Aztec ruler at the time of the Spanish conquest. Moctezuma II (d. 1520; name means "He who gets angry like a lord") was an ambivalent and vacillating ruler who initially welcomed and accommodated the Spanish conquistadores. A learned and intellectual emperor, he apparently thought that evil omens and bad occurrences reflected poorly on his reign. He came to believe in prophecies that seemed fulfilled with the arrival of the Spanish, and thinking that the future had been written, resigned himself to Cortés -- becoming his hostage. When his subjects and the priests revolted against the Spanish, Moctezuma attempted to halt the bloody carnage being waged in the streets of Tenochtitlan and was either struck by a stone cast by the Aztec warriors or put to death by the Spaniards.