La Malinche: A Complicated Woman in Context
La Malinche, or Malintzin, was the primary interpreter in the retinue of Hernán Cortés during his conquest of Mexico in the early 16th century and has become one of the most divisive women in Mexican history. Though she was called Malintzin by the Nahuatl-speaking peoples of the Aztec Empire, she was known as Doña Marina or Malinche to the Spanish conquistadors, and modern scholars typically refer to her by the latter. She was instrumental to the success of the Spanish conquest and is regarded at once a traitor to her people, a symbol of Indigenous responses to colonial power, and an exemplar of survival and resilience.
Early Life
Born in Coatazacoalcos near modern-day Veracruz, Malintzin was the daughter of a noble father and a low-ranking mother and was sold into slavery at a young age. Taken from her home and kin, she was brought to the Mayan coastal town of Xicallanco and traded for either beans or bolts of cloth, the currency that ruled in the trading port at that time. From there, the young, enslaved girl was taken to Potonchan near the mouth of the Tabasco River, where she would live among the powerful and wealthy Chontal Maya. Years later, when the Chontal Maya sustained devastating and unprecedented losses in skirmishes with the newly arrived expedition of Spanish conquistadors, she was one in a group of 20 young women whom the Chontal Maya traded to the Spanish, led by Hernán Cortés, in exchange for peace.
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⇒ La Malinche: A Complicated Woman in Context
