After the Toxcatl massacre, Tenochtitlan’s residents mounted a ferocious resistance over several weeks, eventually regaining control on June 30, when the Spanish-Tlaxcalteca forces abandoned the city after experiencing catastrophic losses.
The invaders’ desperate escape, commonly known as La Noche Triste, is depicted in these drawings. The invading forces had attempted to escape quietly at night (top left), but a local woman noticed them fleeing and alerted the city’s armies (bottom left). The defenders chased the invaders by foot and on the water, as they tried to escape through the bridges that connected the island city with the mainland (top right). The invaders, attacked from all flanks, eventually reached a narrow canal, where, as the text of the codex relates, “many Tlaxcaltecas fell, along with many Spaniards and the women [that they had taken]. So many fell and drawn that those who were behind were able to cross the canal stepping over the dead bodies” (middle right). Decimated and wounded, the invading forces finally reached mainland (bottom right), where a long, perilous voyage awaited them before reaching their base camps.
Image Source
- Florence, Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, MS Mediceo Palatino 220 (Florentine Codex), book 12, fols. 42v–43r (3:449v–450r). Courtesy of the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana.
Further Reading
- Restall, Matthew. When Montezuma Met Cortés: The True Story of the Meeting That Changed History. New York: Ecco, 2018.
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