{"id":1617,"date":"2017-07-11T07:17:50","date_gmt":"2017-07-11T07:17:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/ushistory1os\/chapter\/how-to-read-primary-sources\/"},"modified":"2022-07-25T19:17:12","modified_gmt":"2022-07-25T19:17:12","slug":"how-to-read-primary-sources","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/chapter\/how-to-read-primary-sources\/","title":{"raw":"Types of Sources","rendered":"Types of Sources"},"content":{"raw":"<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\r\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Differentiate between primary and secondary sources<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<h2>Multiple Perspectives<\/h2>\r\nOne of the questions you could ask to learn more about the Aztecs and the Spanish might be, \"How did the Aztec (and how did the Spanish) describe their first encounter?\" Fortunately, there are some accounts from their initial encounters. Granted, many of these records are lost, but there are some surviving first- and second-hand accounts, including those written by\u00a0Cort\u00e9s himself in letters to\u00a0King Charles V, the King of Spain (and the Holy Roman Empire) at the time.\u00a0Other accounts were recorded by conquistador Bernal D\u00edaz\u00a0del Castillo, who wrote about his experiences during the Aztec conquest of 1521 several decades later in a book, <em>The True History of the Conquest of Spain<\/em>. Even more records come from the <em>Florentine Codex<\/em>, a record about the Aztec and life in central America after the Spanish encounter, written by Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahag\u00fan between 1545 and 1590. The codex is in a library in Florence (hence the name), but it was mostly written in\u00a0Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, and documents the culture, practices, and history of the Aztec people.[footnote]Nancy Fitch, \u201cThe Conquest of Mexico.\u201d Teaching Resources for Historians. American Historical Association. Accessed March 16, 2021. https:\/\/www.historians.org\/teaching-and-learning\/teaching-resources-for-historians\/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age\/the-history-of-the-americas\/the-conquest-of-mexico\/for-teachers\/general-discussion-of-the-primary-sources-used-in-this-project.[\/footnote]\r\n\r\nOther accounts come from yet another codex, the\u00a0<i>Anales de Tlatelolco,\u00a0<\/i>which were\u00a0written in Nahuatl by anonymous Aztec authors sometime after the conquest by the Spanish (likely between 1528 and the 1540s). Miguel Le\u00f3n-Portilla translated many of these accounts and published them in a book called <em>The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico\u00a0<\/em>in 1959. Below is an example from that text. It describes Cort\u00e9s's meeting with Moctezuma\u00a0as well as the Massacre in the Great Temple, an event in May 1520 when the Spanish brutally attacked unarmed Aztecs while they were celebrating the\u00a0Feast of Toxcatl (<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Massacre_in_the_Great_Temple_of_Tenochtitlan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">this Wikipedia article shares two perspectives of the account<\/a>). This event began a full-scale war, with continued fighting through August 1521. We will use the text below to practice techniques for analyzing historical documents.\r\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\r\n<h3>Aztec Accounts of the Conquest<\/h3>\r\n<p class=\"p1\"><em><span class=\"s1\">In 1519 Hernan Cort\u00e9s sailed from Cuba, landed in Mexico, and made his way to the Aztec capital. This source aggregates a number of early written reports by Aztec authors describing the destruction of Tenochtitl\u00e1n at the hands of a\u00a0coalition\u00a0of Spanish and Indigenous armies. This collection of sources was assembled by Miguel Leon Portilla, a Mexican anthropologist. <a href=\"http:\/\/Primary Source: Aztec Accounts of the Conquest, 1520\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">You can also view this account here<\/a>.\r\n<\/span><\/em><\/p>\r\n\r\n<h2><em>Speeches of Motecuhzoma and Cort\u00e9s<\/em><\/h2>\r\nWhen Motecuhzoma [Moctezuma] had given necklaces to each one, Cort\u00e9s asked him: \u201cAre you Motecuhzoma? Are you the king? Is it true that you are the king Motecuhzoma?\u201d\r\n\r\nAnd the king said: \u201cYes, I am Motecuhzoma.\u201d Then he stood up to welcome Cort\u00e9s; he came forward, bowed his head low and addressed him in these words: \u201cOur lord, you are weary. The journey has tired you, but now you have arrived on the earth. You have come to your city, Mexico. You have come here to sit on your throne, to sit under its canopy.\r\n\r\n\u201cThe kings who have gone before, your representatives, guarded it and preserved it for your coming. The kings Itzcoatl, Motecuhzoma the Elder, Axayacatl, Tizoc and Ahuitzol ruled for you in the City of Mexico. The people were protected by their swords and sheltered by their shields.\r\n\r\n\u201cDo the kings know the destiny of those they left behind, their posterity? If only they are watching! If only they can see what I see! No, it is not a dream. I am not walking in my sleep. I am not seeing you in my dreams\u2026. I have seen you at last! I have met you face to face! I was in agony for five days, for ten days, with my eyes fixed on the Region of the Mystery. And now you have come out of the clouds and mists to sit on your throne again. This was foretold by the kings who governed your city, and now it has taken place. You have come back to us; you have come down from the sky. Rest now, and take possession of your royal houses. Welcome to your land, my lords!\u201d\r\n\r\nWhen Motecuhzoma had finished, La Malinche translated his address into Spanish so that the Captain could understand it. Cort\u00e9s replied in his strange and savage tongue, speaking first to La Malinche: \u201cTell Motecuhzoma that we are his friends. There is nothing to fear. We have wanted to see him for a long time, and now we have seen his face and heard his words. Tell him that we love him well and that our hearts are contented.\u201d\r\n\r\nThen he said to Motecuhzoma: \u201cWe have come to your house in Mexico as friends. There is nothing to fear.\u201d\r\n\r\nLa Malinche translated this speech and the Spaniards grasped Motecuhzoma\u2019s hands and patted his back to show their affection for him\u2026.\r\n<h2><i>Massacre in the Main Temple<\/i><\/h2>\r\n<em>The Massacre in the Great Temple, also called the Alvarado Massacre, was an event on May 22, 1520, in the Aztec capital Tenochtitl\u00e1n during the Spanish conquest of Mexico, in which the celebration of the Feast of Toxcatl ended in a massacre of Aztec elites. While Hern\u00e1n Cort\u00e9s was in Tenochtitl\u00e1n, he heard about other Spaniards arriving on the coast \u2013 P\u00e1nfilo de Narv\u00e1ez had come from Cuba with orders to arrest him \u2013 and Cort\u00e9s was forced to leave the city to fight them. During his absence, Motecuhzoma asked deputy governor Pedro de Alvarado for permission to celebrate Toxcatl (an Aztec festivity in honor of Tezcatlipoca, one of their main gods). But after the festivities had started, Alvarado interrupted the celebration, killing all the warriors and noblemen who were celebrating inside the Great Temple. The few who managed to escape the massacre by climbing over the walls informed the community of the Spaniards' atrocity.<\/em>\r\n\r\nDuring this time, the people asked Motecuhzoma how they should celebrate their god\u2019s fiesta. He said: \u201cDress him in all his finery, in all his sacred ornaments.\u201d\r\n\r\nDuring this same time, The Sun commanded that Motecuhzoma and Itzcohuatzin, the military chief of Tlatelolco, be made prisoners. The Spaniards hanged a chief from Acolhuacan named Nezahualquentzin. They also murdered the king of Nauhtla, Cohualpopocatzin, by wounding him with arrows and then burning him alive.\r\n\r\nFor this reason, our warriors were on guard at the Eagle Gate. The sentries from Tenochtitl\u00e1n stood at one side of the gate, and the sentries from Tlatelolco at the other. But messengers came to tell them to dress the figure of Huitzilopochtli. They left their posts and went to dress him in his sacred finery: his ornaments and his paper clothing.\r\n\r\nWhen this had been done, the celebrants began to sing their songs. That is how they celebrated the first day of the fiesta. On the second day they began to sing again, but without warning they were all put to death. The dancers and singers were completely unarmed. They brought only their embroidered cloaks, their turquoises, their lip plugs, their necklaces, their clusters of heron feathers, their trinkets made of deer hooves. Those who played the drums, the old men, had brought their gourds of snuff and their timbrels.\r\n\r\nThe Spaniards attacked the musicians first, slashing at their hands and faces until they had killed all of them. The singers-and even the spectators- were also killed. This slaughter in the Sacred Patio went on for three hours. Then the Spaniards burst into the rooms of the temple to kill the others: those who were carrying water, or bringing fodder for the horses, or grinding meal, or sweeping, or standing watch over this work.\r\n\r\nThe king Motecuhzoma, who was accompanied by Itzcohuatzin and by those who had brought food for the Spaniards, protested: \u201cOur lords, that is enough! What are you doing? These people are not carrying shields or macanas. Our lords, they are completely unarmed!\u201d\r\n\r\nThe Sun had treacherously murdered our people on the twentieth day after the captain left for the coast. We allowed the Captain to return to the city in peace. But on the following day we attacked him with all our might, and that was the beginning of the war.\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nDoes your impression of the Aztec encounter with the Spanish now change with the new information from these readings? Consider the questions to help you think about the primary source.\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/5aa67076-ca0c-462a-94ec-27663b745a90\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/ea562913-9e60-4312-919b-b3b455c0c725\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/d47520f6-7edc-472e-ba22-0e5d155ae6f0\r\n\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/505936af-186d-4dbd-8e1c-927632a78c26\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nWith this new information, you are only beginning to understand the entirety of the encounter between the Spanish and the Aztec. When historians encounter primary source documents, they not only look at the message and main idea of a document, but they also must consider the document in light of its surrounding context and also question\u00a0<em>who<\/em> wrote it, <em>why<\/em> they wrote it, and why it is relevant.\r\n\r\nFor example, we know that this source is compiled by\u00a0Miguel Leon Portilla but written by\u00a0Aztec authors sometime after the conquest by the Spanish (likely between 1528 and the 1540s). It was recorded in the<em> Anales de Tlatelolco<\/em> in the Nahuatl language by unknown authors (they had adopted the Spanish alphabet into their written language). They were likely not there first-hand, but are repeating second-hand information they heard or remember about the events. The record\u00a0was intended as an account for the Mexica (Aztec) peoples, and written for an informative purpose. Because these authors represent the Aztec perspective they may be more likely to paint the Spanish in a negative light.\r\n\r\nWith this information in mind, a historian wanting to better understand this encounter would dig deeper to find other accounts from different perspectives, including what the Spanish said about the meeting. In this way, historians look at dozens, even hundreds of different accounts, attempting to piece together the nuances of any given situation. It can be a fun and challenging type of detective work.\r\n<h2>Primary vs. Secondary Sources<\/h2>\r\nWe can group information sources into three basic categories: primary, secondary, and tertiary. When we make distinctions between these three categories of sources, we are relating the information itself to the context in which it was created. Noting this relationship between creation and context helps us understand the big picture in which information operates, and prompts us to consider whose voices we are including in our research, and whose voices may be left out.\r\n<h3>Primary Sources<\/h3>\r\nPrimary sources are first-hand observations or experiences of an event. They can also be the original sources of information before they have been analyzed, such as statistical data sets. Examples of primary sources include:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Eyewitness reports (interviews, photographs)<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Speeches, diaries, memoirs<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Empirical research<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Original documents, historical newspaper articles<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Literary works (novels, plays, poems), artworks<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Tweets<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Photographs<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<h3>Secondary Sources<\/h3>\r\nSecondary sources are created after an event occurred and offer a review or an analysis of the event; they provide an interpretation of the primary source or data without offering new data. Examples of secondary sources would be:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Biographies, nonfiction books<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Editorials<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Literary criticism and reviews<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Periodicals (such as scholarly journals, magazines, or newspapers)<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<h3>Tertiary Sources<\/h3>\r\nTertiary sources are compilations of information coming from secondary and primary sources; these can be lists or collections, and are generally reference material that can help you find, or direct you to, secondary and primary sources. Examples of tertiary sources include:\r\n<ul>\r\n \t<li>Bibliographies<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Abstracts of scholarly articles<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Indexes and directories<\/li>\r\n \t<li>Encyclopedia entries<\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\r\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\r\nhttps:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/ebf47728-f9b6-4c5b-9b37-822844c8b8f3\r\n\r\n<\/div>","rendered":"<div class=\"textbox learning-objectives\">\n<h3>Learning Objectives<\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>Differentiate between primary and secondary sources<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n<h2>Multiple Perspectives<\/h2>\n<p>One of the questions you could ask to learn more about the Aztecs and the Spanish might be, &#8220;How did the Aztec (and how did the Spanish) describe their first encounter?&#8221; Fortunately, there are some accounts from their initial encounters. Granted, many of these records are lost, but there are some surviving first- and second-hand accounts, including those written by\u00a0Cort\u00e9s himself in letters to\u00a0King Charles V, the King of Spain (and the Holy Roman Empire) at the time.\u00a0Other accounts were recorded by conquistador Bernal D\u00edaz\u00a0del Castillo, who wrote about his experiences during the Aztec conquest of 1521 several decades later in a book, <em>The True History of the Conquest of Spain<\/em>. Even more records come from the <em>Florentine Codex<\/em>, a record about the Aztec and life in central America after the Spanish encounter, written by Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahag\u00fan between 1545 and 1590. The codex is in a library in Florence (hence the name), but it was mostly written in\u00a0Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, and documents the culture, practices, and history of the Aztec people.<a class=\"footnote\" title=\"Nancy Fitch, \u201cThe Conquest of Mexico.\u201d Teaching Resources for Historians. American Historical Association. Accessed March 16, 2021. https:\/\/www.historians.org\/teaching-and-learning\/teaching-resources-for-historians\/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age\/the-history-of-the-americas\/the-conquest-of-mexico\/for-teachers\/general-discussion-of-the-primary-sources-used-in-this-project.\" id=\"return-footnote-1617-1\" href=\"#footnote-1617-1\" aria-label=\"Footnote 1\"><sup class=\"footnote\">[1]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Other accounts come from yet another codex, the\u00a0<i>Anales de Tlatelolco,\u00a0<\/i>which were\u00a0written in Nahuatl by anonymous Aztec authors sometime after the conquest by the Spanish (likely between 1528 and the 1540s). Miguel Le\u00f3n-Portilla translated many of these accounts and published them in a book called <em>The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico\u00a0<\/em>in 1959. Below is an example from that text. It describes Cort\u00e9s&#8217;s meeting with Moctezuma\u00a0as well as the Massacre in the Great Temple, an event in May 1520 when the Spanish brutally attacked unarmed Aztecs while they were celebrating the\u00a0Feast of Toxcatl (<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Massacre_in_the_Great_Temple_of_Tenochtitlan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">this Wikipedia article shares two perspectives of the account<\/a>). This event began a full-scale war, with continued fighting through August 1521. We will use the text below to practice techniques for analyzing historical documents.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox key-takeaways\">\n<h3>Aztec Accounts of the Conquest<\/h3>\n<p class=\"p1\"><em><span class=\"s1\">In 1519 Hernan Cort\u00e9s sailed from Cuba, landed in Mexico, and made his way to the Aztec capital. This source aggregates a number of early written reports by Aztec authors describing the destruction of Tenochtitl\u00e1n at the hands of a\u00a0coalition\u00a0of Spanish and Indigenous armies. This collection of sources was assembled by Miguel Leon Portilla, a Mexican anthropologist. <a href=\"http:\/\/Primary Source: Aztec Accounts of the Conquest, 1520\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">You can also view this account here<\/a>.<br \/>\n<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n<h2><em>Speeches of Motecuhzoma and Cort\u00e9s<\/em><\/h2>\n<p>When Motecuhzoma [Moctezuma] had given necklaces to each one, Cort\u00e9s asked him: \u201cAre you Motecuhzoma? Are you the king? Is it true that you are the king Motecuhzoma?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And the king said: \u201cYes, I am Motecuhzoma.\u201d Then he stood up to welcome Cort\u00e9s; he came forward, bowed his head low and addressed him in these words: \u201cOur lord, you are weary. The journey has tired you, but now you have arrived on the earth. You have come to your city, Mexico. You have come here to sit on your throne, to sit under its canopy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe kings who have gone before, your representatives, guarded it and preserved it for your coming. The kings Itzcoatl, Motecuhzoma the Elder, Axayacatl, Tizoc and Ahuitzol ruled for you in the City of Mexico. The people were protected by their swords and sheltered by their shields.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDo the kings know the destiny of those they left behind, their posterity? If only they are watching! If only they can see what I see! No, it is not a dream. I am not walking in my sleep. I am not seeing you in my dreams\u2026. I have seen you at last! I have met you face to face! I was in agony for five days, for ten days, with my eyes fixed on the Region of the Mystery. And now you have come out of the clouds and mists to sit on your throne again. This was foretold by the kings who governed your city, and now it has taken place. You have come back to us; you have come down from the sky. Rest now, and take possession of your royal houses. Welcome to your land, my lords!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>When Motecuhzoma had finished, La Malinche translated his address into Spanish so that the Captain could understand it. Cort\u00e9s replied in his strange and savage tongue, speaking first to La Malinche: \u201cTell Motecuhzoma that we are his friends. There is nothing to fear. We have wanted to see him for a long time, and now we have seen his face and heard his words. Tell him that we love him well and that our hearts are contented.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Then he said to Motecuhzoma: \u201cWe have come to your house in Mexico as friends. There is nothing to fear.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>La Malinche translated this speech and the Spaniards grasped Motecuhzoma\u2019s hands and patted his back to show their affection for him\u2026.<\/p>\n<h2><i>Massacre in the Main Temple<\/i><\/h2>\n<p><em>The Massacre in the Great Temple, also called the Alvarado Massacre, was an event on May 22, 1520, in the Aztec capital Tenochtitl\u00e1n during the Spanish conquest of Mexico, in which the celebration of the Feast of Toxcatl ended in a massacre of Aztec elites. While Hern\u00e1n Cort\u00e9s was in Tenochtitl\u00e1n, he heard about other Spaniards arriving on the coast \u2013 P\u00e1nfilo de Narv\u00e1ez had come from Cuba with orders to arrest him \u2013 and Cort\u00e9s was forced to leave the city to fight them. During his absence, Motecuhzoma asked deputy governor Pedro de Alvarado for permission to celebrate Toxcatl (an Aztec festivity in honor of Tezcatlipoca, one of their main gods). But after the festivities had started, Alvarado interrupted the celebration, killing all the warriors and noblemen who were celebrating inside the Great Temple. The few who managed to escape the massacre by climbing over the walls informed the community of the Spaniards&#8217; atrocity.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>During this time, the people asked Motecuhzoma how they should celebrate their god\u2019s fiesta. He said: \u201cDress him in all his finery, in all his sacred ornaments.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>During this same time, The Sun commanded that Motecuhzoma and Itzcohuatzin, the military chief of Tlatelolco, be made prisoners. The Spaniards hanged a chief from Acolhuacan named Nezahualquentzin. They also murdered the king of Nauhtla, Cohualpopocatzin, by wounding him with arrows and then burning him alive.<\/p>\n<p>For this reason, our warriors were on guard at the Eagle Gate. The sentries from Tenochtitl\u00e1n stood at one side of the gate, and the sentries from Tlatelolco at the other. But messengers came to tell them to dress the figure of Huitzilopochtli. They left their posts and went to dress him in his sacred finery: his ornaments and his paper clothing.<\/p>\n<p>When this had been done, the celebrants began to sing their songs. That is how they celebrated the first day of the fiesta. On the second day they began to sing again, but without warning they were all put to death. The dancers and singers were completely unarmed. They brought only their embroidered cloaks, their turquoises, their lip plugs, their necklaces, their clusters of heron feathers, their trinkets made of deer hooves. Those who played the drums, the old men, had brought their gourds of snuff and their timbrels.<\/p>\n<p>The Spaniards attacked the musicians first, slashing at their hands and faces until they had killed all of them. The singers-and even the spectators- were also killed. This slaughter in the Sacred Patio went on for three hours. Then the Spaniards burst into the rooms of the temple to kill the others: those who were carrying water, or bringing fodder for the horses, or grinding meal, or sweeping, or standing watch over this work.<\/p>\n<p>The king Motecuhzoma, who was accompanied by Itzcohuatzin and by those who had brought food for the Spaniards, protested: \u201cOur lords, that is enough! What are you doing? These people are not carrying shields or macanas. Our lords, they are completely unarmed!\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Sun had treacherously murdered our people on the twentieth day after the captain left for the coast. We allowed the Captain to return to the city in peace. But on the following day we attacked him with all our might, and that was the beginning of the war.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>Does your impression of the Aztec encounter with the Spanish now change with the new information from these readings? Consider the questions to help you think about the primary source.<\/p>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_5aa67076-ca0c-462a-94ec-27663b745a90\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/5aa67076-ca0c-462a-94ec-27663b745a90?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_5aa67076-ca0c-462a-94ec-27663b745a90\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_ea562913-9e60-4312-919b-b3b455c0c725\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/ea562913-9e60-4312-919b-b3b455c0c725?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_ea562913-9e60-4312-919b-b3b455c0c725\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_d47520f6-7edc-472e-ba22-0e5d155ae6f0\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/d47520f6-7edc-472e-ba22-0e5d155ae6f0?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_d47520f6-7edc-472e-ba22-0e5d155ae6f0\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_505936af-186d-4dbd-8e1c-927632a78c26\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/505936af-186d-4dbd-8e1c-927632a78c26?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_505936af-186d-4dbd-8e1c-927632a78c26\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>With this new information, you are only beginning to understand the entirety of the encounter between the Spanish and the Aztec. When historians encounter primary source documents, they not only look at the message and main idea of a document, but they also must consider the document in light of its surrounding context and also question\u00a0<em>who<\/em> wrote it, <em>why<\/em> they wrote it, and why it is relevant.<\/p>\n<p>For example, we know that this source is compiled by\u00a0Miguel Leon Portilla but written by\u00a0Aztec authors sometime after the conquest by the Spanish (likely between 1528 and the 1540s). It was recorded in the<em> Anales de Tlatelolco<\/em> in the Nahuatl language by unknown authors (they had adopted the Spanish alphabet into their written language). They were likely not there first-hand, but are repeating second-hand information they heard or remember about the events. The record\u00a0was intended as an account for the Mexica (Aztec) peoples, and written for an informative purpose. Because these authors represent the Aztec perspective they may be more likely to paint the Spanish in a negative light.<\/p>\n<p>With this information in mind, a historian wanting to better understand this encounter would dig deeper to find other accounts from different perspectives, including what the Spanish said about the meeting. In this way, historians look at dozens, even hundreds of different accounts, attempting to piece together the nuances of any given situation. It can be a fun and challenging type of detective work.<\/p>\n<h2>Primary vs. Secondary Sources<\/h2>\n<p>We can group information sources into three basic categories: primary, secondary, and tertiary. When we make distinctions between these three categories of sources, we are relating the information itself to the context in which it was created. Noting this relationship between creation and context helps us understand the big picture in which information operates, and prompts us to consider whose voices we are including in our research, and whose voices may be left out.<\/p>\n<h3>Primary Sources<\/h3>\n<p>Primary sources are first-hand observations or experiences of an event. They can also be the original sources of information before they have been analyzed, such as statistical data sets. Examples of primary sources include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Eyewitness reports (interviews, photographs)<\/li>\n<li>Speeches, diaries, memoirs<\/li>\n<li>Empirical research<\/li>\n<li>Original documents, historical newspaper articles<\/li>\n<li>Literary works (novels, plays, poems), artworks<\/li>\n<li>Tweets<\/li>\n<li>Photographs<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Secondary Sources<\/h3>\n<p>Secondary sources are created after an event occurred and offer a review or an analysis of the event; they provide an interpretation of the primary source or data without offering new data. Examples of secondary sources would be:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Biographies, nonfiction books<\/li>\n<li>Editorials<\/li>\n<li>Literary criticism and reviews<\/li>\n<li>Periodicals (such as scholarly journals, magazines, or newspapers)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h3>Tertiary Sources<\/h3>\n<p>Tertiary sources are compilations of information coming from secondary and primary sources; these can be lists or collections, and are generally reference material that can help you find, or direct you to, secondary and primary sources. Examples of tertiary sources include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Bibliographies<\/li>\n<li>Abstracts of scholarly articles<\/li>\n<li>Indexes and directories<\/li>\n<li>Encyclopedia entries<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<div class=\"textbox tryit\">\n<h3>Try It<\/h3>\n<p>\t<iframe id=\"assessment_practice_ebf47728-f9b6-4c5b-9b37-822844c8b8f3\" class=\"resizable\" src=\"https:\/\/assess.lumenlearning.com\/practice\/ebf47728-f9b6-4c5b-9b37-822844c8b8f3?iframe_resize_id=assessment_practice_id_ebf47728-f9b6-4c5b-9b37-822844c8b8f3\" frameborder=\"0\" style=\"border:none;width:100%;height:100%;min-height:300px;\"><br \/>\n\t<\/iframe><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\t\t\t <section class=\"citations-section\" role=\"contentinfo\">\n\t\t\t <h3>Candela Citations<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t\t <div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <div id=\"citation-list-1617\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t <div class=\"licensing\"><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Original<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>How to Read Primary Sources. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: Thomas de Mayo. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: Reynolds Community College. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/www.reynolds.edu\/\">http:\/\/www.reynolds.edu\/<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em><\/li><\/ul><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">CC licensed content, Shared previously<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Sources. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: Walter D. Butler, Aloha Sargent, and Kelsey Smith. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/introtocollegeresearch.pressbooks.com\/chapter\/information-sources-by-category\/\">https:\/\/introtocollegeresearch.pressbooks.com\/chapter\/information-sources-by-category\/<\/a>. <strong>Project<\/strong>: Intro to College Research. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em><\/li><li>An Aztec Account of the Spanish Attack. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: The American Yawp. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.americanyawp.com\/reader\/the-new-world\/an-aztec-account-of-the-spanish-attack\/\">https:\/\/www.americanyawp.com\/reader\/the-new-world\/an-aztec-account-of-the-spanish-attack\/<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/\">CC BY: Attribution<\/a><\/em><\/li><\/ul><div class=\"license-attribution-dropdown-subheading\">Public domain content<\/div><ul class=\"citation-list\"><li>The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico. <strong>Authored by<\/strong>: Miguel Leon Portilla. <strong>Provided by<\/strong>: Internet Modern History Sourcebook. <strong>Located at<\/strong>: <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/legacy.fordham.edu\/Halsall\/mod\/aztecs1.asp\">http:\/\/legacy.fordham.edu\/Halsall\/mod\/aztecs1.asp<\/a>. <strong>License<\/strong>: <em><a target=\"_blank\" rel=\"license\" href=\"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/about\/pdm\">Public Domain: No Known Copyright<\/a><\/em><\/li><\/ul><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t <\/div>\n\t\t\t <\/section><hr class=\"before-footnotes clear\" \/><div class=\"footnotes\"><ol><li id=\"footnote-1617-1\">Nancy Fitch, \u201cThe Conquest of Mexico.\u201d Teaching Resources for Historians. American Historical Association. Accessed March 16, 2021. https:\/\/www.historians.org\/teaching-and-learning\/teaching-resources-for-historians\/teaching-and-learning-in-the-digital-age\/the-history-of-the-americas\/the-conquest-of-mexico\/for-teachers\/general-discussion-of-the-primary-sources-used-in-this-project. <a href=\"#return-footnote-1617-1\" class=\"return-footnote\" aria-label=\"Return to footnote 1\">&crarr;<\/a><\/li><\/ol><\/div>","protected":false},"author":29,"menu_order":15,"template":"","meta":{"_candela_citation":"[{\"type\":\"original\",\"description\":\"How to Read Primary Sources\",\"author\":\"Thomas de Mayo\",\"organization\":\"Reynolds Community College\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/www.reynolds.edu\/\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"\"},{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"Primary, Secondary, and Tertiary Sources\",\"author\":\"Walter D. Butler, Aloha Sargent, and Kelsey Smith\",\"organization\":\"\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/introtocollegeresearch.pressbooks.com\/chapter\/information-sources-by-category\/\",\"project\":\"Intro to College Research\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"\"},{\"type\":\"pd\",\"description\":\"The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico\",\"author\":\"Miguel Leon Portilla\",\"organization\":\"Internet Modern History Sourcebook\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/legacy.fordham.edu\/Halsall\/mod\/aztecs1.asp\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"pd\",\"license_terms\":\"\"},{\"type\":\"cc\",\"description\":\"An Aztec Account of the Spanish Attack\",\"author\":\"\",\"organization\":\"The American Yawp\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.americanyawp.com\/reader\/the-new-world\/an-aztec-account-of-the-spanish-attack\/\",\"project\":\"\",\"license\":\"cc-by\",\"license_terms\":\"\"}]","CANDELA_OUTCOMES_GUID":"9db787ec-0f25-4feb-89fb-be528cfb3819,6e6ea64a-ed8f-4294-af26-56a5f19f7ca1","pb_show_title":"on","pb_short_title":"","pb_subtitle":"","pb_authors":[],"pb_section_license":""},"chapter-type":[],"contributor":[],"license":[],"class_list":["post-1617","chapter","type-chapter","status-publish","hentry"],"part":42,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/chapter"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"version-history":[{"count":48,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8358,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1617\/revisions\/8358"}],"part":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/parts\/42"}],"metadata":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapters\/1617\/metadata\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"chapter-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/pressbooks\/v2\/chapter-type?post=1617"},{"taxonomy":"contributor","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/contributor?post=1617"},{"taxonomy":"license","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/courses.lumenlearning.com\/wm-ushistory1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/license?post=1617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}