WEBVTT

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You know, when I was growing up
in Jackson Heights, Queens,

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I learned the same history

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that they taught kids
all over America.

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That George Washington
cut down his cherry tree,

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that Ben Franklin flew his kite,

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and Abe was honest.

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Guess what was missing?

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Us, the Latino contributions
to this country.

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Colón: You can\'t have
a history book

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about the United States

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without considering
the histories

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of all of the Latino
communities.

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Most of the history
we\'re still taught

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is from the point of view
of the conquistadors

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who tried to wipe out any trace

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of advanced indigenous cultures.

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As a kid, that lack of inclusion
in history textbooks

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made me feel invisible.

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I think it\'s essential
that we set the record straight

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about Latinx history.

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Well, with the strike
and with the boycott,

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we were trying
to give farm workers

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basic human rights.

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Ortiz: We don\'t just make
contributions

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to U .S. history,
we have changed U.S. history.

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Latinos are the most highly
decorated ethnic group

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in U.S. military history.

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People tend to forget
that Latinos were here

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long before
the United States existed.

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Colón: If we consider
the richness of our past,

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we\'re able to reconstruct
a much richer picture

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of how our cultures came to be.

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It\'s important
to not underestimate the people

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that came before us
and what they knew.

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Leguizamo: They invented
life-saving medical practices

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and engineered
incredible infrastructure.

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They also calculated
the movements of the planets

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and they wrote it all down
in their sacred books.

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It\'s as epic
as any of the great wonders

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you\'ve learned about
in history class.

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This is the story
from the point of view

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of the people who were already
living in the Americas.

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Carrasco: It is really important
for Latinos to know

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and for other people to know
about Latino roots.

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Leguizamo: Imagine
how others would see us

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if they knew our rich history.

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Imagine
how we would see ourselves

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if we knew our own stories.

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We\'re going to fill in
the parts of our history

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that were lost, all the way
from the ancient Olmecs

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to the Latinos who helped
build this great nation.

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I know that\'s
a lot of ground to cover,

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but don\'t worry,
because I got you.

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Narrator: To bring the history
in this series to life,

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the following program
includes images

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generated by AI tools.

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This is my chance to dig deep
on the real history of Latinos.

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Our history is a complicated
one because Latino identity

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isn\'t always well-understood,
even by ourselves.

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It means you\'re descended
from the original peoples

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of the Americas,
because once Europeans arrived

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to the New World,

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they mixed
with the native populations

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and enslaved Africans,

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and the first Latinos were born.

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Of course,
we come in every color

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and diverse flavor.

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Some of us are Afro-Latino
or Indigenous Latino.

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Some identify as \"Latinx\",

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but \"Hispanic\" refers
to native Spanish speakers.

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Today, hundreds of millions
of people across the globe

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share this identity,

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but our roots go back
thousands of years.

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Between 2000 BC and 1492,

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the peoples of the Caribbean,
Central and South America

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built fantastic cities.

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Fernández: The sophistication
in the arts and architecture

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of these massive cities

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that were bigger
than European cities.

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When the Spanish arrived here,
they found civilizations

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that were in many ways
more advanced

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than where they came from.

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But in order to justify
colonizing and converting

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the natives
and stealing their wealth,

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the conquistadors
created a narrative

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about barbaric cultures
that had to be subjugated.

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Anything that didn\'t fit
this narrative was destroyed.

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Fernández: We know,
we tend to start

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Latin American history
with Columbus.

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I always start in my classroom

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with the Taíno people.

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It\'s important to know
who were the original people

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of the land that Columbus
first encountered.

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Leguizamo: Today,
we use the word \"Taíno\"

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to refer to all the indigenous
people of the Caribbean,

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but the fact is,
there were many different

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political and cultural groups
living throughout the region.

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Moya: The Taíno people
were originally from the mouth

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of the Orinoco River
in Venezuela,

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and they were able to move
into the Caribbean Islands,

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going to Puerto Rico,
then Hispaniola,

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what is Dominican Republic
and Haiti today.

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It\'s the only time
that we know of so far

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where ancient seafarers

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were moving
out of the continent,

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losing sight
of the land behind them

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to cross hundreds,
even thousands of nautical miles

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and settle
into newly inhabited lands,

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in this case, islands.

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Researchers have suggested
that there could have been

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anywhere between 70,000
to 100,000 indigenous peoples

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living in the Caribbean
before contact.

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We often think of islands
as paradise,

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a beautiful and warm place
where there are no stressors,

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but eking out a subsistence
for thousands of years

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on an island
is really hard work.

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You have to be able
to manage agriculture

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in a place where hurricanes
are extremely common.

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You need to be able
to navigate effectively

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the challenging ocean currents
that are still challenging

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to navigate today.

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You need to have
trading partners

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across different islands

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and speak different languages

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in order to do so.

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They had intensive agriculture,

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which allowed them to feed

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a growing population
both within

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as well as between islands.

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The Indigenous people
of the Caribbean

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have so many
awesome cultural achievements

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that I feel I get lost

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when we talk about them
because we often talk about them

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in the worst possible moment
of their history,

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which is, of course,
contact with Europeans.

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When Columbus first set foot
in the New World,

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that was the beginning
of the end

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for many indigenous cultures.

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Let\'s name it
for what it really was.

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Three boats and 86 men
landed in 1492,

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bringing with them
billions of European germs

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in what turned out to be
the apocalypse.

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Now, the first people
to encounter Columbus

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in the New World were the Taíno.

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Sadly, the Taíno
were also the first

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to suffer this
civilization-ending devastation.

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Columbus arrives
to this landmass.

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He doesn\'t know where he is,
and actually,

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one of his three ships
runs aground

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and is destroyed.

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The people living
on that island,

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they come out to help him,

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and they help them

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load all the people
on their canoes.

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As the Spanish tell it,
they gave them their best houses

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for them to stay
and to store their goods.

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That was the first encounter.

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Leguizamo: We never
even stop to think

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about how these natives lived

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before these ships arrived.

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When history is written
by the victors,

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we miss out on the perspective
of the oppressed.

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Columbus: \"They willingly traded
everything they owned.

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They have no iron.

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\"Their spears are made of cane.

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\"They would make fine servants.

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\"With 50 men,
we could subjugate them all

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\"and make them do
whatever we want.\"

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Leguizamo: Contrary
to popular belief,

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he did know the Earth was round,

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but he didn\'t know
that there were

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two entire continents
and millions of people

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between Europe and Asia.

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When he accidentally docked
in Hispaniola in 1492,

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mistaking it for India,

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he quickly took the opportunity
to begin enslaving

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the native people
who lived there,

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stealing
their land and resources,

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brutalizing their families,

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and spreading European diseases.

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I don\'t think he was neither
particularly brave

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nor particularly visionary.

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You have to remember,
before the Portuguese

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and the Spaniards
came to the Americas,

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they had gone
to the Canary Islands,

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they had gone to the Azores,

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so they
were pushing the boundaries.

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If it hadn\'t been Columbus,

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it would have been any
other leader of an expedition.

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So it was going to happen.

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There was nothing special
about Columbus, really.

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In my opinion, the only thing
that was exceptional

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about Columbus was his cruelty,

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because he quickly became known

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for enslaving, brutalizing,
and terrorizing the Taínos.

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Columbus\'s men even documented
that he captured Taíno women

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and gave them to his crew
to be raped.

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Life under Spanish rule
was a nightmare.

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The indigenous people
of the Caribbean

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were the first to experience

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the brunt
of European colonization

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and the atrocities
that came with that.

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And of course, there was also

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forced displacement
and enslavement.

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So it really amounts
to something very close

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to a genocide.

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De las Casas: \"It was a general
rule among Spaniards

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\"to be cruel.

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\"Not just cruel,
but extraordinarily cruel,

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\"so that harsh and bitter
treatment would prevent

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\"Indians as daring
to think of themselves

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\"as human beings

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\"or having a minute
to think at all.

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\"So they would cut
an Indian\'s hand

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\"and leave them dangling
by a shred of skin,

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and they would send him on
saying, \'Go now,

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spread the news to your chiefs.\'

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\"They would test their swords
and their manly strength

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\"on captured Indians

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\"and place bets
on the slicing off of heads

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\"or the cutting of bodies
in half with one blow.\"

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Leguizamo: When we tell
the real story of Columbus,

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that\'s how we challenge
our colonial mindset

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in the present
because the truth is the Taíno

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were not frightened or awed
by these European sailors.

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Fernández: There was a lot
of rebellions against Columbus.

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It was utter chaos.

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The Taíno
were not a passive people.

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There were five different
kingdoms on Haiti alone,

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and some of them were allies
and some of them were enemies,

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and they were
experienced warriors.

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And in fact, when Columbus
and his followers

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were waging war on them,
they fought back.

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Leguizamo: Each chiefdom
was ruled by a leader

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called a \"cacique\" or chief.

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Notably, women could become
caciques as well as men,

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and many fought in battle
alongside their male relatives.

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Agüeybaná II was one
of the most powerful caciques

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in the whole Caribbean

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at the time
of the European invasion.

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He had seen firsthand
the Spanish arrival

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in Puerto Rico in 1493,

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and he devoted his entire life

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to the fight
for his people and their land.

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We know that Agüeybaná
was capable of uniting

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a large alliance
of indigenous peoples.

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He united to fight
against the Spanish,

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and I think that tells us
something about leadership

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at this time,

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and it also tells us something

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about pan-Caribbean unity
in the face of oppression.

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The Taíno fought back.

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Let\'s get rid
of those stereotypes

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of the passive Indian.

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Colón: There are historical
documents that tell us

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that in 1511 the Taíno people
of Puerto Rico

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mounted a huge resistance
against the Spanish

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that included burning down
the Spanish city of Caparra.

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It included raiding many towns,

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and also that they worked
together with indigenous peoples

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from other islands,
not just from Puerto Rico,

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but once African peoples
arrived into the Caribbean,

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they often united
with indigenous people to fight.

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We know that Spanish authorities
were so afraid of this

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that they were writing
to the crown

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asking for reinforcements
to be sent,

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or the whole colonial enterprise
would have been threatened.

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And I mention that because it
really goes against this idea

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that these people
never resisted,

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that they never fought back.

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And because we think of them
that way today as docile,

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we tend to devalue
their contributions

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to our heritage.

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Leguizamo: But here\'s the thing.

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Because the Taíno stories
weren\'t preserved,

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historians have long relied
on the writings and narrative

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from the Europeans,

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which painted the Taíno
as simple and backwards.

00:12:38.801 --> 00:12:42.447
Fernández: It\'s absolutely
not true that the native people

00:12:42.471 --> 00:12:45.075
lost because they
had inferior weaponry.

00:12:45.099 --> 00:12:46.993
That\'s absolutely not true,
and it just feeds

00:12:47.017 --> 00:12:51.122
into these hierarchies
of European superiority.

00:12:51.146 --> 00:12:54.585
The advantage
that the Spaniards had

00:12:54.609 --> 00:12:57.879
in terms of conquering
the Native American

00:12:57.903 --> 00:12:59.839
was immunity to smallpox.

00:12:59.863 --> 00:13:02.759
It turns out the conquistadors\'
best weapons

00:13:02.783 --> 00:13:04.761
were not their guns and steel.

00:13:04.785 --> 00:13:06.221
No, instead it was their bodies,

00:13:06.245 --> 00:13:08.807
which carried billions
of deadly germs with them.

00:13:08.831 --> 00:13:12.561
It was dozens of pandemics,
one right after the other,

00:13:12.585 --> 00:13:15.690
mainly smallpox,
measles, and typhus,

00:13:15.714 --> 00:13:19.025
that almost wiped out
the native populations.

00:13:23.680 --> 00:13:27.325
There\'s no question about it
because the Spanish friars

00:13:27.349 --> 00:13:30.036
who wrote back to the king
of Spain said, you know,

00:13:30.060 --> 00:13:31.788
\"I\'m trying to convert
all these people,

00:13:31.812 --> 00:13:33.498
and they\'re just dying
all around me.\"

00:13:33.523 --> 00:13:35.584
Motolinía: \"As the Indians
did not know the remedy

00:13:35.608 --> 00:13:40.005
\"of the disease, they died
in heaps like bedbugs.

00:13:40.029 --> 00:13:41.757
\"In many places it happened

00:13:41.781 --> 00:13:43.676
\"that everyone in a house died,

00:13:43.700 --> 00:13:45.511
\"and as it was impossible

00:13:45.535 --> 00:13:47.137
\"to bury
the great number of dead,

00:13:47.161 --> 00:13:49.014
\"they pulled down
the houses over them

00:13:49.038 --> 00:13:52.100
\"so that their homes
became their tombs.\"

00:13:52.124 --> 00:13:54.102
The statistics
speak for themselves

00:13:54.126 --> 00:13:56.354
that the estimates
are that there were

00:13:56.378 --> 00:14:00.108
about a million inhabitants
of Hispaniola

00:14:00.132 --> 00:14:05.614
in 1492 when Columbus
and his followers arrived.

00:14:05.638 --> 00:14:10.368
16 years later, in 1508,

00:14:10.392 --> 00:14:13.913
94% of them were gone.

00:14:13.937 --> 00:14:16.667
94%.

00:14:16.691 --> 00:14:19.878
When I think about
what the indigenous people lost,

00:14:19.902 --> 00:14:23.465
it\'s almost too much for me
to wrap my head around,

00:14:23.489 --> 00:14:24.550
let alone my heart.

00:14:24.574 --> 00:14:27.844
Imagine 94%
of your community gone.

00:14:27.868 --> 00:14:29.846
Empty homes, empty towns,

00:14:29.870 --> 00:14:32.432
almost all of your friends
and family gone.

00:14:32.456 --> 00:14:35.060
How do you keep going
after such a loss?

00:14:35.084 --> 00:14:37.563
That\'s why we should never
forget the genocide

00:14:37.587 --> 00:14:40.608
that was inflicted
on our ancestors.

00:14:40.632 --> 00:14:44.779
We need to celebrate
the people of Taíno heritage

00:14:44.803 --> 00:14:47.639
who still exist today.

00:14:48.305 --> 00:14:52.661
Columbus committed so much
violence, rape, and murder

00:14:52.685 --> 00:14:54.287
that he was eventually arrested

00:14:54.311 --> 00:14:54.954
for his violent atrocities.

00:14:54.978 --> 00:14:58.751
The governor of Hispaniola
arrested him on mismanagement

00:14:58.775 --> 00:15:01.587
and brutality charges
against the Taíno

00:15:01.611 --> 00:15:02.713
and his own soldiers,

00:15:02.737 --> 00:15:05.131
and then had him forcibly
returned to Spain

00:15:05.155 --> 00:15:07.802
where he was stripped
of his noble titles.

00:15:07.826 --> 00:15:10.805
And yet we still celebrate
Columbus Day.

00:15:10.829 --> 00:15:13.641
Don\'t get me wrong,
we\'re starting to see change.

00:15:13.665 --> 00:15:17.853
Indigenous Peoples\' Day
is now replacing Columbus Day

00:15:17.877 --> 00:15:20.731
in many cities and states
across the U.S.

00:15:20.755 --> 00:15:23.651
Colón: Indigenous ancestry
is a central part

00:15:23.675 --> 00:15:25.944
of Puerto Rican identity
to this day.

00:15:25.968 --> 00:15:28.363
In fact,
we call ourselves \"boriquas\",

00:15:28.387 --> 00:15:29.489
and boriqua is the Taíno word.

00:15:29.514 --> 00:15:33.702
The idea that the Caribbean\'s
indigenous peoples disappeared

00:15:33.726 --> 00:15:35.453
soon after European contact

00:15:35.477 --> 00:15:37.330
and that they contributed
very little

00:15:37.354 --> 00:15:39.415
to our culture
and our biology today.

00:15:39.439 --> 00:15:43.546
But when we look at the DNA
that people still carry in them,

00:15:43.570 --> 00:15:45.881
that forces us to reconsider

00:15:45.905 --> 00:15:46.715
this extinction narrative.

00:15:46.739 --> 00:15:50.176
In fact, we are connected
culturally, biologically,

00:15:50.200 --> 00:15:51.970
and also genetically
to these people.

00:15:51.994 --> 00:15:54.055
The history
of the New World civilizations

00:15:54.079 --> 00:15:55.850
isn\'t just oppression and pain

00:15:55.874 --> 00:15:58.561
because our story
is so much bigger than that.

00:15:58.585 --> 00:16:01.229
And our story includes more
than just the Taínos

00:16:01.253 --> 00:16:05.609
that had the bad luck to be
the first ones to meet Columbus.

00:16:05.633 --> 00:16:07.903
At the time
of Columbus\'s arrival,

00:16:07.927 --> 00:16:09.530
indigenous civilizations thrived

00:16:09.554 --> 00:16:12.157
throughout all of Southern
and Central America,

00:16:12.181 --> 00:16:16.829
including what we know now
as modern-day Mexico.

00:16:16.853 --> 00:16:17.453
It all starts here.

00:16:17.477 --> 00:16:21.249
The Olmec, the Taíno, the Maya,
the Inca, the Aztec,

00:16:21.273 --> 00:16:24.587
these were the OG civilizations
of Latin America,

00:16:24.611 --> 00:16:27.463
and their great-great-grandkids
to the Nth degree

00:16:27.487 --> 00:16:30.509
would become
the Latinos of today.

00:16:39.208 --> 00:16:42.478
First we have to pay homage
to the \"madrina\",

00:16:42.503 --> 00:16:46.567
or godmother of all ancient
Mesoamerican cultures,

00:16:46.591 --> 00:16:51.780
the Olmecs, whose culture
was old when Rome was young.

00:16:51.804 --> 00:16:53.574
Carrasco: There existed
in Mexico

00:16:53.598 --> 00:16:56.952
what is called the mother
culture of Mesoamerica,

00:16:56.976 --> 00:16:57.620
the Olmecs.

00:16:57.644 --> 00:17:01.247
Leguizamo: The Olmecs
had already formed a complex,

00:17:01.271 --> 00:17:03.542
wide-ranging civilization,

00:17:03.566 --> 00:17:05.628
all before Buddha was even born.

00:17:05.652 --> 00:17:06.795
They\'re considered the earliest

00:17:06.819 --> 00:17:09.130
major Latin American
civilization.

00:17:09.154 --> 00:17:12.342
So many of these things,
the numerical systems,

00:17:12.366 --> 00:17:15.638
the writing systems,
the calendar,

00:17:15.662 --> 00:17:18.831
were created by the Olmecs.

00:17:19.414 --> 00:17:21.769
Carrasco: Over the last
100 years,

00:17:21.793 --> 00:17:22.477
a number of archaeologists

00:17:22.502 --> 00:17:26.439
sort of accidentally discovered
these huge heads.

00:17:26.463 --> 00:17:30.861
Some of which weighed 9 tons,
taller than a man.

00:17:30.885 --> 00:17:32.153
Why the great heads?

00:17:32.177 --> 00:17:33.363
Well, nobody really knows,

00:17:33.387 --> 00:17:36.867
but it seems to me
what the big heads represent

00:17:36.891 --> 00:17:38.744
is some sort of awareness

00:17:38.768 --> 00:17:42.145
of the importance
of intelligence.

00:17:42.939 --> 00:17:44.667
The materials that they used

00:17:44.691 --> 00:17:46.376
for their monumental
architecture

00:17:46.400 --> 00:17:48.629
were brought
from great distances.

00:17:48.653 --> 00:17:52.591
Things that were very heavy,
very difficult to transport.

00:17:52.615 --> 00:17:55.678
They developed some kind
of transportation system,

00:17:55.702 --> 00:17:57.805
maybe through the waterways,

00:17:57.829 --> 00:17:58.889
to take these stones,

00:17:58.913 --> 00:18:02.518
float them down close
to these ceremonial centers,

00:18:02.542 --> 00:18:04.269
then transport them across logs

00:18:04.293 --> 00:18:07.523
or some way of rolling them
into the ceremonial center.

00:18:07.547 --> 00:18:10.215
And then the sculptors
went to work.

00:18:11.551 --> 00:18:12.653
Do you play basketball?

00:18:12.677 --> 00:18:14.947
Well, without the Olmec
and their rubber balls,

00:18:14.971 --> 00:18:17.932
you would never have heard
of Kobe Bryant.

00:18:18.140 --> 00:18:22.287
People think rubber was invented
by Charles Goodyear

00:18:22.311 --> 00:18:23.454
in the 1840s,

00:18:23.478 --> 00:18:24.665
but he was building off the tech

00:18:24.689 --> 00:18:27.208
originally invented
by the Olmecs

00:18:27.232 --> 00:18:28.961
3,000 years ago.

00:18:28.985 --> 00:18:32.965
In Mesoamerica today,
people still play the ballgame.

00:18:32.989 --> 00:18:35.341
So the ballgame
is a great element

00:18:35.365 --> 00:18:37.385
of the Latino ancestors.

00:18:37.409 --> 00:18:40.723
Leguizamo: The Olmec
established several great cities

00:18:40.747 --> 00:18:42.432
throughout their empire,

00:18:42.456 --> 00:18:44.100
but the greatest jewel

00:18:44.124 --> 00:18:46.020
of all pre-Columbian Mesoamerica

00:18:46.044 --> 00:18:51.549
was a mysterious city
called Teotihuacán.

00:18:54.468 --> 00:18:56.739
Now, most of us
are taught to think

00:18:56.763 --> 00:18:57.488
of Greece and Rome

00:18:57.513 --> 00:18:59.867
as the cradles
of Western civilization,

00:18:59.891 --> 00:19:03.704
but the ancient peoples
of Central and South America

00:19:03.728 --> 00:19:05.748
had sophisticated cultures

00:19:05.772 --> 00:19:07.415
hundreds of years before Europe.

00:19:07.439 --> 00:19:12.004
And I\'m here at the real cradle
of Western civilization,

00:19:12.028 --> 00:19:12.880
Teotihuacán,

00:19:12.904 --> 00:19:15.381
where there\'s evidence
of diverse, powerful,

00:19:15.405 --> 00:19:19.803
intelligent cultures
dating back to 400 BC.

00:19:19.827 --> 00:19:24.808
So the great capital
of Mesoamerica was Teotihuacán.

00:19:24.832 --> 00:19:27.728
And it comes into being
as an urban center.

00:19:27.752 --> 00:19:30.647
We really are in the first
century of the Common Era,

00:19:30.671 --> 00:19:33.817
and it rises to be
the great imperial center.

00:19:33.841 --> 00:19:37.613
Teotihuacán is the symbol
of this great achievement

00:19:37.637 --> 00:19:40.991
of building some of the first
cities in the world.

00:19:41.015 --> 00:19:43.994
And Mesoamerica, Mexico,
as well as Peru,

00:19:44.018 --> 00:19:46.496
are two of the areas
where people invented

00:19:46.521 --> 00:19:47.122
these first cities

00:19:47.146 --> 00:19:48.916
without any influence
from other cities.

00:19:48.940 --> 00:19:52.753
The others are Mesopotamia,
northern China,

00:19:52.777 --> 00:19:53.712
Egypt, and the Indus Valley.

00:19:53.736 --> 00:19:55.839
And this is really important
for Latinos to know

00:19:55.863 --> 00:19:58.675
and for other people to know
about Latino roots.

00:19:58.699 --> 00:20:00.511
Leguizamo: All these places
that today

00:20:00.535 --> 00:20:01.970
we\'d consider Third World

00:20:01.994 --> 00:20:04.723
turns out were actually
the places

00:20:04.747 --> 00:20:07.101
where civilization began.

00:20:07.125 --> 00:20:09.937
For instance,
the pyramids of Teotihuacán

00:20:09.961 --> 00:20:14.733
were built around the same time
as the Roman Colosseum.

00:20:14.757 --> 00:20:17.986
Archaeologists estimate
that Teotihuacan had

00:20:18.010 --> 00:20:21.949
up to 200,000 inhabitants
at its peak.

00:20:21.973 --> 00:20:24.159
For comparison,
London\'s population

00:20:24.183 --> 00:20:27.453
didn\'t even break 100,000
until the 16th century.

00:20:27.477 --> 00:20:30.874
So one of the wonderful things
that archaeologists

00:20:30.898 --> 00:20:33.502
have been able to find
is that Teotihuacán

00:20:33.526 --> 00:20:34.044
was a multi-ethnic city.

00:20:34.068 --> 00:20:37.338
The things that brought people
of different ethnicities

00:20:37.362 --> 00:20:39.465
from all over Mesoamerica to Teo

00:20:39.489 --> 00:20:42.719
are the same things that draw
people to cities today.

00:20:42.743 --> 00:20:46.682
Better infrastructure,
bigger ideas, and of course,

00:20:46.706 --> 00:20:48.559
a shot at a better life.

00:20:48.583 --> 00:20:52.187
Newscaster: Mexico\'s famed
Teotihuacán archaeological site

00:20:52.211 --> 00:20:55.231
still holds many mysteries
for historians.

00:20:55.255 --> 00:20:56.817
But the answers they seek

00:20:56.841 --> 00:20:58.193
may lie below the surface.

00:20:58.217 --> 00:21:01.196
Leguizamo: We didn\'t dig
the subway tunnels of New York

00:21:01.220 --> 00:21:02.321
until about 100 years ago.

00:21:02.345 --> 00:21:05.491
2,000 years earlier,
the original scientists

00:21:05.516 --> 00:21:07.452
and rulers of Teotihuacán

00:21:07.476 --> 00:21:08.954
built a series of tunnels

00:21:08.978 --> 00:21:10.581
dozens of feet
beneath the ground

00:21:10.605 --> 00:21:13.458
without the use
of machinery or power tools.

00:21:13.482 --> 00:21:17.838
These tunnels connected chambers
holding treasures long forgotten

00:21:17.862 --> 00:21:21.091
until they were unearthed
in 2003.

00:21:21.115 --> 00:21:23.426
It was
a groundbreaking discovery

00:21:23.450 --> 00:21:24.427
that changed our perception

00:21:24.451 --> 00:21:28.515
of the civilization
that once thrived here.

00:21:28.539 --> 00:21:30.017
And I\'m here to meet the man

00:21:30.041 --> 00:21:31.935
who uncovered these wonders,

00:21:31.959 --> 00:21:34.395
archaeologist Sergio Gómez.

00:21:34.419 --> 00:21:39.466
[Speaking Spanish]

00:21:53.814 --> 00:21:56.358
[Speaking Spanish]

00:22:07.078 --> 00:22:09.430
Leguizamo: This monumental
discovery

00:22:09.454 --> 00:22:11.725
of turquoise
all the way from Arizona

00:22:11.749 --> 00:22:14.352
proves
that the people of Teotihuacán

00:22:14.376 --> 00:22:16.563
had significant
trade relationships

00:22:16.587 --> 00:22:20.234
with societies as far away
as Arizona to the north

00:22:20.258 --> 00:22:21.944
and Honduras to the south.

00:22:21.968 --> 00:22:25.221
[Speaking Spanish]

00:22:38.192 --> 00:22:40.629
Leguizamo: To put that
into context,

00:22:40.653 --> 00:22:41.797
their network extended

00:22:41.821 --> 00:22:44.508
almost as far
as the Roman Empire

00:22:44.532 --> 00:22:46.885
at about the same time.

00:22:46.909 --> 00:22:50.037
[Speaking Spanish]

00:22:58.212 --> 00:23:01.233
Leguizamo: As we get further
into the tunnel,

00:23:01.257 --> 00:23:03.235
I can feel how deep I am

00:23:03.259 --> 00:23:06.238
below the surface of the earth.

00:23:06.262 --> 00:23:09.849
[Speaking Spanish]

00:23:23.988 --> 00:23:29.492
[Speaking Spanish]

00:23:40.004 --> 00:23:43.966
[Speaking Spanish]

00:23:49.138 --> 00:23:51.241
Sergio, thank you
for bringing me here.

00:23:51.265 --> 00:23:51.700
I feel very honored,

00:23:51.724 --> 00:23:55.770
and it\'s so special
to see this sacred space.

00:23:57.563 --> 00:24:00.667
Leguizamo: We have to stop
centering the European version

00:24:00.691 --> 00:24:03.712
of history
and reconsider our own past.

00:24:03.736 --> 00:24:06.715
Take the incredible inventions
and medical knowledge

00:24:06.739 --> 00:24:11.637
of South America\'s
greatest empire, the Inca.

00:24:17.792 --> 00:24:21.146
The Inca people
gained control of the region

00:24:21.170 --> 00:24:24.316
and established their empire
in 1438.

00:24:24.340 --> 00:24:28.362
The Inca\'s extending
from modern-day Colombia,

00:24:28.386 --> 00:24:30.072
Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia,

00:24:30.096 --> 00:24:32.574
central Chile,
and parts of Argentina.

00:24:32.598 --> 00:24:35.744
Leguizamo: They ruled
for nearly 100 years

00:24:35.768 --> 00:24:38.080
before Europeans
reached their territory.

00:24:38.104 --> 00:24:41.499
The Inca
were also extremely organized.

00:24:41.524 --> 00:24:42.668
They had a system of recording

00:24:42.692 --> 00:24:45.962
using these knotted cords
called \"khipus\".

00:24:45.986 --> 00:24:49.465
They divided up their people,
they had censuses.

00:24:49.489 --> 00:24:51.677
They had labor requirements.

00:24:51.701 --> 00:24:53.345
That was the way they supported

00:24:53.369 --> 00:24:56.682
a massive agricultural economy.

00:24:56.706 --> 00:24:59.893
Leguizamo: Khipu are collections
of knotted strings

00:24:59.917 --> 00:25:02.729
which the Inca
encoded with meaning

00:25:02.753 --> 00:25:04.189
to keep records and record data.

00:25:04.213 --> 00:25:06.817
Using different
string colors and weaves,

00:25:06.841 --> 00:25:11.196
the khipu makers
could have created over 1,500

00:25:11.220 --> 00:25:12.656
separate units of information.

00:25:12.680 --> 00:25:16.243
And in comparison,
the Sumerians of Mesopotamia,

00:25:16.267 --> 00:25:17.661
modern-day Iraq and Iran,

00:25:17.685 --> 00:25:21.581
worked with fewer
than 1,500 cuneiform signs,

00:25:21.605 --> 00:25:24.251
and Egyptians had fewer
than 800 hieroglyphics.

00:25:24.275 --> 00:25:28.088
Even after the Spanish
formally colonized these lands

00:25:28.112 --> 00:25:30.757
and set up
their own rules of law,

00:25:30.781 --> 00:25:33.009
native people still found ways

00:25:33.033 --> 00:25:35.303
to challenge European supremacy.

00:25:35.327 --> 00:25:37.431
Carrasco: The Spanish courts,
they were always demanding

00:25:37.455 --> 00:25:42.436
what becomes very important
for immigrants today, \"papeles\".

00:25:42.460 --> 00:25:43.603
You gotta have your papeles.

00:25:43.627 --> 00:25:47.941
Indigenous people would come
in Peru with their khipus,

00:25:47.965 --> 00:25:49.943
in Mexico with their codices,

00:25:49.967 --> 00:25:52.195
and they would use these
in the courts

00:25:52.219 --> 00:25:54.364
to say, \"Hey, we have a history,

00:25:54.388 --> 00:25:56.199
\"we have a style
of telling stories,

00:25:56.223 --> 00:25:58.744
\"we had our own legal system,
and here it is.\"

00:25:58.768 --> 00:26:00.495
Leguizamo: In fact,
the khipu were accepted

00:26:00.520 --> 00:26:03.832
as legal documents
in colonial Spanish courts.

00:26:03.856 --> 00:26:07.586
There are even accounts of khipu
being used as evidence

00:26:07.610 --> 00:26:08.211
against the Spanish

00:26:08.235 --> 00:26:11.006
during cases
in which Native Inca people

00:26:11.030 --> 00:26:13.633
accused colonists of stealing

00:26:13.657 --> 00:26:14.217
their land or property.

00:26:14.241 --> 00:26:17.679
We very much underestimate
people who lived in the past.

00:26:17.703 --> 00:26:20.223
It\'s important
to not underestimate the people

00:26:20.247 --> 00:26:22.642
that came before us
and what they knew.

00:26:22.666 --> 00:26:24.478
Verano: In Western medicine,

00:26:24.503 --> 00:26:27.063
there\'s often been
a little bit of elitism

00:26:27.087 --> 00:26:28.732
saying that the Greeks
were the greatest artists

00:26:28.756 --> 00:26:32.235
of all time, the Romans
were the greatest engineers.

00:26:32.259 --> 00:26:34.905
Now, where Peru
stands out in particular

00:26:34.929 --> 00:26:38.033
is in a form of surgery
on the skull

00:26:38.057 --> 00:26:39.535
that we call \"trepanation\".

00:26:39.559 --> 00:26:41.828
It comes
from the Greek word \"trypanon\",

00:26:41.852 --> 00:26:42.538
which means a drill.

00:26:42.562 --> 00:26:45.207
If you have
a depressed skull fracture

00:26:45.231 --> 00:26:45.999
and the brain is swelling,

00:26:46.023 --> 00:26:50.212
or there\'s a hematoma blood clot
underneath the bone,

00:26:50.236 --> 00:26:51.922
if you can cut a window,

00:26:51.946 --> 00:26:52.839
you can let the brain expand,

00:26:52.863 --> 00:26:56.384
then the patient can survive,
and then it can retract.

00:26:56.408 --> 00:27:01.348
Just an amazing 2,000-year
tradition of skull surgery.

00:27:01.372 --> 00:27:03.892
We know the Inca
weren\'t the only ones

00:27:03.916 --> 00:27:05.143
performing these surgeries.

00:27:05.167 --> 00:27:07.395
In ancient Greece,
they also drilled holes

00:27:07.419 --> 00:27:12.150
in patient skulls, but the Inca
were a lot more successful.

00:27:12.174 --> 00:27:13.777
One of the most
impressive statistics

00:27:13.801 --> 00:27:17.697
that we have from studying
trepanned skulls from Peru

00:27:17.721 --> 00:27:18.865
is that by Inca times,

00:27:18.889 --> 00:27:21.743
when they got the best results
that we know of,

00:27:21.767 --> 00:27:25.038
they had survival rates
of 80% to 90%.

00:27:25.062 --> 00:27:29.544
If we contrast that to Europe
into the early 20th century,

00:27:29.568 --> 00:27:33.988
they had
about a 10% survival rate.

00:27:35.322 --> 00:27:36.509
American medical practitioners

00:27:36.533 --> 00:27:39.135
didn\'t even reach
the same level of success

00:27:39.159 --> 00:27:42.138
performing trepanations
until after the Civil War,

00:27:42.162 --> 00:27:46.017
but even then they lagged behind
the pre-Incan civilizations

00:27:46.041 --> 00:27:49.522
who also pioneered
the use of anesthesia

00:27:49.546 --> 00:27:52.274
hundreds of years earlier.

00:27:52.298 --> 00:27:52.816
Verano: The Peruvian case

00:27:52.840 --> 00:27:55.861
is like an unwritten chapter
in the history of medicine.

00:27:55.885 --> 00:27:58.655
It should be written
as its own thing.

00:27:58.679 --> 00:28:02.577
Just 7% of American physicians
today are Latino.

00:28:02.601 --> 00:28:05.161
Imagine how much higher
that percentage would be

00:28:05.185 --> 00:28:07.747
if Latino kids knew
that they\'d been descended

00:28:07.771 --> 00:28:10.333
from surgeons
and masters of medicine.

00:28:10.357 --> 00:28:12.919
But it was the Inca
gold and silver,

00:28:12.943 --> 00:28:14.337
not their medical expertise,

00:28:14.361 --> 00:28:17.215
that drove the Spanish
all the way to South America.

00:28:17.239 --> 00:28:19.843
There\'s no question
that the Inca had great wealth

00:28:19.867 --> 00:28:23.805
in precious metals,
primarily gold, but also silver.

00:28:23.829 --> 00:28:24.723
Some of these rulers were buried

00:28:24.747 --> 00:28:27.684
with great amounts of things
like crowns made of gold,

00:28:27.708 --> 00:28:30.812
scepters, nose ornaments,
and a variety of other items

00:28:30.836 --> 00:28:35.859
that we can really appreciate
for their artistic fineness.

00:28:35.883 --> 00:28:36.943
It\'s the quality of the work.

00:28:36.967 --> 00:28:39.112
Some of these things
are masterpieces.

00:28:39.136 --> 00:28:39.863
The Spanish, of course,

00:28:39.887 --> 00:28:43.033
didn\'t care about that
in the 1500s.

00:28:43.057 --> 00:28:44.660
Leguizamo: Though the Inca
didn\'t think

00:28:44.684 --> 00:28:46.662
of gold and silver as currency,

00:28:46.686 --> 00:28:48.121
Europeans certainly did.

00:28:48.145 --> 00:28:51.958
It was this drive for wealth
that spurred the conquistadors

00:28:51.982 --> 00:28:55.504
to violently seize
the land and belongings

00:28:55.528 --> 00:28:56.589
of indigenous Americans

00:28:56.613 --> 00:29:00.467
and led to the centuries
of devastation that followed.

00:29:00.491 --> 00:29:03.720
Verano: In Cuzco, the walls
of the central temple

00:29:03.744 --> 00:29:05.472
had huge gold plates on them.

00:29:05.496 --> 00:29:06.973
The Spanish pried those off,

00:29:06.997 --> 00:29:08.975
quickly melted down
these metals,

00:29:08.999 --> 00:29:10.018
and took them away.

00:29:10.042 --> 00:29:14.397
So we\'ve lost a tremendous
amount of Inca gold work.

00:29:14.421 --> 00:29:15.899
There\'s a great illustration

00:29:15.923 --> 00:29:18.276
done by a native
Peruvian artist.

00:29:18.300 --> 00:29:20.028
Leguizamo: In the drawing,
an Inca ruler

00:29:20.052 --> 00:29:23.281
asks a Spanish soldier,
\"Why are you guys

00:29:23.305 --> 00:29:24.908
\"so totally fixated on gold?

00:29:24.932 --> 00:29:27.410
\"What do you do with it?
Do you eat it?\"

00:29:27.434 --> 00:29:30.789
And the Spanish soldier
jokingly replies,

00:29:30.813 --> 00:29:33.608
\"Yes, we eat it.\"

00:29:35.901 --> 00:29:36.629
In 1545,

00:29:36.653 --> 00:29:40.966
a rich silver deposit was
discovered in Potosí, Bolivia,

00:29:40.990 --> 00:29:43.301
ripe for Spanish exploitation.

00:29:43.325 --> 00:29:44.344
So what did they do?

00:29:44.368 --> 00:29:47.055
They enslaved
the native Bolivians

00:29:47.079 --> 00:29:47.847
in their own land.

00:29:47.871 --> 00:29:50.559
So by the year 1600,
Potosí had over

00:29:50.583 --> 00:29:53.770
600 mines in operation,
which yielded

00:29:53.794 --> 00:29:56.691
9 million silver pesos

00:29:56.715 --> 00:29:57.566
annually.

00:29:57.590 --> 00:30:00.276
That\'s more
than all the other silver mines

00:30:00.300 --> 00:30:02.278
in the world, combined.

00:30:02.302 --> 00:30:03.071
Now, over the centuries,

00:30:03.095 --> 00:30:06.324
the Spanish would steal
an entire mountain\'s worth

00:30:06.348 --> 00:30:10.663
of silver on the backs
of enslaved indigenous Incans

00:30:10.687 --> 00:30:12.665
and African miners.

00:30:12.689 --> 00:30:14.374
During the colonial period,

00:30:14.398 --> 00:30:17.419
80% of the silver of the world

00:30:17.443 --> 00:30:20.839
came out of Peru and Mexico.

00:30:20.863 --> 00:30:22.298
During this period,

00:30:22.322 --> 00:30:24.510
silver was the central thing

00:30:24.534 --> 00:30:27.846
in the making
of a world economy.

00:30:28.245 --> 00:30:31.517
Now, all that silver
didn\'t just float to Spain.

00:30:31.541 --> 00:30:33.602
No, the Spanish
traded silver pesos

00:30:33.626 --> 00:30:36.479
with the Ottoman Empire,
China and India,

00:30:36.504 --> 00:30:38.691
profiting all along the way.

00:30:38.715 --> 00:30:40.568
Now the more wealth
they piled up,

00:30:40.592 --> 00:30:43.319
the more power they had
to crush other cultures,

00:30:43.343 --> 00:30:46.448
not just in Latin America,
but all over the world.

00:30:46.472 --> 00:30:48.784
In fact, it was
this ill-gotten wealth

00:30:48.808 --> 00:30:51.119
that funded
the Enlightenment era

00:30:51.143 --> 00:30:52.580
in Europe in the 1700s.

00:30:52.604 --> 00:30:54.623
Because suddenly governments
could afford to pay

00:30:54.647 --> 00:30:57.543
scientists and philosophers
and artists

00:30:57.567 --> 00:31:00.045
to sit around
and create all day,

00:31:00.069 --> 00:31:03.006
ideas flourished,
technology advanced,

00:31:03.030 --> 00:31:04.257
but only in Europe.

00:31:04.281 --> 00:31:07.242
[Speaking Spanish]

00:31:11.955 --> 00:31:15.393
The European commercial
revolution

00:31:15.417 --> 00:31:17.937
of the 1500s, 1600s,

00:31:17.961 --> 00:31:19.732
would have been impossible

00:31:19.756 --> 00:31:21.525
without the silver
of the Americas.

00:31:21.549 --> 00:31:23.485
And this isn\'t even
ancient history, okay?

00:31:23.510 --> 00:31:27.573
The Spanish stole
so much silver from Potosi

00:31:27.597 --> 00:31:28.907
that, in 2011,

00:31:28.931 --> 00:31:30.366
the mountain collapsed,

00:31:30.390 --> 00:31:32.410
hollowed out
from the inside.

00:31:32.434 --> 00:31:35.997
Now this backbreaking labor
proved deadly.

00:31:36.021 --> 00:31:38.458
Potosi became known in Quechua

00:31:38.482 --> 00:31:40.001
as \"the mountain that eats men,\"

00:31:40.025 --> 00:31:42.378
as many
as 8 million indigenous

00:31:42.402 --> 00:31:43.756
and African enslaved people

00:31:43.780 --> 00:31:45.633
may have perished
in the mines

00:31:45.657 --> 00:31:48.176
500 year history.

00:31:48.200 --> 00:31:50.805
And that 500-year-old
transfer riches

00:31:50.829 --> 00:31:52.472
continues to affect us today.

00:31:52.496 --> 00:31:54.891
Because Europe used
that stolen money

00:31:54.915 --> 00:31:56.519
to fund their empires,

00:31:56.543 --> 00:31:58.353
which generated more wealth.

00:31:58.377 --> 00:32:00.021
And it was an ongoing cycle,

00:32:00.045 --> 00:32:02.650
but the poor indigenous
Inca miners

00:32:02.674 --> 00:32:04.150
back in South America,

00:32:04.174 --> 00:32:04.943
well, they were left

00:32:04.967 --> 00:32:07.530
with generational
poverty instead.

00:32:11.181 --> 00:32:11.659
Hundreds of years

00:32:11.683 --> 00:32:14.620
before the arrival
of the Spanish, however,

00:32:14.644 --> 00:32:16.705
Maya society was thriving.

00:32:16.729 --> 00:32:19.457
Their culture
may be best remembered today

00:32:19.481 --> 00:32:21.417
for their meticulous calendars

00:32:21.441 --> 00:32:23.962
and knowledge of astronomy.

00:32:23.986 --> 00:32:26.005
The Maya originally just meant

00:32:26.029 --> 00:32:27.966
\"the people
in the Yucatan Peninsula,\"

00:32:27.990 --> 00:32:29.844
and that was the word
for their language.

00:32:29.868 --> 00:32:33.429
But now it\'s understood
that encompasses

00:32:33.453 --> 00:32:36.559
the Yucatan Peninsula,
the Peten Basin,

00:32:36.583 --> 00:32:40.478
the Guatemala Highlands,
Belize, part of Honduras,

00:32:40.503 --> 00:32:43.022
Campeche, Tabasco, and Chiapas.

00:32:43.046 --> 00:32:47.026
The Maya were probably
the most sophisticated culture

00:32:47.050 --> 00:32:48.612
in pre-Columbian Americas.

00:32:48.636 --> 00:32:50.238
Leguizamo:
One mind-blowing example:

00:32:50.262 --> 00:32:53.199
how the Maya tracked
the movements of the cosmos

00:32:53.223 --> 00:32:55.368
and recorded it
in their codices,

00:32:55.392 --> 00:32:59.832
which were their form
of books and sacred texts.

00:32:59.856 --> 00:33:02.041
The Maya calculated accurately

00:33:02.065 --> 00:33:06.755
the 365 plus days
of the solar year

00:33:06.779 --> 00:33:08.841
over 2,000 years ago.

00:33:10.032 --> 00:33:12.051
The codices have information

00:33:12.075 --> 00:33:13.596
about the Venus cycle,

00:33:13.620 --> 00:33:16.014
the first rising of Venus
with the sun,

00:33:16.038 --> 00:33:20.059
over 800 years
accurately calculated.

00:33:20.083 --> 00:33:22.688
There is a Mars table
that showed

00:33:22.712 --> 00:33:25.064
that they accurately calculated

00:33:25.088 --> 00:33:27.025
the cycle of Mars.

00:33:27.049 --> 00:33:30.028
So these documents
were probably painted

00:33:30.052 --> 00:33:32.071
within a couple of hundred years

00:33:32.095 --> 00:33:33.657
of the Spanish arriving,

00:33:33.681 --> 00:33:35.784
but it\'s clear
that some parts of them

00:33:35.808 --> 00:33:39.538
were copies of much,
much earlier documents,

00:33:39.562 --> 00:33:42.290
just like the Bible is
a collection of documents

00:33:42.314 --> 00:33:44.960
from a lot
of different periods of time

00:33:44.984 --> 00:33:47.170
and different kinds of material.

00:33:47.194 --> 00:33:48.463
Leguizamo:
Before European contact,

00:33:48.487 --> 00:33:51.382
the Maya had developed
one of the most advanced

00:33:51.406 --> 00:33:54.970
water management systems
in the world.

00:33:54.994 --> 00:33:55.512
Macri: The Maya,

00:33:55.536 --> 00:33:58.807
they were experts
at managing water.

00:33:58.831 --> 00:34:00.016
Leguizamo: The Maya aqueducts

00:34:00.040 --> 00:34:01.142
were so brilliantly constructed,

00:34:01.166 --> 00:34:06.189
they rerouted rivers to flow
beneath their royal plazas.

00:34:06.213 --> 00:34:08.066
We have amazing evidence

00:34:08.090 --> 00:34:11.612
of their ability to store water,

00:34:11.636 --> 00:34:13.572
some in the chultunes,

00:34:13.596 --> 00:34:15.699
some in reservoirs.

00:34:15.723 --> 00:34:20.537
So even at 1,000 BC,
the people of San Lorenzo

00:34:20.561 --> 00:34:24.457
had constructed pipes
of concrete blocks

00:34:24.481 --> 00:34:29.004
to direct water
where they needed it to be.

00:34:29.028 --> 00:34:31.006
At the site of Palenque,

00:34:31.030 --> 00:34:32.591
they diverted a stream

00:34:32.615 --> 00:34:35.719
through the region
known as the palace,

00:34:35.743 --> 00:34:37.345
where there were toilets,

00:34:37.369 --> 00:34:38.388
stones with holes in the center

00:34:38.412 --> 00:34:41.016
that water was diverted
underneath it

00:34:41.040 --> 00:34:44.019
to go through and take it
out to the stream.

00:34:44.043 --> 00:34:44.728
Leguizamo: In contrast,

00:34:44.752 --> 00:34:47.438
the White House
didn\'t get indoor plumbing

00:34:47.462 --> 00:34:48.607
until 1804,

00:34:48.631 --> 00:34:51.067
when Thomas Jefferson
installed a cistern

00:34:51.091 --> 00:34:54.697
that distributed water
through wooden pipes.

00:34:57.139 --> 00:34:59.492
The Maya developed
a writing system,

00:34:59.517 --> 00:35:01.996
they developed
the notion of the zero,

00:35:02.020 --> 00:35:06.583
which doesn\'t exist anyplace
other than in India.

00:35:06.607 --> 00:35:08.376
Perez:
The Maya language contains

00:35:08.400 --> 00:35:08.877
figures and characters

00:35:08.901 --> 00:35:12.130
by which they could signify
everything they desired,

00:35:12.154 --> 00:35:12.965
and that these great books

00:35:12.989 --> 00:35:15.926
are of such a astuteness
and subtle technique

00:35:15.950 --> 00:35:16.259
that we could say

00:35:16.283 --> 00:35:19.220
our writing does not offer
much of an advantage.

00:35:19.244 --> 00:35:22.348
Leguizamo: The conquistadors
and the Catholic friars

00:35:22.372 --> 00:35:24.685
considered
all indigenous documents

00:35:24.709 --> 00:35:26.102
to be the work of the devil,

00:35:26.126 --> 00:35:30.148
and they burned
all that they could find.

00:35:30.172 --> 00:35:33.944
They wanted
to eradicate their religion

00:35:33.968 --> 00:35:36.697
and their society
and their culture.

00:35:36.721 --> 00:35:39.658
The Spanish soldiers
and the sailors

00:35:39.682 --> 00:35:42.036
who arrived to do the conquering

00:35:42.060 --> 00:35:43.954
were not educated people,

00:35:43.978 --> 00:35:44.538
and they didn\'t know

00:35:44.562 --> 00:35:48.542
even the science
that was known in Europe.

00:35:48.566 --> 00:35:51.127
Leguizamo:
Just like in the Caribbean,

00:35:51.151 --> 00:35:52.378
in Mesoamerica,

00:35:52.402 --> 00:35:55.049
conquistadors like Hernán Cortés

00:35:55.073 --> 00:35:56.884
and Francisco Pizarro

00:35:56.908 --> 00:35:58.510
committed forced conversions

00:35:58.534 --> 00:36:01.805
alongside the pillaging
in mass murder.

00:36:01.829 --> 00:36:03.932
One of the things
the Spanish did

00:36:03.956 --> 00:36:04.767
was round up Indians

00:36:04.791 --> 00:36:06.476
and make a move
to a certain region

00:36:06.500 --> 00:36:10.606
where they would be
converted to Christianity.

00:36:10.630 --> 00:36:11.607
People had to leave

00:36:11.631 --> 00:36:12.983
the area that they knew well

00:36:13.007 --> 00:36:15.861
to live in a place
that was unfamiliar to them,

00:36:15.885 --> 00:36:19.197
so you find people
gradually less and less able

00:36:19.221 --> 00:36:20.824
to take care of themselves.

00:36:20.848 --> 00:36:24.870
Once people have been
properly colonized

00:36:24.894 --> 00:36:26.162
by foreign invaders

00:36:26.186 --> 00:36:29.083
and mistreated
for a generation or two,

00:36:29.107 --> 00:36:31.459
they are no longer having
a literate society.

00:36:31.483 --> 00:36:35.089
and then you have Indians
who don\'t read and write.

00:36:35.113 --> 00:36:36.632
And that happened with the Aztec

00:36:36.656 --> 00:36:39.384
and it certainly happened
with the Maya people.

00:36:39.408 --> 00:36:40.594
Leguizamo:
So why doesn\'t history

00:36:40.618 --> 00:36:44.723
remember these empires
as equal to the Spanish?

00:36:44.747 --> 00:36:45.933
Well, like they say,

00:36:45.957 --> 00:36:48.184
history is a fable agreed upon.

00:36:48.208 --> 00:36:51.855
The agreed upon narrative
of European superiority

00:36:51.879 --> 00:36:55.400
is passed down even
when it\'s not the whole truth.

00:36:55.424 --> 00:36:59.195
I think the history textbooks
not only don\'t get it right,

00:36:59.219 --> 00:37:01.280
they mainly don\'t say anything.

00:37:01.304 --> 00:37:02.281
They say very little

00:37:02.305 --> 00:37:05.828
about Mesoamerican
civilizations.

00:37:16.863 --> 00:37:18.966
Leguizamo:
I\'m here at Penn Museum

00:37:18.990 --> 00:37:21.135
of Archaeology and Anthropology,

00:37:21.159 --> 00:37:23.637
which houses
an amazing collection

00:37:23.661 --> 00:37:26.515
of Aztec artifacts.

00:37:27.330 --> 00:37:29.601
I\'m here to meet
expert Simon Martin,

00:37:29.625 --> 00:37:32.146
who\'s been studying
Mesoamerican cultures

00:37:32.170 --> 00:37:35.481
up close and personal
for decades.

00:37:35.506 --> 00:37:38.276
So this is
our Aztec sculpture.

00:37:38.300 --> 00:37:40.278
This is the kind
of great period

00:37:40.302 --> 00:37:41.404
that everyone\'s
heard about.

00:37:41.428 --> 00:37:43.406
This is
when the Spanish arrived.

00:37:43.430 --> 00:37:45.117
And these are
some of the objects

00:37:45.141 --> 00:37:45.909
they would have seen

00:37:45.933 --> 00:37:47.911
when they went
to Tenochtitlan,

00:37:47.935 --> 00:37:49.830
the predecessor
of Mexico City.

00:37:49.854 --> 00:37:52.040
Right, the capital
of the Aztecs.

00:37:52.064 --> 00:37:54.417
Yeah. We know
so much more about them

00:37:54.441 --> 00:37:57.004
because the Spanish
actually saw

00:37:57.028 --> 00:37:58.964
Aztec society in action.

00:37:58.988 --> 00:37:59.756
How advanced
were they?

00:37:59.780 --> 00:38:01.299
Well, they were
very sophisticated.

00:38:01.323 --> 00:38:04.970
They turned essentially
a swamp into a city.

00:38:04.994 --> 00:38:07.973
So they expanded
using drainage

00:38:07.997 --> 00:38:08.891
and using raised fields

00:38:08.915 --> 00:38:12.144
and building big dikes
and aqueducts.

00:38:12.168 --> 00:38:14.188
And there were
at least 100,000 people

00:38:14.212 --> 00:38:16.648
living on essentially
an island

00:38:16.672 --> 00:38:18.650
in the middle
of a lake.

00:38:18.674 --> 00:38:19.275
One of the buildings

00:38:19.299 --> 00:38:20.611
that most impressed
the Spaniards

00:38:20.635 --> 00:38:23.572
when they came
into Tenochtitlan

00:38:23.596 --> 00:38:26.992
was Temple Mayor,
the great Aztec temple.

00:38:27.016 --> 00:38:30.621
Leguizamo:
In 1978, a group of electricians

00:38:30.645 --> 00:38:32.873
installing pipes underground

00:38:32.897 --> 00:38:35.125
struck a huge carved stone,

00:38:35.149 --> 00:38:35.959
which we came to discover

00:38:35.983 --> 00:38:39.671
was a centerpiece
of the Templo Mayor,

00:38:39.695 --> 00:38:42.007
unseen for hundreds of years.

00:38:42.031 --> 00:38:45.468
Narrator: The discovery were
a 20-ton stone medallion,

00:38:45.492 --> 00:38:46.845
which archaeologists
say could provide

00:38:46.869 --> 00:38:49.388
the missing link
to Aztec religious customs,

00:38:49.412 --> 00:38:52.601
which were wiped out
by the conquering Spaniards.

00:38:52.625 --> 00:38:54.895
The medallion
is a story in stone.

00:38:54.919 --> 00:38:58.732
Except for one small crack,
it is perfectly preserved

00:38:58.756 --> 00:39:01.400
five centuries
after it was buried.

00:39:01.424 --> 00:39:03.153
They would like
to widen their search

00:39:03.177 --> 00:39:05.239
to find
more of the ancient city,

00:39:05.263 --> 00:39:07.908
but it lies
under the National Cathedral,

00:39:07.932 --> 00:39:09.408
and too much history
would have to be torn up

00:39:09.432 --> 00:39:15.414
on top of the ground
to get at the mysteries below.

00:39:15.438 --> 00:39:17.876
Carrasco: This discovery
is a sculptural

00:39:17.900 --> 00:39:18.752
and architectural masterpiece

00:39:18.776 --> 00:39:23.298
because what the Aztec artists
and sculptors were able to do

00:39:23.322 --> 00:39:26.677
was to put
a kind of symbolic picture

00:39:26.701 --> 00:39:29.763
of their whole view
of the universe

00:39:29.787 --> 00:39:31.056
in this one building.

00:39:31.080 --> 00:39:33.850
It rocked me to find out
Tenochtitlan

00:39:33.874 --> 00:39:36.394
was five times larger
than Madrid

00:39:36.418 --> 00:39:39.022
before Cortés invaded
the Aztec capital.

00:39:39.046 --> 00:39:41.650
I wish I could have seen
what a major metropolis,

00:39:41.674 --> 00:39:45.486
100% built by Aztec
engineers and artists,

00:39:45.511 --> 00:39:47.155
would have looked like.

00:39:51.183 --> 00:39:52.035
Ledesma: The Aztecs,

00:39:52.059 --> 00:39:53.245
they called themselves Mexicas

00:39:53.269 --> 00:39:56.455
because their biggest god
was Mextli.

00:39:56.479 --> 00:39:59.293
What we know
from their ecological records

00:39:59.317 --> 00:40:02.170
and the historical sources,

00:40:02.194 --> 00:40:07.676
the Aztecs, or Mexicas,
started here in 1325.

00:40:09.492 --> 00:40:11.470
Verano: There were native
healers in Mexico,

00:40:11.494 --> 00:40:13.849
and when the Spanish
first had contact with them,

00:40:13.873 --> 00:40:16.143
they were very impressed
with their ability

00:40:16.167 --> 00:40:17.936
to treat fractures, wounds,

00:40:17.960 --> 00:40:20.272
their control
of herbal medications.

00:40:20.296 --> 00:40:23.108
And it\'s been said
that when the conquistadors

00:40:23.132 --> 00:40:24.985
came to the city
of Tenochtitlan,

00:40:25.009 --> 00:40:27.279
if they had injuries themselves
or illnesses,

00:40:27.303 --> 00:40:30.032
they would prefer
to go to an Aztec doctor

00:40:30.056 --> 00:40:31.407
rather than their own surgeons

00:40:31.431 --> 00:40:34.036
that came across with them
from Europe.

00:40:34.060 --> 00:40:36.913
Leguizamo: Spanish conquistador
Hernán Cortés

00:40:36.937 --> 00:40:38.999
reportedly told
Emperor Charles V

00:40:39.023 --> 00:40:43.879
that the Aztec doctors
were superior to those in Spain.

00:40:43.903 --> 00:40:45.756
So superior, in fact,

00:40:45.780 --> 00:40:46.882
that the king need not bother

00:40:46.906 --> 00:40:51.678
sending Spanish physicians
to the new world.

00:40:51.702 --> 00:40:52.387
Perez: Some of the Indians

00:40:52.411 --> 00:40:54.640
are so experienced
that they have cured

00:40:54.664 --> 00:40:57.225
many old and serious
infirmities,

00:40:57.249 --> 00:41:00.562
which the Spaniards
have suffered many days

00:41:00.586 --> 00:41:02.939
without finding a remedy.

00:41:02.963 --> 00:41:04.358
Leguizamo:
Modern science confirmed

00:41:04.382 --> 00:41:08.695
that over 85%
of the herbs Aztecs used

00:41:08.719 --> 00:41:09.780
are truly effective

00:41:09.804 --> 00:41:12.240
and could not be found
outside of the Americas.

00:41:12.264 --> 00:41:15.327
Your local pharmacy today
is filled with drugs

00:41:15.351 --> 00:41:20.749
that contain compounds
used by the Aztec.

00:41:22.233 --> 00:41:26.213
Hernán Cortés was
the first European conquistador

00:41:26.237 --> 00:41:28.548
to reach
the great Aztec capital.

00:41:28.572 --> 00:41:30.217
And when he
and his troops arrived,

00:41:30.241 --> 00:41:32.886
the Aztec king Moctezuma
greeted them

00:41:32.910 --> 00:41:36.098
on the outskirts of the city.

00:41:36.122 --> 00:41:38.350
Olmos: Gazing
on such wonderful sites,

00:41:38.374 --> 00:41:39.768
we did not know what to say,

00:41:39.792 --> 00:41:45.524
or whether what appeared
before us was real.

00:41:45.548 --> 00:41:50.052
[Speaking Spanish]

00:42:07.236 --> 00:42:09.798
For the indigenous people,
the Spaniards come,

00:42:09.822 --> 00:42:11.216
they don\'t see them
as Spaniards

00:42:11.240 --> 00:42:13.510
the way we see them today
from Europe.

00:42:13.534 --> 00:42:15.262
They see them
as another ethnic group

00:42:15.286 --> 00:42:18.390
who is part of a number
of powerful groups.

00:42:18.414 --> 00:42:23.210
Ledesma: [Speaking Spanish]

00:42:42.229 --> 00:42:44.458
Leguizamo: There was
a third important person

00:42:44.482 --> 00:42:47.210
at this diplomatic
meet and greet,

00:42:47.234 --> 00:42:49.713
Cortés\'s native interpreter,

00:42:49.737 --> 00:42:51.673
the Spanish called her
Doña Marina,

00:42:51.697 --> 00:42:55.677
and the Maya gave her
the title of respect,

00:42:55.701 --> 00:42:57.304
Malintzin.

00:42:57.328 --> 00:43:00.307
Malinche is an extremely
divisive figure

00:43:00.331 --> 00:43:01.433
in Latin history.

00:43:01.457 --> 00:43:03.852
She gave birth
to Hernán Cortés\'s son.

00:43:03.876 --> 00:43:06.730
Metaphorically,
this is the first Latino,

00:43:06.754 --> 00:43:11.109
a child with both indigenous
and European ancestry.

00:43:11.133 --> 00:43:13.612
She\'s the mother
of all modern Mexico,

00:43:13.636 --> 00:43:17.657
but as I learned,
many also see her as a traitor,

00:43:17.681 --> 00:43:21.328
a temptress who aligned
with the conquistadors

00:43:21.352 --> 00:43:22.788
over her own people.

00:43:22.812 --> 00:43:26.750
She actually was born
into a noble Aztec family,

00:43:26.774 --> 00:43:32.339
and she was sold
to a Chontal Mayan community.

00:43:32.363 --> 00:43:34.883
She\'s basically
on the lower rungs

00:43:34.907 --> 00:43:37.427
of the society in Chontal Maya.

00:43:37.451 --> 00:43:40.722
She learns the language,
of course.

00:43:40.746 --> 00:43:42.766
Hernán Cortés is traveling

00:43:42.790 --> 00:43:46.311
through the southern part
of Mexico.

00:43:46.335 --> 00:43:47.979
He looks scary and dangerous,

00:43:48.003 --> 00:43:49.189
and so they just like, \"Here,

00:43:49.213 --> 00:43:51.526
we\'re going to give you
some gifts, move on.\"

00:43:51.550 --> 00:43:55.487
And among those gifts
that they gave Cortés

00:43:55.512 --> 00:44:00.492
was 20 women to serve
as basically sex slaves

00:44:00.517 --> 00:44:01.785
for him and his troops.

00:44:01.809 --> 00:44:03.370
Leguizamo:
Malinche was among these women.

00:44:03.394 --> 00:44:07.666
She was no more than 19
or 20 years old at the time.

00:44:07.690 --> 00:44:08.750
Soon, she learns Spanish

00:44:08.774 --> 00:44:10.043
and she becomes
absolutely crucial

00:44:10.067 --> 00:44:12.379
in the linguistic
and communicative bridge

00:44:12.403 --> 00:44:15.257
between the Spaniards
and Moctezuma,

00:44:15.281 --> 00:44:16.592
because she is trilingual.

00:44:16.616 --> 00:44:21.556
Cortés makes note of that,
and he makes her his woman,

00:44:21.580 --> 00:44:24.182
and says,
\"I will give you your freedom

00:44:24.206 --> 00:44:27.394
if you will be my interpreter
and my secretary.\"

00:44:27.418 --> 00:44:31.064
We do know,
because it is in the record,

00:44:31.088 --> 00:44:35.902
that she did give away
the information

00:44:35.926 --> 00:44:36.653
when they were in Cholula,

00:44:36.677 --> 00:44:40.657
that the Cholulans were going
to attack the Spanish,

00:44:40.681 --> 00:44:42.492
and there was going
to be a massacre.

00:44:42.517 --> 00:44:44.202
And she went and told Cortés,

00:44:44.226 --> 00:44:46.454
so Cortés organized a massacre

00:44:46.478 --> 00:44:48.164
against the Cholulans.

00:44:48.188 --> 00:44:50.834
And she becomes
very close to Cortés,

00:44:50.858 --> 00:44:53.378
so much so
that the indigenous people,

00:44:53.402 --> 00:44:55.755
as a way of kind
of making fun of him,

00:44:55.779 --> 00:44:59.175
called him Malinche
in some of the documents,

00:44:59.199 --> 00:45:01.428
and they\'re calling him
Malinche,

00:45:01.452 --> 00:45:02.470
because they\'re saying

00:45:02.494 --> 00:45:05.348
he\'s not only very close
to Malinche,

00:45:05.372 --> 00:45:08.603
but she has
some control over him.

00:45:08.627 --> 00:45:10.061
Leguizamo:
It\'s painful to imagine

00:45:10.085 --> 00:45:13.440
a native woman helping Cortés
in his conquest.

00:45:13.464 --> 00:45:14.482
In Mexican arts and literature,

00:45:14.507 --> 00:45:18.695
Malinche is usually depicted
as a seller of her nation.

00:45:18.719 --> 00:45:21.323
\"Malinchista\" today
is still used

00:45:21.347 --> 00:45:22.198
as a Spanish insult

00:45:22.222 --> 00:45:24.577
to describe a traitor
or a backstabber,

00:45:24.601 --> 00:45:27.704
and it\'s really easy
to paint Malinche as a villain

00:45:27.728 --> 00:45:29.080
in Mexican history.

00:45:29.104 --> 00:45:31.082
She\'s not siding
with the Europeans,

00:45:31.106 --> 00:45:33.084
she doesn\'t know what Europe is,

00:45:33.108 --> 00:45:34.002
who the Europeans are,

00:45:34.026 --> 00:45:36.880
and she does the work
that she had to do.

00:45:36.904 --> 00:45:39.466
I just want to say
that it\'s ridiculous

00:45:39.490 --> 00:45:40.342
to think that a woman

00:45:40.366 --> 00:45:42.637
who is a translator
for a conqueror

00:45:42.661 --> 00:45:45.221
is the one responsible
for the whole falling

00:45:45.245 --> 00:45:47.516
of the Mexica Aztec Empire.

00:45:47.540 --> 00:45:50.226
Leguizamo: Today,
many Mexican and Chicana women

00:45:50.250 --> 00:45:52.812
are taking Malinche\'s
story back,

00:45:52.836 --> 00:45:56.149
some see her now
as a victim of machismo culture,

00:45:56.173 --> 00:46:00.737
and an icon of motherhood
and feminine power.

00:46:00.761 --> 00:46:01.279
My own mestizo heritage

00:46:01.303 --> 00:46:06.661
includes both the conquerors
and the indigenous people.

00:46:06.685 --> 00:46:07.369
So Malinche\'s story

00:46:07.393 --> 00:46:10.121
can\'t be fully
one thing or another,

00:46:10.145 --> 00:46:11.666
and neither can mine.

00:46:13.608 --> 00:46:17.987
[Speaking Spanish]

00:47:17.672 --> 00:47:19.899
The Aztec,
they were very militaristic

00:47:19.923 --> 00:47:24.112
and they dominated
a huge amount of territory.

00:47:24.136 --> 00:47:27.115
The problem was
that the Spanish arrived

00:47:27.139 --> 00:47:30.745
and the enemies
of the Mexica were like,

00:47:30.769 --> 00:47:36.709
\"Wow, these new strange people
look pretty powerful.

00:47:36.733 --> 00:47:38.209
I think I\'ll ally with them,

00:47:38.233 --> 00:47:42.548
and I can finally defeat
my enemy, the Mexica.\"

00:47:42.572 --> 00:47:45.842
Cortés maybe had less
than 500 troops,

00:47:45.866 --> 00:47:46.802
and he ended up having

00:47:46.826 --> 00:47:48.386
thousands and tens of thousands

00:47:48.410 --> 00:47:49.471
by the time he created alliances

00:47:49.495 --> 00:47:53.601
with those dominated groups
in the Aztec territory.

00:47:53.625 --> 00:47:57.020
80% of the warriors
are indigenous warriors

00:47:57.044 --> 00:47:58.647
from other communities.

00:47:58.671 --> 00:48:00.023
So it\'s not really a conquest

00:48:00.047 --> 00:48:02.108
so much as
it is also a revolution,

00:48:02.132 --> 00:48:04.653
a rebellion
of other indigenous people

00:48:04.677 --> 00:48:06.029
working with this new army.

00:48:06.053 --> 00:48:09.784
So the real conquerors
were all that indigenous people

00:48:09.808 --> 00:48:10.992
rather than the Spaniards.

00:48:11.016 --> 00:48:13.829
Carrasco: But what happens
when they are able

00:48:13.853 --> 00:48:16.873
to defeat the Aztec warriors
in the city,

00:48:16.897 --> 00:48:19.794
is they destroy this city
so badly

00:48:19.818 --> 00:48:22.045
that even
in the Spanish accounts,

00:48:22.069 --> 00:48:25.423
they\'re mourning
what they have done.

00:48:25.447 --> 00:48:26.132
And we have descriptions

00:48:26.156 --> 00:48:28.803
of the flattened parts
of this city.

00:48:28.827 --> 00:48:31.471
Leguizamo: It took
the Spanish conquistadors

00:48:31.495 --> 00:48:32.347
years to traverse

00:48:32.371 --> 00:48:34.057
all of Central
and South America,

00:48:34.081 --> 00:48:37.060
but their diseases
traveled far faster.

00:48:37.084 --> 00:48:39.187
Once the first indigenous person
was infected,

00:48:39.211 --> 00:48:42.775
their germs quickly spread
to the rest of their family

00:48:42.799 --> 00:48:44.943
and then their whole village.

00:48:44.967 --> 00:48:46.152
Villages traded with one another

00:48:46.176 --> 00:48:49.948
and soon whole regions
could be struck down by plagues.

00:48:49.972 --> 00:48:52.325
Even though the Europeans
hadn\'t yet arrived

00:48:52.349 --> 00:48:53.869
at every corner
of the continent,

00:48:53.893 --> 00:48:56.287
their deadly viruses raged
ahead of them,

00:48:56.311 --> 00:48:59.374
carried by the natives
themselves.

00:48:59.398 --> 00:49:00.793
A lot of people died

00:49:00.817 --> 00:49:03.378
because the diseases
the Spanish were carrying

00:49:03.402 --> 00:49:05.840
travel ahead of them.
Right, right.

00:49:05.864 --> 00:49:07.215
So when they arrived,

00:49:07.239 --> 00:49:10.426
very often the societies
were already devastated.

00:49:10.450 --> 00:49:11.846
And that\'s one
of the reasons

00:49:11.870 --> 00:49:12.929
they managed
to win so easily.

00:49:12.953 --> 00:49:14.515
It wasn\'t
that one civilization

00:49:14.539 --> 00:49:15.683
was stronger
or better

00:49:15.707 --> 00:49:17.893
or had better
military knowledge.

00:49:17.917 --> 00:49:18.017
Yeah.

00:49:18.041 --> 00:49:20.604
These people
were vanquished by disease.

00:49:20.628 --> 00:49:22.313
Leguizamo:
The fall of Tenochtitlan

00:49:22.337 --> 00:49:24.232
was a tragedy for the Aztec,

00:49:24.256 --> 00:49:24.692
but it didn\'t mean

00:49:24.716 --> 00:49:27.068
the whole of Latin American
civilization

00:49:27.092 --> 00:49:29.237
instantly came
under Spanish rule.

00:49:29.261 --> 00:49:31.657
No, because indigenous
communities

00:49:31.681 --> 00:49:32.949
fought back with force

00:49:32.973 --> 00:49:35.661
and through subtler ways
as well.

00:49:42.567 --> 00:49:44.879
Macri: At one point,
the Catholic bishop

00:49:44.903 --> 00:49:47.005
brought on a Mayan man in

00:49:47.029 --> 00:49:49.299
and asked him
to give him an alphabet.

00:49:49.323 --> 00:49:52.636
That Catholic bishop said,
\"I want you to write me

00:49:52.660 --> 00:49:54.722
a sentence in your language.\"

00:49:54.746 --> 00:49:57.056
And he wrote down, \"Ma inkati,\"

00:49:57.080 --> 00:50:00.268
and it means, \"I don\'t want to.\"

00:50:00.292 --> 00:50:01.102
And for a long time,

00:50:01.126 --> 00:50:03.772
people translate
as, \"I do not wish.\"

00:50:03.796 --> 00:50:07.066
No, it means, \"I don\'t want to.\"

00:50:07.090 --> 00:50:08.484
I love that story.

00:50:08.509 --> 00:50:11.196
The name of the man is Chu.

00:50:11.220 --> 00:50:12.030
You should know his name.

00:50:12.054 --> 00:50:14.115
I mean, you should not
be nameless.

00:50:14.139 --> 00:50:16.911
That\'s the first
written example we have

00:50:16.935 --> 00:50:18.244
from an indigenous person

00:50:18.268 --> 00:50:23.709
of resistance
to the invaders, really.

00:50:24.399 --> 00:50:26.044
Well, it seems like
a small moment,

00:50:26.068 --> 00:50:29.005
a scribe refusing
to translate a phrase

00:50:29.029 --> 00:50:30.298
from Mayan to Spanish,

00:50:30.322 --> 00:50:34.637
but history is made up
of small moments of resistance

00:50:34.661 --> 00:50:35.554
just like this one.

00:50:35.578 --> 00:50:39.558
Just think about Rosa Parks
sitting at the front of the bus

00:50:39.582 --> 00:50:40.099
and what that led to.

00:50:40.123 --> 00:50:43.520
The scribe chose dignity
for himself and his culture

00:50:43.544 --> 00:50:46.523
in the face
of torture and death.

00:50:46.547 --> 00:50:47.691
Those are my people.

00:50:47.715 --> 00:50:51.904
Leguizamo: Our ancestors endured
an almost total genocide

00:50:51.928 --> 00:50:56.032
through war, plague,
and religious conversion.

00:50:56.056 --> 00:50:57.993
The land and wealth
were seized,

00:50:58.017 --> 00:50:59.452
and they were forced
into a cycle

00:50:59.476 --> 00:51:04.917
of generational poverty
that still exists to this day.

00:51:04.941 --> 00:51:08.963
Today, Latinos are reclaiming
their own histories

00:51:08.987 --> 00:51:10.839
and recovering the real stories

00:51:10.863 --> 00:51:13.174
that were erased
from the records.

00:51:13.198 --> 00:51:14.677
At long last, we\'re getting

00:51:14.701 --> 00:51:17.053
the uncolonized side
of the story.

00:51:17.077 --> 00:51:20.516
When we think of our history
as starting with colonization,

00:51:20.540 --> 00:51:24.185
we\'re really doing a disservice
to our ancestors,

00:51:24.209 --> 00:51:26.271
and that really creates

00:51:26.295 --> 00:51:27.856
a myopic view of history,

00:51:27.880 --> 00:51:29.148
a perspective that is biased

00:51:29.172 --> 00:51:32.110
towards only
one part of our past,

00:51:32.134 --> 00:51:33.696
and erases the rest.

00:51:33.720 --> 00:51:36.489
When we consider
that our history starts

00:51:36.514 --> 00:51:37.574
5,000 years ago

00:51:37.598 --> 00:51:38.909
and not 500 years ago,

00:51:38.933 --> 00:51:42.037
we are able to reconstruct
a much richer picture

00:51:42.061 --> 00:51:44.080
of how our cultures came to be.

00:51:44.104 --> 00:51:44.832
We are able to appreciate

00:51:44.856 --> 00:51:47.208
the contributions
of indigenous ancestors,

00:51:47.232 --> 00:51:49.628
of African ancestors,
of European ancestors,

00:51:49.652 --> 00:51:51.337
and everything
that came after that,

00:51:51.361 --> 00:51:54.215
with a much broader
and critical lens.

00:51:54.239 --> 00:51:57.011
Carrasco: It\'s not just
the victim and the victimizer,

00:51:57.035 --> 00:51:59.013
there\'s the shared culture.

00:51:59.037 --> 00:52:00.556
And that\'s what Latino history

00:52:00.580 --> 00:52:02.599
and Latino culture
really is about.

00:52:02.623 --> 00:52:03.391
It\'s about the sharing

00:52:03.415 --> 00:52:06.352
that has taken place
all through the Americas.

00:52:06.376 --> 00:52:08.564
You can\'t have
an inclusive democracy

00:52:08.588 --> 00:52:13.484
unless people understand
how their histories are shared.

00:52:13.509 --> 00:52:14.528
You have to understand

00:52:14.552 --> 00:52:18.615
that what we call America
or the Americas

00:52:18.639 --> 00:52:19.115
is the result

00:52:19.139 --> 00:52:22.077
of not only competing
with one another,

00:52:22.101 --> 00:52:23.537
but also cooperating.

00:52:23.561 --> 00:52:25.956
And there\'s really
no cultural group

00:52:25.980 --> 00:52:27.248
that has done more of that

00:52:27.272 --> 00:52:29.543
or done it
better than the Latinos.

00:52:29.567 --> 00:52:32.420
And that\'s
the type of affirmation

00:52:32.444 --> 00:52:34.297
that we have to have
of the past,

00:52:34.321 --> 00:52:36.382
so that we can have
a shared future.

00:52:36.406 --> 00:52:40.012
Histories that are
monochromatic and monothematic

00:52:40.036 --> 00:52:43.264
are not only boring,
but they distort reality.

00:52:43.288 --> 00:52:47.310
Reality is complex,
reality is multiple.

00:52:47.334 --> 00:52:48.979
particularly in places
in the Americas,

00:52:49.003 --> 00:52:52.315
where people come
from all over the planet.

00:52:52.339 --> 00:52:54.985
That\'s part of the history.

00:52:55.009 --> 00:52:56.820
Leguizamo:
The Olmecs, Aztecs, Maya

00:52:56.844 --> 00:52:59.197
Incas and Tainos
have been conquered.

00:52:59.221 --> 00:53:02.785
Their wealth had been stolen,
their culture had been erased.

00:53:02.809 --> 00:53:05.286
But there was a new new world
that was being built,

00:53:05.310 --> 00:53:07.915
and Latinos were
a big part of that,

00:53:07.939 --> 00:53:09.374
all across the Americas,

00:53:09.398 --> 00:53:11.292
and even
in a budding new country

00:53:11.316 --> 00:53:14.253
that you know today as US of A.

00:53:14.277 --> 00:53:15.421
And maybe if we recognize

00:53:15.445 --> 00:53:17.591
these achievements
of our ancestors,

00:53:17.615 --> 00:53:19.760
we would see
the tremendous contributions

00:53:19.784 --> 00:53:21.845
we\'ve made
throughout the world.

00:53:21.869 --> 00:53:25.682
I wish I had been taught that
when I was growing up.

00:53:25.706 --> 00:53:26.850
Well, there\'s so much history

00:53:26.874 --> 00:53:30.395
we\'ve barely scratched
the surface.

00:53:30.419 --> 00:53:32.898
Now the more that I\'ve learned
on this journey,

00:53:32.922 --> 00:53:37.611
the more I\'ve realized
how little I knew.

00:53:37.635 --> 00:53:39.195
I\'m a different person today

00:53:39.219 --> 00:53:40.321
because of what I\'ve learned,

00:53:40.345 --> 00:53:44.283
and that\'s why I wanted
to share this with you.