aiming for a payoff.

And I think you underestimate just how GOOD Columbus was in publishing his bullshit. Yes, other explorers could try the same thing, but Columbus was enormously good at that.

Also, Clombus motivation was pretty unique: He had talked the bosses of the Spanish Inquisition into bankrolling him on the promise of vast riches. He really, really needed to show that he was coming through.
Do you not know about the reply tag or are you intentionally trying to avoid me?

a) Yes the Portugese were looking for a route to India, mapping every nook and cranny along the way and not just potential trade posts or way stations. I think you are down playing the fact that there was genuine curiosity at play as well.

b) Columbus was not the only guy to do this, see Cartier trying to pass off quartz as diamonds.

The also bump into Brazil, but I cannot imagine what would keep them coming back
Brazilwood.
 
During the 1490s Spain was still involved in troubles with Granada and the Canaries and the timing of Colombus plus his relatively bad hand at negotiating do make his whole ordeal lucky, but if the Portuguese discover the Americas and it leaks(be it immediately or a decade) you'd bet Spain would send expeditions, heck even England was able to participate in sending some explorers despite sending him in places effectively unexplored and unknown, this convinces me that if the Portuguese discover the Brazil, then the Spanish would send another expedition West with confirmation of there being land, especially considering Spain was far richer than England, had better trade winds and outposts in the area and also for their rivalry with the Portuguese.

I don't think the early gold rush not happening would delay things that much, Spain expanded in this time in the Canarias despite not particularly having a reason to do so and the reconquista pushed them to being involved oversea as well, plus Columbus bullshit-talk was counterweighted by the heavy demands he levied on the Spanish and his megalomanic attitude in the colonies(and his failures), in my view though such a universe would possibly have Portugal have a headstart in the colonies, awarding them some of the Caribbeans but I imagine they still would be focused on Africa and India; other European powers could participate as well, but I don't think the early 16th century would be a good time for much oversea expansion for non-Atlantic powers, at best France could.
 
The conquest of Tawantisuya (Peru) seems to validate this point of view. If remember correctly, Pizzaro had to work with two Natives he had captured near the coast of Peru in an earlier expedition. They had learned basic Spanish, they did not seem to be as smart as Malinche, and probably did not master the subtleties of Quichua courtly speach. That did not stop him from trapping the leader of the Incas, capturing him and forcing him to order his generals to surrender (there where rebellions later, but by then the basic cities had been captured and were firmly in Spanish hands).

In fact, the whole conquest of Peru seems like a cruder version of the conquest of Mexico. Whereas Cortes seems more subtle in making alliances, and wrote letters justifying his acts, Pizzarro had not learned to read or write, and was just concerned with "capturing the boss" in order to force him to give him his gold.

The fact that there had just been a civil war helped him, and the fact he had two translators (even if simple ones) also did. But its success makes me wonder if "dumber" Cortes, with less "luck", would not have been able tostill conquer Mexico. Maybe they woul not, since Mexico might have been more populated and more used to war than the Tawantisuya. But it is something I wonder.

I'm quite sure that the Spaniards would sooner or later find or take someone that knows Nahuatl and teach him Spanish, it isn't rocket science. The Malinche was only useful in translating Mayan to Nahuatl first but then she learned Spanish, those 2 "incidents" are easily repeatable by literally just taking(by force, coercion or trade) someone from the area.
 
The conquest of Tawantisuya (Peru) seems to validate this point of view. If remember correctly, Pizzaro had to work with two Natives he had captured near the coast of Peru in an earlier expedition. They had learned basic Spanish, they did not seem to be as smart as Malinche, and probably did not master the subtleties of Quichua courtly speach. That did not stop him from trapping the leader of the Incas, capturing him and forcing him to order his generals to surrender (there where rebellions later, but by then the basic cities had been captured and were firmly in Spanish hands).

In fact, the whole conquest of Peru seems like a cruder version of the conquest of Mexico. Whereas Cortes seems more subtle in making alliances, and wrote letters justifying his acts, Pizzarro had not learned to read or write, and was just concerned with "capturing the boss" in order to force him to give him his gold.

The fact that there had just been a civil war helped him, and the fact he had two translators (even if simple ones) also did. But its success makes me wonder if "dumber" Cortes, with less "luck", would not have been able tostill conquer Mexico. Maybe they woul not, since Mexico might have been more populated and more used to war than the Tawantisuya. But it is something I wonder.
It seems like if you told about the 2 conquest without mentioning that one happened after the other people would reverse the order.
 
The conquest of Tawantisuya (Peru) seems to validate this point of view. If remember correctly, Pizzaro had to work with two Natives he had captured near the coast of Peru in an earlier expedition. They had learned basic Spanish, they did not seem to be as smart as Malinche, and probably did not master the subtleties of Quichua courtly speach.

The difference is that Quechua, as spoken by commoners and the elite, was mutually comprehensible, sort of like the difference between Received Pronunciation and London English.

Nahuatl courtly speech is roughly the equivalent of Pig Latin. If you aren't trained in how to interpret it, it may as well be a foreign language. There was no such register in Quechua. There were also several other differences in the two conquests that make me wary of drawing direct comparisons.

Malinche wasn't high nobility as far as I know, and the Spaniards surely would be able to find some nobles in their way, even if not immediately or in first expedition(that doesn't even have to be of military nature like IOTL).

It doesn't matter if it takes a couple of years(irrealistic even for adults), the point is that it isn't insourmontable, neither for the Spanish or Nahuatl allies/captives.

I don't know which sources you used, but I would be highly skeptical of a man in his 20s unable to learn a language after 8 years of being able to speak only in that language(as he and another man were the sole Spaniards in that tribe), it could be simply down to regional differences as he lived on another part of the Peninsula.

We don't know if Malinche was high nobility because we don't know anything for certain about her life before being purchased by the Spanish. Anyway while it is still possible for the Spanish to acquire interpreters at some point, it definitely wouldn't be as fast as OTL. Which is important, because Cortes's conquest of the Aztecs occurred because he was able to gather intelligence using Malinche and Aguilar over a period of several months and then rapidly act on that intelligence and destabilize the empire. Just a slight delay timewise spent looking for interpreters or training new ones makes that strategy a lot less workable.
 
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The difference is that Quechua, as spoken by commoners and the elite, was mutually comprehensible. Nahuatl courtly speech is roughly the equivalent of Pig Latin. If you aren't trained in how to interpret it, it may as well be a foreign language. There was no such register in Quechua.
Can you send us some source so we might read on it? So far I'm not sure how that differs from speaking heavily polite and I'm not exactly sure how 20-24 year old Malinche knows that speech anyway(especially as she spend apparently considerable time in Maya territory), the whole thing doesn't ring consistent.
 
Can you send us some source so we might read on it? So far I'm not sure how that differs from speaking heavily polite and I'm not exactly sure how 20-24 year old Malinche knows that speech anyway(especially as she spend apparently considerable time in Maya territory), the whole thing doesn't ring consistent.

Look up "Rethinking Malinche" by Frances Karttunen. It does sound unusual that Malinche would speak lordly Nahuatl, but Frances Karttunen is considered to be an expert in Nahuatl linguistics, so I have confidence in her work. We're actually pretty certain from existing sources that Malinche did speak lordly Nahuatl, to the extent that some historians try to use it to piece together her life before becoming a slave (i.e. claiming she was of noble birth), although I think those claims are still a little tenuous.

The register of Nahuatl I'm referring to is called tecpillahtolli and it is well documented in literature, and the Mexica people themselves drew a sharp distinction between tecpillahtolli and macehuallahtolli, the register of commoners that non-nobility spoke.
 
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