when the Spaniards arrived the Mesoamericans were busily drinking cacao they were so besotted by this drink in fact that they proudly shared it with company in 1519 the Aztec emperor Montezuma served some to his new guest the conquistador Hernando Cortes the Aztecs thought that Cortes was the reincarnation of an exiled good-king instead he had come calling to find rumored Aztec gold and within three years he brought down the Aztec empire