The Other Moctezuma Girls, Sofia Robleda, 2026, Amazon Crossing
Thanks to the musings of a president aspiring to be an emperor, the “death of civilisation” is in vogue, yet the hidden scars on women left by imperial abuses throughout history need uncovering if they are to be healed.
The greatest and most splendorous known empire of the unconquered American continent, the Mexica—better known as the Aztecs—and its downfall has inspired amazing writing and generated millions of pages over five centuries.
Women in Aztec and other indigenous societies in that era were resourceful, but mainly a resource—it was common for them to be traded to seal alliances between warring tribes, no differently to the role of women in Europe whereby female heirs or queens were used to set deals and solidify empires.
Before his arrival in Tenochtitlán, today known as Mexico City, the conquistador Hernán Cortés was gifted a woman called known as Malinche, a well-bred indigenous lady who spoke various languages and Spanish and acted as his interpreter. Malinche knew the rules of indigenous court life and how to navigate the world of men.
The name of the emperor Moctezuma Xocoyotzin (II), still resounds, but not much is known about his descendants.
It is said that Moctezuma fathered between 100 and 500 children, but only a few were recognised as legitimate. It is also said that it was Moctezuma who received Cortés and his men with open arms.
Cortés was given Moctezuma’s three teenage daughters, the youngest called Tecuipoch (around 11 years old at the time of the Spaniards’ arrival). She was the most important woman in Mexico at the time and was later baptised Doña Isabel Moctezuma.
In a move designed as means to stop all the Moctezuma heirs claiming lands that were rightfully theirs, Cortés awarded Doña Isabel the encomienda of Tacuba. She became Cortés’ “domestic companion”, and gave birth to Leonor Cortés Moctezuma, who was removed from her mother and taken under Cortés’ custody.
The newcomers later returned the monarch’s hospitality with an attack backed by a thousand Tlaxcalteca warriors, a rival tribe to the Mexica tired of the level of taxes imposed on them by the Aztecs.
Moctezuma the emperor did not die by the hand of the Spanish, but under the stones his own people threw at him, indignant about the defeat and what was regarded as his appeasement of the invaders.
Tecuipoch also had the misfortune of marrying six times. From her last two last marriages (to Spanish men) she had six more children. The Other Moctezuma Girls were Tecuipoch’s youngest daughters: Isabel and Catalina Cano de Moctezuma.
In Sofia Robleda’s historical fiction the author presents a series of flashbacks between Tecuipoch and her namesake daughter Isabel, and the trials and tribulations of the girl and her sister Catalina after they receive a mystery package from the afterlife.
Robleda, also author of another journey of discovery (Daughter of Fire) paints a picture of total assimilation of Moctezuma’s legitimate heirs into the nobility established in Nueva España or New Spain, the name given to Mexico after the conquest.
The life of the nobility in this context was like standard European court life during the 16th century. For Isabel and Catalina Cano de Moctezuma—just like all the noblewomen of Spain, such as Queen Juana de Castilla, (nicknamed throughout the ages “the Mad One”)—their rights to a large portion of the encomienda of Tacuba were denied. Instead, the fate that awaited them was gaslighting and a life of silence and submission surrounded by the walls of a convent.
The book presents a vision of quasi-contemporary young and lively teenagers possessing a rebellious streak, with a mission: decoding and preserving their mother’s last will and in doing so their people’s heritage.
The two teenage girls face the contradiction of being heirs to a fortune but destined not to enjoy it as they were not men, and cheerfully accepting being micromanaged by their entitled testosterone-fuelled brothers. Obeying the stiff and suffocating established rules was comparable to wearing the attire of colonial times, and the remote possibility of finding a marriage that was not transactional became too much. What could a girl do?
Most importantly: the personal contradiction of growing up witnessing the segregation imposed by the Spanish colonisers against the indigenous population and the enslaved Africans they imported, was a prison. It is fair to say that, in this context, women and indigenous people were, and sadly are, still seen by those in power as the lowest in the list of priorities.
Both girls—just like axolotls—belonged to both worlds and none, the dilemma of any modern Mexican, deciding which world won’t betray the other.
The reader can feel that this novel is written for the screen, and certainly it has many elements that could be aimed at visual media. The writing is immersive, with colourful references to streets and landscapes, descriptive of sites surrounding the city, the smells of food and people. There is affection in the way we are told about places and even mythical beings, blending what are the tangible and the spiritual worlds.
It feels clear that Robleda’s intention is to pay homage to a proud but lost world, from which many fragments are still present even now. The narration is sprinkled with terms from the ancient Nahuatl (Mexican) language that today exist in English, but there is a handy Nahuatl glossary attached to enable the reader. Also to help us is a genealogical tree at the start, which could benefit by being printed in a larger format.
But the main aim of this novel is giving voice to the nameless part of most history—women in all their versions, young or old, ghosts or spirits ahead of their time, such as Tecuipoch who freed her slaves as her dying wish.
The effort the author has put into imagining that world and translating it for a contemporary reader, thereby opening the door to a story about which very little has been written, is commendable.
Moctezuma’s granddaughters Isabel and Catalina Cano joined the prestigious Concepción de la Madre de Dios convent, a place reserved for pure-blooded Spanish women. In 1553 they renounced their right of inheritance to Tacuba on behalf of their father and Cano brothers.
The conquest is a sore issue for any Mexican. Cortés died in Spain but as per his last wish was buried in Mexico, where his remains were moved on two occasions. In the period of the war of Independence his body was hidden as it was feared it would be desecrated. He has rested in Mexico City since 1946, in a concealed corner of the Hospital of Jesus of Nazareth, the very spot where he first met emperor Moctezuma.
Five hundred years later two descendants of Moctezuma and Cortés embraced at this same spot in a symbolic attempt to repair the wound left by the Conquest.
We do not know where Moctezuma was buried, although his blood still pulsates through notorious people in Mexico, and even parts of Europe among royal circles.
In Mexico we can trace Eduardo Matos Moctezuma, who has worked in the preservation of Mexico’s indigenous past, and who directed the reconstruction of the Templo Mayor project in Mexico City, one of the most important archaeological sites in the world.
There is also Blanca Barragán Moctezuma, a known descendant of Doña Isabel Moctezuma whose research led to finding Tecuipoch’s testament in 1994.
They have done their part in rescuing the history of this captivating figure, but much more needs to be done in bringing to light a story that Robleda has cleverly unearthed.
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Categories: Mexico