The last issue introduced you to the history of Australia, a former colonial country, and in this issue, we continue to talk about the history of another former colonial country, Mexico.
Although Mexico is located in the New World of America, it is an ancient civilization with a long history of more than 3,000 years, and Mexico is also the birthplace of Indian culture, known as the "mother of Indian civilization", where the mysterious Maya, Aztec, Olmec and other cultures were born.
Mexican Day of the Dead event
Today, let's walk into the mysterious and ancient country of Mexico, and see what kind of stories the Mayans, Aztecs, and later Spaniards created in the history of Mexico?
Origins and legends of ancient Mexican civilization
Speaking of ancient Mexico, many people's first reaction may be the Maya and their miraculous prophecies, after all, before 2012, a rumor about the Maya "doomsday prophecy" had made a lot of noise, and Hollywood also produced a good quality doomsday disaster movie "2012", and under the publicity of the movie, Maya civilization is even more well-known.
For a while, many people thought that the Maya were the oldest civilization in the history of the Americas. In fact, the Maya are just one of many branches of the Indians, and many Indians, including the Maya, whose ancestors were the Olmecs who once lived in south-central Mexico.
Olmec giant stone statue
The origin of the Olmecs has always been a mystery, but based on the cultural relics that have been unearthed so far and the records of the Chinese Classic of Mountains and Seas, more and more scholars at home and abroad suspect that the Olmecs were immigrants from ancient Chinese.
This speculation is not unfounded, and scholars supporting this view have given the following important evidence:
First, the Bering Strait, which separates Asia from the Americas, is only 80 kilometers at its narrowest point and is located at high latitudes, and it is entirely possible to achieve land passage during the ice age, and Chinese may have come to the Americas from Asia to settle 3,000 years ago.
Second, the image of the tiger and leopard totem worshiped by the Olmec people, and the image record in the Chinese "Classic of Mountains and Seas" that the Queen Mother of the West "is like a human, with a leopard tail and tiger teeth and a good roar, and unkempt hair and hoopoes".
Third, the hieroglyphs used by the Olmecs and Maya are very similar to the hieroglyphs of ancient China.
However, it remains to be verified whether Indians originated in China, but the conclusion that "Indians come from Asia" is unanimously recognized by the academic community, after all, there are a large number of Asian genes in the existing Indians.
Old photographs of Indians in the nineteenth century
Around the 12th century BC, when the Chinese Shang Dynasty was following the migration of Pangeng to Yin, the Olmecs also created the first Indian civilization on the American continent in Mexico, on the other side of the world.
However, the Olmecs have only been active in Mexico for more than four hundred years, perhaps due to civil war, climate change and many other factors, which have led to the gradual disappearance of the Olmecs in the long river of history, and the next to replace them in Mexican history is the aforementioned Maya.
The oldest known Mayan city-state was probably founded around the eighth century BC, and its remains are found in the Yucata Peninsula in southern Mexico and Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and other countries in present-day Central America.
The Maya inherited many Olmec cultural traditions and science and technology, and carried them forward, but for unknown reasons, around the first century AD, many Maya city-states in the coastal plains were suddenly abandoned and abandoned, and the development of Maya civilization entered the first period of decline.
About two centuries later, the Maya civilization was revived and reached its heyday, and the Mayan pyramids we know today, the 2012 apocalyptic prophecy, crystal skulls and other most representative things of Maya culture were born during this period.
Mayan pyramids
The political system of the Maya is very similar to the development model of the ancient Greeks, and their country is not a unified powerful empire, but a number of independent city-states that together form the Maya civilization circle.
Of course, these city-states also had a variety of mergers and horizons, forming many powerful city-state alliances, many of which have become popular destinations for archaeologists and ordinary tourists alike because of their glorious remains, such as Calakmul, Copan, Palenque, Yaskilan, and so on in present-day Mexico.
By the beginning of the ninth century, the Maya civilization once again experienced a sudden decline, the population of the cities was greatly reduced, these cities were quickly abandoned, and the Maya tradition of building pyramids for centuries suddenly stopped.
Due to the lack of historical data and the lack of accepted mainstream explanations, scholars have also put forward their own different hypotheses, among which the plague theory, the climate drought theory, the hypothesis of ecological collapse caused by overexploitation and so on.
In addition to these catastrophic internal causes, some scholars believe that the collapse of the Maya civilization was due to the invasion of foreign enemies. But the "foreign enemy" mentioned here was not the Spaniards, after all, in the ninth century, the Christians of the Iberian Peninsula were still fighting hard against the Muslims who tried to conquer them, and had neither the energy nor the ability to cross the ocean to discover and colonize Mexico.
Restoration of the Mayakopan city-state
The "foreign enemy" here refers to the Toltecs living north of the Maya region in the region of present-day central Mexico. It is believed that in the post-Maya civilization era, Toltec customs appeared in many of the remaining Maya city-states, such as martial spirits, murderous sacrifices, and worship of the Quetzalcoatl god. However, the Mayan tradition, which used to study astronomy, calendars and mathematics, and worshipped the sun god, gradually disappeared.
Therefore, in order to distinguish the transformation of Maya culture, historians call the Maya civilization after the ninth century and before the Spanish colonization of Mexico the Maya Pan culture, which is a fusion civilization created by the Toltecs and the Maya together.
After that, the Maya did not do much in history, and before the arrival of the Spaniards, the remaining Maya city-states were mired in endless infighting and hegemony, which led to the further decline of their civilization.
When the Maya declined, a more powerful Indian civilization, the Aztec civilization, arose in the Mexican Valley in the northern part of the Maya city-state.
The Aztecs, a branch of the Nahua ethnic group of Indians, originally lived on the Pacific coast of northern Mexico, but due to the deterioration of the living environment, the Aztecs began to migrate to southern Mexico in the mid-twelfth century.
Aztec civilization
There is another story about the Aztec migration that is well known in Mexico today:
It is said that in the process of migrating south, the Aztecs were sacked by other Indian tribes and attacked by beasts along the way, and they could not find a place with abundant materials and stable environment to settle down, but the tenacious quality of the Aztecs touched the sun god Huiziro Portley.
Therefore, the sun god appeared and told their elders, "Keep going south, and if you see an eagle standing on a cactus pecking at a snake, that is where you settle." ”
After nearly two hundred years of migration, one day in 1325 AD, the Aztecs finally saw this miraculous scene on the island in the center of Lake Texcoco and settled here.
Later, with the help of the Quetzalcoatl god in Indian mythology, who was in charge of grain, the Aztecs built a city called "Tenochtitlan" centered on this small island, which means "land of cacti", which is the capital of today's United Mexican States - Mexico City, and worshipped Quetzalcoatl as the new king of the Aztec state.
Flag of Mexico
And the magical scene of the eagle pecking at the snake on the cactus seen by the Aztecs was also painted on their flag and coat of arms by today's Mexicans, becoming the spiritual symbol of the Mexican nation.
Later, the Aztecs and the Texcoco and Tracoban people living in the area integrated with each other, absorbed their more advanced cultivation technology and copper smelting technology, and soon became the most powerful tribe in the area, and began to move towards foreign expansion.
By the end of the 15th century, the Aztecs had conquered all of south-central Mexico, as well as other Indian tribes in Guatemala and elsewhere, and the last remaining Mayan city-states became vassals of the Aztecs, thus establishing a powerful Indian empire in Mexico.
Regarding the power of the Aztec Empire, in the process of Spanish colonization of the Americas, Spanish explorers who returned from the Americas described to the Europeans: "The Aztecs are the most ferocious, warlike, and powerful Native Americans." ”
Restoration of ancient Mexico City
It is precisely because in the history of Mexico, the Aztec Empire was powerful for a while, ruled most of the Mexican land, and is the Indian civilization that most represents the indigenous culture of Mexico.
Therefore, in the process of the gradual formation of Mexican national consciousness, the descendants of local indigenous people and Mexican native white people will use Aztec culture as a difference between themselves and Spaniards, in order to prove that they are the rightful owners of Mexico, which will also have the Mexican flag and coat of arms mentioned above.
Conjecture about the relationship between Fuso and Mexico
The Mayan civilization, Aztec civilization and Inca civilization of the three major Indian civilizations in the Americas, the first two were born in Mexico, plus the source of Indian civilization, the Olmec civilization, also originated in Mexico, and the Indians have Asian genes.
Therefore, there is a view that the "Fuso State" mentioned in ancient Chinese books is actually Mexico.
The Fuso tree in the Classic of Mountains and Seas
The name "Fusang" first came from the ancient Chinese book "Classic of Mountains and Seas", which recorded that at the easternmost end of the world, there are two large mulberry trees that support each other and grow together, collectively known as the Fusang tree, and the ten brothers of the sun god Jinwu live on the Fusang tree, and they take turns rising from the Fuso tree every morning and flying to the west, forming a sunrise and sunset throughout the day.
In the traditional concept, the furthest understanding of the East by ancient Chinese is Japan, which calls itself the "Land of the Rising Sun", and Fuso is slowly equating with Japan.
However, when we carefully study the ancient texts, we will find that the world that the ancient Chinese knew was probably much larger than we think today.
In many history books before the Tang Dynasty, "Waguo" and "Fusang Kingdom" appeared at the same time, referring to two completely different countries, such as the Book of Liang and the Southern History in the Twenty-Four History.
The position relationship between the Kingdom of Yin and Fuso is also accurately recorded in the Book of Liang, according to the Book of Liang: "The Kingdom of Fusang is more than 20,000 li east of the Great Han Kingdom, the Great Han Kingdom is more than 5,000 li east of the Kingdom of the Wenshin, and the Kingdom of the Wenshen is more than 7,000 li northeast of the Kingdom of the Wa." ”
maguey
In addition, the Book of Liang also records that there is a kind of "Fusang wood" in the Fuso Kingdom, the leaves of this plant are very similar to paulownia leaves, the fruit is like pears, the shape is like bamboo shoots, the fruit can be eaten, and the leaves can be used to weave cloth.
And there is really a plant in the world that is very consistent with this description in the Book of Liang, that is, the agave native to Mexico.
The agave does resemble a large bamboo shoot with paulownia leaves, and the fruit of the agave is not only edible, but also a famous raw material for winemaking, and spinning from the leaves of agave is one of the ancient traditional crafts in Mexico.
In addition, the Book of Liang also describes the customs of the Fuso state, such as the marriage process of the Fuso people, the man first goes to the woman's house to work for a number of years, during this period, if the woman is not satisfied, the man can be bombarded, if very satisfied, the two will marry after a few years, which is the custom of the Mexican Maya.
Moreover, the ancient Indians did not have iron smelting technology, and the agricultural tools and weapons they used were made of bronze or red copper, which is also very consistent with the record in the Book of Liang that the Fusang Kingdom "has no iron and copper".
However, as early as when China was still at the end of the Warring States period, Japan had already learned iron smelting technology from the Yan Kingdom through the Korean Peninsula, which did not conform to the saying that "there is no iron and copper".
Suspected Indian armor made of ancient Chinese money
The Book of Liang also mentions that the state of Fusang "has northern and southern prisons in its national law, and if the offender is less, it will be jailed in the south, and the heavier will be in the north." If there is amnesty, the southern prison is pardoned, and the northern prison is not pardoned. This was also the case with the ancient Maya, who held light and heavy offenders separately.
It was according to these records in the Book of Liang that in 1761 AD, the famous French sinologist Deggin first published his research results, arguing that the reference to this Fuso state in ancient Chinese texts should refer to present-day Mexico.
Later, on the basis of this conjecture, Deggin further proposed that the Chinese monks who arrived in Fuso around the fifth century AD were the first people to discover the Americas in the Old World, far more than a thousand years before Columbus discovered the American continent.
When this conjecture was introduced to China, Zhang Taiyan, who first supported this statement, published an article entitled "The Theory of Fa Xian Seeing the Western Hemisphere", arguing that Fuso was Mexico, and the famous monk Fa Xian, who wrote the "Records of the Buddha Kingdom" in the late Eastern Jin Dynasty, was the first person in the Old World to discover America.
In addition to Zhang Taiyan, Lü Simian, known as one of the "Four Great Historians of Modern China", also supported that Fuso was today's Mexico, and based on this research, he found that the Han Kingdom and the Tattoo State mentioned in the Book of Liang should refer to Kamchatka and the Kuril Islands respectively.
Eastern Jin Dynasty monk Fa Xian
Of course, some scholars pointed out that in the Book of Liang, it is recorded that the state of Fuso had a carriage, while there were no horses in the Americas, and the earliest horses in the Americas were brought by Spanish conquerors.
There is also a legend about this, it is said that when the Spanish colonists first arrived in the Yucatan Peninsula, where the Maya people lived, several local Maya city-states organized a large coalition army to jointly face the invaders.
Facing thousands of Mayan warriors in front of him, only seven hundred Spanish soldiers were very nervous, and as a result, a Spanish knight fell off his horse in fright, and what all Spaniards did not expect was that when the rider who fell off his horse climbed on his war horse again, the Maya on the opposite side scattered and fled without a trace.
After a long time, the Spaniards understood that there were no horses in the Americas, so the Maya did not know the horse as an animal, they always thought that the war horse and the rider were a whole, a new creature, so when the Maya saw that a creature actually broke itself into two, and then reunited as if nothing happened, of course, they were frightened and panicked.
The Spaniards invade South America
However, today, through the study of a large number of unearthed fossils, people can already conclude that the North American continent is the true origin and main evolutionary center of equines, whether it is the earliest equine or the dinosaur horse as the direct ancestor of modern horses, their fossils were unearthed on the North American continent.
Of course, all of these are just some speculations made by scholars based on written records in ancient books and very limited excavated cultural relics, and there is really no very strong evidence to prove that the "Fuso State" in ancient Chinese books refers to Mexico, or that there were Chinese people who visited Mexico during the Southern and Northern Dynasties era.
The real connection between China and Mexico has to start with Mexico's decline to a Spanish colony.
The colonial plunder of Mexico by the Spaniards
In 1492 AD, Christopher Columbus, a Genoese navigator employed by the Spanish crown, accidentally discovered America on a voyage in search of China and India.
Columbus and its navigational charts
At that time, the Spaniards did not know that this was a new continent, including Columbus himself, who had reached the Atlantic coast of Mexico several times since then, and still firmly believed that he had arrived somewhere in India, so he called the local indigenous people "Indians", and to this day "Indians" and "Indians" are the same word "Indian" in English.
It was not until 1507, the year after Columbus's death, that another Italian navigator, Amerigo Vespusi, proved that Columbus had arrived in a new continent that had never been known, so America's name was also used to name the place, calling it America.
When the Spanish government learned that the route it had financed had not reached Asia, but had reached an unknown place, it was initially disappointed, because Spain's rival at the time, Portugal, had successfully reached India and China by taking the Eastern route, bypassing the Cape of Good Hope in Africa, and monopolizing the trade routes between Europe and Asia.
However, as the subsequent expedition team in-depth investigation into the Americas found that there were many untapped gold and silver mines, the Spanish nobles began to get excited again and prepare to occupy this "borderland".
Distribution of minerals in Latin America
In 1519, Hernán Cortés, a minor nobleman, led a Spanish expedition to land in Mexico.
I don't know if it's because of fate, or because of some deeper reason, a coincidence was created. In Aztec mythology and legend, Quetzalcoatl who instructed the Aztecs to build Mexico City was later abandoned and framed and forced to leave Mexico, and before leaving, Quetzalcoatl warned the Aztecs who betrayed him that one day he would return to reclaim the throne that belonged to him.
And in Aztec mythology, the appearance of Quetzalcoatl is depicted as a high-nosed and deep-eyed, vigorous hair, fair skin, like a European appearance, so the Aztec king Montezuma II at that time identified Cortez as the returning Quetzalcoatl god.
So Montezuma II enthusiastically invited Cortés and his party into Mexico City, and at Cortés's request, executed several Aztec generals who insisted on resisting Spain, and Montezuma II became Cortés' prisoner.
Cortés then began to use Montezuma II's influence in the Aztecs to get the Aztecs to help the Spanish colonists mine the gold and silver they had dreamed of.
Quetzalcoatl stone carvings
It was much later that a belated truth began to circulate among the Aztec city-states, that these Spaniards were not descendants of God, they were ordinary people like the Aztecs, so the Aztecs revolted and began to rebel against Spanish rule.
Montezuma II himself died in this uprising, and Cortés escaped the siege, and a year later, he once again led a larger Spanish army to attack Mexico City, and the Aztecs were completely destroyed, and Mexico became another new colony of the Kingdom of Spain in the Americas, the Viceroyalty of New Spain.
Later, not only the Spanish colonies in Central America and the Caribbean, but also the Philippines in Asia were incorporated into New Spain, with Mexico as its capital.
Under the Viceroyalty of New Spain, the Kingdom of Spain established twelve more inquisitorial courts, which, in addition to judicial functions, also worked part-time in the legislative and executive functions, and could be regarded as first-level administrative bodies of the Spanish colony. Today, the borders between many Latin American countries, as well as some state boundaries in Mexico and the southern United States, can actually be traced back to the jurisdiction of the Inquisition.
Spanish colonies in the Americas
After the Spaniards became the new rulers of Mexico, it can be said that they had good luck, and they soon discovered large-scale silver mines in the mountains 185 kilometers southwest of Mexico City, which later developed into the Mexican mountain town of Taxco, known as the "silver capital of the world".
With the invention of mercury amalgamation in 1554 to extract silver from silver mines, Spanish silver production in Mexico increased rapidly.
According to scholars' statistics, the annual production of silver in Spain's American colonies at that time could be as high as 300 tons per year, and these silver, in addition to a part of the military expenditure needed to pay for Spain's struggle for European hegemony with France on the European continent, all coincided with the flow of trade into China at the right time.
Because the silver coins minted in Spain were originally printed with the Pillar of Hercules, which is the symbol of the Strait of Gibraltar on today's Spanish flag and coat of arms, the Spanish silver dollar is also known as the "Pillar Ocean" in China.
Later, starting from King Carlos IV of Spain, the Spanish silver dollar began to print the head of the king wearing a European-style wig, and this head looks very similar to the head of Shakyamuni Buddha, so since then the Spanish silver dollar has been called "Buddha Yang" in China.
Spanish Pillar Ocean (left) and Spanish Buddha Yang (right)
By 1821, Mexico officially issued its own silver dollar from Spanish independence, and as the actual location of the silver mine, the Mexican silver dollar naturally quickly competed with the Spanish silver dollar in the Chinese market.
The Mexican silver dollar is again engraved with the pattern of an eagle pecking snake, so the Mexican silver dollar is called "Eagle Ocean" in China. As a result, Mexico has a definite relationship with China again because of silver.
In addition to silver, Mexico's most important contribution to China's historical development should be the introduction of potatoes and corn.
After the Spanish occupied Mexico, they began to sell animals and plants that were not available in the Old World to Europe and Asia, among which drought-tolerant, hardy, easy-to-grow, high-yield potatoes and corn were also brought around the world by the Spaniards.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, these two crops also began to be widely cultivated on the Chinese land, which greatly met the demand of Chinese for food, and the abundance of food, the most intuitive change was the explosive growth of the population.
At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the Chinese population was only more than 60 million, and by the Kangxi Dynasty, the Chinese mouth exceeded 100 million, and the Chinese in the last year of Qianlong reached nearly 300 million.
This explosive population increase, in addition to the stability of the early years of the Qing Dynasty and the abolition of the poll tax by the Yongzheng Emperor, also played a huge role in the introduction of potatoes and corn from Mexico.
Species exchange between old and new continents
Mexico's contribution to the world during this period was very large, providing not only gold and silver but also food seeds, but also today's favorite consumables cigars, chocolate and tequila.
However, in sharp contrast to Mexico's contribution to the world, the local Indians of Mexico were infected with smallpox, influenza and other viruses carried by the colonists, resulting in the mass death of the Indians, and the remaining people were ruthlessly oppressed and exploited by the colonists.
The attitude of the Spanish government towards the colonies and the attitude of Britain and France towards the North American colonies was completely different, because the large-scale development of the British and French colonies was already after the Industrial Revolution, and Britain and France were more in pursuit of economic benefits, buying colonial raw materials at low prices, and selling their own industrial products to the colonies at high prices for benefits, which was a kind of "boiled frog" type of economic plunder.
Spain's treatment of the South American colonies including Mexico was a kind of "killing chickens and eggs" type of violent plunder, not only large-scale hunting and expulsion of local Indians, but also cruel exploitation of its own immigrants, many slaves working in the mines, eating, drinking and Lasa were in the mines, and the colonists wanted the slaves to spend 24 hours a day for 25 hours.
Colonial slaves working in Mexican mines
In this long period of oppression, the colonial people became more and more dissatisfied with the Spanish government, which led the colonial people, including the descendants of the colonists, to think of independence.
Mexico's independence and anti-Euro-American struggle
As in many countries of the New World, as in many countries of the New World, it was the native-born white natives who first expressed strong dissatisfaction with colonial status in Mexico, especially the well-educated and first-hand white elite of Europe.
They first questioned the legality of Spanish rule over Mexico, after all, these native-born whites had lived in Mexico for generations, and they had long considered Mexico their homeland and no longer considered themselves Spaniards.
And most of the native-born whites were more well-off than African-Americans and Indians, and after several generations of business, many native-born whites became the local gentry, and gradually controlled most of the economic income of Mexican plantations and mines by squeezing other colored people.
It was precisely because colonial wealth and labor resources were concentrated in the hands of this group of white landowners that they naturally became the key tax targets of the colonial government in Mexico, which further gave the white landowners the idea of overthrowing Spanish rule and ruling Mexico themselves.
Mexican Independence Movement
By the end of the 18th century, the French Enlightenment spread throughout Europe, and many white Mexicans who returned from studying in Europe also brought back to Mexico the "nationalism" and "anti-authoritarianism" promoted by the Enlightenment, and coupled with the influence of the American Revolution, more and more white Mexicans began to embark on the road of anti-colonialism.
After all the economic and ideological preparations, the outbreak of the Mexican War of Independence entered the final point of "everything is ready, only the east wind is owed".
And this "east wind" is the French emperor Napoleon I in 1808 to fully occupy Spain. When the news reached Mexico, the Mexicans were not only angry at the occupation of their metropolis, but also very happy, and saw it as a great opportunity for independence.
On September 16, 1810, Miguel Hidalgo, a priest born in a native white family, rang the church bell in the central Mexico city of Dolores, and then he delivered an impassioned speech to the assembled people, calling on everyone to overthrow Spanish rule, so the people opened the Mexican War of Independence in the call for independence, so Miguel Hidalgo was also regarded by later generations as the father of Mexican independence.
Hidalgo
Dolores, who first launched the uprising in Hidalgo, was also renamed Dolores Hidalgo in honor, and the name of today's state of Hidal in central Mexico is also derived from him, and September 16 became an official holiday in Mexico - War of Independence Day, and the Mexican independence movement will also be called - the bell of Dolores.
In addition to Hidalcogo, there are many states in Mexico today, also named after the leaders who led the Mexican independence movement at the time, such as Morelos from José Morelos, the successor of Hidalgo, and Regro from Vicente Regro, another leader of the rebel army.
After the outbreak of the Mexican War of Independence, due to the lack of unity and coordination within the rebel army, the final revolutionary achievements were stolen by Agustin de Iturbide, who was sent by the Spanish colonial government to eliminate the rebel army, and became Yuan Shikai of Mexico.
On May 19, 1822, Iturbide was crowned by his supporters, proclaimed himself "Emperor Agustín I of Mexico", and the First Mexican Empire was established.
Agustin I
Although "Mexico" and "Spain" have a "West" character in Chinese translation, the two are not directly related, the name "Mexico" comes from the name of the god of war in Aztec mythology "Mexitri", which is also the newly independent Mexican government for cultural recognition and flaunt its legitimacy, will abandon "New Spain" and adopt the new name "Mexico".
But because the dictatorship of the First Mexican Empire was unpopular, it existed for only a year and a half before it was overthrown by a new revolution, and Agustin I went into exile in England, and the United Mexican States was established.
At the same time, several regions of southern Mexico declared their independence from Mexico to form the United Central American Provinces, which were later renamed the Federal Republic of Central America.
Later, the dissolution of the Federal Republic of Central America formed today's Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, which are known only by the Chinese men's football team.
After a long 12-year war of independence, the United Mexican States was in ruins, so it recruited immigrants as pioneers to move to the off-the-beaten-path states of Coahuila and Texas in northern Mexico.
Mexican separatist movement (areas marked in red)
Soon in Coahuila and northern Texas, the number of American immigrants had far exceeded the number of immigrants from other parts of Mexico, and these American immigrants and their descendants began to have a lot of dissatisfaction with the Mexican government due to differences in political habits and cultural customs.
Especially after the abolition decree of the Mexican government, the American Texas estate owners who had long relied on slave production began to think of independence from Mexico.
In 1835, the Mexican federal government began to try to change the country's system from federal to centralized, which forced Texans to accelerate their actions.
The Mexican government sensed the change, and Mexican dictator Santa Anna ordered the disarmament of militias in Coahuila and Texas.
So on October 2, 1835, the Texas Revolutionary War broke out when the Texas militia clashed with Union troops who had come to collect their weapons.
Battle of San Jacinto
After Santa Anna was captured, she signed the Treaty of Verasco with Texas, recognizing Texas independence. However, because Santa Anna was removed from the presidency by the Mexican federal government after he became a prisoner of war, the treaty was not officially recognized by Mexico at the time.
So the Texas landowners, in order to counter the Mexican army that might return, began to move closer to their northern neighbors, and on December 25, 1845, they joined the United States of America, becoming the 28th state of the United States and the second largest state in the United States today.
With this as the trigger, the 21-month Mexican-American War broke out from 1846, and Mexico was defeated without suspense and forced to cede large areas of northern territory to the United States.
These territories included all of present-day California, Nevada, Utah, and New Mexico, as well as parts of Colorado, Arizona, Kansas, and Wyoming, plus the previously independent Texas, resulting in the loss of more than half of Mexico's territory.
It is precisely because of this that the later Mexican President Poferio Diaz lamented: "The tragedy of Mexico is that it is too far from God and too close to the United States." ”
Territories ceded to the United States by Mexico
Although the United States forgave Mexico more than $3 million in reparations and paid Mexico an additional $15 million in compensation at the cost of ceding territory, this is clearly a drop in the bucket compared to the economic losses suffered by Mexico because of the war.
Therefore, after Mexican President Benito Juárez, who came to power from an Indian peasant family, the Mexican government announced that it would stop returning borrowings borrowed from foreign banks.
This statement directly led to the signing of the 1861 Treaty of London by France, Britain and Spain, Mexico's most important creditors, and decided to act together to demand debts from Mexico backed by force.
Because France was the main force in this war, this war is also known as the Second Franco-Mexican War.
Why the second time? That's because in 1838, there had been a First Franco-Mexican War, known as the "Pastry Wars."
The French navy that traveled to Mexico to participate in the pastry wars
It is said that the cause of the war was a clash between several Mexican officers and the owner of a French pastry shop in Mexico, and then several officers smashed the pastry shop in anger, and the pastry shop owner went to the local government to sue the officers, but the local court ignored the matter.
So the French boss turned to his homeland, and the French government, which was already dissatisfied with Mexico, took the opportunity to come forward and ask Mexico to compensate the French expatriates for the losses, and after refusing, the French Navy sent a fleet to capture the important port city of Veracruz, which lasted for three and a half months, and finally ended with Mexico compensating France with 600,000 pesos under the mediation of Britain.
By the time of the Second Franco-Mexican War, although at the beginning of the war, on May 5, 1862, the Mexican army successfully repelled the French army in Puebla, which is the origin of the May Pentame Festival in today's Mexico.
However, as more French reinforcements arrived from Europe and more and more important Mexican cities were captured by the French army, the Mexican Catholic conservatives, seeing that the situation was wrong, turned to the French army and united with France to install a regime in Mexico known as the Second Mexican Empire.
Celebration of the Cinque de Mayo Festival in Mexico
In this war, the three old empires of France, England and Spain had joined it, and in order to pull another old power, Austria, into the water, and to meet the demands of the Mexican Catholic conservatives, Napoleon III of France encouraged the brother of the Austrian emperor Franz Joseph, the Catholic Grand Duke Massimiliano, to become emperor in Mexico.
However, under the firm resistance of the Mexican republican guerrillas, the French army and the conservatives who supported Massimiliano were unable to effectively control Mexico.
It was not until 1865, with the end of the American Civil War, the restored United States began to speak out against European interference in American affairs, and the United States government openly threatened France that if France did not withdraw its troops from Mexico, then the United States would intervene militarily in the Mexican Civil War and support the republican guerrillas.
Under pressure from the United States, France began withdrawing its troops from Mexico, but Maximiliano rejected the proposal to withdraw with the French army, feeling that since he had become emperor of Mexico, he could not abandon his supporters.
The last emperor of Mexico, Maximiliano I
So Maximiliano's wife, then Princess Charlotte of Belgium, returned to Europe alone and began to seek assistance for her husband. Although Charlotte's brother, King Opold I of Belgium, cared about his sister, the Belgian state Liwei was unable to intervene in American affairs, so he could only write to his brother-in-law to persuade him to leave Mexico quickly.
As the Austrian emperor, Massimiliano's brother Franz Josef could be regarded as one of the world's great powers, but at this time, Austria was facing the challenge of Prussia, busy and self-careful, and had no more energy and ability to interfere in American affairs except to issue a statement reminding the US government and Juarez.
As a result, on May 11, 1867, Massimiliano was defeated and captured, and a month later he was executed by the Republicans on charges of "subverting the Mexican republican system", becoming the last emperor in Mexican history.
After the death of Massimiliano, Juárez was elected president twice, during his reign he implemented many liberal reforms that had a profound impact on Mexico, achieved the separation of church and state in Mexico, abolished the privileges of teachers and military officers, and he also vigorously established Indian education in the country, worked hard to improve the living conditions of Indians, promoted the formation of Mexican national consciousness, and became the most important politician in Mexican history. For this reason, this reform movement was also given his name, called the Juarez reform.
The first Indian-American president in Mexican history - Juárez
In 1877, four years after Juárez's death, Díaz, who lamented that Mexico was "too far away from God and too close to the United States," staged a military coup and seized state power, becoming one of the most famous dictators in Mexican history.
During the dictatorship of Díaz, the railway network and telegraph network throughout Mexico were built, and a large amount of foreign capital and technology was introduced, which promoted the industrialization and modernization of Mexico.
At the same time, in order to control Mexican agriculture more conveniently, ensure that Mexican agricultural products can be more competitive in the international market, and earn more foreign exchange for the government, Díaz instructed governors across Mexico to send police to "help" the large estate owners of the states to encroach on rural land, thereby promoting the collectivization of agriculture in Mexico.
In 1908, Díaz said in an interview that Mexico is now ready for democracy, and we will allow others to run for president together.
But in 1910, when the democratic leader Francisco Madero formed the "opposition party" and announced his participation in the presidential election, Díaz ordered Madero's arrest and then declared his victory.
With this as the trigger, the democrats in Mexico launched an uprising in the same year, and the Mexican Revolution officially broke out.
Dias
Eventually, as the rebels captured Juárez, the capital of Mexico at the time, Diaz was forced to resign and go into exile in Europe, and Madero became Mexico's new president with the support of his supporters.
But in 1913, Madero was assassinated by supporters of Diaz, and the Mexican revolution fell into a chaotic period that lasted for two decades.
It was not until 1934, when the Institutional Revolutionary Party of Mexico gained state power and ruled Mexico until the end of the twentieth century, when the first political party rotation was achieved in 2000, that a new chapter in Mexico's history was opened!