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INSTITUTE OF SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY PUBLICATION NO. 13 



we suspect that highland influences found in Toto- 

 nacapan antedate the Mexican conquest. 



DISCOVERY 



Although the Spanish discovery of Totonacapan 

 is part and parcel of the discovery of New Spain, 

 we shall confine ourselves to a sketch of events 

 which bear directly on the Totonac area. 



ANTECEDENTS 



From the arrival of the Spaniards in the New 

 World, the Antilles, and especially Santo Domin- 

 go, became the base for subsequent explorations. 

 At that time — during the late fifteenth and early 

 sixteenth centuries — the Spaniards still were more 

 interested in a sea route to the Orient than they 

 were in local conquest and colonization. Stim- 

 ulated by the success of Portuguese navigators, 

 who followed the route to the east, along the Afri- 

 can coast, the Spaniards made frequent explora- 

 tions to the west and south of the Antilles (cf. Pe- 

 reyra). It is quite possible that these trips led 

 to knowledge of the coast of the Gulf of Mexico 

 prior to the expeditions of 1517, 1518, and 1519, 

 headed respectively by Hernandez de Cordoba, 

 Grijalva, and Cortes, inasmuch as several earlier 

 European maps (Juan de la Cosa, 1500 ; Stobnicza 

 and Ptolemy, 1513) depict the Gulf coast with 

 considerable precision, although far from com- 

 pletely. 



Anton de Alaminos — erstwhile companion of 

 Columbus and pilot for Hernandez de Cordoba — 

 is said (Diaz del Castillo 1 : 65) to have guided the 

 latter by maps on his return from Yucatan to 

 Cuba, via Florida. However, probably as a sur- 

 vival of the ideas of Columbus, Alaminos still be- 

 lieved that Yucatan was an island (Diaz del Cas- 

 tillo 1 : 63). It is evident that if he had maps of 

 the Gulf, assuredly he did not use those men- 

 tioned previously — above all, that of Juan de la 

 Cosa, since no break to the west is indicated along 

 the coast (Pereyra 1: 162,163). 



In any case, it would appear that the Gulf coast 

 was known prior to 1517. Among modern his- 

 torians, both Pereyra (1:173, 174, 195-201) and 

 Toussaint (p. 69) are inclined to credit the dis- 

 covery to a voyage made between 1497 and 1498 

 by Americus Vespucci, Vicente Yanez Pinzon, and 

 Juan Diaz de Solis. Moreover, in agreement with 

 Varnhagen and Fiske Toussaint (p. 70) believes 



that the voyagers landed in the Huasteca, because 

 of certain ethnographic and ecological details con- 

 tained in one of Vespucci's letters. 



Subsequent to this hypothetical discovery, on 

 his fourth and last voyage (1502), Columbus 

 touched the coast of Nicaragua, without, however, 

 penetrating the Gulf of Mexico. Later, in 1512, 

 the survivors of a shipwreck reached Yucatan, 

 where they were sacrificed by the Maya, with the 

 sole exception of Gonzalo de Guerrero and Jero- 

 nimo de Aguilar. The latter, rescued in 1519, was 

 promptly attached to the party of Cortes. More- 

 over, in 1515, the northern coasts of the Gulf were 

 explored by Ponce de Leon. 



In summary, it may be said that between 1497 

 and 1515, various voyages gave the Spaniards a 

 more or less exact knowledge of the Gulf coast and 

 even a certain amount of contact with the inhabit- 

 ants. There is, however, no indication of any en- 

 counter, at such an early date, between the 

 Spaniards and the Totonac. We may guess that 

 the presence of Spanish ships in the Gulf and fleet- 

 ing contacts with their occupants, may have given 

 rise to feelings of uneasiness among the native 

 peoples, which may have been translated into the 

 revival of the myth of Quetzalcoatl and in the pre- 

 dictions of his imminent return. 



HERNANDEZ DE CORDOBA AND GRIJALVA 



About 1517 the situation became difficult for the 

 majority of the Spanish residents in the recently 

 conquered island of Cuba. Only a small part of 

 them had obtained Indians and lands, and the dis- 

 satisfied ones decided to try their luck elsewhere 

 (Diaz del Castillo 1 : 52) . This was the origin of 

 the expedition of Hernandez de Cordoba, the real 

 discoverer of Yucatan. Unhappy encounters with 

 its natives moved the party to return to Cuba, 

 having proceeded first to Florida. The course of 

 the journey does not suggest, however, any possible 

 contact with Totonacapan — nor even knowledge 

 of its coasts. 



The booty which the travelers brought back to 

 Cuba, as well as the word of an abundance of pre- 

 cious metals, stimulated the Governor of Cuba, 

 Diego Velazquez, to promote new explorations. A 

 year later, in 1518, a new expedition set forth, 

 under the leadership of Grijalva. 



Grijalva's course was substantially the same as 

 that of Hernandez de Cordoba, but he continued 



