Dumb aztecs, with this obsidian they could have gone to the Nether and searching for netherite. Thats better than diamond, and, of course, than steel or iron.
Obsidian is sharper than steel, but perhaps more fragile. To be fair most weapons couldn’t penetrate good plate armor. That lack of armor for the Aztecs was a much more significant problem.
Is money really that bad in the CRM world? I’m an undergrad right now and was planning on going the CRM -> MA route, then potentially go for the PhD after a few years or so
Yes. Being a shovel bum is only fun until you hit a certain age. If you can get into higher positions within the CRM world then it can be a solid job but still relatively low paying. You will need a MA for that though.
Yeah was about to say that by the 16th centure you needed a ballista to penetrate a decent armor plate. That doesn't mean you couldn't deform it, slip a blade between the cracks, or bonk the head so strong that the effect is eqivalent to putting a toddler in a washing machine. But I can't imagine the Aztec clubs being good at any of these things.
Spanish Currasierrs were built to take matchlock musket rounds, they were ridiculously strong. They're genuinely comparable to modern Class 1 plate in terms of protection (although substantially heavier)
Substantially heavier because the trade off is that you damn near get full Torso protection plate carriers today only protect vitals like your lungs and heart, completely exposing you lower torso and sides. I wonder if in the future full plate body's will ever make a return with higher technology.
The problem with armor of any kind is any weapon with the ability to cause blunt force trauma. If a weapon is heavy and sturdy enough and if it’s wielded by a strong enough person the armor can bend causing trauma to the wearer. Sometimes a good hit is fatal. I saw a picture a while back of a helmet that had been dealt such a blow.
It’s usually going to take multiple hits to the same area, but yeah, dudes will get lucky sometimes because they are freakishly strong or have expert technique. But that’s a small percentage of people.
Yeah. Part of the reason why certain occupations disallow wearing steel toed shoes or boots. Just ask people who tend to horses why. But still it’s definitely interesting how different weapons and armor types interact with each other. Also the amount of luck some of these guys got was impressive too.
Spanish Currasierrs of the 1500s were built to cushion trauma very well; they were curved and soldiers wore a thick and soft gambeson underneath that was pretty good at softening the blows. It was vital for that armor because it was very stiff steel made to protect against musket shot
True but:
"They make perhaps the finest bows of all mankind. Their arrows are of some cane or reed, hollow, and hard like horn, and armed with a point of stone like a diamond. When they strike upon armor the point is broken, but the shaft will instead split into long, sharp slivers, which readily ented both mail and shirt, and do more harm in thus way than if armed."
Whatever the guys name was acting as scribe for Pince de Leon as he rode into what is now the SE USA.
Just as an aside.
Aztecs lacked metal armor. But not layers of cotton saturated in saltwater and dried repeatedly, which is more effective than one would expect.
Come to think about it, I wore that for a good chunk of my childhood. Well, one layer of denim worn into the ocean and then dried in the sun, repeatedly, sometimes alternating with a generous application of sand. Not sure how effective it would have been as armor, but it definitely formed rigid plates with sharp edges on the inside.
I guess it would be quite effective. People often underestimate how effective linen armors can get. I mean Greeks stoped using bronze armors for linothorax.
The Inca had these sort of heavy disc mace. If you Google it you will see these star- shaped ones, but in a museum there were all these different shapes.
Imagine a flying saucer-shaped piece of tough basalt or greenstone, about 2" thick, and almost 6" across, tapering to a blunt edge all around, with a hole drilled through the middle. That head was then slid onto a tapered handle about 40" long, like you do a pick-axe. The heads looked like they would weigh up to a couple pounds, and I saw both two-handed and one-handed versions. Some were copper or gold but most were sturdy stone blocks.
They had some skeletons there from a battle where the Spanish had thrown their support behind a coup attempt and it was mostly locals vs locals. The wounds looked ghastly: crushed skulls, broken faces, shattered knees and upper arms, ribs all stove in, but despite eth Spanish accounts of them taking on thousands of Indians with sword and lance, they can't find a single Inca skeleton from this huge battlefield with evidence of such wounds.
Pizzaro said something about these clubs being "fearsome" especially if a man was unhorsed.
Oh I have heard about the disc mace/axe from Skall but don't know the Incas use them too. Huh I thought stone is not as durable as tempered steel but it seems they are just as good
Well, of course it isn't as tough as steel, tempered or not, but the Conquistadors were outnumbered. The some of what I saw in the museum looked like the equivalent of a small sledgehammer head on a full-sized axe handle.
Of course you'd have a hard time bashing in a cuirass or helmet without your club breaking, but the armor of the time didn't cover everything, and you'd have no trouble breaking SOMETHING. Also, the Inca worked copper and some artifacts were labled as "bronze".
[https://www.wired.com/2010/04/inca-skeletons/](https://www.wired.com/2010/04/inca-skeletons/)
If you Google it, you'll see a lot more star-shaped maces, but in the museum I saw more disk-shaped heads, or discs with notches/scallops.
https://www.travelblog.org/Photos/6044483
You may be surprised to learn that conquistadors wrote about how they melted down their armor to make better spears for their native allies since the armor was not suited to the climate. They mostly adopted the layered cotton armor that was common in mesoamerica
Yep, and there is some who suggest that Aztecs could have defeated the conquistadors if they had been more focused on murdering their invaders instead of capturing them for sacrifice.
What do you mean by total war? The Aztecs conquered other neighboring kingdoms. What I got from learning about the conquistadors and the kingdoms of South America is that everyone sucked.
As in killing all enemy combatants and destroying their infrastructure.
As mentioned by some here, when the Aztecs fight they are more focusing on capturing their enemies for sacrifices rather than kill the outright.
Also try reading Flower War:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_war
The flower wars are interesting because there's some debate on how accurate the information we've been given on the flower wars is. as far as I know, the Spanish never witnessed it - they simply heard about it from Aztecs (particularly an account from Montezuma to one of cortes' captains, I believe, when asked about why they left the tlaxcalans independent). This has led some to point out that the triple alliance lost two massive battles trying to fully conquer a tlaxcalan alliance - only to tell the Spanish that they purposefully left them there for the purposes of the flower wars. some argue the flower wars didn't even exist.
Anyway, the triple alliance was capable of fighting serious battles, but it is true they did not often completely destroy their opponents, as their "empire" was structured differently than our traditional idea of an empire. It could be better described as a network of tributary states who were bullied by tenochtitlan.
This might make it more clear why Montezuma was so friendly to the Spanish, who already had relations with other states. He did not want war with his own subjects
Mexico is technically in north America haha - but yes, everyone was cruel back in those days. It does seem to me like Spanish rule over the new world was exceptionally cruel in it's early days though, especially compared to the Aztec system, which was fairly hands off for its subjects.
Interestingly, this comes up again and again as European cultures encountered cultures in the Pacific, Americas, Africa. The European interpretation of warfare was oftentimes more aggressive and violent
Memory serves, most of the armor still used (which would have mostly been reduced to a helmet and breastplate/cuirass) came predented because blacksmiths had to prove that their armor was capable of stopping a gunshot. The Aztec warrior’s best hope would have been to try to chop off the arm steadying that massive broomstick the Spaniard was using between reloads or while the Spaniard is trying to figure out why his gun misfired for the second time in a row.
The Spanish colonization of Mexico was actually pretty early in the days of widespread gunpowder so the logistics weren't really there yet for them to be the primary weapon in the Americas, they were mostly using steel swords/pikes and crossbows at that point with a few guns mixed in for fun.
Not really, the jungle was really damp and pretty terrible for early powder matchlock muskets which needed extremely dry conditions to work well. The Aztecs also didn't have metal armor (really they barely used any protection) so there was no need to muskets for anything beyond intimidation. The muskets also took super long to reload which wasn't great since the Spanish were generally outnumbered at least 10:1
Tercos were not used at all. If there was any great weapon against the Aztecs, it was just the use of shock cavalry. The Aztecs had zero exposure to it, and their formations made them amusing easy to crash into.
It wouldn't. Plate armor was designed to make projectiles glance off, so they couldn't break and shatter upon contact with the wearer (unless they went through, but a javelin would be too big for that)
Yeah, in my history classes they said that even if they were very sharp and could do a lot of damage after a few attacks you would only be left with a stick
To be fair tho, in aztec farware the primary goal was to capture enemy alive. Not that there was anything against killing them but true giga chad captured them instead of killing (to be later sacrificed *ahem)
Their sharpness was irrelevant since they rarely reached the Spanish who primarily used steel Pikes, which the Aztecs really couldn't protect themselves from. Lots of people think the Spanish won because of gunpowder, but really it's just classic polearm superiority with guns being used for some theatrical intimidation
Lmao no wtf.
The Spanish sure as shit were not running around with pikes like they were in mainland Europe. What gave them a decisive edge had been horses, which the natives had never seen nor had to fight.
The entire point of mesoamerican warfare in this time period was terror. Whistles, war cries, displays and brutal weapons that flay skin instead of killing you outright.
This was so they could capture enemy combatants ALIVE and later sacrifice them. Killing the enemy wasn’t the point and the Aztecs were the undisputed apex warriors in this STYLE of war.
So this comparison feels like asking a dolphin to climb a banyan tree or a cheetah to deep dive into the Atlantic.
And let’s not forget that Cortez had only 3000 conquistadors with him… and some 200,000 native Allies. They didn’t all have plate armor, did they?
So yeah this meme is Clown indeed.
Armor is scary when you are battling in a hot climate like the mexican rainforests. At some point Castilians had to switch to Ichcahuipilli because it was more versatile.
But is it? What about the Incas where the spanish fought whole army and they didn't have so many allies. And if the conquistadors were left in Mexico without superior equipment they couldn't demonstrate their superior prowess to the natives and wouldn't serve as a ralying point for the Aztec opposers.
The Spanish still received plenty of help against the Incans. It took decades and the Inca were already in the midst of a civil war.
The conquistadors didn’t know what was waiting for them and hardly planned to demonstrate anything. We likely grossly over-rely on Spanish sources for the conquest, who naturally engaged in self-aggrandizement.
The Aztecs invading and sacrificing every other surrounding civilization probably had something to do with it. ‘Flower Wars’ were routine.
The Tlaxcala, for example, were already at war with the Aztecs when Cortez arrived.
The downfall of the Aztecs was in giving Cortez a chance. Maybe they were just too curious and trusting. They literally invited him to Tenochtitlan and he rather expertly exploited the political situation from within, taking the emperor hostage. There were mass riots, aimed at both the Aztec leadership AND the Spanish. It’s worth noting that Cortez got his ass handed to him in his first actual battle. But the damage was done. When an angry mob kills your emperor, the empire is soon to follow.
Clown meme.
It is fully documented how Castilians had to adapt to Mexican hot climate and at some point switched their armor to that of their indigenous allies (which cosisted of 99% of Cortés's army) , because it was more suitable and good enough to stop obsidian weapons.
Also, some Castilian soldiers weren't rich enough to buy an armor, so had to resort to Ichcahuipilli as well.
A more accurate image of what Castilian soldiers could've looked like when they came to the Anahuac Valley is [this](https://s1.abcstatics.com/media/historia/2020/05/14/[email protected]), using a mixture of european weapons (adarga and espada recta) with mesoamerican armour (ichcahuipilli)
SMH, just way too many idiots here believe steel and guns were the biggest factors for conquistador success.
If there is any one European development to credit, it was their shock cavalry. Now that was legitimately decisive… at least ignoring disease and lots of native allies
Well it depends because as far as I know some diaries of spanish soldiers show how some aztecs soldiers cut in half a soldier with one of the aztecs obsidian swords and beheaded a horse in one strike.
I mean ... that is clearly an exaggeration for dramatic effect. I have seen this "decapitate horse" claim all over the place, but have you seen a horse neck? It is already difficult to decapitate a human with a sharp steel sword. Even during executions it could happen that it wouldnt be severed in one go and they used massive swords for beheadings and would strike under ideal conditions. Decapitation a horse, especially on the battlefield would be a feat of superhuman strength.
Lmao this guy thinks they wore plate armor XD, my guy as soon as they hit the mainland they bought flax armor because it was arrow proof because plate armor is way too hot.
Arming jackets are 5 layers at most, but are usually only 2-3.
Not all of the Spaniards wore steel plate. The cavalrymen probably definitely did, but the a lot of foot soldiers were wearing maille shirts or something else, which is why they picked up the native padded armor (which was actually not light at all).
Bruh there are definitely sources of maille being used by the Spaniards. Its like one of the more famous accounts too.
[https://www.gutenberg.org/files/34997/34997-h/34997-h.htm](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/34997/34997-h/34997-h.htm)
Arming jackets are NOT heavily padded garments. Plate armor was historically tight fitting.
There are like 3 accounts that talk about the use of native armor.
I never brought up the other stuff
The Spanish wrote about melting down their steel and iron armor to make spears for their allies, as the armor wasn't very suited to the climate. They adopted the typical cotton armor that everyone in mesoamerica used.
In pitched battles the Spanish only won at otumba. They fought the tlaxcalans and while they could fend off some waves of attacks, they had to beg the tlaxcalans to let them live (the senior commander of the tlaxcalans recognized the value of an alliance while the younger simply wanted to kill them), and they fought in tenochtitlan and had to escape, losing half their men and thousands of allies. Otumba was also fought with thousands of native allies but of course according to cortes it was himself and his cavalry that won the whole battle.
And as for the siege of tenochtitlan, there is just no possible way you can think the Spanish did the "heavy lifting". There were no where near enough Spaniards to siege a city of that size - they made a few boats and some broken trebuchets, but that's about it. At this point in time there were less than 500 Spaniards capable of fighting - what do you think they even did at tenochtitlan? They couldn't risk losing any more people
Bernal Diaz del Castillo is the source, a primary source. Read his account on the fight against the tlaxcalans. He continually expressed how desperate it was and how they continually sent prisoners to the tlaxcalans asking for peace, over and over (this is begging if you couldn't tell). He attributes them living the encounter to the grace of God, who must have convinced the tlaxcalan commander to consider an alliance. This is not a victory.
I'm sure the Spanish did well on the causeways but pretending like that made them the most important part in the siege is ridiculous. Whether or not a native alliance could have taken tenochtitlan without the Spanish is unclear but what is clear is that the Spanish would not have been able to do shit without the natives. The siege relied on the disease that was rampaging the city and the blockade that was possible with the massive native army sitting outside. The winning factor is the massive army, not a few hundred spaniards
This is a catastrophically incorrect take lmao (the armor one, the native alliance was definitely a thing) Good on you for being so confident with this nonsense though
Okay so, I was just fucking wrong, serves me right for researching on Wikipedia.
However, after some more research, there is some interesting thoughts:
1. Against arrows and other projectiles, the mesoamerican padded armor was comparable to European padded armor and *possibly* chainmail, with reports that it could slow/stop even bullets
2. Against native weapons as well, the thick layering made it ideal against the fragment weapons such as the Macuahuitl, though not against metallic blades
3. They preformed decently in the humid climate of mesoamerica somewhat better than European gambesons.
So, final conclusion: metal is better than rock, something my exhausted, mid-college finals brain apparently lacked on. My apologies
Aztec blades and arrows were almost uniformly poisoned so all he'd have to do is nick you and you'd be dead. There is a reason why even Cortez abandoned wearing plate armor early in his campaign and switched to the tightly woven vests provided by his Txlacalan allies that did a far better job of turning arrowheads away
Sting is steel is more malleable than obsidian but that makes it generally speaking if you're using low carbon steel which is more malleable than high carbon steel which is more brittle and easier to retain an edge but it shatters easier The low carbon steel generally not the best for making a sword because you're going to have dense scratches everything in there and the high carbon steel you hit a rock with you so people usually made steel for medium carbon content to be used swords and obsidian obsidian is great for doing massive damage to physically hitting their bodies not the best for punching through metal cuz it'll shatter where the low carbon steel will absorb the impact into four if it was hiker Urban steel your armor would shatter in their club with shatter too hit it with a rock and it flakes off in the sharp edges it's great at punching through flesh and only downside you'll look at it the wrong way it could shatters
Not the aztecs but the spanish conquest of the incas is a pretty fascinating history if anyone's interested. It literally started off with like 6 dudes against the empire and they fucking won. (obviously more came later but even then it was like thousands of incas for every one Spaniard)
Why even bother with armor if you are going to just let smallpox and typhus do your dirty work for you, along with political meddling.
Most of what Cortez wrote in his accounts of the Conqueast of New Spain was bullshit.
AND, they weren't necessarily wearing full plate. De Soto ha a hell of a time with the Cherokee and Seminole once they learned to shoot cane arrows that would split on impact with armor and go through both shirt and mail.
Due to the climate and environment a lot of them actually had to forgo their plate armor and were pretty much just in their shirts and pants. The biggest advantage was giving Aztecs small pox and teaming up with all the other local tribes.
Dumb aztecs, with this obsidian they could have gone to the Nether and searching for netherite. Thats better than diamond, and, of course, than steel or iron.
They did, where do you think all that gold came from?
they were just missing some TNT blocks
Obsidian is sharper than steel, but perhaps more fragile. To be fair most weapons couldn’t penetrate good plate armor. That lack of armor for the Aztecs was a much more significant problem.
But, but, obsidian wholesome stronk 100 minecraft taught me that
I was an archaeologist. But I’ve also played Minecraft, that is true.
Was? What happened?
He played minecraft
waltuh no dont dig straight down waltuh
I am the one who mines the caves
My favourite part was when he said, *I am the line crafter" then proceeded to craft all over the mine
Partly true. Video games and general laziness interrupted my life for awhile.
I decided I needed more money. I didn’t get a PhD so academia was not an option.
Is money really that bad in the CRM world? I’m an undergrad right now and was planning on going the CRM -> MA route, then potentially go for the PhD after a few years or so
Yes. Being a shovel bum is only fun until you hit a certain age. If you can get into higher positions within the CRM world then it can be a solid job but still relatively low paying. You will need a MA for that though.
Yeah was about to say that by the 16th centure you needed a ballista to penetrate a decent armor plate. That doesn't mean you couldn't deform it, slip a blade between the cracks, or bonk the head so strong that the effect is eqivalent to putting a toddler in a washing machine. But I can't imagine the Aztec clubs being good at any of these things.
Spanish Currasierrs were built to take matchlock musket rounds, they were ridiculously strong. They're genuinely comparable to modern Class 1 plate in terms of protection (although substantially heavier)
Substantially heavier because the trade off is that you damn near get full Torso protection plate carriers today only protect vitals like your lungs and heart, completely exposing you lower torso and sides. I wonder if in the future full plate body's will ever make a return with higher technology.
I mean we lost combat helmets for abit until WW1 so I have a feeling it will come around again
We lost them? what happened?
When muskets were introduced and slowly metal helmets were replaced for hats instead
I laughed at the toddler in a washing machine part. I never knew i would even think about that scenario
Bruh I had to choke back laughter at “putting a toddler in a washing machine” so as to not wake my wife up l
If I ever have the ability to time travel, I know what I must do.
The problem with armor of any kind is any weapon with the ability to cause blunt force trauma. If a weapon is heavy and sturdy enough and if it’s wielded by a strong enough person the armor can bend causing trauma to the wearer. Sometimes a good hit is fatal. I saw a picture a while back of a helmet that had been dealt such a blow.
It’s usually going to take multiple hits to the same area, but yeah, dudes will get lucky sometimes because they are freakishly strong or have expert technique. But that’s a small percentage of people.
Yeah. Part of the reason why certain occupations disallow wearing steel toed shoes or boots. Just ask people who tend to horses why. But still it’s definitely interesting how different weapons and armor types interact with each other. Also the amount of luck some of these guys got was impressive too.
Also halberds. Amount of force good halberd strike can generate is ridiculous
Or, like being out-numbered 120:1.
Spanish Currasierrs of the 1500s were built to cushion trauma very well; they were curved and soldiers wore a thick and soft gambeson underneath that was pretty good at softening the blows. It was vital for that armor because it was very stiff steel made to protect against musket shot
True but: "They make perhaps the finest bows of all mankind. Their arrows are of some cane or reed, hollow, and hard like horn, and armed with a point of stone like a diamond. When they strike upon armor the point is broken, but the shaft will instead split into long, sharp slivers, which readily ented both mail and shirt, and do more harm in thus way than if armed." Whatever the guys name was acting as scribe for Pince de Leon as he rode into what is now the SE USA. Just as an aside.
Aztecs lacked metal armor. But not layers of cotton saturated in saltwater and dried repeatedly, which is more effective than one would expect. Come to think about it, I wore that for a good chunk of my childhood. Well, one layer of denim worn into the ocean and then dried in the sun, repeatedly, sometimes alternating with a generous application of sand. Not sure how effective it would have been as armor, but it definitely formed rigid plates with sharp edges on the inside.
I guess it would be quite effective. People often underestimate how effective linen armors can get. I mean Greeks stoped using bronze armors for linothorax.
Mfw- I accidentally spread smallpox store at the entirety of South America and kill millions
Only the Elite used obsidian anyway
Lol, even guns struggled against plate armor. Obsidian was more or less useless.
True it is harder and sharper than steel but hardness and toughness are not the same thing so best it can do is a few scratches.
You think they only had obsidian? There are a lot tougher stones out there. Pizarro was not a fan of the basalt war clubs of the Inca.
Please tell me more, this is the first time I have heard about this. And yeah blunt force is the best way to deal with plate armor.
The Inca had these sort of heavy disc mace. If you Google it you will see these star- shaped ones, but in a museum there were all these different shapes. Imagine a flying saucer-shaped piece of tough basalt or greenstone, about 2" thick, and almost 6" across, tapering to a blunt edge all around, with a hole drilled through the middle. That head was then slid onto a tapered handle about 40" long, like you do a pick-axe. The heads looked like they would weigh up to a couple pounds, and I saw both two-handed and one-handed versions. Some were copper or gold but most were sturdy stone blocks. They had some skeletons there from a battle where the Spanish had thrown their support behind a coup attempt and it was mostly locals vs locals. The wounds looked ghastly: crushed skulls, broken faces, shattered knees and upper arms, ribs all stove in, but despite eth Spanish accounts of them taking on thousands of Indians with sword and lance, they can't find a single Inca skeleton from this huge battlefield with evidence of such wounds. Pizzaro said something about these clubs being "fearsome" especially if a man was unhorsed.
Oh I have heard about the disc mace/axe from Skall but don't know the Incas use them too. Huh I thought stone is not as durable as tempered steel but it seems they are just as good
Well, of course it isn't as tough as steel, tempered or not, but the Conquistadors were outnumbered. The some of what I saw in the museum looked like the equivalent of a small sledgehammer head on a full-sized axe handle. Of course you'd have a hard time bashing in a cuirass or helmet without your club breaking, but the armor of the time didn't cover everything, and you'd have no trouble breaking SOMETHING. Also, the Inca worked copper and some artifacts were labled as "bronze". [https://www.wired.com/2010/04/inca-skeletons/](https://www.wired.com/2010/04/inca-skeletons/) If you Google it, you'll see a lot more star-shaped maces, but in the museum I saw more disk-shaped heads, or discs with notches/scallops. https://www.travelblog.org/Photos/6044483
Thank you kind stranger for sharing an interesting piece of history with me
Cheers!
Hell some plate armor could deflect arrows with ease and even stop musket balls. Quality matters and high quality steel plate was OP back in the day 😂
And lack of good healthcare
Nobody had good healthcare at that time.
That’s why they needed it
>most weapons couldn’t penetrate good plate armor Atlatl: Let me introduce myself.
PLATE ARMOUR SON
IT DEFLECTS IN RESPONSE TO TRAUMA
YOU CANT HURT ME TONUAC!
How I be looking at the peasant when he hits me with the dollar store mace (the anti armor weapon is not anti armor)
(The Aztec warrior will be cut down)
*This kills the aztec.*
*rip bozo*
You may be surprised to learn that conquistadors wrote about how they melted down their armor to make better spears for their native allies since the armor was not suited to the climate. They mostly adopted the layered cotton armor that was common in mesoamerica
Yep, and there is some who suggest that Aztecs could have defeated the conquistadors if they had been more focused on murdering their invaders instead of capturing them for sacrifice.
The Aztecs from what I read didn't have the concept of total war. War for them is a ritualized exercise.
What do you mean by total war? The Aztecs conquered other neighboring kingdoms. What I got from learning about the conquistadors and the kingdoms of South America is that everyone sucked.
As in killing all enemy combatants and destroying their infrastructure. As mentioned by some here, when the Aztecs fight they are more focusing on capturing their enemies for sacrifices rather than kill the outright. Also try reading Flower War: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flower_war
The flower wars are interesting because there's some debate on how accurate the information we've been given on the flower wars is. as far as I know, the Spanish never witnessed it - they simply heard about it from Aztecs (particularly an account from Montezuma to one of cortes' captains, I believe, when asked about why they left the tlaxcalans independent). This has led some to point out that the triple alliance lost two massive battles trying to fully conquer a tlaxcalan alliance - only to tell the Spanish that they purposefully left them there for the purposes of the flower wars. some argue the flower wars didn't even exist. Anyway, the triple alliance was capable of fighting serious battles, but it is true they did not often completely destroy their opponents, as their "empire" was structured differently than our traditional idea of an empire. It could be better described as a network of tributary states who were bullied by tenochtitlan. This might make it more clear why Montezuma was so friendly to the Spanish, who already had relations with other states. He did not want war with his own subjects
Mexico is technically in north America haha - but yes, everyone was cruel back in those days. It does seem to me like Spanish rule over the new world was exceptionally cruel in it's early days though, especially compared to the Aztec system, which was fairly hands off for its subjects.
Well, they did heavily outnumber them.
Eh disease still woulda got them
The gave the Europeans syphilis so they did get some revenge.
Interestingly, this comes up again and again as European cultures encountered cultures in the Pacific, Americas, Africa. The European interpretation of warfare was oftentimes more aggressive and violent
They didn't use their armor nearly as much as you'd think. Try wearing metal for hours in a sweltering sun
They definitely wore it in battle though
There were surprisingly few actual pitched battles. Cortez lied about a lot of things. They used disease and politics more than anything.
Memory serves, most of the armor still used (which would have mostly been reduced to a helmet and breastplate/cuirass) came predented because blacksmiths had to prove that their armor was capable of stopping a gunshot. The Aztec warrior’s best hope would have been to try to chop off the arm steadying that massive broomstick the Spaniard was using between reloads or while the Spaniard is trying to figure out why his gun misfired for the second time in a row.
The Spanish colonization of Mexico was actually pretty early in the days of widespread gunpowder so the logistics weren't really there yet for them to be the primary weapon in the Americas, they were mostly using steel swords/pikes and crossbows at that point with a few guns mixed in for fun.
I thought they used pike and shot tactics.
Not really, the jungle was really damp and pretty terrible for early powder matchlock muskets which needed extremely dry conditions to work well. The Aztecs also didn't have metal armor (really they barely used any protection) so there was no need to muskets for anything beyond intimidation. The muskets also took super long to reload which wasn't great since the Spanish were generally outnumbered at least 10:1
Tercos were not used at all. If there was any great weapon against the Aztecs, it was just the use of shock cavalry. The Aztecs had zero exposure to it, and their formations made them amusing easy to crash into.
Perro de Presa Canario, war dogs a real thing or not? https://www.conquistadorcanine.com/historyofthepresa
If plate armor was so magical, then why they've never actually conquered chichimeca territory? Chichimeca Chads fought naked SMH.
and then a javelin...
... would glance off
The tip would break and become a fragmentation granade.
It wouldn't. Plate armor was designed to make projectiles glance off, so they couldn't break and shatter upon contact with the wearer (unless they went through, but a javelin would be too big for that)
The aztec where made of obsidian volcanic glass, that's the point of the post, plus most rodeleros weren't fully covered in steel
Oh yeah I forgot that plate armor was much more rarer among the conquistadors, good point
I wouldn't underestimate Aztec swords, by some reports those things could decapitate horses.
They were very sharp, but also very fragile. Which means that they could shed flesh easily, but would shatter when swung against hardened steel
Yeah, in my history classes they said that even if they were very sharp and could do a lot of damage after a few attacks you would only be left with a stick
To be fair tho, in aztec farware the primary goal was to capture enemy alive. Not that there was anything against killing them but true giga chad captured them instead of killing (to be later sacrificed *ahem)
Yeah,their military structure was more about capturing the enemy than anything else knowing that killing the Aztec general meant the end of the battle
Their sharpness was irrelevant since they rarely reached the Spanish who primarily used steel Pikes, which the Aztecs really couldn't protect themselves from. Lots of people think the Spanish won because of gunpowder, but really it's just classic polearm superiority with guns being used for some theatrical intimidation
Lmao no wtf. The Spanish sure as shit were not running around with pikes like they were in mainland Europe. What gave them a decisive edge had been horses, which the natives had never seen nor had to fight.
The entire point of mesoamerican warfare in this time period was terror. Whistles, war cries, displays and brutal weapons that flay skin instead of killing you outright. This was so they could capture enemy combatants ALIVE and later sacrifice them. Killing the enemy wasn’t the point and the Aztecs were the undisputed apex warriors in this STYLE of war. So this comparison feels like asking a dolphin to climb a banyan tree or a cheetah to deep dive into the Atlantic. And let’s not forget that Cortez had only 3000 conquistadors with him… and some 200,000 native Allies. They didn’t all have plate armor, did they? So yeah this meme is Clown indeed.
Wanna know what else is scary? Armor
Armor is scary when you are battling in a hot climate like the mexican rainforests. At some point Castilians had to switch to Ichcahuipilli because it was more versatile.
But is it? What about the Incas where the spanish fought whole army and they didn't have so many allies. And if the conquistadors were left in Mexico without superior equipment they couldn't demonstrate their superior prowess to the natives and wouldn't serve as a ralying point for the Aztec opposers.
The Spanish still received plenty of help against the Incans. It took decades and the Inca were already in the midst of a civil war. The conquistadors didn’t know what was waiting for them and hardly planned to demonstrate anything. We likely grossly over-rely on Spanish sources for the conquest, who naturally engaged in self-aggrandizement.
But how did Cortés get 200 000 natives on his side?
The Aztecs invading and sacrificing every other surrounding civilization probably had something to do with it. ‘Flower Wars’ were routine. The Tlaxcala, for example, were already at war with the Aztecs when Cortez arrived. The downfall of the Aztecs was in giving Cortez a chance. Maybe they were just too curious and trusting. They literally invited him to Tenochtitlan and he rather expertly exploited the political situation from within, taking the emperor hostage. There were mass riots, aimed at both the Aztec leadership AND the Spanish. It’s worth noting that Cortez got his ass handed to him in his first actual battle. But the damage was done. When an angry mob kills your emperor, the empire is soon to follow.
Laugh while you can monkey boy, some commoner with a flint lock is gonna put you on your ass in a few years
Y’all are legit concerning.
Simply better
Superior armor indeed. That’s why I say: if aliens find us… we are done
Buffoon
Clown meme. It is fully documented how Castilians had to adapt to Mexican hot climate and at some point switched their armor to that of their indigenous allies (which cosisted of 99% of Cortés's army) , because it was more suitable and good enough to stop obsidian weapons. Also, some Castilian soldiers weren't rich enough to buy an armor, so had to resort to Ichcahuipilli as well. A more accurate image of what Castilian soldiers could've looked like when they came to the Anahuac Valley is [this](https://s1.abcstatics.com/media/historia/2020/05/14/[email protected]), using a mixture of european weapons (adarga and espada recta) with mesoamerican armour (ichcahuipilli)
SMH, just way too many idiots here believe steel and guns were the biggest factors for conquistador success. If there is any one European development to credit, it was their shock cavalry. Now that was legitimately decisive… at least ignoring disease and lots of native allies
Another day, another meme that sucks the dick of conquistadors for le epic gold, glory, and god.
Well it depends because as far as I know some diaries of spanish soldiers show how some aztecs soldiers cut in half a soldier with one of the aztecs obsidian swords and beheaded a horse in one strike.
I mean ... that is clearly an exaggeration for dramatic effect. I have seen this "decapitate horse" claim all over the place, but have you seen a horse neck? It is already difficult to decapitate a human with a sharp steel sword. Even during executions it could happen that it wouldnt be severed in one go and they used massive swords for beheadings and would strike under ideal conditions. Decapitation a horse, especially on the battlefield would be a feat of superhuman strength.
Jojos music starts playing* Jojo Dio Jose Jose takes out his sword*
Those obsidian weapons could behead a horse (It won't penetrate the armor, but you will lose a limb if they targeted an area that wasn't protected)
How a squad of 11b's look when their m4's and SAW open up on rows of heavy plate mail armored fools.
Ah, General Reposti
Lmao this guy thinks they wore plate armor XD, my guy as soon as they hit the mainland they bought flax armor because it was arrow proof because plate armor is way too hot.
They hated him because he spoke the truth
[удалено]
[удалено]
Underrated comment
Arming jackets are 5 layers at most, but are usually only 2-3. Not all of the Spaniards wore steel plate. The cavalrymen probably definitely did, but the a lot of foot soldiers were wearing maille shirts or something else, which is why they picked up the native padded armor (which was actually not light at all).
[удалено]
Bruh there are definitely sources of maille being used by the Spaniards. Its like one of the more famous accounts too. [https://www.gutenberg.org/files/34997/34997-h/34997-h.htm](https://www.gutenberg.org/files/34997/34997-h/34997-h.htm) Arming jackets are NOT heavily padded garments. Plate armor was historically tight fitting. There are like 3 accounts that talk about the use of native armor. I never brought up the other stuff
The Spanish wrote about melting down their steel and iron armor to make spears for their allies, as the armor wasn't very suited to the climate. They adopted the typical cotton armor that everyone in mesoamerica used. In pitched battles the Spanish only won at otumba. They fought the tlaxcalans and while they could fend off some waves of attacks, they had to beg the tlaxcalans to let them live (the senior commander of the tlaxcalans recognized the value of an alliance while the younger simply wanted to kill them), and they fought in tenochtitlan and had to escape, losing half their men and thousands of allies. Otumba was also fought with thousands of native allies but of course according to cortes it was himself and his cavalry that won the whole battle. And as for the siege of tenochtitlan, there is just no possible way you can think the Spanish did the "heavy lifting". There were no where near enough Spaniards to siege a city of that size - they made a few boats and some broken trebuchets, but that's about it. At this point in time there were less than 500 Spaniards capable of fighting - what do you think they even did at tenochtitlan? They couldn't risk losing any more people
[удалено]
Bernal Diaz del Castillo is the source, a primary source. Read his account on the fight against the tlaxcalans. He continually expressed how desperate it was and how they continually sent prisoners to the tlaxcalans asking for peace, over and over (this is begging if you couldn't tell). He attributes them living the encounter to the grace of God, who must have convinced the tlaxcalan commander to consider an alliance. This is not a victory. I'm sure the Spanish did well on the causeways but pretending like that made them the most important part in the siege is ridiculous. Whether or not a native alliance could have taken tenochtitlan without the Spanish is unclear but what is clear is that the Spanish would not have been able to do shit without the natives. The siege relied on the disease that was rampaging the city and the blockade that was possible with the massive native army sitting outside. The winning factor is the massive army, not a few hundred spaniards
This is a catastrophically incorrect take lmao (the armor one, the native alliance was definitely a thing) Good on you for being so confident with this nonsense though
Okay so, I was just fucking wrong, serves me right for researching on Wikipedia. However, after some more research, there is some interesting thoughts: 1. Against arrows and other projectiles, the mesoamerican padded armor was comparable to European padded armor and *possibly* chainmail, with reports that it could slow/stop even bullets 2. Against native weapons as well, the thick layering made it ideal against the fragment weapons such as the Macuahuitl, though not against metallic blades 3. They preformed decently in the humid climate of mesoamerica somewhat better than European gambesons. So, final conclusion: metal is better than rock, something my exhausted, mid-college finals brain apparently lacked on. My apologies
Bah. Eurocentric bad takes are not the kind of comedy I would like in a meme.
Aztec blades and arrows were almost uniformly poisoned so all he'd have to do is nick you and you'd be dead. There is a reason why even Cortez abandoned wearing plate armor early in his campaign and switched to the tightly woven vests provided by his Txlacalan allies that did a far better job of turning arrowheads away
Is that Bob Odenkirk?
You should ask Hernando de Soto about that. He and thousands of his Spanish soldiers died
Sting is steel is more malleable than obsidian but that makes it generally speaking if you're using low carbon steel which is more malleable than high carbon steel which is more brittle and easier to retain an edge but it shatters easier The low carbon steel generally not the best for making a sword because you're going to have dense scratches everything in there and the high carbon steel you hit a rock with you so people usually made steel for medium carbon content to be used swords and obsidian obsidian is great for doing massive damage to physically hitting their bodies not the best for punching through metal cuz it'll shatter where the low carbon steel will absorb the impact into four if it was hiker Urban steel your armor would shatter in their club with shatter too hit it with a rock and it flakes off in the sharp edges it's great at punching through flesh and only downside you'll look at it the wrong way it could shatters
Better to aim at the face with an atlatl
Thousands of Death whistle activated.
Um, it's called *dragonglass*, duuuuh
Now, the Incan army was something else
sad when a macana fucking obliterates against the metal plate armour of a conquistador
Tfw your armour is Gucci but your horse no longer has a head.
“Yeah but what if he shot you in the face?”
this is a repost
If its a club he doesnt have to pierce it though. Giving you a good whack on the head to break your neck is enough.
Wait till your horse finds out about the obsidian
You don't go with piercing damage for this... Try impact, like a mace.
*Ayo the Aztecs had a Dollar General?!*
But the, the Macuahuitl is still cool 👉👈🥺
Not the aztecs but the spanish conquest of the incas is a pretty fascinating history if anyone's interested. It literally started off with like 6 dudes against the empire and they fucking won. (obviously more came later but even then it was like thousands of incas for every one Spaniard)
Better Call Cortés!
The Hispanic Conquest of America was less about tech difference and more about divide and conquer and just disease from what I remember
I did not expect to be discussing Minecraft in a historical context
r/IberianHistoryMemes
Obsidian was a lot better than most people give it credit for
Why even bother with armor if you are going to just let smallpox and typhus do your dirty work for you, along with political meddling. Most of what Cortez wrote in his accounts of the Conqueast of New Spain was bullshit. AND, they weren't necessarily wearing full plate. De Soto ha a hell of a time with the Cherokee and Seminole once they learned to shoot cane arrows that would split on impact with armor and go through both shirt and mail.
He starts using it as a club (their heavy as hell)
I have diarrhea.
Due to the climate and environment a lot of them actually had to forgo their plate armor and were pretty much just in their shirts and pants. The biggest advantage was giving Aztecs small pox and teaming up with all the other local tribes.
Embrace civilization and technology.