Bitter Chocolate (3 page)

Christopher Columbus met Maya, or a part of their diminished numbers, on his last trip to the New World in 1502. Off the coast of what we now call Honduras, the famed explorer and his men
spotted boats as awesome to the Europeans as their own caravels must have appeared to the natives. They saw two enormous dugout canoes—each about fifteen metres long, propelled by slaves and navigated by people wearing elaborate garb—more ornate than anything Columbus had found in all of his travels to the Americas.

Columbus was looking for land and wealth, though, not cultural experiences. He didn't have the time or energy to explore the Honduran coast or to learn more about its people. Nonetheless, the admiral did order the mysterious boats seized, and from this encounter Columbus acquired some fleeting knowledge of the Maya while they still had a glimmer of their former glory. The canoes were filled with consumer goods, mostly food but also cloth and objects of admirable craftsmanship.

The most curious discovery was of some strange brown almond-shaped beans. Columbus's son, Ferdinand, recorded what he saw in this way: “They seemed to hold these almonds at a great price; for when they were brought on board [Columbus's ship] together with their goods, I observed that when any of these almonds fell, they all stooped to pick it up, as though an eye had fallen.” This was the outside world's first encounter with cocoa, a substance later destined to be transformed into the international capstone of confections and laid as the foundation of a multi-billion-dollar industry. But beyond Ferdinand's amused recollections, Columbus had nothing more to do with the beans or the Maya. He went on his way and eventually returned to Spain, disappointed and frustrated that he was unable to find a passage to Asia.

The Maya did tell Columbus something of great interest to him, news he passed on to others: Deeper into the continent and well into the mountain plateaus of the interior, there was an even grander and more commanding civilization than anything the Europeans had yet encountered in the New World. This was the land of the Aztecs, fierce warriors who had not only conquered
the former Mayan territory but also built upon the knowledge and craftsmanship of all the other Meso-American people.

If the Europeans thought the Maya appeared stunning, they would be unprepared for the opulence and grandeur of the Aztecs. Their monarch was a man feared and loathed by all tribes throughout the New World, a man whose cruelty and rapaciousness was exceeded only by his depravity and decadence. Among his excesses was one that would later earn him the moniker of The Chocolate King.

Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin, ninth emperor of the Aztecs, known in popular history as Montezuma II, was undoubtedly one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the world when he took the Aztec throne in 1502, the same year Columbus made his final voyage, though at the time Montezuma knew nothing of the universe beyond his own vast domain. And the outside world knew of him only as a rumour.

Montezuma's great capital, Tenochtitlán, undoubtedly the biggest city anywhere in the world at that time, was built on an island in the salt lake of Texcoco—where Mexico City is today—while the territory under his control stretched to both the Pacific Coast and the Gulf of Mexico and extended south for about two hundred kilometres to present-day Nicaragua. The population of Montezuma's empire is estimated to have been between six and seven million people of different tribes, including the Maya.

Historians describe Montezuma as a ruthless and despotic leader who was obsessed with conquering territory and who murdered thousands of his subjects in ritual sacrifices. The fact remains, however, that under Montezuma, the Aztecs also developed a sophisticated and advanced society. Splendid houses for generals and noblemen lined the wide avenues stretching through Tenochtitlán. State-financed canal systems and aqueducts fashioned from bricks and mortar provided both a source of fresh water and transportation for the capital. Engineering, architecture, mathematics and music flourished. The Aztecs
loved books—specifically those about themselves—and they created an extensive record of their existence. Traders with goods from across the empire and even beyond its borders came to the bustling markets of Tenochtitlán, and as many as sixty thousand people could swell the central squares on any given day. This was a civilization to rival anything in Europe at the time, an Emerald City in an uncharted continent.

Great banquets and feasts were routine in Montezuma's court, where several hundred different dishes might grace his tables, even though the emperor was said to be a spare eater. He shared these feasts with his noblemen, his warriors and the longdistance traders whose job it was to bring the vast stores of wealth back to Tenochtitlán from all of the Aztec-controlled provinces.

No matter what else was on the menu, the highlight was one of the most coveted foodstuffs in all the Meso-American culture:
cacahuatl
. Vessels of liquid cocoa concluded meals, though Montezuma refreshed himself with cups between courses. In fact, he consumed vast quantities of cocoa daily, taking his frothy beverage in mugs of painted calabash and never drinking twice from the same cup.

As it was for the Maya, the preparation and consumption of
cacahuatl
was an entirely elitist pursuit, far out of the reach of the common folk and a luxury even for those who harvested the beans. Cocoa was such a valued commodity that it was beans, not bullion, that served as the coins of the realm in Montezuma's treasury and the empire's official currency. At the height of his power, the emperor had a stash of nearly a billion cocoa beans, all extracted begrudgingly from the hard labour of his empire.

Montezuma's warriors were treated as nobles, and as such they consumed cocoa as well, but they also took
cacahuatl
on their conquests. The Aztecs had developed the first solid chocolate bars or tablets, portable nourishment that was later dissolved in water to make a drink. A chunk of rehydrated cocoa could sustain a man over a long day of trekking and provide
sustenance to soldiers while they put down insurrections and sacked villages. Montezuma's uncompromising warriors helped make Tenochtitlán the superpower of Central America. No army could stand up to them.

As with so many other luxury goods in the Aztec capital, cocoa didn't come from the lands around Tenochtitlán, where the soil and climate was inhospitable to such tropical plants, but from the farthest reaches of the empire, particularly the highly fertile cocoa-producing region of Xoconocho, where the prized Criollo beans flourished. This coveted and prolific parcel of land on the Pacific Coast is now the Chiapas region of Mexico, but Xoconocho also included a part of what is now Guatemala. A twice-yearly supply of two hundred loads of the precious beans (the fruit of about 160,000 pods) had to be delivered from Xoconocho to Tenochtitlán, but even this was not enough to satisfy the capital. Other beans came from the conquered Tabasco region of the Maya and from the area around what the Spanish would later call Vera Cruz, the original source of Olmec chocolate production. Cocoa bean consumption in the capital was insatiable, and the demand on farmers and serfs was crippling.

Montezuma had been an impressive leader when he first came to power in 1502. He had the unusual distinction of being trained as both a soldier and a priest—considered stabilizing professions, and ideal preparation for a future Aztec ruler. As a young emperor, he often led his armies on their warring expeditions, while on the domestic front, his public aqueducts and canal systems rivalled anything to be found in civilization.

But it was all too good to last. After only two decades, the reign of Montezuma changed fundamentally, setting in motion forces that would, over time, destroy his empire. He suddenly stopped appearing in public and cut off contact with all but select members of his inner circle. Soon half of the people under his dominion were employed in the business of suppressing insurrections by the other half. Montezuma's taxes, necessary to pay for the
lavish excesses at his court, had become exorbitant. Eventually, the gluttonous, drunken banquets became too much for a people who were, at heart, a pious and puritanical lot. The decadent, pleasure-driven Aztec court, of which the arrogant Montezuma was both symbol and a centrepiece, turned even his most loyal subjects against him.

Montezuma had enemies everywhere, yet he believed his large and ruthless army, energized by loyalty and cocoa, was more than enough to keep his poor and disorganized enemies at bay. But there was one thing Montezuma's sublime confidence and military muscle couldn't handle: the intangible power of a prophecy.

Aztecs believed their culture to be superior and their mastery over others to be a God-given right. They believed their society came about through divine intervention, that they were directed to their island stronghold capital by the god Quetzalcoatl, ruler of civilization and lord of the forces of good and light. But Aztec religious belief held that Quetzalcoatl would return one day with a host of white-skinned gods sporting long beards, and that these strangers would claim their rightful ownership of the Aztec throne. The predicted time for the arrival of these strange creatures was upon them. And according to the prophecy, the emperor would be unable to resist their power.

Charles V, a Hapsburg and the Holy Roman Emperor, was also the King of Spain (in his role as the Spanish monarch, he was also Charles I). In 1519, while Montezuma presided over a vast but uncertain empire, Charles enjoyed authority over a newly united and emboldened Spain, finally liberated from eight centuries of domination by the Islamic Moors. Not only was Charles the sovereign of a strong and expansive Spanish dominion, but he also had a large and growing collection of colonies around the globe. Spain was rapidly becoming the biggest and most influential
imperial power in Europe. But Charles wanted to expand his wealth and control over even more of the world. Fantastic rumours of rich societies in yet-undiscovered places beyond the western sea persuaded him to secure more territory for the greater good of Spain by financing a band of avaricious and uncompromising mariners and soldiers to pursue his interests. They would come to be known collectively as the conquistadors.

Hernán Cortés was one of them. He was an artillery officer based in Cuba, already in his thirties, facing a limited future with few opportunities for advancement and little hope of ever getting rich. Cortés was young and quite handsome, a broad-shouldered lady's man who had abandoned his law studies and fled to the Caribbean at the age of nineteen to escape the jealous husband of his lover. Though he had grown up in privilege, he was a relative nobody in the overcrowded colony of Cuba, Spain's base in the New World and holding bay for its treasure fleet.

In 1519, Cortés was competing with too many others for promotion. The young officer had none of the experience of the soldiers under his command, men who had honed their military skills in the barbaric battles of the Moorish wars. But while Cortés may not have been as skilled or as bloodthirsty as the older men, he was certainly as acquisitive.

Diego Velasquez, the governor of Cuba, was anxious to invade the coastal areas of the Gulf of Mexico before others did, chasing rumours of gold and silver. He didn't entirely trust Cortés, but Velasquez had been impressed with the charismatic captain's abilities. The governor chose him to lead an important expedition into the heart of Mexico, promoting him to the rank of captain-general.

Cortés set sail for the Yucatán Peninsula on February 18, 1519, arriving on the mainland in early spring. He immediately renounced his prior loyalty to the governor in Cuba and founded his own capital: Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz (the “Rich Town of the True Cross”). So his men couldn't leave him, Cortés had all but one of his ships scuttled—filled with water and sunk up to
their masts. Almost immediately Velasquez had lost control over Cortés's expedition. Though he betrayed his immediate sponsor, the newly minted captain-general knew enough to keep in the good books of the Spanish king.

Cortés understood that Charles was primarily interested in wealth and territory. But the monarch was also anxious to appear to be more than just another greedy acquisitor and he wanted his conquistadors to be more than just murderous, rapacious thugs. Charles instructed his officers to serve God as well as himself by converting to Christianity any Indians they encountered in the New World. Such a command gave the expeditions a veneer of noble purpose. No matter how savage the conquest, Spaniards—and their sovereign—could sleep at night in the knowledge that they were killing and conquering in the name of the Almighty. Cortés used his one remaining ship to dispatch letters to the royal palace in Spain, promising that he would give the poor wretches of the New World the Good News of Christianity and kindle a light in their pagan darkness while he conquered Mexico. King Charles replied that he heartily approved.

Along with his dubious piety, Charles also possessed a redeeming curiosity. He demanded more from his explorers than gold and territory. Because the native people in the new lands were to be his subjects, he wanted to know as much as possible about their customs and indigenous products. If not for this interest, Europe might never have learned about cocoa—or would have discovered it long after the extermination of any native who might have been able to explain the mysteries of its goodness and how it could be liberated from the unlovely cocoa bean.