Conquistador

By Buddy Levy

Conquistador - Buddy Levy
  • Release Date: 2008-06-24
  • Genre: Latin American History
Score: 4.5
4.5
From 66 Ratings

Description

In an astonishing work of scholarship that reads like an adventure thriller, historian Buddy Levy records the last days of the Aztec empire and the two men at the center of an epic clash of cultures.

“I and my companions suffer from a disease of the heart which can be cured only with gold.”Hernán Cortés

It was a moment unique in human history, the face-to-face meeting between two men from civilizations a world apart. Only one would survive the encounter. In 1519, Hernán Cortés arrived on the shores of Mexico with a roughshod crew of adventurers and the intent to expand the Spanish empire. Along the way, this brash and roguish conquistador schemed to convert the native inhabitants to Catholicism and carry off a fortune in gold. That he saw nothing paradoxical in his intentions is one of the most remarkable—and tragic—aspects of this unforgettable story of conquest.

In Tenochtitlán, the famed City of Dreams, Cortés met his Aztec counterpart, Montezuma: king, divinity, ruler of fifteen million people, and commander of the most powerful military machine in the Americas. Yet in less than two years, Cortés defeated the entire Aztec nation in one of the most astonishing military campaigns ever waged. Sometimes outnumbered in battle thousands-to-one, Cortés repeatedly beat seemingly impossible odds. Buddy Levy meticulously researches the mix of cunning, courage, brutality, superstition, and finally disease that enabled Cortés and his men to survive.

Conquistador is the story of a lost kingdom—a complex and sophisticated civilization where floating gardens, immense wealth, and reverence for art stood side by side with bloodstained temples and gruesome rites of human sacrifice. It’s the story of Montezuma—proud, spiritual, enigmatic, and doomed to misunderstand the stranger he thought a god. Epic in scope, as entertaining as it is enlightening, Conquistador is history at its most riveting.

Praise for Conquistador

“Prodigiously researched and stirringly told, Conquistador is a rarity: an invaluable history lesson that also happens to be a page-turning read.”—Jeremy Schaap, bestselling author of Cinderella Man: James J. Braddock, Max Baer and the Greatest Upset in Boxing History, and Triumph: The Untold Story of Jesse Owens and Hitler’s Olympics 

“Sweeping and majestic . . . A pulse-quickening narrative.”—Neal Bascomb, author of Red Mutiny: Eleven Fateful Days on the Battleship Potemkin

Reviews

  • Great book!!

    5
    By doug1231
    This was a fantastic book about the conquest of Mexico by the Spanish. It makes you want to go back and see the beauty of the country of Mexico before it was destroyed by greed and war.
  • One of the best books I have ever read.

    5
    By daddyblue
    If you didn't know who cortez was you would think this is one of the most exciting adventure thrill rides you've ever read. I read the entire book in 3 days, couldn't put it down. It's been 2 years since I read it and I still think about this book more than any I have read since. If you like history and the feeling of being on the edge of your seat, get this book.