Gonzalo Guerrero
[4][5][note 3] In circa 1514, Guerrero entered the service of Nachan Can, halach uinich or governor of Chetumal, while Gerónimo de Aguilar, his crew-mate, remained a slave of the batab or mayor of Xamanha.[10][11][note 4] Upon Hernán Cortés' 6 March 1519 landing in Cozumel, during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire, the conquistador learned of Guerrero and his crew-mate, Aguilar, and promptly invited both to join the entrada to Tenochtitlan.Tienenme por cacique y capitán, cuando hay guerras, la cara tengo labrada, y horadadas las orejas."[16] Díaz goes on to describe how Gonzalo's Mayan wife, Zazil Há, interrupted the conversation and angrily addressed Aguilar in her own language: Spanish: "Y asimismo la india mujer del Gonzalo habló a Aguilar en su lengua, muy enojada y le dijo: Mira con qué viene este esclavo a llamar a mi marido: idos vos y no curéis de más pláticas."[17] English Translation: "And the Indian wife of Gonzalo spoke to Aguilar in her own tongue very angrily and said to him, "What is this slave coming here for talking to my husband, – go off with you, and don't trouble us with any more words."[23] The reinforcements were deviated off course by 'friendly' scouts, while Montejo was gently coaxed into thinking his infantrymen had met an ill end, prompting him to depart in the second quarter of 1528 without having engaged.[24][23][note 5] Guerrero is also thought to have fought an extended campaign against Alonso de Avila's 1531–1533 entrada, which managed to capture the provincial capital, but ultimately likewise failed.[25][26][note 6] In late May or early June 1536, Pedro de Alvarado, determined to deal a death-blow to native resistance in the Sula Valley, led a successful entrada against Cicumba's fortified camp on the banks of the Ulua River.The initial Spanish attempts to chronicle the conquest, done in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries (Oviedo, Herrera), mention him, but are considered less accurate than the contemporaneous accounts.Mueller concludes, 'while primary and secondary sources sketched Guerrero's history during the colonial period, today he has become a political and literary icon and has been transformed into a national myth...If he was reviled by the chroniclers, Guerrero has enjoyed a vindication of sorts, since he has become an exemplar who fills the need to connect the colonisers from Europe and the indigenous of the Americas in a domestic context.'The second of the Cornell University professor's two long sojourns in late-20th century Central America – a region riven by political strife in which Guinness becomes dangerously involved – allows him to discover, with the help of an elderly Guatemalan scholar, a hitherto unimaginable side of the slave-turned-warrior chief.