As time goes by everything from big or small incidents become history and they cannot be changed. Thus, we learn something from the past and try not to repeat the same mistake. As a student majoring in history, I used to have such assumptions such as ‘if that hadn’t happened what would it be?’ But no matter how many different hypotheses we come up with, history won’t change a bit and the only thing you get is a wild imagination. With the mindset of seeking the true beauty of history, after visiting a special exhibition titled ‘The People of the Sun’ at the National Museum of Korea this summer, my intentions were realized.

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you think of Latin American civilization? One might think of the Inca civilization, Machu Picchu, a figure of indigenous people or maybe Spanish Conquerors. Many however do not know much about the Aztecs and are more familiar with the images of brutal war and human sacrifice. They might even be more familiar with interesting stories of extinction that the Spanish conqueror was mistaken for their god. The simple fact of the matter is, Aztecas had flourished with their high level of art, economy, ruling system, and technique of medical treatment until Hernán Cortés conquered the Aztec Empire in 1521. The document written by the Europeans about the Empire indicates that due to the Aztecs’ highly developed medical treatment, white people actually desired to be treated by locals.

After viewing many different relics and captions, it changed my awareness of the Aztec civilization not having had many chances to learn about Latin America and the likelihood that most documents which can be looked up are likely to be distorted by conquerors in their favor. Cruelty of war and human sacrifices, as well as the downturn of the empire due to foolish kings have been especially stressed in the ancient documents. However, a recent study found that distortion was definitely used in the process of trying to justify the Spanish invasion. It made me doubt myself whether I myself have also looked upon their civilization from the eyes of an invader. In conclusion, there’s a gap between what’s real and what public awareness is that people need to fix, and the writer of this column will continue in her efforts to see what they really are.