Ridding the Land of Spaniards

The Indian did not always stay conquered. The biggest of their battles to reamin free broke out in 1541. The Mixton War, as it was labeled, set aflame the territory lying between Jalisco and Zacatecas. A few years before, Nuno de Guzman had inflicted his brand of civilization on it, killing and enslaving at will. His legacy of crulety was kept alive by Spanish encomenderos. The war, which lasted two years, erupted on the edges of Zacatecas, where the Caxcanes, a sedantary farming people, blocked the northward Spanish march. Its leaders, native priests mostly, gave the war a profoundly religious, anti-Christian character. The Indians burned churches, destroyed monsteries, and cut down crosses. If they triumphed, so their banners proclaimed, they would extirpate all christian vestiges, restore the anciet religions, revive old customs, and rid the land of the spaniards. The defeat of the Indians in the Mixton War opened the way for the Spanish occupation of Zacatecas. The war brought death to Pedro de Alvarado, who, fleeing from the Indians, had a horse fall upon him.

Triumphs and Tragedy: A History of the Mexican People By Ramon Eduardo Ruiz