The Massacre in the Great Temple, also called the Alvarado Massacre, was an event on May 22, 1520, in the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan during the Spanish conquest of Mexico, in which the celebration of the Feast of Toxcatl ended in a massacre of Aztec elites. In 1552, the Dominican friar Bartolome de las Casas published A Short Account of the Destruction of the Indies, an account of atrocities committed by landowners and officials during the colonization of New Spain, particularly in Hispaniola. Las Casas, who accompanied Columbus on his second voyage, described Columbus's treatment of the natives in his History of the Indies. Las Casas was one of the first advocates for the indigenous people. Engravings appeared in Narratio regionum Indicarum per Hispanos quosdam deuastatarum verissima by Theodore de Bry in 1598. |