How did the Spanish defeat the Aztecs and Incas?

How did the Spanish defeat the Aztecs and Incas?

Superior Weapons. Spanish weaponry was far superior to anything used by the Aztecs or Incas. Cortés and his men used over a dozen large portable guns, mainly for their shock value against the Aztecs. Even less sophisticated weapons like steel-edged swords, pikes and crossbows, gave Spaniards the upper hand.

How did the Spanish defeat the Aztecs?

Cortés’s army besieged Tenochtitlán for 93 days, and a combination of superior weaponry and a devastating smallpox outbreak enabled the Spanish to conquer the city. Cortés’s victory destroyed the Aztec empire, and the Spanish began to consolidate control over what became the colony of New Spain.

Who conquered the Mayans Aztecs and Incas?

Spanish
Both the Aztec and the Inca empires were conquered by Spanish conquistadors; the Aztec Empire was conquered by Cortés, and the Inca Empire was defeated by Pizarro.

How did the Spanish defeat the Inca so quickly?

In Europe, the advantage of handguns was that men could easily be trained to use them. In the New World, whose armies lacked the crossbows and longbows that preceded these guns, the arquebus was a hand weapon of unprecedented ranged power. All of these weapons were used to devastating effect in defeating the Incas.

What killed the Incas?

The spread of disease Influenza and smallpox were the main causes of death among the Inca population and it affected not only the working class but also the nobility.

What led to the destruction of the Aztecs and Incas?

Lacking food and ravaged by smallpox disease earlier introduced by one of the Spaniards, the Aztecs, now led by Cuauhtemoc, finally collapsed after 93 days of resistance on the fateful day of 13th of August, 1521 CE. Tenochtitlan was sacked and its monuments destroyed.

Why did the Spanish defeat the Aztecs so easily?

They found that the city’s society had crumpled. The Aztecs no longer trusted Montezuma, they were short on food, and the smallpox epidemic was under way. More than 3 million Aztecs died from smallpox, and with such a severely weakened population, it was easy for the Spanish to take Tenochtitlán.

Why did the Aztecs lose to the Spanish?

The overthrow of the Aztec Empire by Cortez and his expedition rests on three factors: The fragility of that empire, the tactical advantages of Spanish technology, and smallpox.

What destroyed the Mayans?

An enormous drought that swept across Mexico around 1,000 years ago triggered the demise of one of the world’s greatest ancient civilisations. Scientists studying the climate at the time of the ancient Maya found that rainfall fell by up to 70 per cent at the time the region’s city states were abandoned.

Who defeated the Mayans and Aztecs?

The Spanish conquered the Aztec, Incan and Mayan Empires in the first half of the 16th century, bringing all of the major civilizations of the…

How were the Incas defeated?

On November 16, 1532, Francisco Pizarro, the Spanish explorer and conquistador, springs a trap on the Incan emperor, Atahualpa. Pizarro’s men massacre the Incans and capture Atahualpa, forcing him to convert to Christianity before eventually killing him. …

What destroyed the Inca empire?

At its peak in the early fifteenth century, the Inca Empire consisted of approximately twelve million people and stretched from the northern border of Ecuador to central Chile. In 1532, the Spanish arrived and invaded Inca territory, setting off a genocide. By 1535, the empire was destroyed.