“Anyone who even thinks of abandoning this mission will be cut up into a thousand pieces…I am the wrath of God!” At the height of the age of exploration, during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, one story in particular gripped the imagination of European colonialists: El Dorado, a legendary city of gold, hidden in the very heart of the South American Rainforests. But no kingdom sought this prize more furiously than the mighty Spanish Empire. Determined to restore their fortunes with El Dorado’s treasures, they sent countless expeditions in search of the golden city, to no avail. Then, in 1559, the authorities in Lima assembled a new expedition, bigger and better than ever before, under the leadership of the knight Pedro de Ursula. The group he mustered to go with him would prove ill chosen indeed. Among them was his famously beautiful mistress, Dona Inez, and more ominously still, a fierce eyed, limp-footed man by the name of Lope de Aguirre. Little did his companions know that they had a devil in their midst. Aguirre would prove to be one of history’s strangest and most unsettling characters, and one of the great villains of the Spanish conquests of the New World. Cruel and psychopathic, he would eventually violently usurp Ursula’s command, and lead his companions not in search of El Dorado, but further and further into the Amazonian interior, enacting a regime of paranoid terror as they went. It would prove to be one of the strangest, most gruesome, and also the most horrific journeys of all time, replete with murder, betrayal, treason, and above all, madness…. Join Tom and Dominic, as they discuss the iniquitous Spanish conquistador Aguirre, and his journey both into the heart of the South American wilderness, but also into human madness. It is a story of mystery and adventure, gold and greed, horror and death. EXCLUSIVE NordVPN Deal ➼ https://nordvpn.com/restishistory Try it risk-free now with a 30-day money-back guarantee! _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett + Aaliyah Akude Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: What is the story behind Aguirre, the Wrath of God?
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I am the great traitor. There must be no other. Anyone who even thinks about deserting this mission will be cut up into 98 pieces. Whoever takes one grain of corn or one drop of water more than his ration will be locked up for 155 years. If I, Aguirre, want the birds to drop dead from the trees, then the birds will drop dead from the trees. I am the wrath of God.
The earth I pass will see me and tremble. Whoever follows me on the river will win untold riches. We will control all of New Spain and we will stage history as others stage plays. I, the wrath of God, will marry my own daughter and with her found the purest dynasty ever known to man. Together we will rule the whole of this continent. I am the wrath, the wrath of God.
So that was Klaus Kinski, the great German actor, as Lope de Aguirre in the film Aguirre, the Wrath of God, which was made in 1972, directed by Funster Werner Herzog. And Loosely based on, I mean, one of the most remarkable episodes of European exploration in history, a 16th century Spanish band of conquistadors venturing into the Amazon rainforest in search of El Dorado. And it doesn't end well.
And it's one of the maddest films ever made, partly because, of course, the Conquistadors speak in German and we know that they would have spoken in English. But also, Dominic, I guess because it ranks alongside Francis Ford's Coppola's attempt to finish Apocalypse Now as a kind of cinematic folie de grandeur, doesn't it? It does indeed. Because they go into the jungle and it's all terrible.
And Herzog tries to kill Kinski. Kinski's going mad. He's got his great bulging eyeballs. Yeah. The making of the film is carnage. It is.
And it's holding a mirror up to the carnage of the original 16th century expedition. Exactly. It's very like Apocalypse Now in that sense. So they shot it in the early 70s, as you say. They shot it on location in the Peruvian Amazon. And Herzog at one point threatened to shoot Kinski, his lead actor, and then turn the gun on himself.
And that's sort of been reported as he was basically forcing Kinski to film scenes at gunpoint, which I think is a slight exaggeration. But the filming of it was demented. But that actually, of course, reflected the subject matter, which is, as you say, this expedition. Yeah. That's very, very Heart of Darkness, actually. The 16th century expedition.
It's about European colonizers, colonialists, conquistadors. In Heart of Darkness, which we did a podcast on a few weeks ago, they go up the Congo. Joseph Conrad, his narrator, Marlow, goes up the Congo. He's in search of this guy, Kurtz, who's lost his mind. Well, in this story, it's the people who are going up the river who lose their minds.
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Chapter 2: Who was Lope de Aguirre and why is he infamous?
Chapter 3: What was the significance of the film Aguirre, the Wrath of God?
So they now discover they've got massive holes in their rafts. They have to stop by the side of the river and build new ships. That takes them three months. I mean, day after day, hammering and stuff, you know, cutting down trees to make nails and planks and things. They've got no food. They're living off wild fruit. And I have to say their own horses because they had horses on these rafts.
So they're now eating them. And Aguirre actually is quite pleased about this, because he thinks, if we eat all our animals, there's no way we can sort of settle down or be tempted to capture towns and, you know, all this stuff. We'll just have to keep going all the way to the Atlantic and get out of here, which is basically what I want to do.
And I think it's about this point that the mood really, really starts to darken. What do you mean, starts to darken? Yeah, because that was all prelude. That was all quite jolly. Because previously, when they'd got on reasonably well with the native population, they had done a bit of trading. Of course, there'd been a bit of violence, but nothing completely off the scale.
Now, there's a lot of fighting. And basically, the word spreads that the Spaniards are bad guys. And whenever they go out to look for food, they're often ambushed by Indians. There's also a huge row, one of endless huge rows inside the camp. Some of Don Fernando's friends say, look, you actually need to get rid of Aguirre. But he doesn't have the guts. He demotes him as second in command.
And the problem is, Aguirre, as we've established, is a very vengeful man. So Aguirre just notes this slight, he hides his fury and resentment, but he's determined one day that he will get his revenge. So we come to March 1561. Don Fernando and Aguirre call another meeting. You can sense that the mood is getting very paranoid.
They begin by demanding that every man pledge his loyalty to Don Fernando by God and the Virgin. And then Aguirre addresses the men and he says, look, we've been talking, the plan has changed. We are going to forget about El Dorado now.
We are going to seize the wealth of Peru and we will crown Don Fernando Guzman, our general, by the grace of God, Lord and Prince of Peru, the Maine and Chile, to whom by right these kingdoms belong. Wow, there's a twist. He says, we forswear our allegiance to the king of Spain. And Aguirre makes this huge pronouncement.
He says, from this day forward, I pledge myself to my prince, king and natural lord, Don Fernando, and I swear and promise to be his faithful vassal and to die in his defence. So that's a death sentence, isn't it? And then he turns to Fernando. He bows. And in front of everybody, he kisses his hand as the new Prince of Peru.
And Tom, I hate to tell you, but with that traitor's kiss, the real nightmare begins. Brilliant, Dominic.
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