History

Pre-Hispanic Civilizations

The earliest "Mexicans" were perhaps Stone Age hunter-gatherers coming from the north, descendants of a race that had crossed the Bering Strait and reached North America around 12,000 B.C. This is the prevailing theory, but there is a growing body of evidence that points to an earlier crossing of peoples from Asia to the New World. What we know for certain is that Mexico was populated by 10,000 B.C. Sometime between 5200 and 1500 B.C., they began practicing agriculture and domesticating animals.

The Olmecs & Maya: The Pre-Classic Period (1500 B.C.-A.D. 300) -- Eventually, agriculture improved to the point that it could provide enough food to support large communities and enough surplus to free some of the population from agricultural work. A civilization emerged that we call the Olmec -- an enigmatic people who settled the lower Gulf Coast in what is now Tabasco and Veracruz. Anthropologists regard them as the mother culture of Mesoamerica because they established a pattern for later civilizations in a wide area stretching from northern Mexico into Central America. The Olmec developed the basic calendar used throughout the region, established principles of urban layout and architecture, and originated the cult of the jaguar and the sacredness of jade. They may also have bequeathed the sacred ritual of "the ballgame" -- a universal element of Mesoamerican culture.

One intriguing feature of the Olmec was the carving of colossal stone heads, several of which you can admire today in the Parque Museo La Venta in Villahermosa, Tabasco. We still don't know what purposes these heads served, but they were immense projects; the basalt from which they were sculpted was mined miles inland and transported to the coast, probably by river rafts. The heads share a rounded, baby-faced look, marked by a peculiar, high-arched lip -- a "jaguar mouth" -- that is an identifying mark of Olmec sculpture.

The Maya civilization began developing in the pre-Classic period, around 500 B.C. Our understanding of this period is only sketchy, but Olmec influences are apparent everywhere. The Maya perfected the Olmec calendar and, somewhere along the way, developed their ornate system of hieroglyphic writing and their early architecture. Two other civilizations also began their rise to prominence around this time: the people of Teotihuacán, just north of present-day Mexico City, and the Zapotec of Monte Albán, in the valley of Oaxaca.

It's Just a Game -- The ancient Maya played a game with a solid rubber ball that held great importance for them. Go to any Maya city and you can view the ball courts where it was played (Bonampak being a rare exception). These are readily identifiable by their I-shaped layout with sloping walls in the center. The Maya weren't the only ones to play this game -- ball courts have been found as far south as Nicaragua and as far north as Arizona.

We know little about the details of the game or its rules. What we do know comes from ancient depictions of the game, early accounts by the Spanish, and from the Maya epic, the Popol Vuh. We know that the ball was heavy and could inflict injury. The players wore thick cloth padding and protective gear. They played in teams of between 2 and 10 members, and the object was to get the ball to pass through a stone ring or other goal using mainly the hips.

We also know that the game was part sport and part religious ritual that, at times, involved human sacrifice, but we're not sure who was sacrificed -- the winners, the losers, or perhaps prisoners of war who were allowed to play the game one last time before losing their heads. We know that the game was symbolically the affirmation of a cosmological belief system. In the Popol Vuh, the hero twins, Hunahpu and Xbalanque, challenge the lords of the underworld to a game, part of which they play with the head of one of the twins. Eventually the twins win the game and are allowed to return to the world of the living. Playing the game might have been one of the ways for cheating the underworld.

Teotihuacan, Monte Alban & Palenque: The Classic Period (A.D. 300-900) -- The rise and fall of these three city-states marks the boundaries of this period -- the heyday of pre-Columbian Mesoamerican artistic and cultural achievements. These include the pyramids and palaces in Teotihuacán; the ceremonial center of Monte Albán; and the stelae and temples of Palenque, Bonampak, and Calakmul. Beyond their achievements in art and architecture, the Maya made significant discoveries in science, including the use of the zero in mathematics and a complex calendar with which the priests could predict eclipses and the movements of the stars for centuries to come.

The inhabitants of Teotihuacán (100 B.C.-A.D. 700 -- near present-day Mexico City) built a city that, at its zenith, is thought to have had 100,000 or more inhabitants covering 14 sq. km (5 1/2 sq. miles). It was a well-organized city, built on a grid with streams channeled to follow the city's plan. Different social classes, such as artisans and merchants, were assigned to specific neighborhoods. Teotihuacán exerted tremendous influence as far away as Guatemala and the Yucatán Peninsula. Its feathered serpent god, later known as Quetzalcoatl, became part of the pantheon of many succeeding cultures, including the Toltecs, who brought the cult to the Yucatán where the god became known as Kukulkán. The ruling classes were industrious, literate, and cosmopolitan. The beautiful sculpture and ceramics of Teotihuacán display a highly stylized and refined aesthetic whose influences can be seen clearly in objects of Maya and Zapotec origin. Around the 7th century, the city was abandoned for unknown reasons. Who these people were and where they went remains a mystery.

Toltecs & Aztec Invasions: The Post-Classic Period (A.D. 900-1521) -- Warfare became more pervasive during this period. Social development was impressive but these latter civilizations were not as cosmopolitan as those in the classic period. In central Mexico, a people known as the Toltec established their capital at Tula in the 10th century. They were originally one of the barbarous hordes of Indians that periodically migrated from the north. At some stage in their development, the Toltec were influenced by remnants of Teotihuacán culture and adopted the feathered serpent Quetzalcoatl as their god. They also revered a god known as Tezcatlipoca, or "smoking mirror," who later became a god of the Aztecs. The Toltec maintained a large military class divided into orders symbolized by animals. At its height, Tula may have had 40,000 people, and it spread its influence across Mesoamerica. By the 13th century, however, the Toltec had exhausted themselves, probably in civil wars and in battles with the invaders from the north.

The Maya of the Yucatán, especially the Xiu and Itzáes, may have been something of an exception to the norm in that they seemed to have had broad trading networks and been the beneficiaries of multiple influences from the outside world. They built beautiful cities in and around the Yucatán's Puuc hills, which are not far south of Mérida. The regional architecture, called Puuc style, is characterized by elaborate exterior stonework appearing above door frames and extending to the roofline. Examples of this architecture, such as the Codz Poop at Kabah and the palaces at Uxmal, Sayil, and Labná, are beautiful and quite impressive. Associated with the cities of the Puuc region was Chichén Itzá, ruled by the Itzáes. This metropolis evidences strong Toltec influences in its architectural style as well as the cult of the plumed-serpent god, Kukulkán.

The precise nature of this Toltec influence is a subject of debate. But there is an intriguing myth in central Mexico that tells how Quetzalcoatl quarrels with Tezcatlipoca and through trickery is shamed by his rival into leaving Tula, the capital of the Toltec empire. He leaves heading eastward toward the morning star, vowing someday to return. In the language of myth, this could be a shorthand telling of an actual civil war between two factions in Tula, each led by the priesthood of a particular god. Could the losing faction have migrated to the Yucatán and formed the ruling class of Chichén Itzá? Perhaps. What we do know for certain is that this myth of the eventual return of Quetzalcoatl became, in the hands of the Spanish, a powerful weapon of conquest.

Cortez, Moctezuma & the Spanish Conqiest

In 1517, the first Spaniards arrived in Mexico and skirmished with Maya Indians off the coast of the Yucatán Peninsula. One of the fledgling expeditions ended in a shipwreck, leaving several Spaniards stranded as prisoners of the Maya. The Spanish sent out another expedition, under the command of Hernán Cortez, which landed on Cozumel in February 1519. Cortez inquired about the gold and riches of the interior, and the coastal Maya were happy to describe the wealth and splendor of the Aztec empire in central Mexico. Cortez promptly disobeyed all orders from his superior, the governor of Cuba, and sailed to the mainland.

He and his army arrived when the Aztec empire was at the height of its wealth and power. Moctezuma II ruled over the central and southern highlands and extracted tribute from lowland peoples. His greatest temples were literally plated with gold and encrusted with the blood of sacrificial captives. Moctezuma was a fool, a mystic, and something of a coward. Despite his wealth and military power, he dithered in his capital at Tenochtitlán, sending messengers with gifts and suggestions that Cortez leave. Meanwhile, Cortez blustered and negotiated his way into the highlands, always cloaking his real intentions. Moctezuma, terrified, convinced himself that Cortez was in fact the god Quetzalcoatl making his long-awaited return. By the time the Spaniards arrived in the Aztec capital, Cortez had gained some ascendancy over the lesser Indian states that were resentful tributaries to the Aztec. In November 1519, Cortez confronted Moctezuma and took him hostage in an effort to leverage control of the empire.

In the middle of Cortez's dangerous game of manipulation, another Spanish expedition arrived with orders to end Cortez's authority over the mission. Cortez hastened to meet the rival's force and persuade them to join his own. In the meantime, the Aztec chased the garrison out of Tenochtitlán, and either they or the Spaniards killed Moctezuma. For the next year and a half, Cortez laid siege to Tenochtitlán, with the help of rival Indians and a decimating epidemic of smallpox, to which the Indians had no resistance. In the end, the Aztec capital fell, and, when it did, all of central Mexico lay at the feet of the conquistadors.

Having begun as a pirate expedition by Cortez and his men without the authority of the Spanish crown or its governor in Cuba, the conquest of Mexico resulted in a vast expansion of the Spanish empire. The king legitimized Cortez following his victory over the Aztec and ordered the forced conversion to Christianity of this new colony, to be called New Spain. Guatemala and Honduras were explored and conquered, and by 1540, the territory of New Spain included possessions from Vancouver to Panama. In the 2 centuries that followed, Franciscan and Augustinian friars converted millions of Indians to Christianity, and the Spanish lords built huge feudal estates on which the Indian farmers were little more than serfs. The silver and gold that Cortez looted made Spain the richest country in Europe.

The Rise of Mexico City & Spanish Colonialism

Hernán Cortez set about building a new city upon the ruins of the old Aztec capital. To do this, he collected from the Indians the tributes once paid to the Aztec emperor, many of them rendered in labor. This arrangement, in one form or another, became the basis for the construction of the new colony. But diseases brought by the Spaniards devastated the native population over the next century and drastically reduced the labor pool.

Over the 3 centuries of the colonial period, Spain became rich from New World gold and silver, chiseled out by Indian labor. The colonial elite built lavish homes in Mexico City and in the countryside. They filled their homes with ornate furniture, had many servants, and adorned themselves in imported velvets, satins, and jewels.

A new class system developed. Those born in Spain considered themselves superior to the criollos (Spaniards born in Mexico). Those of other races and the castas (mixtures of Spanish and Indian, Spanish and African, or Indian and African) occupied the bottom rungs of society. It took great cunning to stay a step ahead of the avaricious Crown, which demanded increasing taxes and contributions from its fabled foreign conquests. Still, wealthy colonists prospered enough to develop an extravagant society.

However, discontent with the mother country simmered for years. In 1808, Napoleon invaded Spain and crowned his brother Joseph king, in place of Charles IV. To many in Mexico, allegiance to France was out of the question; discontent reached the level of revolt.

Hidalgo, Juarez & Mexico's Independence

The rebellion began in 1810, when Father Miguel Hidalgo gave the grito, a cry for independence, from his church in the town of Dolores, Guanajuato. The uprising soon became a full-fledged revolution, as Hidalgo and Ignacio Allende gathered an "army" of citizens and threatened Mexico City. Although Hidalgo ultimately failed and was executed, he is honored as "the Father of Mexican Independence." Another priest, José María Morelos, kept the revolt alive with several successful campaigns through 1815, when he, too, was captured and executed.

After the death of Morelos, prospects for independence were rather dim until the Spanish king who replaced Joseph Bonaparte decided to make social reforms in the colonies. This convinced the conservative powers in Mexico that they didn't need Spain after all. With their tacit approval, Agustín de Iturbide, then commander of royalist forces, changed sides and declared Mexico independent and himself emperor. Before long, however, internal dissension brought about the fall of the emperor, and Mexico was proclaimed a republic.

Political instability engulfed the young republic, which ran through a dizzying succession of presidents and dictators as struggles between federalists and centralists, and conservatives and liberals, divided the country. Moreover, Mexico waged a disastrous war with the United States, which resulted in the loss of half its territory. A central figure was Antonio López de Santa Anna, who assumed the leadership of his country no fewer than 11 times. He probably holds the record for frequency of exile; by 1855 he was finally left without a political comeback and lived out his final days in Venezuela.

Political instability persisted, and the conservative forces, with some encouragement from Napoleon III, hit upon the idea of inviting in a Habsburg to regain control. They found a willing volunteer in Archduke Maximilian of Austria, who accepted the position of Mexican emperor with the support of French troops. The ragtag Mexican forces defeated the modern, well-equipped French force in a battle near Puebla (now celebrated annually as Cinco de Mayo). A second attempt was more successful, and Ferdinand Maximilian Joseph of Habsburg became emperor. After 3 years of civil war, the French were finally induced to abandon the emperor's cause; Maximilian was captured and executed by a firing squad near Querétaro in 1867. His adversary and successor (as president of Mexico) was Benito Juárez, a Zapotec Indian lawyer and one of the great heroes of Mexican history. Juárez did his best to unify and strengthen his country before dying of a heart attack in 1872; his impact on Mexico's future was profound, and his plans and visions bore fruit for decades.

Yucatecan Indpendence & the Caste War

In 1845, with Mexico unable to establish a stable form of government, the Yucatán's landed oligarchy decided to separate from Mexico and declare the Yucatán independent. To defend the territory from invasion they armed the populace, including the Indians who had toiled for their entire lives on the haciendas. The Indians, unhappy with their status as serfs, realized that it wasn't so important to them whether their oppressors lived in Mexico City or Mérida, and, with arms in hand, they rose up against the landowners. Thus began the War of the Castes.

Far outnumbering the oligarchy and its constabulary forces, the peasants quickly gained control of most of the countryside. They were able to capture several towns and even the city of Valladolid. Mérida, too, might have been taken, but a strange thing happened. Planting season arrived, and, rather than press their advantage and take the capital, the Maya put down their weapons to return to their corn fields. This gave the non-Indians time to regroup, swear fealty to Mexico, and call for an army from the Mexican government. Eventually the Maya rebels were driven back into what is now Quintana Roo, where they were largely left on their own, virtually a nation within a nation, until a Mexican army with modern weaponry finally penetrated the region at the turn of the twentieth century.

Diaz, Zapata, Pancho Villa & the Mexican Revolution

A few years after Juárez's death, one of his generals, Porfirio Díaz, assumed power in a coup. He ruled Mexico from 1877 to 1911, a period now called the "Porfiriato." He stayed in power through repressive measures and by courting the favor of powerful nations. Generous in his dealings with foreign investors, Díaz became, in the eyes of most Mexicans, the archetypal entreguista (one who sells out his country for private gain). With foreign investment came the concentration of great wealth in few hands, and social conditions worsened.

In 1910, Francisco Madero called for an armed rebellion that became the Mexican revolution ("La Revolución" in Mexico; the revolution against Spain is the "Guerra de Independencia"). Díaz was sent into exile; while in London, he became a celebrity at the age of 81, when he jumped into the Thames to save a drowning boy. He is buried in Paris. Madero became president, but Victoriano Huerta promptly betrayed and executed him. Those who had answered Madero's call responded again -- the great peasant hero Emiliano Zapata in the south, and the seemingly invincible Pancho Villa in the central north, flanked by Alvaro Obregón and Venustiano Carranza. They eventually put Huerta to flight and began hashing out a new constitution.

For the next few years, the revolutionaries Carranza, Obregón, and Villa fought among themselves; Zapata did not seek national power, though he fought tenaciously for land for the peasants. Carranza, who was president at the time, betrayed and assassinated Zapata. Obregón finally consolidated power and probably had Carranza assassinated. He, in turn, was assassinated when he tried to break one of the tenets of the revolution -- no reelection. His successor, Plutarco Elias Calles, installed one puppet president after another, until Lázaro Cárdenas severed the puppeteer's strings and banished him to exile.

Until Cárdenas's election in 1934, the eventual outcome of the Revolution remained in doubt. There had been some land redistribution, but other measures took a back seat to political expediency. Cárdenas changed all that. He implemented a massive redistribution of land and nationalized the oil industry. He instituted many reforms and gave shape to the ruling political party (now the Partido Revolucionario Institucional, or PRI) by bringing under its banner a broad representation of Mexican society and establishing the mechanisms for consensus building. Cárdenas is practically canonized by most Mexicans.

Modern Mexico

The presidents who followed were more noted for graft than leadership. The party's base narrowed as many of the reform-minded elements were marginalized or chased out of the party. In 1968, the government violently repressed a democratic student movement during a demonstration in the Tlatelolco section of Mexico City. An unknown number of people died, and though the PRI maintained its grip on power, it lost its image as a progressive party.

Economic progress, much of it in the form of large development projects, became the PRI's sole basis for legitimacy. In 1974 the government decided to construct a completely new megaresort somewhere on Mexico's coast. To find the ideal location for this resort, the planners fed all the different variables into a computer, and out popped Cancún. The rest, as they say, is history that has forever changed Mexico's economy.

In putting together these kinds of projects, the government weathered several periods of social unrest caused by periodic devaluations of the peso. But in 1985, Mexico City suffered a devastating earthquake that brought down many of the government's new, supposedly earthquake-proof buildings, exposing shoddy construction and the widespread government corruption that fostered it. There was much criticism, too, for how the government handled the relief efforts.

Throughout these years the opposition parties were growing. The two largest ones were the PRD (Partido de la Revolución Democrática) on the left and the PAN (Partido Acción National) on the right. During the presidential elections of 1988 the government had to commit massive fraud to ensure that its candidate, Carlos Salinas de Gortari, was declared the winner over the PRD's, Cuauhtémoc Cárdenas, formerly of the PRI and son of former President Lázaro Cárdenas. The fraud was barely disguised; the PRI unplugged the election computers and claimed that it was a system failure.

Under pressure at home and abroad, the government moved to demonstrate a new commitment to democracy and even began to concede electoral defeats for state governorships and legislative seats. These policies led to divisions within the party between factions of reformists and hardliners. A power struggle ensued, resulting in several political assassinations including most famously the assassination of the PRI's next presidential candidate, Luis Colosio. After that assassination and the crippling economic crisis that came in 1994, soon after Salinas de Gortari stepped down, nothing could be the same. The replacement president, Ernesto Zedillo, spent his 6 years in office trying to stabilize the economy and bring transparency to government.

In 2000 he shepherded the first true elections in 70 years of one-party rule. The winner was the PAN's candidate, Vicente Fox, a former businessman who ran on a platform of economic liberalization and anti-corruption. Many Mexicans voted for him, not from support for his conservative views, but just to see if the PRI would let go of power. It did, and Fox ran the show for the next 6 years. He didn't prove to be the master politician that was necessary for a situation that required making political alliances in a divided legislature. His efforts to build a coalition with segments of the PRI failed to work, and little was accomplished during his last 3 years in office. The Mexican electorate felt widespread disappointment with his administration, especially regarding the efforts to combat corruption. But they also felt that the government had become more transparent.

The presidential election of 2006 proved a real test for Mexico's nascent pluralism because it was extremely close, and the results were bitterly disputed by the losing party, the PRD. The final ruling of the elections tribunal was unpopular. It declared Felipe Calderón the winner while denying the PRD's request for a recount. The losing candidate was Andrés Manuel López Obrador, with Madrazo, the PRI candidate, coming in a distant third. López Obrador did not take defeat gracefully and provoked a constitutional crisis, which only time has managed to heal. President Calderón, seeing how the PRD's campaign resonated with the poor, has tried to steal his opponent's thunder by announcing programs to boost employment, alleviate poverty, and stabilize the skyrocketing price of tortillas. Time will tell how well he handles the political situation, but in the first year of his presidency he has shown himself to be a more capable politician than his predecessor.

Modern Yucatan, Tabasco & Chiapas

Cancún was the scene of an ugly national scandal that broke in 2005 that continues to send shock waves through Mexican society. Journalist Lydia Cacho wrote an exposé about a large prostitution and pedophilia ring operating in the resort, implicating some of the region's most powerful businessmen. Two of those named were Kamel Nacif, from the state of Puebla, and Jean Succar Kuri, a local hotel owner. Nacif used his influence with the governor of Puebla, Mario Marín, to arrest Cacho in Cancún for defamation and transport her back to Puebla -- Puebla is 1,609km (1,000 miles) from Cancún, and the little matter of jurisdiction gets lost in the case. On the long ride back, Cacho says that she was repeatedly threatened and had the barrel of a pistol stuck in her mouth. The officers deny it.

Several human rights organizations acted fast to get Cacho released and evidently foiled the governor's plans to have her tortured in prison. Cacho brought suit against Governor Marín, alleging that he violated her human rights. An immense amount of damning evidence made the case appear clear cut, but late in 2007, in a shocker, the nation's supreme court ruled against Cacho, stating that her rights weren't violated. The court's investigation found plenty of evidence to support a guilty verdict, but there was a late change of heart by two justices. To many observers, this case demonstrates that if one person's rights cannot be upheld in Mexican law, then the human rights of all Mexicans are at risk. An onslaught of criticism has ensued and continues to pour out of the media.

In Chiapas the main issue has been to gain some degree of local control over the state's gas and oil. This has been the main plank of the Zapatistas, who have gradually morphed from armed combatants to broad political movement. In 1994, the Zapatistas' political/military uprising in Chiapas focused world attention on Mexico's great social problems. A new political force, the Zapatista National Liberation Army (EZLN for Ejército Zapatista de Liberación Nacional), skillfully publicized the plight of the peasant in today's Mexico. The government was forced into negotiations with the EZLN, a position that brought it little if any political capital. Its tactic was to make some easy concessions and to stall on other demands. The EZLN continues to seek to improve the situation of the state's many rural poor, but they have to some degree changed their tactics, now favoring change through political movement, instead of armed insurrection.