Daily Life of the Aztecs Read online

  The Daily Life of THE AZTECS

  ON THE EVE OF THE SPANISH CONQUEST

  Jacques Soustelle Translated from the French by Patrick O'Brian

  NEW YORK THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1962

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  © Librairie Hachette, 1955. Distribué par Presse-Avenir

  English translation © 1961 by George Weidenfeld & Nicolson Ltd

  First published in France in 1955 under the title LA VIE QUOTIDIENNE DES AZTEQUES A LA VEILLE DE LA CONQUETE ESPAGNOLE

  Printed in Great Britain

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  'For as long as the world shall endure, the honour and the glory of Mexico-Tenochtitlan must never be forgotten.'

  Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin

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  CONTENTS

  Introduction xiii

  I THE CITY

  Origin and situation -- Extent and population --

  General appearance: roads and traffic -- Public

  buildings, squares and market-places -- The prob-

  lems of a great city -- Tenochtitlan as a young

  capital 1

  II SOCIETY AND THE STATE AT THE

  BEGINNING OF THE SIXTEENTH CEN-

  TURY

  The ruling class -- The rising class of traders -- The

  craftsmen -- The common people -- The slaves --

  Wealth and poverty: standards of living -- The

  sovereign, the great dignitaries, the council 36

  III THE WORLD, MAN AND TIME

  A shifting, threatened world -- Heaven and earth --

  Death and rebirth -- Destinies and signs -- An

  imperial religion 95

  IV A MEXICAN'S DAY

  The house, furniture and garden -- Getting up,

  washing and dressing, clothes -- Business, work,

  ceremonies -- Meals -- Games and amusements --

  The rhythm of day and night 120

  V FROM BIRTH TO DEATH

  Baptism -- Childhood and youth, education -- Mar-

  riage: family life -- Sickness and old age -- Death

  and the hereafter 163

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  VI WAR

  The meaning of war -- Casus belli -- Chivalry --

  Conduct of war -- Negotiations for peace 203

  VII CIVILISED LIFE

  Barbarism and civilisation -- Self-control, good

  breeding, social order -- The arts as a setting for

  life -- The arts of language, music and dancing 216

  Appendix I The pronunciation of Aztec words 245

  Appendix II The eighteen months and the rites 246

  Notes 248

  Maps 298

  Bibliography 302

  Index 305

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  LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

  1 The legendary origin of Tenochtitlan, from the Codex Mendoza in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Photo: Bodleian Library, Oxford)

  2 The temples of Tlaloc and Huitzilopochtli at Tenochtitlan, from the Codex of 1576 in the British Museum (Photo: John Freeman)

  3 Zapotec temple at Monte Alban, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  4 Reconstruction of Tenochtitlan as it was in 1519, from the drawing by Ignacio Marquina (Photo: Natural History Museum , New York)

  5 Serpents' heads on the temple at Tenayuca, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  6 The Emperor Tizoc, from a stone monument in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  7 Head of an 'eagle knight', in the Museo Nacional, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  8 A 'jaguar knight' in combat with a sacrificial victim, from the Codex Magliabecciano in Florence (Photo: John Freeman )

  9 Warriors attacking an island, from the Mixtec Codex Zouche-Nuttall in the British Museum (Photo: British Museum )

  10 Grades of warriors and dignitaries, from the Codex Mendoza in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Photo: Bodlian Library, Oxford)

  11 Priests lacerating themselves with knives, from a drawing in Ramirez' Indias de Nueva España (Photo: John Freeman)

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  12 Prisoner of war sacrificed to the god, from the Codex Florentino in Florence ( Bernadino de Sahagun's Historia de las cosas de Nueva España)

  13 Human sacrifice, from the Codex Magliabecciano in Florence (Photo: John Freeman)

  14 Sacrificial knife with mosaic handle, in the British Museum (Photo: British Museum)

  15 Huitzilopochtli, aided by the Emperor Motecuzoma, sacrificing to the sun, from a stone in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  16 The goddess Chalchiuhtlicue, statue in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  17 The god Tlaloc, statue in the Museum Für Volkerkunde, Vienna (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  18 Ometecuhtli and Omeciuatl, from the Codex Borgia in the Vatican (Photo: John Freeman)

  19 The god Xipe Totec, statue in the Museum Für Volkerkunde, Basel (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  20 The god Quetzalcoatl, statue in the Museo Missionario Etnologico, Rome (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  21 The god Xochipilli, statue in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton , Munich)

  22 Turquoise and obsidian encrusted skull, in the British Museum (Photo: British Museum)

  23 Statue of a little dog accompanying the dead, Colima culture, from western Mexico

  24 Calendar stone once on the main steps of the great temple at Tenochtitlan, in the Museo Nacional, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Anton, Munich)

  25 Painting of a Tzitzimitl, from the Codex Magliabecciano in Florence (Photo: John Freeman)

  26 Education among the Aztecs, from the Codex Mendoza in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Photo: Bodleian Library , Oxford)

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  1. 27 A wedding, from the Codex Mendoza in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Photo: Bodleian Oxford Library)

  2. 28 Midnight revels of warriors, from a drawing in Ramirez' Indias de Nueva Espana (Photo: John Freeman )

  3. 29 Carved wooden single drum, in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Munich Anton )

  4. 30 A page of tribute records, from the Codex Mendoza in the Bodleian Library, Oxford (Photo: Bodleian Oxford Library )

  5. 31 The Emperor distributing food and clothing to the population, from a drawing in Ramirez' Indias de Nueva España

  6. 32 A trader, pochtec, brings wares to an Aztec dignitary, from the Codex Florentino in Florence ( Bernadino de Sahagun's Historia de la cosas de Nueva España)

  7. 33 Obsidian mirror, in the British Museum (Photo: John Freeman)

  8. 34 Cocoa jug, in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Munich Anton)

  9. 35 Four paintings of Aztec cloaks, from the Codex Magliabecciano in Florence (Photo: John Freeman)

  10. 36 Green feathered headdress given to Cortes by Motecuzoma, in the Museum Für Volkerkunde, Vienna (Photo: Museum Für Vienna Völkerkunde)

  11. 37 Rock crystal skull, in the British Museum (Photo: British Museum)

  12. 38 Golden turquoise encrusted brooch, Mixtec work, from Nochixtlan, Oaxaca now in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia y Historia, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Munich Anton )

  13. 39 Gold Mixtec pectoral found at Tomb 13 at Monte Alban, in the Museo Nacional, Mexico (Photo: Ferdinand Munich Anton)

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  INTRODUCTION

  WE MUST first define the subject of this book in space and time, for during the two or t
hree thousand years before our era and up until the fateful year of the European invasion ( 1519, or one -- reed according to the native calendar) many varied civilisations followed one another in the huge expanse of Mexico, rising each in turn like the waves of the sea, and like the waves, falling in ruin.

  The subject of this book, then, is the life of the Mexicans -- the Mexica, 1 as they said themselves -- at the beginning of the sixteenth century. The great feast of the New Fire, the 'binding of the years', took place at the end of each native 'century' of fifty-two years; and the last was in the year 1507, during the reign of Motecuhzoma II Xocoyotzin ('the younger'). The Mexican civilisation was then in the full vigour of its rise and of its youth. Scarcely a hundred years had passed since Itzcoatl ( 1428-1440), the first of the great rulers, had founded the league of the three cities, of which Mexico-Tenochtitlan had become the capital. And it was in this city, on the shores and even on the water of a lake in the hollow of the central valley, seven thousand five hundred feet high and overlooked by snow-capped volcanoes, that the Aztec power was built up -- a power which became, within a few decades, the most extensive domination that that part of the world had ever known.

  At that time, in 1507, nobody, from the arid steppes of the north to the burning jungles of the isthmus, from the coast of the Gulf of Mexico to the shore of the Pacific, could have believed that this enormous empire, its culture, its art, its gods, were to go down a few years later in a historic cataclysm that makes even the fall of Constantinople seem comparatively mild. In Mexico nobody knew that a white-skinned race from another world already had a footing in the islands of the western sea, and had had it since 1492. Twenty-seven years were to elapse between the first voyage of Columbus and the landing of Hernan Cortés upon the continent -- a quarter of a century's respite during which the

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  two worlds lived side by side in mutual ignorance, with no more than an arm of the sea between them.

  Les peuples tout enfants à peine se Découvrent

  Par-dessus les buissons Nés pendant leur sommeil.

  These lines of de Vigny come to mind when we think of this strange marking time in history. In Europe the modern world was beginning to break out of its enclosing mould: in this same 1507, when the Mexicans once more 'bound the years', lighting the new fire on the summit of the Uixachtecatl, Luther was ordained priest. One year before Leonardo da Vinci had painted the Gioconda, and Bramante had begun Saint Peter's at Rome. France was engaged in her great Italian wars; and in Florence, Niccoló Machiavelli was the secretary of state for the militia. Spain had beaten the Moors of Granada and so had won back the last of her conquered territory; and an irresistible expansion urged the Spanish caravels, soldiers and missionaries towards the newly-discovered lands. But so far the wave had not carried them beyond the islands -- Cuba, the Bahamas, Haïti. The coast of the mainland had only just been touched, at Honduras and Darien: not a single white man yet knew that beyond the Strait of Yucatán and the Gulf of Mexico lay huge countries, with their crowded cities, their wars, their states and their temples.

  In Mexico there was the same ignorance: no notion that fate was already standing at the door. The emperor continued the methodical organisation of the territories subjected to the Mexica, the ruling nation. One by one the last free cities fell; and the distant villages of the tropics bowed to the rule of the high central plain. It is true that some little states kept their independence, particularly the aristocratic republic of Tlaxcala, a besieged enclave in the middle of the empire, cut off from all trade and from any kind of outlet; but the xochiyaoyotl, the flowery war, was essential in the very heart of the Mexican peace, for the service of the gods and the glory of the sun.

  A few years later and the veil which hid the one world from the other was to be torn away. They would confront one another, steel blades against swords of obsidian, guns

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  against arrows and spear-throwers, iron helmets against feather head-dresses. Palaces, pyramids, raised causeways across the lakes, stone statues and turquoise masks, processions blazing with jewels and plumes, priests, kings, sacred books, all this was to melt and vanish like a dream. Just before it disappears, let us try to catch the iridescent image, the splendour and the shadows of a world already doomed.

  These late-comers to the central plateau, the Mexica, or Aztecs, as they were sometimes called in memory of Atzlán, the mythical starting-point of their wanderings, never thought of themselves as anything but the heirs of the brilliant civilisations that had preceded them. Their knowledge of the past went back no more than a few hundred years: for them the pyramids of Teotihuacán, which we date from the sixth century, were built by the gods at the beginning of the world, at the same time that they created the sun and the moon. For them all the highly-civilised arts, sculpture, architecture, engraving, feather-mosaic work, the invention of the calendar, were due to the former inhabitants of Tula, the Toltecs, who reached the height of their civilisation in the tenth and eleventh centuries.

  The Mexicans placed Tula and its king-god Quetzalcoatl, the Plumed Serpent, in a remote and fabulous past: it was Quetzalcoatl and the Toltecs who had found out the arts and sciences that Mexico had possessed since then. But the black magic of Tezcatlipoca, the dark god of the night sky, had triumphed, and the shining Quetzalcoatl, exiled from Mexico, had set out over the Atlantic, 'the heavenly water'; or according to other traditions, had burned himself upon a pyre.

  In the chaos that followed the fall of Tula, the wandering tribes of the north, who were known by the general name of Chichimeca, the equivalent of the Greek 'barbarians', came into the central plateau in successive waves; and at this point legend and history join. In the twelfth century began a great movement that brought the migrating nations southward one after another, nations of hunters and warriors, houseless and knowing nothing of agriculture or weaving.

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  These tribes, coming into contact with what was left of the Toltec civilisation and with the settled farming inhabitants who had stayed after the collapse of Tula, very soon set up villages and towns and adopted the way of life of their predecessors. They abandoned their rustic dialects in favour of the classical Nahuatl of the Mexicans: they built cities, Colhuacán, Atzcapotzalco, Texcoco, in which the upper classes led a highly civilised existence; and these cities fought for supremacy in the valley, each in turn winning it from the others. It was in this world, so reminiscent of Renaissance Italy, full of battles, plots and astonishing reverses, that a poor, unwelcome, humiliated tribe managed to acquire a few little swampy islands in the lake from their powerful neighbours. The Mexica founded their capital, a wretched village of reed huts, around the temple of Uitzilopochtli, the jealous and unyielding god who had guided them during a hundred and fifty years of migration. All about them stretched marshes, with no arable land, no timber or stone for building; the dry land was all owned by the established cities, and they rigidly held on to their fields, woods and quarries. It was in 1325 that these wanderers first settled in the dismal place that they were allowed -- a place, however, in which they had seen the sign that their god had promised them, an eagle poised upon a cactus, eating a serpent. Another fifty years had to go by before they could arrive at a satisfactory organisation and name their first sovereign, Acamapichtli; and even then the Mexican state was still so weak and its destiny so unsure that they were obliged to accept the overlordship of Atzcapotzalco in order to survive, and they were not able to shake it off until 1428.

  Nobody could have seen an embryonic empire in these humble beginnings: nobody, except the 'god-bearers', the warrior-priests who had been the attendants of the image of Uitzilopochtli during the migration, who interpreted his oracles to the people and who had faith in his promise of eventual domination. It was they who formed the primary nucleus of that ruling class which, in less than two hundred years, was to carry the Mexica to the height of their imperial power.

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  By the early days of the sixteen
th century nothing remained of this poor and lowly start except the chinampas on the edges of the city, the ingenious floating gardens that were left over from the time when the landless Mexicans had been obliged to make their own earth by piling the mud from the bottom of the lake on to wicker-work rafts. MexicoTenochtittan, the New World's Venice, proudly reared its embankments and its pyramids above the waters: to a score of nations, 2 the name of its emperor, Motecuhzoma, stood for magnificence and power. The wealth of the provinces flowed in: luxury continually increased. Since the fabulous days of Tula, no Indian of Mexico had beheld such marvels.

  We know the Mexico of the time of the first coming of the Europeans by many sets of records that can be compared and combined. Archaeological research has yielded a great deal in the valley of Mexico, and one can scarcely open a trench without finding something from Aztec times or earlier. There have been abundant discoveries of ritual and domestic pottery, tools, arms and sculpture: yet as the Mexicans usually burned their dead instead of burying them like the Zapotecs, for example, or the Mixtecs, in this case we do not have the almost inexhaustible fund of utensils, clothes and jewels which the graves supply elsewhere. Furthermore, not a single ancient monument has survived in Mexico City itself, because of the systematic destruction of the town by the Spaniards during the siege of 1521 and after it. So paradoxically we are far better acquainted with the architecture of the distant Mayas, back in the seventh century, than with that of the sixteenth-century Mexicans. The temples and pyramids of Palenque or of Yaxchilán, lost in the jungle of Chiapas, have survived the attack of the weather and the vegetation for more than a thousand years, while those of Mexico have gone down before the destructive will of man.