South America: Economics and Politics - The Wise World Traveler: Becoming a Part of All that You Meet - page 313

Islam also brought to Spain a richness of cultural achievement: architecture—think of the
bell tower in Seville, the Cathedral in Cordoba; science—Arabs named and may have in-
vented algebra; consider what the state of science might be without Arabic numerals and
the concept of zero; and philosophy—consider what the world gained through the Arabs'
having preserved the writings of classical Greece. Recall the words of science that incor-
porate the Arab word for “al” meaning “the”: algebra, alchemy, altitude, algorithm, and
alkali. Think, too, of that most characteristic Spanish cry of joy and approval: ole , derived
from the Arabic word for God, Allah.
The Arab and Berber armies also brought to Spain secrets of superb metallurgy. All
through the Middle Ages, the great challenge of sword makers was to forge a sword both
strong and sharp. Strong swords were dull and resisted sharpening. Sharp swords were
brittle. But sword makers in Damascus had perfected the technique of working iron at
different temperatures to produce swords and daggers both sharp and strong. Along with
Damascus steel (which the Spanish renamed the Toledo blade), Arabs rode to Spain on
desert-bred horses, superb in strength and endurance. Both Arab horses and Damascus steel
(along with guns and gunpowder) were the Spanish implements of conquest in the New
World. Add to it the fighting skills honed during the reconquest ( the Reconquista ) of Spain
from Muslim overlords and the determination to make Christianity the paramount religion
of the world.
The Portuguese were the first Europeans to reach the Far East. They sailed to their
conquests south along Africa and then across the Indian Ocean, impelled by a craving for
riches but also by a passion to outflank Islam. The Spaniards sailed west for these same
purposes, and when Columbus claimed for Spain the lands of the Western Sea, Spanish in-
tent was the same as Portugal's: to outflank Islam, to bring souls to Christ, and to get rich.
Whether they achieved their first purpose is open to debate. But there is no doubting their
success in the second and third purposes.
NEW WORLD CONQUISTADORES
The most successful and most ruthless of New World conquistadores came from a sun-
baked, poverty-struck Spanish area, Estremadura. As several have remarked, they had
much to gain by conquest and relatively little to lose. Herman Cortes, born in 1485 in
Medellin, Estremadura, joined in the conquest of Cuba in 1511 and, in 1519, commanded
an expedition to subjugate the newly discovered Mexico. With 600 men, some twenty
horses, and ten small cannons, he captured the Indian settlement of Tabasco and took as his
slave and mistress Malinche, who was to serve as his interpreter and his advisor on both
Indian psychology and the resentment of tribes exploited by the Aztecs of central Mexico.
Even more important, she instructed Cortes on the weaknesses of Montezuma, emperor of
the Aztecs.