Prescott - A Harvest of Silences

I found this prompt to be one that is a bit challenging to answer, despite the fact Jack and I were the ones to develop it. I do find Prescott’s work to be  overall more valuable (at least today) as a primary source utilized to better understand the mindset of the period in which he is writing. With this said however, after reading his work it became abundantly clear Prescott knew the subject matter well he was writing about through extremely in-depth research and thought. He continually cites sources, even openly noting when they contrast with his own conclusions, and illustrates a spring of knowledge about the conquest, Cortes, and even the Native Americans. It was still plagued by the same problems, one would expect, that were present in 19^th century American ideology and historiography.

Prescott’s romanticization of the life of Cortes, and by extension the Western enterprise, as well as his constant belittling and degrading comments towards the natives are two of the main sources of bias that yield a harvest of silences. The most apparent, from my perspective, would be the motives and understanding behind the Native American actions. His section on the seizing of Montezuma illustrates a complete disregard for, what I would imagine are, the emperor’s actual motives, but rather Prescott utilizes the scene to package his own ideas and place before the reader. I, and most likely Troillot, would be extremely interested in delving deeper into the actions of the Aztecs, including Montezuma, to better understand the Conquest from their perspective. Perhaps this section would have had a different effect on a 19^th century audience, however for me I found myself completely sympathetic to Montezuma and wishing I had more knowledge of him, rather than glorified Cortes the aggressor.

A more specific kind of silence that I noticed when it comes to the Native Americans is the Western interpretation of their motives. I once, during my undergraduate years, read The Diary of Mary Rowlandson, a 17^th century Puritan women who is kidnapped by Native Americans. She writes her experiences down in a diary in which she attempts to understand the Native American culture and thought processes. Even though her work is of an earlier era, perhaps even closer to that of Cortes, and of a different demographic, I noticed distinct parallels between her thought process and that of the 19^th century Prescott.

Both Prescott and Rowlandson utilized their framework of ideology to both subvert the Native Americans legitimacy as well as vindicate their own. When they encounter acts of grandeur and greatness in the native populations, they easily dismiss such accomplishments in two distinct ways. First, they attribute such accomplishments as simply acts of God/Providence which utilized the natives as a medium for divine work. Secondly, they interpret such acts as the natural progression of civilization that’s inherent in all humans. This notion is turned on the natives because their lack of Western standards of development illustrates their inherent subservience. In an essence, they are potential energy diffused by their fallacies whom are in need of help from the epitome of civilization, the West. When it comes to the shortcomings of the natives, in Prescott and Rowlandson’s minds, they are however all too eager to utilize such facts as ammunition against the legitimacy of the Native Americans. Both stances directly vindicate their own predispositions and belief systems.