The Poet Prince of Texcoco
“O friends, to a good place we’ve come to live, come in springtime! In that place a very brief moment! So brief is life!” -Nezahualcoyotl
In the downtown Zocalo district, there is a small monument that you could easily miss unless you were looking for it. It is the Garden of the Triple Alliance, a peaceful monument to a violent empire. The Triple Alliance is a term used to describe the trio of Nahuatl city-states in central Mexico, Tenochtitlan (what is now Mexico City), Texcoco and Tlacopan, that together conquered much of what is today Mexico. While their dialects and religions varied slightly, they came from similar ancestors and had similar cultures. This small, quaint garden is a funny way to commemorate an empire that expanded through war and conquest, and would at times require sacrificial victims as tribute. The Alliance’s oppression and subjugation of other Mesoamerican peoples, such as the Tlaxacala and Toltecs, led in part to their fateful decisions to help the invading Spanish. But today this park is a lovely and peaceful spot amidst the chaotic churn of downtown.
Also commemorated in this park is Nezahualcoyotl, the prince of Texcoco. Born in 1402, Nezahualcoyotl (often translated as “Hungry Coyote”) became prince of his territory at the young age of fifteen, but was overthrown and forced into exile. Nezahualcoyotl would spend three years fighting and return with an army of 10,000 soldiers to return his family and regain his throne. As prince, Nezxhualcoyotl supported the artists and philosophers in his kingdom, and encouraged education. In the incredible historical novel Aztec, Nezahualcoyotl is portrayed as a cautious and clever leader, in contrast to the egotistical and ambitious, younger Moctezuma. Rebuffing Moctezuma’s desires to continue to use their armies to expand the empire, Nezahualcoyotl wisely plans to conserve his kingdom’s resources for whatever dark forces are amassing in the east. At that point in the novel (and history), both Moctezuma and Nezahualcoyotl have heard reports of strange, white men appearing on the eastern coast, and Nezahualcoyotl is proven right to view this threat as gravely serious.
There is something romantic, even cinematic, about this figure: A prince in exile, a warrior poet fighting to retake his kingdom. Later a wise, older ruler who can see the danger and destruction that is to come. There is of course, something deeply tragic about Nezahualcoyotl, too: He was a man who may have sensed his civilization would soon face an existential threat, and even with his foresight, knew there was very little he, or anyone, could do about it.
Nezahualcoyotl survives today not just in history, but in his writing. He is considered to be one of the greatest poets of ancient Mexico. The royalty and nobility of the Triple Alliance were expected to be well educated in many subjects, and nobles were taught how to use both the pen and the sword. There are some historical parallels with the samurais of Japan and the scholarly nobles of ancient Greece and Rome. It is amazing that we still have access to his poems, considering that poetry and literature at that time was often times memorized and reproduced orally, as well as the fact that there was great literary and cultural destruction by the Spanish in the generations after the Conquest.
Here is an excerpt of a poem written by Nezahualcoyotl, perhaps reflecting on his own experience of war and reconquest:
The battlefield is the place: where
one toasts the divine liquor in war,
where are stained red the divine
eagles,
Where the tigers howl,
Where all kinds of precious stones
rain from ornaments,
where wave headdresses rich with
fine plumes,
where princes are smashed to bits.
Here is another excerpt of a poem that is kind of like a pre-modern take on “these are a few of my favorite things”:
I love the song of the mockingbird,
bird of four hundred voices;
I love the color of jade
and the drowsy perfume of flowers;
but more than these, I love
my fellow human beings.
In recent years, as Mexico has strived to decolonize their national identity and intentionally celebrate their long ignored indigenous roots, Nezahualcoyotl has been frequently honored as a wise and fair ruler in Mexican history. There is a neighborhood named after him in Mexico City that, true to the character of the man, is home to many artists. He is even honored with his likeness on the 100 peso bill.
But I imagine the actual man would take all this recognition in stride. Like another poet who once famously wrote “nothing gold can stay”, Nezahualcoyotl also wrote about the impermanence and ever changing nature of life:
Truly do we live on earth?
Not forever on earth; only a little while here.
Although it be jade, it will be broken,
Although it be gold, it is crushed,
Although it be quetzal feather, it is torn asunder.
Not forever on earth; only a little while here.
