The chronicles of the time speak of her as one of the five women who did not consent to remain still while their husbands fought
Malinche: the 'language' of Hernán Cortés and the mother of a legitimate bastard
"At all times there have been men of manly spirit and advice." This is what Francisco Cervantes de Salazar referred to the group to which María de Estrada belonged. In his work Chronicle of New Spain, its description, the quality and temperament of it, the property and nature of the Indians , of the 16th century, the first professor of Rhetoric of the Royal and Pontifical University of Mexico left written the words that Mary de Estrada pronounced after the disaster of the Sad Night , a day that led five "women of Castile" to the sacrificial stone of the Templo Mayor.
After the withdrawal in Tlaxcala, while preparing the final offensive for the capture of Tenochtitlán, with the intention that the women stay in the allied city, the one that Bernal Díaz del Castillo referred to as a "good and honest woman "He said to Hernán Cortés:" It is not right, Mr. Captain, that Spanish women dexed their husbands going to war ; where they die we will die, and it is reason that the Indians understand that the Spaniards are so brave that even their women they know how to fight, and we want, because for the cure of our husbands and others we are necessary, to take part in such good works, to gain some popularity like the other soldiers. "
María de Estrada, whose birthplace we have no record , regardless of the fact that Father Feijoo, in his speech Defense of the women of the 16th century , said that "the last name persuades that she was Asturian", was the sister of the conqueror Francisco de Estrada , established in the New World since 1509, the year in which Mary probably arrived. The first Caribbean references place it in Cuba. There it fell to the Taíno Indians during the fighting that took place in Matanzas. Once released, he married the Sevillian Pedro Sánchez Farfán in the town of La Trinidad. She probably moved to New Spain in April 1520, aboard the fleet led by Pánfilo de Narváez, to meet her husband, who had joined the courteous host . Sánchez Farfán was the one who captured Narváez during the operation that Cortés deployed to neutralize the one sent by Diego Velázquez de Cuéllar.
Captain Bernal Díaz del Castillo quotes her by name in her true History of the conquest of New Spain in 1632, when she takes stock of the survivors of the Sad Night . The one from Medina del Campo wrote: "Forgotten, I must write the content we received from seeing our lady Marina and Mrs. Luisa, the daughter of Xicotenga alive, who escaped them on the bridges some Tascaltecas, and also a woman who told herself María de Estrada, that we didn't have another woman from Castilla in Mexico but that one. "
"Deeds made with a sword"
The chronicler Diego Muñoz Camargo, son of Spanish and Indian, added details of the actions of that woman . In his History of Tlaxcala of 1802, he left this note: "In this so reckless call the sad night [...] a lady named María de Estrada was courageously shown, making marvelous and feats made with a sword and a circle in her hands , fighting bravely with such fury and encouragement, that it exceeded the effort of any man, no matter how hard and courageous it was, that our own put fright. " In his Indian monarchy of 1615, the Franciscan brother Juan de Torquemada , practically traced that bellicose portrait: "Mary of Estrada showed herself very courageously in this predicament and conflict, which with marvelous sword and an encirclement in her hands made wonderful deeds, and He entered through the enemies with such courage and courage, as if he were one of the bravest men in the world, forgotten that she was a woman , and clothed with the courage that men of courage usually have, and honor. wonders and things that he did, which he put in fright and amazement at all who looked at her . "
Twelve years after the fall of the Mexican Empire, Pedro Sánchez Farfán died, a circumstance that left a mark on the correspondence of Hernán Cortés , always favorable to that soldier and, therefore, to his wife.
The loyalty was reciprocal, as Sánchez Farfán refused to sign the accusations made by Cortés at the first Hearing of Mexico City, a refusal that led to his dismissal of the position of governor . In a letter written on March 18, 1533 in the Port of Santiago, bathed by the South Sea, the Medellin informed his cousin, Mr. Francisco Núñez, in charge of his affairs in the Court, of that death, a fact that He asked that he be known by the Empress and the members of the Council. In the letter, he urged his relative to watch over the widow's interests . Specifically, for the conservation of the towns of Tetela and Xilotem.
Cortes' pen, which accounts for the extinction of those orders linked to his closest circle, betrays the affection he had for the couple : "But Sánchez Farfán was one of the greatest friends that I had in these parts and that I lost a I am very close to his wife and I am in a lot of friend and, for the things that touch him, I have to realize that instead of her husband because it served me many days and I have it instead of sister and I say this so that you know as soon as I have everything that you do for her and that you say to all those gentlemen. Well I think that then as her husband died the listeners would take away the villages and porn in corregimiento because they have done so with all those who die, at least with those that they think are my friends, and his wife receives a lot of damage , so for taking away his main maintenance and because in one of them he had the farm of his farm. cipal that I have and you procured me and send the good dispatch of it very soon because I finished it in a lot ".
Some time later, the widow married in second nuptials with one of the 33 founders of Puebla : the Sevillian Alonso Martín Partidor, who had already lost his first wife, with whom he had numerous children. Like that of so many others, the figure of María de Estrada was diluted wrapped in lawsuits that tried to retain dividends that, won with the sword, refused with the pen.
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