Meet the Mexica!

[Ares Land]

I've been on a Mesoamerican reading binge lately, and following a discussion with bradrn, it seemed to me that a thread on the Mexica, also known as the Aztecs might be of general interest.
I'm not quite sure where this might fit, so, well, it'll be in Ephemera.

Mesoamerican civilization should be of great interest to conworlders, as one example of a truly alien culture, with some strange and disturbing culture, with some very familiar traditions, and motive and very relatable people.

A warning, though, expect a great deal of violence and some really disturbing mental images. Seriously. At times, you'll be reaching for the brain bleach.

The trouble with sources

Most of this is drawn from Michel Graulich's Le Sacrifice Humain chez les Aztèques and Montezuma, Jacqueline de Durand-Forest's Les Aztèques and Pratiques religieuses et divinatoires chez les Aztèques, various translations of the Popol Vuh, Claude-François Robez, les Mayas, with multiple Wikipedia tabs open to keep track of everything and, in English, works of a more general nature, such as Bruce G. Trigger's Understanding Early Civilizations, Marvin Harris' Cannibals and Kings and, naturally, Charles C. Mann's 1491. So a good deal of French-language works, I'm afraid, because that's what I can get from the library (Also, I can count myself lucky : I can't read Spanish, which would be best, but Mesoamerican scholarship in French is top-notch.)

As a rule, Mesoamerican history is told by an unreliable narrator. We can rely on Spanish sources, and native sources, written in Spanish or in Nahuatl, before and after the conquest.

Generally speaking, the Spanish aren't bad on facts, but they didn't understand much of what was going on around them. There's a general tendency to exaggeration, they may also misremember things. Hernán Cortés in particular is out to impress Charles V, which means he sometimes overstate the wealth of the newly conquered land. Oddly enough, he minimizes the cannibalism or the human sacrifices. The thing is, he was in trouble several times over. His expedition was unauthorized, much of the conquest was the work of his local allies, who were definitely in it for the sacrifices and the human meat.
Native sources are of course, invaluable, especially with respect to the native worldview. There are several issues with them: theycontradict themselves, a lot, as each city-state had its own version of history, or so it seems. The chronology is sometimes altered: Mesoamerica was big on astrology, and when history didn't quite match the predictions, the dates of birth are accordingly reassigned. The Mesoamerican conception of time is cyclical, so of course events tend to repeat in the chronicles. Pre-conquests, they were not above rewriting history, either. Famously, the Mexica tlatoani (king) Itzcoatl upon defeating his overlords had most of earlier chronicles destroyed and rewritten. Moctezuma II himself was himself in the process of rewriting chronicles and myths.
Other difficulties: writers rarely, if ever, bothered with the long/short vowels and the glottal stops in Classical Nahuatl. As a consequence, you get some widely different translations of the same thing. Are the Chichimeca the 'dog people' (chichi) or the 'breastmilk people' (chīchi)?
In addition, Nahuatl, especially in the poetic registers favoured by the nobility was full of puns, metaphors, and allusions. Does Quetzcalcoatl mean 'Feathered Serpent' or 'Precious Twin'? Both!

And of course, each historian brings their own interpretation to the table. Sometimes they change their mind: Michel Graulich dismisses the idea that Montezuma ate children as an obvious fabrication in Montezuma, but in 'Le Sacrifice Humain... boiled child is his favorite dish (Montezuma, not Graulich)!

So remember this thread is just an introduction, written by an amateur. I'll probably get things wrong here and there. Sometimes you'll read another version of a myth, or another interpretation, and that's OK. I just want to give an idea of how the Mexica were like to fellow conworlders and history geeks, so don't get into Internet debates or write historical fiction based on this, OK?

Oh, and finally, most of the thread, by necessity, will end up focussing on the elite, and on men. We simply have very little idea on how life was for women, commoners, let alone women commoners. Nobody really bothered writing about them at the time.

Some stereotypes and misconceptions.

You probably have a mental image of the Aztecs already. It's worth going through a few common stereotypes and see which of these hold up.

• The Aztecs were evil and barbaric.

Let's face it, the Aztecs, as TV Tropes likes to put it, crossed the moral event horizon. Repeatedly. In fact they organized regular tours.
We may wonder what would happen if Mesoamerican civilization had survived. It would put a whole new spin to the 'Clash of Civilizations' thing, wouldn't it? Besides, as conworlders, the question is especially important, because there's an element of storytelling in what we do. If you're reading a fantasy book and the authors describes ominous pyramids, or a culture that's into cannibalism, you've probably stumbled upon the Evil Empire. Well, bear with me here, but just because someone's into sacrificing children to the rain god or likes his temples caked with blood doesn't mean he's necessarily a bad guy!
In fact, the Aztecs were about par for the course, for a Mesoamerican civilization. They oppressed their rivals and vassals, much like any empire does, and in fact their enemies did the same thing to them as soon as they got the chance. They weren't any more evil than their neighbours: everyone in Mesoamerican believed that human sacrifice and cannibalism were part of life.
They're very relatable, actually, they held themselves to a high moral standard, valued poetry and the arts, and of course their fate is poignant.
(It's also worth mentioning that European history has its awfully horrific moments.)

• But still, they were particularly bloodthirsty.

Yes, but that's because they could afford to: human sacrifice is expensive. Besideds, much in Mesoamerican culture is about one-upmanship. The Mexica were the local superpower at the time, they had to do everything bigger and better than everyone else. (We'll see later how human sacrifice relates to the potlatch).

• Reports of human sacrifices are much exaggerated or, it's all just Spanish propaganda.

There is a tendency to minimize the scale or gravity of human sacrifice. We do know the usual figures for the dedication of the Templo Mayor must be exaggerated, because you can only sacrifice so many people in four days. In Tenochtitlan, every religious festival was accompanied by blood sacrifice, and there were I believe, somewhere around twenty festivals a years. I'm not getting into figures, but we're looking at several thousands a year.
Victims were well-treated, even fêted and treated as gods when the occasion called for it. It was a great honor to be sacrificed... but still a fate to be avoided. Usually, the people involved did their best to keep the victim reasonably happy. The victims weren't tortured.
We can sort of understand the sacrifice of war captives. Their fate wasn't worse than being killed on the battlefield. The sacrifice of slaves is harder to understand. I don't think it's possible to rationalize child sacrifice (for added horror, the children were sacrificed to Tlaloc, the rain god, and so they had to weep: their tears represented rain).

• Quetzalcoatl didn't require human sacrifice, or the Toltecs didn't practice it. Alternatively: the Aztecs invented human sacrifice.

Let's take care of that last one: human sacrifice was already a very old institution when the Aztec got on the scene. The Toltecs have nothing to do with whatever Miguel Ruiz or New Age books say about them, they did sacrifice human victims. Much is made of Quetzalcoatl, and I'll cover him later... Some sources do list him as not requiring human victims. Some insist that he did. Some even say he invented the practice. IMO, any claims that human sacrifice was not practiced by so-and-so should be taken with a grain of salt. (Native chroniclers understandably were under a lot of pressure to dismiss sacrifice). Also, it goes without saying, but Quetzalcoatl was not a Great White God.

• The Aztecs were less bloodthirsty than the Europeans, really. War was highly ritualized, nothing like our own total war.

So says Victor Davis Hanson (along with a host of other people). Wellthat's both true and false. When pressed for survival, the Aztecs practiced total war just fine. Under more normal circumstances, they did hold to a kind of chivalric ideal and liked to give their enemy fair warning. But they weren't above surprise attacks, either. On the whole, they preferred easy victories, a fact that is explained, I believe, by ecology and geography. The Valley of Mexico is marshy, mountainous terrain and the Aztec had no pack animals. Logistics were a nightmare.
Ritual wars -- also known as the 'Flower Wars' -- are best seen as a kind of cold war. But more on that later.
Other factors are in play: they obeyed a kind of international law: wars required an appropriate casus belli, and, lastly, a very jarring cultural factor: the Aztecs wanted to pull your heart out and then eat your flesh, but sometimes they could be exquisitely polite about it.

• The Aztecs were decadent and on the brink of collapse.

That one is from Orson Scott Card who despite his flaws should have known better really. They were neither. In fact they were barely getting started. I think that idea comes from three facts: first, Mesoamerican societies were prone to sudden collapse, which we can't explain very well: all accounts are highly mythologized. Second, some among the Mexica were absolutely convinced that they were growing fat and rich, losing their martial virtuel and that the empire was going to the dogs. No matter where you look, you'll find such people. That must be a human universal. Lastly, our post-conquest native sources, unashamedly retconned history by having Mexica and Texcocan seers predicting the arrival of Cortés.

• The Aztecs were free of Catholic taboos imposed by the Conquistadores, also they had lots of sex.

That one is from Gary Jennings, who definitely should have known better, really. The Aztecs were very conservative about most everything, including sex. In fact they shared many of the Catholic taboos: they required virginity of young men and women, advised chastity to all. Abortion, homosexuality and adultery were seriously punished. Everyone underwent fasting and mortifications. Also, their clergy was celibate, and had to fast and mortify themselves more than anyone, with the possible exception of the emperor. The nobility was polygamous, though, and the emperor could have hundred of wives, though that was mostly about marriage alliances and status display. (A major plot point in Aztec is a ritual involving mass rape followed by sacrifice, but I still haven't figured out what festival he had in mind.)

• The Mayincatec.

The Inca had nothing to do with the Maya or Mexica or any Mesoamerican people. There never was any contact, and the civilizations haven't anything do with each other that can't be explained by similar constraints, such as the lack of horses. But you already know that. Some have seen commonalities between the Tarascan and Andean civilization, including similarities with the Aymara language, but nothing conclusive in any case.
There are a lot of commonalities between the Mexica and the Maya, especially the contemporary post-classic Maya. In fact the religions are similar enough that Mesoamerican scholars will bring up the Popol Vuh (the Quiché Maya "Bible") in trying to make sense of some obscure point in Mexica mythology.

[bradrn]

A warning, though, expect a great deal of violence and some really disturbing mental images. Seriously. At times, you'll be reaching for the brain bleach.

Oh dear, I’m already regretting asking for this… Still, at least it’ll be interesting to read!

(Idea: maybe put the most disturbing stuff in [more] tags? At least that way I’ll know which parts I may want to avoid.)

[Moose-tache]

Amazing stuff, thanks for this!

Something to keep in mind is that we're comparing an Early Modern civilization to what is essentially a Bronze Age civilization. Things like casual horrific violence and sudden systems collapse were pretty common among Bronze Age civilizations in Eurasia. They don't cry out to me for some kind of special explanation or excuse.

[Ares Land]

(Idea: maybe put the most disturbing stuff in [more] tags? At least that way I’ll know which parts I may want to avoid.)

Oh, sure. I'll do that.

Something to keep in mind is that we're comparing an Early Modern civilization to what is essentially a Bronze Age civilization. Things like casual horrific violence and sudden systems collapse were pretty common among Bronze Age civilizations in Eurasia. They don't cry out to me for some kind of special explanation or excuse.

Stone Age, even! I agree with you that the Mexica were what they were and they don't really need any special excuses. I'm not even sure we hold the moral high ground: our own civilization has its share of horrific violence...
Still, why the Mexica did what they did and how it looked to them is an issue worth adressing. And again, from a conworlding perspective, it's worth nothing that even the most grimdark writers avoid mass human sacrifice and cannibalism...

[bradrn]

(Idea: maybe put the most disturbing stuff in [more] tags? At least that way I’ll know which parts I may want to avoid.)

Oh, sure. I'll do that.

Thank you!

Something to keep in mind is that we're comparing an Early Modern civilization to what is essentially a Bronze Age civilization. Things like casual horrific violence and sudden systems collapse were pretty common among Bronze Age civilizations in Eurasia. They don't cry out to me for some kind of special explanation or excuse.

Stone Age, even!

…and here I get my first surprise of the thread: I knew that Mesoamerica was behind Afro-Eurasia technologically, but I had assumed that they were past the Stone Age at least! That just makes the monuments they left behind even more impressive.

I agree with you that the Mexica were what they were and they don't really need any special excuses. I'm not even sure we hold the moral high ground: our own civilization has its share of horrific violence...

I am reminded of something I once read: that archaeologists used to dismiss ancient reports of Carthaginian child sacrifice as merely Roman propaganda, and continued doing so right up until they found the remains. (Can’t remember the source, sorry, though I think it was somewhere on Wikipedia). It appears that Bronze Age societies were much the same the world over (that is: nasty, violent theocratic dictatorships), though Mesoamerica is certainly one of the more horrific ones.

[Ares Land]

…and here I get my first surprise of the thread: I knew that Mesoamerica was behind Afro-Eurasia technologically, but I had assumed that they were past the Stone Age at least! That just makes the monuments they left behind even more impressive.

A good point! I don't know nearly enough about Mesoamerican technology as I'd wish to, but I do have a few things to say about that.

Technology

Bronze is actually a bit overrated. The problem is, it's awfully expensive. You need a good source of copper (and copper ores are fairly rare) and a source of tin (even less common, and seldom found close to copper ores). Arsenic might do in a pinch, but it's not too common either, and of course it's toxic. Because of the cost, early civilizations made less use of bronze that you might think. Mesopotamian farmers, for instance, used ceramic tools (they had nothing but clay to work with). Iron is more democratic and for that reason the Iron Age in Europe and the Middle East was accompanied by mass political upheaval.

The Purépucha, a people of Michoacán (west of the Aztec empire, on the Pacific coast) with a respectable empire of their own (they're also known by the derogatory 'Tarascan') had access to much mineral wealth were the foremost metallurgists: they worked with silver, gold and copper and they did make bronze tools. For this reason (among others) a connection with Andean civilization has been suggested. The Purépucha were fairly distinct, culturally, from the rest of Mesoamerica and their metallurgy techniques never filtered south.

The Aztecs quite famously used obsidian (like all Mesoamericans), and for good reason: obisidian is a naturally-occuring kind of class, and is accordingly excellent for cutting tools (glass scalpels are used in surgery, after all). Obsidian knives can be much sharper than steel even. The only problem is that it's brittle.
The Mesoamericans also used flint. It was connected with thunder and had religious significance, which made it a good choice for sacrificial tools.
Amateurs of badass weapons should get a good look at the https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macuahuitl, which is a wooden club serrated with obsidian blades.

While I'm at it, a quick word about the wheel. Archeologists have dug up some wheeled "toys" -- in fact we're not even really sure what the small figurines were used for: they were no longer produced at the time of the conquest. But no Mesoamerican civilization ever used the wheel beyond that. The reason is quite simple really: the Mesoamerican lived in difficult, often mountainous terrain and they had suitable animals to pull a cart.
Transportation was by human porters (carrying baskets were quite elaborate) or by canoe.

Speaking of water transportation, the Mesoamericans used canoes, but had no boats as we think of them. The idea of seafaring was virtually unknown (although there was contact with the Caribbean), and in fact in encountering Spanish ships they had absolutely no idea of what they were dealing with.

Crops and food.

We don't think of crops as technology, but of course they are!
This is especially true of maize. Maize was probably domesticated from teosinte, a decidedly unpromising weed. An 'ear' of teosinte is nothing like a corncob, it contains something like ten seeds, enclosed in a hard fruitcase. The domestication -- or creation -- of maize was a very impressive feat, compared to the domestication of wheat, the wild varieties of which are already useful as crops...

Squash had been domesticated earlier : it seems that they were first domesticated as gourds, to serve as bottles. Beans came a bit later.
Staple crops included tomatoes, the related tomatillo, chilli pepper, amaranth, chia seeds, and the maguey or century plant, used both for fiber, and for its sugary sap fermented into an alcoholic beverage called pulque (octli in Nahuatl).
Cocoa beans were cultivated in the tropical lowlands: the Aztecs imported it as tribute and the upper classes consumed extraordinary quantities of a cold chocolate drink, flavoured with various spices and on occasion with hallucinogens. Chocolate is strongly associated with human sacrifice and human blood, which make some descriptions a little... dissonant.
Mesoamericans also domesticated cotton, used for clothes and armor.
The Aztecs used valuable clothes and cocoa beans as currency. Other valuables include tropical bird feathers (which is why the quetzal- in Quetzalcoatl means 'precious' as well as 'feathered') and jade (not quite the same variety as in East Asia).

The Valley of Mexico isn't, technically, a valley: it's a basin surrounded by mountain ranges; water from the mountain ends up at the lowest point of the basin, giving rise to a network of lake. Mexico-Tenochtitlan was built on an island, later largely enlarged, on Lake Texcoco. Arable land was at premium. So, using reeds, they build small artificial islands to be used as fields, called chinampas or 'floating gardens' (they weren't really floating). Some of the lakes were brackish; to ensure a supply of freshwater, the Aztecs built complex waterworks. The Spaniards either weren't aware of this or wouldn't bother; they ended up draining the whole area. Almost nothing of the lake remains now.

Enough about the vegetables, let's talk about meat. The Mesoamericans raised turkeys and dogs for that purpose. The variety of dogs the Aztecs bred for their meat is probably ancestral to the chihuahua. Other sources of protein were found in the lake or around it, including lizards, migrating geese and ducks, insect eggs, frogs, tadpoles and fish.

More: show

I'll talk about it more when I get to religion and human sacrifice, but I should really add human meat to the list. It wasn't just valued for religious reasons: it seems that the Aztecs and many other Mesoamerican peoples just liked the taste. It was considered a luxury and a delicacy; after the Conquest, native nobles replaced it with pork. The recipe was, basically Pozole

We find with some reports of impoverished peasants eating mud from the lake. Bernal Diaz del Castillo, one of Cortez' soliders and a chronicler of the conquest at one points gets hungry enough to try it. He reports that it tastes a bit like cheese. It seems that the "mud" was actually spirulina, edible cyanobacteria known these days as a health food and dietary supplement.

You're probably not hungry anymore after these last two, so I'll end this post with a few non-alimentary use of plants.
I've mention cotton and maguey. In addition to these, paper for the codices was made out of tree bark and reeds were used for construction material.
The Aztec used hallucinogens; for this purposed, they employed psilocybin mushrooms and peyote. I've mentioned alcohol as well. All three were used in religious ceremonies; their use was regulated by sumptuary laws and the customary, frequent fasts. Hallucinogens were usually ingested, but they were on occasion injected into the rectum as an enema.
Hallucinogens were an important part of medicine. Medicine was conceived as religious rituals (personally, I find them reminescent of chamanism): it was ahead of European medicine. Not that their understanding of disease was any sounder, but some of the herbal remedies on offer actually worked (hygiene was also better).

Tobacco was first cultivated in Mesoamerica and the Aztecs were smokers (possibly only the elite; it was an imported good). They smoked both cigars and tobacco mixed with liquidambar (an aromatic resin) and flowers in reed pipes. The use seems to have been mostly recreational, although it was also offered in temples as a kind of incense.
Finally, the Aztecs grew flowers in the chinampas; they were, in fact, extremely fond of them. Aztec noblemen are depicted smelling delicate flowers; the Spaniards were often offered garlands of flower. Flowers were associated both with poetry and death on the battlefield.

[bradrn]

Firstly: this is even more interesting than I thought it would be, so thanks for writing this! It will surely be very helpful to me once I start making my conworld! (I’ll start soon, promise… any year now… )

A couple of comments:

The Purépucha were fairly distinct, culturally, from the rest of Mesoamerica and their metallurgy techniques never filtered south.

Do you have any idea why their technology never diffused to the rest of Mesoamerica?

This is especially true of maize. Maize was probably domesticated from teosinte, a decidedly unpromising wheel.

I assume that ‘wheel’ here is a typo, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what it’s supposed to be…

(Also, is teosinte a Nahuatl word? It seems more like Irish to me.)

We find with some reports of impoverished peasants eating mud from the lake. Bernal Diaz del Castillo, one of Cortez' soliders and a chronicler of the conquest at one points gets hungry enough to try it. He reports that it tastes a bit like cheese. It seems that the "mud" was actually spirulina, edible cyanobacteria known these days as a health food and dietary supplement.

Huh, edible mud… yet another interesting but completely unexpected fact!

Flowers were associated both with poetry and death on the battlefield.

I find it interesting that we also have these same associations: flowers and poetry (obviously), poetry and death on the battlefield (many epic poems and requiems), flowers and death on the battlefield (not sure how widespread this one is, but in Australia this association applies particularly to poppies).

[Ares Land]

Firstly: this is even more interesting than I thought it would be, so thanks for writing this! It will surely be very helpful to me once I start making my conworld! (I’ll start soon, promise… any year now… )

A couple of comments:

Hey, thanks!

The Purépucha were fairly distinct, culturally, from the rest of Mesoamerica and their metallurgy techniques never filtered south.

Do you have any idea why their technology never diffused to the rest of Mesoamerica?

No idea. I know there are tin deposits in what was Purépecha land. Maybe tin was harder to get elsewhere? Obsidian was a great deal cheaper too, which must have been a factor.

I assume that ‘wheel’ here is a typo, but I cannot for the life of me figure out what it’s supposed to be…

(Also, is teosinte a Nahuatl word? It seems more like Irish to me.)

Sorry! That was weed, not wheel!
teosinte is indeed from Nahuatl teōcintli, 'god-corncob'. The element teō- (pronounced [te.o:] with two syllables) shows up a lot in compounds. It means 'god' but also 'numinous', 'awesome', 'sacred', 'difficult'... no idea what it's supposed to mean here. Fun fact: the name of the maize god Cinteōtl 'corncob-god' uses the same morphemes in a different order.

I find it interesting that we also have these same associations: flowers and poetry (obviously), poetry and death on the battlefield (many epic poems and requiems), flowers and death on the battlefield (not sure how widespread this one is, but in Australia this association applies particularly to poppies).

The explanation for that last one can be found in Nahuatl poetry, and it is a bit macabre: a dead body on the battlefield, surrounded with spilled blood looks like a flower...

[Linguoboy]

(Also, is teosinte a Nahuatl word? It seems more like Irish to me.)

Except it violates the orthographic rule of caol le caol agus leathan le leathan. Both teo and sinte on their own are possible Irish words; the first is a form of te "hot" and the second could be an occurrence of sínte "stretched" where someone forgot the síneadh fada.

[Ares Land]

The Aztec Empire.

The conquistadors called the Aztec 'Mexicans', a very good choice, as that was exactly what they called themselves. In Nahuatl, that was Mexica (more precisely Mēxihcah or [meːˈʃiʔkaʔ]), the inhabitants of Mexico, which meant, of course the city-state of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, (in Nahuatl altepetl or in atl in tepetl: 'water mountain").

"Mexican" grew more than a bit confusing over time, so "Aztec' (from Aztlan, the mythical origin of the Mexica) was used instead.

Mexica refers to the inhabitants of the city-state; Tenocha, from Tenochtitlan is more or less a synonym. The word for the ethnic group was Colhua (actually the name of a related group the Mexica took over). The wider group of Nahuatl speakers are called Nahua. The empire wasn't restricted to Nahuas; it included unrelated linguistic groups such as the Otomi or the Zapotec; nor did it include all Nahuas: the enemy Tlaxcallans, for instance, were Nahuatl speakers.

Mesoamerica never had large territorial states: Mesoamerican polities were city-states, as in classical Greece. City-states were monarchies, the king was usually called a tlatoani (speaker) in Nahuatl.
Cities were placed under the patronage of two deities; in Mexico-Tenochtitlan they were Tlaloc (the Rain God, worshipped all over Mesoamerica) and Huitzilopochtli (the Mexica tribal god, associated with the widely-worshipped, sociopathic Tezcatlipoca).
The Mexica were associated with two neighbouring Nahua cities: the Acolhua city-state of Texcoco and the Tepanec city-state of Tlacopan, forming the Triple Alliance.

The Triple Alliance, when conquering a city-state usually left it "sovereign" and "independant", but required it to pay regular tribute.


The tribute was divided according to geographical direction: Tlacopan got the north-east, Texcoco the north-west and Mexico-Tenochtitlan the south. Or maybe divided according in equal shares: one source lists 2/5 to the Mexica, 2/5 to Texcoco and the remainder to Tlacopan. The military leadership went to Mexico, while Texcoco was preeminent in judiciary and legislative matters.
As for Tlacopan, it was clearly a minor partner, and indeed by the time of the Conquest pretty much a Mexica puppet state.

We can see the Empire as a kind of racket, as Michel Graulich puts it: three gangs dividing a territory between themselves, and taking protection money from less powerful neighbours.

The Triple Alliance went a bit further than just asking for tribute, though. There were religious requirements as well. The chief aim of a campaign was the city's main temple; sometimes it was burnt down, to symbolize Huitzilopochtli's victory over the local patron. The locals kept worshipping their patron god, but an effigy of Huitzilopochtli was placed in their temple. To make sure the Mexica god was properly worshipped, an effigy of the local god was taken 'hostage' in a dedicated temple in Tenochtitlan.
The Alliance preferred by far leaving the local dynasty in charge. But they might have a say in dynastic succession, and pick the heir they liked best. When local rulers couldn't be trusted, they might place a military governor in his stead, or replace him with a Mexica king. In the most extreme cases of rebellion, they simply killed everyone in the city and replace them with Mexica (or Acolhua, or Tepanec -- but most of the time, the Mexica were in charge). They also planted colonies, and of course set up local garrisons. Tributary cities were of course required to help passing allied armies, or to provide soldiers.

Nobles were allowed multiple wives and kings, of course, even more so. This greatly multiplied the potential for marriage alliances, and combined, with the tendency to meddle in succession, guaranteed that the rulers of the most important cities were related to each other. Texcoco, especially influential in arts and culture, required its tributary nobles to be educated in Texcoco.
Tributary cities could themselves have tributary cities, which would then owe tribute to their local leader and to the Triple Alliance. Sometimes cities were offered tributaries by their overlord, usually in distant parts of the empire. This made sure they were interested in the empire's continued existence.
In the same spirit, the Mexica kings sometimes made lavish offerings to the local deities.

So the Alliance was a racket... but there was a little something in it for the tributaries. Protection, occasional reciprocal gifts, access to Mexica trade...

Hey, let's grab a map from Wikipedia:



The empire was smaller than you might think: 200,000 square kilometers, about the size of the island of Great Britain, and on par with other early empires, like the Egyptian Old Kingdom at its beginning, or the First Babylonian Empire.

The many enclaves show neatly, I think, common Aztec strategies: surrounding powerful enemies, and only going in when victory is pretty much certain.
(The Zapotec areas around Teotilan were being conquered when Cortés arrived).

[Raphael]

Great thread! I try not to be judgmental, given other cultures', including my owns, cruelty, but some aspects of your posts kinda get me thinking about the universal human tendency to combine horrible and great or even whimsical stuff. I mean, large-scale ritual child sacrifice in a culture whose language has poetic registers that value puns and word-plays, stuff like that. And the various references to the dedication of the Temple Mayor, which apparently involved a lot of human sacrifices - that sounds horrifying, but when it comes down to it, aside from all the gruesomeness, it's basically the authorities making a lot of fuss around the grand opening of a new public building, and that's not strange or "exotic" at all.

[Ares Land]

More on the Empire

As shown on the map, the empire also had provinces, tributary subdivisions, and a network of tax collectors. (To be honest, I don't know a whole lot about these yet).

The map suggests the existence of hard, fixed borders. There was, of course, no such thing, except for a line of fortresses bordering the Purépecha empire. The constraints of the map limits also prevent it from showing the sheer density of city states. For instance, the valley of Mexico has somewhere around 20 major city-states -- and a host of smaller one -- for 9,600 sq. km. (about the size of the New York metropolitan area. Or half of Wales).

The situation, by the way, was undergoing important changes when the conquistadors arrived. The pretense of a 'Triple Alliance' was ending: the aging king of Texcoco hadn't even bothered sending any troops out for military campaigns in more than ten years. When he died, Moctezuma II had him replaced by one of his nephews. Likewise, he deposed many kings in the valley of Mexico, replacing them by friends, relatives, and puppets. The 'hegemonic empire' model was changing towards a more traditional one. That change wasn't going well for the Mexica, and other city-states resented Mexica arrogance. Cortés would be able to put all that resentment and hurt feelings to good use.

Aztecs at war.

Hey, we're talking about the Aztecs! It's high time we talked a bit about war.

War usually began with an appropriate casus belli: the offending city-state was accused of killing merchants, refusing trade, possessing weapons of mass destruction or of generally insulting the Mexica (refusing, for instance, to participate in the enlargment of the temple of Huitzilpochtli).
The target had usually been given ample warning before hands. Ambassadors made offhand comments such as 'nice little altepetl you got here, it'd be a shame if something happened to it' and extolled the benefits of joining the empire. Formal declarations of war were issued, with plenty of advance notice.
(Such niceties weren't always strictly observed. When it was strategically convenient, the Mexica sometimes just attacked by surprise.)

The expansion of the empire sometimes followed a fairly convoluted path; Michel Graulich puts it nicely and says the empire 'followed the path of least resistance'. Basically, the Mexica only picked a fight when they were sure to win. Moctezuma II is quoted as saying, before the walls of an enemy city: 'Do you think I would even be here if I had the slightest chance of losing?".

This behavior runs counter to our expectations. Some conclude that the Mexica weren't such bad guys after all, others find this, perhaps, a little cowardly and secretly gloat over European superiority (pointed look at Victor Davis Hanson).
Myself, I think this is entirely explained by economics. War is expensive, even more so in Mesoamerica. We're looking at very rough terrain (the empire lies, mostly, on a volcanic plateau) with no pack animals of any kind. Which means any detachment of soldiers has to be followed by an equal number of porters, and all of these need to be fed. Fighting in pre-Conquest Mesoamerican was probably a great deal more expensive than fighting in Europe at the time.
So, given the costs, Mexica rulers did the rational thing: they left their targets every chance to join them peacefully, and weren't above using their reputation and soft power to that effect.

Anyway, let's go back to what happened when fighting did happen (and it happened really often. Moctezuma, for instance, spent most of his adult life at war).
War in pre-modern states is a seasonal activity: to the Mexica it meant the dry season, when there wasn't so much work in the fields, and soldiers didn't have to deal with mud and torrential rains too much.
For some reason, everyone talks about Mexica "warriors". I don't know why. Is it supposed to mean they were badass, primitive or both? In any case, and in constrast with even scholarly works, I'll call them 'soldiers' because, well, that's what they were.

Most Mexica soldiers were conscripts, but there were in addition several corps of elite troops: the cuauhocelemeh 'eagle-jaguars', ocelemeh, 'jaguars', otōntin (named after the Otomi people) and the cuachicqueh 'shorn ones', who shaved their hair and vowed never to step back in battle. Weapons included bows and arrows, the macuahuitl which I already mentioned, spears thrown with an atlatl, and slings (much more deadly than you'd think when throwing very heavy projectiles). Elite soldiers dressed with jaguar skins, or as eagles, wearing a feathered helmet with an open peak, or as Tzitzimime (female star demons).

Battle was accompanied by drums, terrifying battle cries, and of course obscene gestures and chilling insults.

More: show

Some of the choicies ones, picked from Bernal Diaz:
'Soon we'll eat your flesh with chilli peppers' or the scathing: 'we tasted your comrades' flesh: it is foul-tasting, when we kill you, we'll feed you to the animals in the zoo.' Animals in the zoo of Mexico-Tenochtitlan really were fed with the remnants of sacrifices, by the way.

The Spaniards who saw the Mexica or the Tlaxcallan army in action didn't like it one bit and left some pretty chilling testimonies.

Of course, the Mexica tried to make as many prisoners for sacrifice as possible; captured soldiers were treated with a sort of courtesy. 'He is my son', said the victor, and the captive replied 'He's my father', using the reverential forms. (Both nouns and verbs mark politeness in Nahuatl). We know that some elite enemy soldiers met with the Mexica king, who commiserated over their defeat and offered words of consolation.
It was best to take captives alive, of course, (and soldiers received large rewards for it) but dying on the battlefield was an honorable death as well, a 'Flowery Death', granting the dead a place of honor in the afterlife, accompanying the sun in the morning and living as carefree hummingbirds the rest of the time.
Human sacrifices happened on the spot as well. The first captive was traditionally sacrificed to the god of fertility Xipe Totec. (It means 'Our Lord the Flayed One'. Don't ask.)

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Ah, so you had to ask. Very well. Victims offered to Xipe Totec were flayed, their skin was carefully removed to make a garment, or a kind of disguise. The one wearing the skin became Xipe Totec; on the battlefield, that role fell to the general in charge, who thus went around wearing the skin of the first captured enemy. Moteczuma, for instance, was most often depicted in his role as a Xipe Totec impersonator to emphasize his status as a war leader.

The rest of the captives were taken to Mexico and stayed there, waiting for an appropriate occasion for their sacrifice.
The king, of course, invited other kings and political leaders to witness the act. With much curtesy, he even invited the heads of enemy city-states, even the Tlaxcallans (the hereditary enemy!), in disguise and discreetly of course to see the imperial killing machine at work, in the hopes, I suppose, to put the fear of Huitzilopochtli into them.

The Flowery Wars

One the first things a Mexica male heard at birth was 'Your trade and skill is war; your role is to give the sun the blood of your enemies to drink and feed the earth, Tlaltecuhtli, with the bodies of your enemies.' (The admonishment was pronounced by the midwife, who had some priestly duties). Statements to that effect were beaten (quite litteraly) into him through his formative years.
So of course, the Mexica found peace a little disturbing. Who then would feed the sun and earth?

In fact, between 1450 and 1454, during such a period of peace, the Mexico valley was hit by a devastating drought. The causes were clear: the gods were most unhappy at the noticeable lack of blood.
That most regrettable peace went on until someone - possibly Tlacaelel, the formidable cihuacoatl ("Prime Minister") of the Mexica had an idea: ritual war. They would make an agreement with some enemies, and fight a war with no strategic objectives, without any political reasons. The Flowery War, war waged for the sole purpose of appeasing the gods.
In a memorable image, he described his plan as setting up a marketplace for the gods, where they could pick up dead soldiers like so many "tortillas, warm and ready to eat". Of course, barbarians and foreigners would be most unsuitable to feed the gods. No, what they'd like best would be fellow Nahuas.
So an agreement for ritual war was found: the Texcoco, Tenochtitlan and Tlacopan would take turns fighting Tlaxcala, Huexotzinco, Cholula, Atlixco, Tliliuhquitepec and Teocac.
The cities wouldn't be destroyed. Tlacaelel insisted on it: the gods needed a permanent marketplace.

And so Flowery Wars were instituted, and those six cities left alone, an enclave in the midst of the empire, left there for the sole purpose of honoring and feeding the gods. The plan worked: the satisfied gods relented and the drought ended.

Well, that's the story the Texcocans told much after the fact. Oh, the Triple Alliance believed that sincerely, of course. But it's possible they had ulterior motives.
All of those cities are in the Valley of Puebla, that is, the enclave marked 'Tlaxcallan confederacy', next to the Valley of Mexico. And by 'next to', I mean 'dangerously close to': Tlaxcala was only sixty kilometers away from Mexico.
The Mexica didn't like wars they had a chance of losing. And the thing is, if they fought those city in a conventional manner, they had a very solid chance of losing. The Tlaxcalans were excellent soldiers, and the others weren't bad either. Besides, the Valley of Puebla was hard to get to, and it had little to no resources to offer as tribute. So a conventional war would be dangerous, and worse, unprofitable.

All of those cities were bottled up in their enclaves, poor, cut off from trade and the possibility of alliance. The Flowery Wars offered the Mexica a chance to feed the gods, train their soldiers, and gradually weaken Tlaxcala and its allies by attrition. What wasn't to like?
So the Flowery Wars were a cold war and a ritual war at the same time. And indeed the Flowery Wars grew less and less 'Flowery' over time. There's a solid chance Moctezuma or his successor would have finished off the Puebla Valley had not Cortés intervened.

Most likely, the Mexica should have finished them off earlier. It turned out that Tlaxcalla was on the way to Mexica from Veracruz, where the Spaniards landed. They were fierce warriors, and they fought Cortés at first. But they also listened to him, especially when he suggested an alliance...

Like I said, the Tlaxcallans were excellent soldiers and Cortés finally destroyed the empire with a few hundred Spanish soldiers and more than 100,000 allies, the better part of which from the Puebla Valley.

[Ares Land]

Great thread! I try not to be judgmental, given other cultures', including my owns, cruelty, but some aspects of your posts kinda get me thinking about the universal human tendency to combine horrible and great or even whimsical stuff. I mean, large-scale ritual child sacrifice in a culture whose language has poetic registers that value puns and word-plays, stuff like that. And the various references to the dedication of the Temple Mayor, which apparently involved a lot of human sacrifices - that sounds horrifying, but when it comes down to it, aside from all the gruesomeness, it's basically the authorities making a lot of fuss around the grand opening of a new public building, and that's not strange or "exotic" at all.

Thanks! And I share your feelings: the Mexica were both very alien and very relatable, and the contrast between seemingly understandable ritual and mundane motive is often surprising.

[zompist]

Elite soldiers dressed with jaguar skins, or as eagles, wearing a feathered helmet with an open peak, or as Tzitzimime (female star demons).

All of this is interesting, but I want to know more about these soldiers who went to battle in drag. (Also need to swipe this idea for Almea...)

[Raphael]

Aztecs at war.

Hey, we're talking about the Aztecs! It's high time we talked a bit about war.

War usually began with an appropriate casus belli: the offending city-state was accused of killing merchants, refusing trade, possessing weapons of mass destruction or of generally insulting the Mexica (refusing, for instance, to participate in the enlargment of the temple of Huitzilpochtli).
The target had usually been given ample warning before hands. Ambassadors made offhand comments such as 'nice little altepetl you got here, it'd be a shame if something happened to it' and extolled the benefits of joining the empire.

I'm reminded of the "nice little Empire you got here, it'd be a shame if something happened to it" letter that US President Millard Fillmore sent to Emperor Komei of Japan:

https://archive.org/stream/FillmoreLett ... ror_nw.txt

That most regrettable peace went on until someone - possibly Tlacaelel, the formidable cihuacoatl ("Prime Minister") of the Mexica

Now I have a mental image of a chihuahua serving as prime minister. Sorry.

[Raphael]

Another thought that occurred to me: even if every single human being who lives in a specific area eventually dies by being killed in battle, during a massacre, or as a sacrifice, that still means that mathematically, on average, each human being in that area can only kill one other human being. Even if we assume that all the killing is done by the men, that still means that on average, each man can only kill about two people in his lifetime. That's some basic math that people who talk about how much specific cultures supposedly are or were into killing sometimes seem to forget.

[bradrn]

Basically, the Mexica only picked a fight when they were sure to win. … they left their targets every chance to join them peacefully, and weren't above using their reputation and soft power to that effect.

Anyway, let's go back to what happened when fighting did happen (and it happened really often. Moctezuma, for instance, spent most of his adult life at war).

This seems slightly contradictory: if the Mexica tried to avoid war and convince their targets to join them peacefully, then why was there still so much fighting?

[Yalensky]

More: show

Some of the choicies ones, picked from Bernal Diaz:
'Soon we'll eat your flesh with chilli peppers' or the scathing: 'we tasted your comrades' flesh: it is foul-tasting, when we kill you, we'll feed you to the animals in the zoo.' Animals in the zoo of Mexico-Tenochtitlan really were fed with the remnants of sacrifices, by the way.

I'm just impressed that Tenochtitlan had a zoo. Definitely a Tiffany problem right there.

[vlad]

Here I am to nitpick.

they're also known by the derogatory 'Tarascan'

I don't believe "Tarascan" was ever derogatory. It's just another victim of the irrational belief that exonyms are evil.

The conquistadors called the Aztec 'Mexicans', a very good choice, as that was exactly what they called themselves. In Nahuatl, that was Mexica (more precisely Mēxihcah or [meːˈʃiʔkaʔ]), the inhabitants of Mexico, which meant, of course the city-state of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, (in Nahuatl altepetl or in atl in tepetl: 'water mountain"). [...] Mexica refers to the inhabitants of the city-state; Tenocha, from Tenochtitlan is more or less a synonym.

First, I assume you meant Tenochca.

"Mexico" and "Tenochtitlan" are not synonyms, nor are "Mexica" and "Tenochca". Mexico also included Tlatelolco, and the Tlatelolca were also Mexica. The phrase "Mexico Tenochtitlan" (also occasionally "Tenochtitlan Mexico" -- both orders were used) is analogous to "London, England" -- Tenochtitlan is within Mexico. The phrases "Mexico Tlatelolco" and "Mexica Tlatelolca" are also found.

And you can go deeper. There's a quarter of Tenochtitlan called Moyotlan, whose inhabitants are Mexica Tenochca Moyoteca. Chimalpahin goes four levels deep sometimes, because he's a nerd (e.g. Tzacualtitlan Tenanco Amaquemecan Chalco).

Tlacopan got the north-east, Texcoco the north-west and Mexico-Tenochtitlan the south.

And this naming practice was not unique to Mexico. Just as Tenochtitlan was called "Mexico Tenochtitlan", Tlacopan was called "Tepanohuayan Tlacopan", and Texcoco was called "Acolhuacan Tetzcoco". Giving Tenochtitlan alone a special hyphenated name is misleading.

The word for the ethnic group was Colhua (actually the name of a related group the Mexica took over).

I don't think this is accurate. "Colhua" always referred to the Colhua and not the Mexica. The only grain of truth to this is that the king of Tenochtitlan had the title "Colhua teuctli".

The word for the ethnic group is Mexitin.

"Mexican" grew more than a bit confusing over time, so "Aztec' (from Aztlan, the mythical origin of the Mexica) was used instead.

I'm not sure "confusion" is the reason for the change of name. I also think the term "Aztec" just introduced more confusion, and wish people would stop using it.

[Ares Land]

Here I am to nitpick.

Many thanks for the nitpicking. I wasn't aware that other cities used similar naming practices. (Yes, I meant Tenochca, by the way. Sorry for the typo!)
Just to nitpick a little further, Spanish chronicles of the Conquest have rivals of the Mexica use 'Colhua' more or less interchangeably with 'Mexica' (admittedly, I don't think the Spaniards were very sensitive to nuance). 'Mexitin' is mostly used in mythology, I believe?

This seems slightly contradictory: if the Mexica tried to avoid war and convince their targets to join them peacefully, then why was there still so much fighting?

Good question! There always was a state, or several, to resist Mexica expansion. Understandably: Mexica demands were still onerous and of course kings weren't eager to give up even some of their independance. So those states that felt capable of resisting militarily did so.
Having minor powers join without a fight saved the Mexica resources for attacking the more reluctant. Conversely, wars sometimes led to neigbouring cities offering tribute voluntarily. This happened, for instance, during Moctezuma II's Mixtec campaigns. All of this fed the Mexica's explosive growth (the empire doubled in size during Moctezuma II's lifetime, for instance).

Besides, the empire also had to deal with rebellions (which were pretty constant); several wars were sometimes necessary for a conquered province to stay conquered. The Mexica also had to fight to protect their tributaries, and intervened militarily to settle conflicts between vassals. And there was, of course, the ongoing cold / ritual war with Tlaxcalla and its neighbours.

All of this is interesting, but I want to know more about these soldiers who went to battle in drag. (Also need to swipe this idea for Almea...)

I'm sorry to disappoint... But they weren't quite in drag.

They wore a skull helmet, and possibly a decorated cotton suit of armor. You can get an idea of what it was like here:
https://books.google.fr/books?id=tYTISc ... et&f=false

I'm not sure who, exactly, got to wear the tzitzimitl suit in battle; I'll be sure to get back to you when I find out

The tzitzimime are cosmic horrors depicted as skeletal women. They're also compared to spiders, because they sort of hang in the night sky, upside down, waiting for a chance to fall to Earth, head first, and devour all of mankind. This could happen at the end of the year, or at the end of a 52-year period, or during solar eclipses. It was also believed that at those times, they could possess pregnant women and unborn children -- more on this later, but the Mexica viewed childbirth with perhaps a little too much religious awe.