Hernan Cortez was born in 1485 to a lesser family in Medellin, Spain. Cortez grew up in the days where Columus was the equal to Neil Armstrong. When he was given the opportunity form family friends to move to Hispaniola at 19 he quickly agreed.

When his ambition landed him in as the captain of an expedition to the new world, when he came to the continent he allied indigenous groups against each other. Later Cortez defeated the Governor of Cuba when he was accused of mutiny. He later received pardon for the king of Spain, and when he overthrew the Aztec empire Cortez was awarded the Marques del valle de Oaxaca, but the prestigious title of Viceroy was awarded to a high ranking nobleman, Antonia de Mendoza. Cortez died in his sleep in Spain in the year of 1541.

Hernan Cortez is best know for his ingenious defeat of the Aztec civilization. He fought the Aztecs not only from destroying moral by kidnaping the emperor of the civilization, but by methods later mentioned in his memoir over using rival groups against the Aztecs who had enslaved them gave Cortez an upper hand to the Aztecs ultimately leading in the downfall in their civilization.

Because of Cortez's defeat of the Aztec empire, he inspired an increase of explorations to what is now Latin America. He also created revolutionary new tactics on how to defeat the native civilizations in his memoirs over defeating the Aztec civilizations, a key example of this is the defeat of the Incan empire, which was mentioned in the diary of Francisco Pizarro about how to defeat civilizations. Because of Cortez's huge accomplishment of defeating one of the leading civilizations in Latin America at that time, that region would not have been claimed and domesticated until much later. This is because when the capital of the Aztec civilization teotechiacan was captured, large quantities of gold and other valuables were discovered leading to a mini gold rush to find gold and make their name in Spain.

• His parents strongly wanted cortez to be a lawyer.
• Cortez began going to college at age 14.
• His military nickname was killer.
• He discovered chocolate.
• When he arrived in Mexico Cortez burnt the ships so they could not turn back.

http://www.aztec-history.com/hernan-cortez-biography.html

http://latinamericanhistory.about.com/od/theconquistadors/a/cortesbio.htm

http://www.donquijote.org/culture/spain/history/hernan-cortes.asp

http://biography.yourdictionary.com/articles/facts-about-hernando-cortes.html

http://www.softschools.com/timelines/hernan_cortes_timeline/106/