Ancient society

by Lewis Henry Morgan

The Indian pueblos in the valley of Mexico revealed to Europeans a lost condition of ancient society, which was so remarkable and peculiar that it aroused at the time an insatiable curiosity. More volumes have been written, in the proportion of ten to one, upon the Mexican aborigines and the Spanish Conquest, than upon any other people of the same advancement, or upon any event of the same importance. And yet, there is no people concerning whose institutions and plan of life so little is accurately known. The remarkable spectacle presented so inflamed the imagination that romance swept the field, and has held it to the present hour. The failure to ascertain the structure of Aztec society which resulted was a serious loss to the history of mankind. It should not be made a cause of reproach to any one, but rather for deep regret. Even that which has been written, with such painstaking industry, may prove useful in some future attempt to reconstruct the history of the Aztec confederacy. Certain facts remain of a positive kind from which other facts may be deduced; so that it is not improbable that a well-directed original investigation may yet recover, measurably at least, the essential features of the Aztec social system.

The “kingdom of Mexico” as it stands in the early histories, and the “empire of Mexico” as it appears in the later, is a fiction of the imagination. At the time there was a seeming foundation for describing the government as a monarchy, in the absence of a correct knowledge of their institutions; but the misconception can no longer be defended. That which the Spaniards found was simply a confederacy of three Indian tribes, of which the counterpart existed in all parts of the continent, and they had no occasion in their descriptions to advance a step beyond this single fact. The government was administered by a council of chiefs, with the co-operation of a general commander of the military bands. It was a government of two powers; the civil being represented by the council, and the military by a principal war-chief. Since the institutions of the confederate tribes were essentially democratical, the government may be called a military democracy, if a designation more special than confederacy is required.

Three tribes, the Aztecs or Mexicans, the Tezcucans and the Tlacopans, were united in the Aztec confederacy, which gives the two upper members of the organic social series. Whether or not they possessed the first and the second, namely, the gens and the phratry, does not appear in a definite form in any of the Spanish writers; but they have vaguely described certain institutions which can only be understood by supplying the lost members of the series. Whilst the phratry is not essential, it is otherwise with the gens, because it is the unit upon which the social system rests. Without entering the vast and unthreadable labyrinth of Aztec affairs as they now stand historically, I shall venture to invite attention to a few particulars only of the Aztec social system, which may tend to illustrate its real character. Before doing this, the relations of the confederated to surrounding tribes should be noticed.

The Aztecs were one of seven kindred tribes who had migrated from the north and settled in and near the valley of Mexico; and who were among the historical tribes of that country at the epoch of the Spanish Conquest. They called themselves collectively the Nahuatlacs in their traditions. Acosta, who visited Mexico in 1585, and whose work was published at Seville in 1589, has given the current native tradition of their migrations, one after the other, from Aztlan, with their names and places of settlement. He states the order of their arrival as follows: 1. Sochimilcas, “Nation of the Seeds of Flowers,” who settled upon Lake Xochimilco, on the south slope of the valley of Mexico; 2. Chalcas, “People of Mouths,” who came long after the former and settled near them, on Lake Chalco; 3. Tepanecans, “People of the Bridge,” who settled at Azcopozalco, west of Lake Tezcuco, on the western slope of the valley; 4. Culhuas, “A Crooked People,” who settled on the east side of Lake Tezcuco, and were afterwards known as Tezcucans; 5. Tlatluicans, “Men of the Sierra,” who, finding the valley appropriated around the lake, passed over the Sierra southward and settled upon the other side; 6. Tlascalans, “Men of Bread,” who, after living for a time with the Tepanecans, finally settled beyond the valley eastward, at Tlascala; 7. The Aztecs, who came last and occupied the site of the present city of Mexico.[198] Acosta further observes that they came “from far countries which lie toward the north, where now they have found a kingdom which they call New Mexico.”[199] The same tradition is given by Herrera,[200] and also by Clavigero.[201] It will be noticed that the Tlacopans are not mentioned. They were, in all probability, a subdivision of the Tepanecans who remained in the original area of that tribe, while the remainder seem to have removed to a territory immediately south of the Tlascalans, where they were found under the name of the Tepeacas. The latter had the same legend of the seven caves, and spoke a dialect of the Nahuatlac language.[202]

This tradition embodies one significant fact of a kind that could not have been invented; namely, that the seven tribes were of immediate common origin, the fact being confirmed by their dialects; and a second fact of importance, that they came from the north. It shows that they were originally one people, who had fallen into seven and more tribes by the natural process of segmentation. Moreover, it was this same fact which rendered the Aztec confederacy possible as well as probable, a common language being the essential basis of such organizations.

The Aztecs found the best situations in the valley occupied, and after several changes of position they finally settled upon a small expanse of dry land in the midst of a marsh bordered with fields of pedregal and with natural ponds. Here they founded the celebrated pueblo of Mexico (Tenochtitlan), A. D. 1325, according to Clavigero, one hundred and ninety-six years prior to the Spanish Conquest.[203] They were few in number and poor in condition. But fortunately for them, the outlet of Lakes Xochimilco and Chalco and rivulets from the western hills flowed past their site into Lake Tezcuco. Having the sagacity to perceive the advantages of the location they succeeded, by means of causeways and dikes, in surrounding their pueblo with an artificial pond of large extent, the waters being furnished from the sources named; and the level of Lake Tezcuco being higher then than at present, it gave them, when the whole work was completed, the most secure position of any tribe in the valley. The mechanical engineering by which they accomplished this result was one of the greatest achievements of the Aztecs, and one without which they would not probably have risen above the level of the surrounding tribes. Independence and prosperity followed, and in time a controlling influence over the valley tribes. Such was the manner, and so recent the time of founding the pueblo according to Aztec traditions which may be accepted as substantially trustworthy.

At the epoch of the Spanish Conquest five of the seven tribes, namely, the Aztecs, Tezcucans, Tlacopans, Sochimilcas, and Chalcans resided in the valley, which was an area of quite limited dimensions, about equal to the state of Rhode Island. It was a mountain or upland basin having no outlet, oval in form, being longest from north to south, one hundred and twenty miles in circuit, and embracing about sixteen hundred square miles excluding the surface covered by water. The valley, as described, is surrounded by a series of hills, one range rising above another with depressions between, encompassing the valley with a mountain barrier. The tribes named resided in some thirty pueblos, more or less, of which that of Mexico was the largest. There is no evidence that any considerable portion of these tribes had colonized outside of the valley and the adjacent hill-slopes; but, on the contrary, there is abundant evidence that the remainder of modern Mexico was then occupied by numerous tribes who spoke languages different from the Nahuatlac, and the majority of whom were independent. The Tlascalans, the Cholulans, a supposed subdivision of the former, the Tepeacas, the Huexotzincos, the Meztitlans, a supposed subdivision of the Tezcucans, and the Tlatluicans were the remaining Nahuatlac tribes living without the valley of Mexico, all of whom were independent excepting the last, and the Tepeacas. A large number of other tribes, forming some seventeen territorial groups, more or less, and speaking as many stock languages, held the remainder of Mexico. They present, in their state of disintegration and independence, a nearly exact repetition of the tribes of the United States and British America, at the time of their discovery, a century or more later.

Prior to A. D. 1426, when the Aztec confederacy was formed, very little had occurred in the affairs of the valley tribes of historical importance. They were disunited and belligerent, and without influence beyond their immediate localities. About this time the superior position of the Aztecs began to manifest its results in a preponderance of numbers and of strength. Under their war-chief, Itzcoatl, the previous supremacy of the Tezcucans and Tlacopans was overthrown, and a league or confederacy was established as a consequence of their previous wars against each other. It was an alliance between the three tribes, offensive and defensive, with stipulations for the division among them, in certain proportions, of the spoils, and the after tributes of subjugated tribes.[204] These tributes, which consisted of the manufactured fabrics and horticultural products of the villages subdued, seem to have been enforced with system, and with rigor of exaction.

The plan of organization of this confederacy has been lost. From the absence of particulars it is now difficult to determine whether it was simply a league to be continued or dissolved at pleasure; or a consolidated organization, like that of the Iroquois, in which the parts were adjusted to each other in permanent and definite relations. Each tribe was independent in whatever related to local self-government; but the three were externally one people in whatever related to aggression or defense. While each tribe had its own council of chiefs, and its own head war-chief, the war-chief of the Aztecs was the commander-in-chief of the confederate bands. This may be inferred from the fact that the Tezcucans and Tlacopans had a voice either in the election or in the confirmation of the Aztec war-chief. The acquisition of the chief command by the Aztecs tends to show that their influence predominated in establishing the terms upon which the tribes confederated.