human beings; but that they were animals with which the invaders justified their dehumanized treatment. To date the dominant culture does not accept that natives think and are able, by themselves, to initiate a social movement such as the EZLN. To accept that there was a large and sophisticated knowledge of the human being, of the world and the universe, would equate to recognize by the colonizers of yesterday and today, that one of the greatest human injustices would have been committed, because one of the World’s six most important and ancient human civilizations has been denied and tried to destroy.
"After 1519 a vast majority of new influences passed through indigenous life. The Habsburgs imperialism took their incentive from peninsular traditions and neglected regional adaptations. The Valley was never "headquarters" for the Spanish, except in the most circumstantial way. The Spaniards established their colonial capital in the Valley, but decidedly connected by road with Veracruz and then by sea to Seville. They almost never adopted the indigenous clothing styles or in construction design of houses. Instead, they exaggerated their own Spanish styles, as if to deny their provincial status. The indigenous civilization "Culture" had for them, in the best cases, an exotic appeal. The Spanish consumed products from the chinampas, but ignored the chinampas farming methods until the 18th century." (Charles Gibson. 1967)[1]
The researcher examined the attitude of the Spanish colonizer, in not recognizing any value to the wisdom and the millenary knowledge of the defeated civilization. The colonizing culture only saw the tip of the iceberg of the Anahuac civilization knowledge, and built over it a flimsy blind and predatory structure. However, what supports the contemporary Mexican society undoubtedly is the knowledge generated over eight thousand years, which represents the vast base of the iceberg that is under
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- ↑ Charles Gibson (1920–1985) was an American ethno historian who studied the Nahua peoples of colonial Mexico. His most significant works are Tlaxcala in the Sixteenth Century (1952) and The Aztecs under Spanish Rule (1964).
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