{"podcast":{"title":"The Conquistadors: Exploration, Greed, and Destruction — Fexingo History","slug":"the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470","podcast_index_feed_id":7864470,"rss_url":"https://feeds.fexingo.com/history/the-conquistadors.xml","website_url":"https://www.fexingo.com/history/the-conquistadors/","image_url":"https://audio.fexingo.com/history/the-conquistadors/cover.png","author":"Fexingo","episode_count":182,"summary":"From the moment Hernán Cortés burned his ships on the Veracruz shore to the fall of Tenochtitlan in 1521, the Spanish conquistadors remade the Americas through a volatile mix of courage, cruelty, and greed. Lucas and Luna guide listeners through the brutal collision of two worlds, examining not only the well-known figures—Cortés, Pizarro, Moctezuma, Atahualpa—but also the indigenous allies, enslaved Africans, and forgotten women who shaped the conquest. Each episode dissects a specific campaign or cultural encounter: the siege of Tenochtitlan, the conquest of the Inca Empire, the protracted Maya resistance, and the lesser-known expeditions into Florida and the Amazon. They explore the legal and moral debates of the Valladolid Controversy, the devastating impact of Old World diseases, and the encomienda system that bound native peoples to Spanish lords. The show also confronts the long legacy: how conquest myths were constructed, how indigenous memory survives, and how modern movements grapple with statues, repatriation, and historical memory. This is not a simple story of heroes or villains—it is a search for understanding amid the rubble of empires. Can we truly grasp the scale o…","last_synced_at":"2026-07-29T06:20:17.143281+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470"},"episode":{"title":"How Smallpox Toppled the Aztec Empire","slug":"how-smallpox-toppled-the-aztec-empire","published_at":"2026-07-26T03:04:46+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470/how-smallpox-toppled-the-aztec-empire","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470","url":"https://audio.fexingo.com/history/the-conquistadors/episode-0176.mp3","audio_url":"https://audio.fexingo.com/history/the-conquistadors/episode-0176.mp3","summary":"In 1520, as Hernán Cortés and his allies fought to take Tenochtitlan, a far deadlier enemy arrived without a single sword drawn: smallpox. This episode explores how the cocoliztli—the 'great sickness'—swept through Mesoamerica, killing an estimated one-third of the population in just years. We trace the outbreak from the arrival of a enslaved African from the Narváez expedition to the death of the Aztec emperor Cuitláhuac. Drawing on the Florentine Codex and other indigenous accounts, we discuss the horrific symptoms, the psychological devastation, and how disease became an unintentional but decisive ally for the Spanish. We also touch on later epidemics of measles and typhus, and reflect on the demographic collapse that transformed the Americas forever. A sobering look at a silent conqueror. #Smallpox #AztecEmpire #Cocoliztli #HueyCocoliztli #Cuitláhuac #FlorentineCodex #HernánCortés #NarváezExpedition #Mesoamerica #DemographicCollapse #Conquistadors #NewSpain #Epidemics #SilentConqueror #History #FexingoHistory #IndigenousHistory #SpanishConquest Keep every episode free: buymeacoffee.com/fexingo","meta_description":"In 1520, as Hernán Cortés and his allies fought to take Tenochtitlan, a far deadlier enemy arrived without a single sword drawn: smallpox. This episode ex…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":375,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470/episodes/how-smallpox-toppled-the-aztec-empire/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-conquistadors-exploration-greed-and-destruction-fexingo-history-7864470/how-smallpox-toppled-the-aztec-empire.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}