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Fall of Tenochtitlan: Hernán Cortés and approximately 100 Spaniards capture the capital of the Aztec Empire.
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It was 1517 before another expedition from Cuba visited Central America landing on the coast of the Yucatán in search of slaves. This was followed by a phase of conquest: The Spaniards (just having finished a war against the Muslims in the Iberian peninsula) replaced the American local oligarchies and imposed a new religion: Christianity.
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1519 - Small Spanish army led by Hernan Cortes lands at Veracruz, marking the start of Spain's conquest of Mexico.
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1521 - Allied with local anti-Aztec forces, Cortes' men capture the capital Tenochtitlan (modern-day Mexico City).
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1521-1820 - Mexico forms part of the Viceroyalty of New Spain.
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At the height of the Spanish Empire (17th Century), the Spanish Empire was the largest empire in the world and included the following modern countries and territories: Bahamas, Belize, Canada (British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan), Cayman Islands, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Federated States of Micronesia, Guam, Guatemala, Haiti, Honduras, Jamaica, Mexico, Nicaragua, Northern Mariana Islands,
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Cortés and his men conquer the entire Aztec Empire in what will later become Mexico.
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The Catholic Church’s influence was felt in the region when missionaries began arriving in 1523. The missionaries built many monasteries and converted millions of people to Catholicism.
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A few years later the first mainland Audiencia was created in 1527 to take over the administration of New Spain from Hernán Cortés. An earlier Audiencia had been established in Santo Domingo in 1526 to deal with the Caribbean settlements.
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Therefore in 1535, King Charles V named Antonio de Mendoza as the first Viceroy of New Spain. After the Spanish conquest of the Inca Empire in 1532 opened up the vast territories of South America to further conquests, the Crown established an independent Viceroyalty of Peru there in 1540
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Upon his arrival, Viceroy Antonio de Mendoza vigorously took to the duties entrusted to him by the King and encouraged the exploration of Spain’s new mainland territories. He commissioned the expeditions of Francisco Vázquez de Coronado into the present day American Southwest in 1540–1542.
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During the 16th century, many Spanish cities were established in North and Central America. Spain attempted to establish missions in what is now the Southern United States including Georgia and South Carolina between 1568 and 1587.
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The Spanish also controlled commerce. The main products were silver, sugar, cacao, hides and fine woods. The only manufacturing really developed during the period was the textile industry.
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By 1810, there were an estimated six million inhabitants in New Spain, of which 60,000 were Spanish born in Spain, 940,000 were Spanish born in the territories, 3.5 million were indigenous Mexicans, and 1.5 million were Mestizos—of mixed Spanish and Indian blood.
