Two excellent articles. You have deep knowledge and write well.

Thanks. I am a very long time student of history. Stuff eventually start clicking in and one ends up seeing things that other people *just* conveniently skip seeing...

Cortez had some horses, however naturally the initial amazement and fear would have vanished pretty fast. Especially for Aztecs, a society who were raiding their neighbors to use them as livestock to eat during famines.

Its very likely that Cortez's Indian allies advertised him as Quetzalcoatl to gain support. He could have helped it. It could also be the idea of his Indian wife, who seems to be the person that coordinated a lot of that.

However one thing we are certain is that Aztecs and their allies did not fear them or dropped their guard at any point - because in the final major battle, ~200,000 Aztecs and allies faced a similar number of Native American allies of Cortez in a gigantic battle. Among such numbers, a few hundred conquistadors could not have made any impact with their arms, armor and horses, but only with their knowledge of battle, tactics and coordination. Even then its certain that every allied tribe and city commanded their own forces directly.

Yes, I can comfortably say, in the early 16th century, Spanish were pretty humanist. The successful arguments of Casas neutralizing the arguments of the nobility regarding the status of the Native Americans was the major factor that prevented what the English did to North America happening in South America too. Of course, since they were declared of the same legal status, intermarriage has become pretty normalized as well.

Later on in the century the Spanish establishment becomes less humanist and more imperialist, following the other European powers, but by this time the 'New Spain' is already seen as an extension of Spain and the status of Native Americans never come into question.

As for the Inquisition - actually yes, a very interesting detail - Spanish Inquisition seems to have been pretty mild compared to all other kinds of criminal persecution (non-religious, civil matters included) that many Spaniards convicted of non-religious crimes seem to have tried to get themselves reclassified as religious offenders in order to be get away with much lighter sentences. And successfully too. Ending up getting away with scoldings, shaming, some jail time, some prohibitions and so on. The percentage of torture etc among the punishment handed out by the actual inquisition constitutes a tiny amount compared to all the other stuff.

But, 'Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition' is much funnier than the reality, of course...