The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire was a pivotal event in the history of the Americas, that took place during the Spanish colonization of the Americas, marked by the collision of the Aztec Triple Alliance and the Spanish Empire with its Indigenous allies. Between 1519 and 1521, Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and his small army of European soldiers and the large allied army of Indian auxiliaries, overthrew the most powerful pre Columbian empire to exist in Mesoamerica.