<p>Five centuries after the fall of the Aztec empire, some of emperor Moctezuma II's descendants strive to defend his honor, while others want compensation from the Mexican government.</p>.<p>They number in their hundreds and include the Mexican ambassador to the United States, Esteban Moctezuma, as well as members of Spanish nobility.</p>.<p>And until decades ago, some were even paid a "Moctezuma pension."</p>.<p>At her home in Mexico City, Blanca Barragan Moctezuma displays centuries-old documents showing the money that her family used to regularly receive.</p>.<p>The payment to Moctezuma II's descendants through his daughter Isabel was worth an estimated $60,000-$90,000 a year in today's money -- until it was scrapped in 1934.</p>.<p>"Perhaps there was no more money. It was post-revolutionary Mexico," said Blanca's husband Jesus Juarez.</p>.<p>Some descendants sued to try to have the pension reinstated, but without success.</p>.<p>The payment "was compensation for the right to use the lands belonging to Isabel's descendants," said Alejandro Gonzalez Acosta, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.</p>.<p>After the fall of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan on August 13, 1521, Spain granted Isabel perpetual ownership of territory consisting of the city of Tacuba.</p>.<p>"According to chroniclers, it contained more than 300 towns," said Gonzalez Acosta.</p>.<p>So why was Isabel, who died in 1550, given such privileges?</p>.<p>"Moctezuma had many children, but Tecuichpo Ichcaxochitl was the only legitimate one," Blanca Barragan Moctezuma said, calling Isabel by her Aztec name, meaning "daughter of the ruler" and "white flower."</p>.<p>Some scholars believe that it was more about quelling a rebellion.</p>.<p>Isabel was married five times -- twice to Moctezuma's relatives and successors and three times to Spaniards.</p>.<p>She also had a daughter out of wedlock with conquistador Hernan Cortes, whom her descendants and historians accuse of raping her.</p>.<p>Most of her seven children came from her fourth and fifth marriages which produced the Andrada-Moctezuma and Cano-Moctezuma lineages.</p>.<p>Despite the Aztec blood running through his veins, Pablo Moctezuma, a historian and brother of the ambassador in Washington, was once embarrassed by his roots.</p>.<p>Moctezuma is seen by some as a superstitious man who capitulated by confusing Cortes with the god Quetzalcoatl.</p>.<p>"That was an invention," said Pablo Moctezuma, who has also found contradictions in accounts of the emperor's death in July 1520.</p>.<p>"The conquistadors say that the Mexica (Aztecs) killed him, but religious and indigenous chroniclers say it was the Spanish," he said.</p>.<p>Moctezuma's lineage in Spain came through Pedro -- his son with a concubine -- who was taken to Europe as a child, probably to prevent an uprising, according to historians.</p>.<p>In 1627, a great-grandson living in Spain was granted the hereditary title of count, which was later elevated to the duke.</p>.<p>The current holder, Juan Jose Marcilla de Teruel-Moctezuma, criticizes Mexican President Andres Lopez Obrador's demand for Spain to apologize for the events of the conquest.</p>.<p>"There's no point in demanding that the king apologize for something that happened five centuries ago," he said.</p>.<p>The Cano-Moctezuma branch arrived in Granada and holds the title of the Count of Miravalle.</p>.<p>"They're one more family among the descendants," said Gonzalez Acosta, the researcher, who met the 12th Countess of Miravalle, Maricarmen Enriquez de Luna, before her death in 2014.</p>.<p>Some in Spain, however, have bestowed a higher status on them.</p>.<p>One newspaper declared that Mexico had a "new empress" when Carmen Ruiz Enriquez inherited the title -- a claim that Gonzalez Acosta attributes to an overimaginative press.</p>.<p>Together with some Mexican descendants of Moctezuma II, the Miravalles tried to get the pension reinstated in 1991 and again in 2003.</p>.<p>But such behavior draws scorn from other heirs of the Aztec emperor for whom honor comes before money.</p>.<p>"They're ridiculous claims," Pablo Moctezuma said.</p>
<p>Five centuries after the fall of the Aztec empire, some of emperor Moctezuma II's descendants strive to defend his honor, while others want compensation from the Mexican government.</p>.<p>They number in their hundreds and include the Mexican ambassador to the United States, Esteban Moctezuma, as well as members of Spanish nobility.</p>.<p>And until decades ago, some were even paid a "Moctezuma pension."</p>.<p>At her home in Mexico City, Blanca Barragan Moctezuma displays centuries-old documents showing the money that her family used to regularly receive.</p>.<p>The payment to Moctezuma II's descendants through his daughter Isabel was worth an estimated $60,000-$90,000 a year in today's money -- until it was scrapped in 1934.</p>.<p>"Perhaps there was no more money. It was post-revolutionary Mexico," said Blanca's husband Jesus Juarez.</p>.<p>Some descendants sued to try to have the pension reinstated, but without success.</p>.<p>The payment "was compensation for the right to use the lands belonging to Isabel's descendants," said Alejandro Gonzalez Acosta, a researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.</p>.<p>After the fall of the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan on August 13, 1521, Spain granted Isabel perpetual ownership of territory consisting of the city of Tacuba.</p>.<p>"According to chroniclers, it contained more than 300 towns," said Gonzalez Acosta.</p>.<p>So why was Isabel, who died in 1550, given such privileges?</p>.<p>"Moctezuma had many children, but Tecuichpo Ichcaxochitl was the only legitimate one," Blanca Barragan Moctezuma said, calling Isabel by her Aztec name, meaning "daughter of the ruler" and "white flower."</p>.<p>Some scholars believe that it was more about quelling a rebellion.</p>.<p>Isabel was married five times -- twice to Moctezuma's relatives and successors and three times to Spaniards.</p>.<p>She also had a daughter out of wedlock with conquistador Hernan Cortes, whom her descendants and historians accuse of raping her.</p>.<p>Most of her seven children came from her fourth and fifth marriages which produced the Andrada-Moctezuma and Cano-Moctezuma lineages.</p>.<p>Despite the Aztec blood running through his veins, Pablo Moctezuma, a historian and brother of the ambassador in Washington, was once embarrassed by his roots.</p>.<p>Moctezuma is seen by some as a superstitious man who capitulated by confusing Cortes with the god Quetzalcoatl.</p>.<p>"That was an invention," said Pablo Moctezuma, who has also found contradictions in accounts of the emperor's death in July 1520.</p>.<p>"The conquistadors say that the Mexica (Aztecs) killed him, but religious and indigenous chroniclers say it was the Spanish," he said.</p>.<p>Moctezuma's lineage in Spain came through Pedro -- his son with a concubine -- who was taken to Europe as a child, probably to prevent an uprising, according to historians.</p>.<p>In 1627, a great-grandson living in Spain was granted the hereditary title of count, which was later elevated to the duke.</p>.<p>The current holder, Juan Jose Marcilla de Teruel-Moctezuma, criticizes Mexican President Andres Lopez Obrador's demand for Spain to apologize for the events of the conquest.</p>.<p>"There's no point in demanding that the king apologize for something that happened five centuries ago," he said.</p>.<p>The Cano-Moctezuma branch arrived in Granada and holds the title of the Count of Miravalle.</p>.<p>"They're one more family among the descendants," said Gonzalez Acosta, the researcher, who met the 12th Countess of Miravalle, Maricarmen Enriquez de Luna, before her death in 2014.</p>.<p>Some in Spain, however, have bestowed a higher status on them.</p>.<p>One newspaper declared that Mexico had a "new empress" when Carmen Ruiz Enriquez inherited the title -- a claim that Gonzalez Acosta attributes to an overimaginative press.</p>.<p>Together with some Mexican descendants of Moctezuma II, the Miravalles tried to get the pension reinstated in 1991 and again in 2003.</p>.<p>But such behavior draws scorn from other heirs of the Aztec emperor for whom honor comes before money.</p>.<p>"They're ridiculous claims," Pablo Moctezuma said.</p>