The Aztecs

by Michael E Smith

  Luxury Crafts and the Economy

  Luxury goods had a far more limited demand than cookpots or obsidian blades because they were expensive and many were used almost exclusively by nobles and priests. These items required greater skill and effort to produce. As a result, the organization of production for luxury crafts differed greatly from that for utilitarian crafts. Artisans (or artists) were full-time specialists, and much of their work was done directly for noble patrons. They also sold some of their goods in the market, where their primary customers were nobles. Although some of these items were forbidden to commoners, most were not. Commoners could purchase jade necklaces or feather ornaments in the market if they could afford them (see chapter 5). Another important trait of luxury goods is that many of the raw materials had to be obtained from distant areas, through trade or taxes. Quetzal feathers and jade came from southern Mesoamerica, turquoise from north of Mesoamerica, and coral from the coasts. Obtaining these exotic raw materials to make luxury products was one of the major incentives for long-distance trade in Aztec times, a topic considered in the next chapter.

  Otumba: An Aztec Craft Center

  In the late 1980s, the discovery of abundant evidence for specialized craft production at the site of Otumba took many archaeologists and ethno-historians by surprise. Prior to the Otumba project, scholars had assumed that most craft specialists lived in Tenochtitlan. Archaeologists who studied smaller cities and towns had found little evidence for craft production beyond the ubiquitous spindle whorls that were discarded or lost in the process of domestic textile production. Some suggested that there had been limited, part-time producers of pottery and stone tools in the rural areas, but most agreed that the existence of large numbers of urban specialists residing in towns outside of the imperial capital was unlikely.20

  Otumba had been a city-state capital in the Teotihuacan Valley. Unlike most former Aztec towns, the colonial and modern Otumba settlements are adjacent, rather than on top of, the Aztec occupation. The archaeological site is not very impressive today because most of the civic architecture has been disturbed or destroyed by farming. Maguey plants cover the area (figure 4.6). There isn't even a tall pyramid left at Otumba, and from the perspective of monumental archaeology, the site doesn't appear to have much to offer. Yet from the perspective of social archaeology, Otumba has yielded some of the most important evidence to date of Aztec craft production.

  The Otumba archaeological project was directed by Thomas H. Charlton, Deborah L. Nichols, and Cynthia Otis Charlton.21 Thomas Charlton had worked previously on various fieldwork projects in the Otumba area. His observations of certain artifacts on the surface of the Aztec town site (including spindle whorls, obsidian cores, and figurine molds) led him to suspect the existence of numerous specialized craft workshops at Otumba. A fieldwork project was needed to test this hypothesis.

  Charlton, Nichols, and Otis Charlton designed a program of systematic surface sampling in which they picked up all artifacts from each of 1,150 squares of 5 by 5 m. The entire 2 sq km of the Aztec city was divided into a grid of 50 m squares. One 5 by 5 m collection was made in each of these squares, with additional collections taken in those areas with abundant craft production artifacts. These intensive surface collections proved to be very successful in documenting craft production activities at Otumba. Most of the town site has been plowed by farmers in recent times, resulting in the churning up of thousands of previously buried artifacts. The large 5 by 5 m units used for surface collections yielded enough artifacts to reconstruct activities in each area of the site, including both widespread domestic tasks and specialized craft work. By taking at least one surface collection from every 50 m square of the site, the archaeologists were able to trace the spatial distribution of craft production activities across the entire settlement. The surface collections were augmented by test excavations in specific workshop locations.

  The Otumba surface collections contained evidence for the manufacture of seven major types of products: obsidian blades, obsidian bifacial tools, basalt tools, lapidary products, ceramic goods, cotton textiles, and maguey textiles. The locations of concentrations of production debris are shown in figure 4.13. Evidence for the manufacture of obsidian prismatic blades consisted of very high concentrations of obsidian in the surface collections coupled with the presence of debitage (the waste byproducts of chipped-stone toolmaking) and exhausted cores (figure 4.1). These remains were concentrated in several discrete areas of the site (figure 4.13), which suggested a series of small household-based workshops. Evidence for the manufacture of obsidian bifacial tools was also recovered by the Otumba project, but not in the urban center; these items were made at outlying rural villages that had been part of the wider Otumba city-state. Basalt, a hard and porous volcanic rock readily available in the Otumba region, was worked into both domestic implements (such as manos and metates for grinding corn) and industrial tools (scrapers for loosening the fibers from maguey leaves and polishers for finishing lapidary products). The waste flakes and production tools that indicate basalt working were found at a few scattered locations within the city.

  Figure 4.13 Map of the Aztec city of Otumba showing the locations of areas of craft production (modified after Otis Charlton 1994:fig.8.1; reproduced with permission)

  Probably the most spectacular evidence for craft production at Otumba concerned the lapidary industry. From the artifacts recovered in the surface collections and test excavations, Cynthia Otis Charlton reconstructed nearly the entire sequence of steps involved in the manufacture of ear spools, lip plugs, and beads from obsidian and other stones, including chert and rock crystal (figure 4.14). This is the only case where the complete production process of an Aztec luxury craft has been documented archaeologically.

  Figure 4.14 Technological sequence for the manufacture of obsidian jewelry (drawing by Cynthia Otis Charlton; reproduced with permission)

  The lapidary workshops at Otumba were identified by the presence of production tools (perforators and polishers of basalt), premanufacture blanks, and partially finished products. Ear spools were made from partially used prismatic blade cores of obsidian, following the technological steps shown in figure 4.14. Because of the brittleness of the volcanic glass, many items broke in the process of manufacture and were discarded. The Otumba artifacts included broken examples from each step of the sequence shown in figure 4.14. Finished pieces were not recovered in the surface collections, however. Most of these had been traded away in Aztec times, and those that ended up on the surface of the site were broken by plowing or picked up by farmers long before the archaeologists arrived. Most lapidary production was carried out in three zones in the southeast portion of the site (figure 4.13). The artifacts were associated with residences, which implies that artisans worked in their homes or else had workshops close to their houses. It is difficult to determine from archaeological evidence whether the artisans were full-time or part-time specialists.

  The Otumba ceramic industries used molds to manufacture several types of objects, including incense burners, figurines, and spindle whorls. Evidence for this production consisted of the ceramic molds, production errors and rejects, and large numbers of the finished products. No kilns or firing areas were located, and the type of extensive excavations required to find such features were beyond the scope of the original Otumba project. Long-handled incense burners, used in both domestic and temple rituals, were manufactured in molds found in the western portion of Otumba. Small ceramic figurines, in the forms of people, animals, and gods, also were produced in large numbers. A large district in the southeast portion of the city contained many molds for figurines, high concentrations of broken figurine fragments, and instances of duplicate figurines clearly made from the same mold. These workshops also turned out other small mold-made ceramic objects such as clay balls (perhaps used as blowgun pellets), rattle balls, rattles, stamps, and small spindle whorls (see figure 4.3).

  Molds for the manufacture of both types of ceramic spindle
whorls – the large variety used to spin maguey fiber and the small variety used for cotton – were found at Otumba, but with differing distributions. The small cotton whorls were made in small numbers at the figurine workshops, whereas the large maguey whorls were produced in larger numbers in a zone of possible maguey fiber workshops. Cotton whorls were recovered from all parts of the site, pointing to widespread domestic cloth production. Used maguey whorls, on the other hand, were found primarily in the same southeast zone in which they were produced. This concentration of whorls in one area may indicate the existence of workshop areas dedicated to specialized maguey cloth production.

  No other Aztec archaeological site has produced this level of evidence for the widespread and concentrated manufacture of so many different craft items. Taken together, the findings of the Otumba project suggest several patterns in the organization of craft production at the city. First, the excavations indicate that production areas or workshops were located within or adjacent to houses rather than in separate workshop buildings. Second, the concentration of several of the industries (particularly the lapidary, figurine, and maguey cloth industries) in their own zones or areas points to specialization on the level of the neighborhood or calpolli, as Sahagún described for the luxury artisans at Tenochtitlan. Third, the dating of the collections indicates that the major period of occupation and craft production at Otumba was the Late Aztec period, when both production and exchange in central Mexico reached their maximum development.

  The Otumba project has contributed greatly to our understanding of the techniques and organization of Aztec craft production, providing the first good evidence for the existence of a center of urban craft specialists outside of Tenochtitlan. How did these products move from producer to consumer? The various utilitarian and luxury crafts were part of an economy with quite sophisticated systems of exchange. The size, organization, and ubiquity of Aztec marketplaces greatly impressed the Spanish conquerors. Anyone – commoners or nobles – could obtain virtually any good or service present in Mesoamerica at these markets. Professional merchants were organized into guilds, and both regulated the markets and mounted long trading expeditions to the far corners of Mesoamerica. This was a complex and active economy with several types of currency in circulation, and the Aztec state controlled only a very small part of the overall economy. I now turn from the topic of production to that of exchange.

  Chapter five

  The Commercial Economy

  On reaching the market-place . . . we were astounded at the great number of people and the quantities of merchandise, and at the orderliness and good arrangements that prevailed, for we had never seen such a thing before . . . You could see every kind of merchandise to be found anywhere in New Spain.

  Bernal Díaz del Castillo, The Conquest of New Spain

  The Aztecs, like many other civilizations, relied on markets and merchants to move goods from producer to consumer. By “market,” I mean a physical space – a marketplace – where buyers and sellers congregate to exchange goods and services. Markets of this type are still thriving institutions in modern Mesoamerica, and these marketplaces can provide an idea of what their Aztec predecessors may have been like.1

  Where they still flourish today, markets in cities tend to be held daily, in permanent buildings. Markets in smaller settlements usually are held only once a week, often in an open public plaza. On market day, otherwise sleepy towns and villages became bustling centers of activity. Vendors set up temporary stalls to sell their wares, and buyers arrive early to take care of their weekly purchases. Some of the vendors are professional merchants who travel from market to market; others are farmers or petty artisans, or members of their families, who sell their products as a part-time activity (figure 5.1). In areas with a high population and a complex economy, individual markets are usually linked together into an integrated market system. Such was the case in the Aztec Valley of Mexico, and in many ways the scale and complexity of the Aztec market system surpassed most modern peasant market systems in Mesoamerica.

  Figure 5.1 A modern Maya woman selling vegetables in the marketplace, Merida, Yucatan (photograph by Michael E. Smith)

  Marketplaces

  Almost every Aztec settlement, from the imperial capital to the smallest villages, had a marketplace that came alive weekly on market day (the Aztec week was five days long). The sheer volume of goods that moved through Aztec markets was enormous, but the efficiency and success of the market system in distributing goods and services relieved the state of the need to manage exchange activities closely. Unlike in the Inca Empire and in some other early civilizations, where the central government maintained heavy control over the economy in general, Aztec markets and trade were largely independent of the state.2

  The Tlatelolco Market

  The biggest marketplace in the ancient New World was located in Tenochtitlan's twin city Tlatelolco. Hernando Cortés, Bernal Díaz del Castillo, and the other Spanish conquerors were astounded by the great size of the market plaza, the tens of thousands of people, the many hundreds of types of goods for sale, and the orderliness and organization of the market. The best description of the market is that of Cortés himself, and it is worth quoting the conqueror at length to get an idea of the richness of the Tlatelolco market:

  The city has many open squares in which markets are continuously held and the general business of buying and selling proceeds. One square in particular is twice as big as that of Salamanca and completely surrounded by arcades where there are daily more than sixty thousand folk buying and selling. Every kind of merchandise such as may be met with in every land is for sale there, whether of food and victuals, or ornaments of gold and silver, or lead, brass, copper, tin, precious stones, bones, shells, snails and feathers . . .

  There is a street of game where they sell . . . rabbits, hares, deer and small dogs which they breed especially for eating. There is a street of herb-sellers where there are all manner of roots and medicinal plants that are found in the land . . . There are barbers' shops where you may have your hair washed and cut. There are other shops where you may obtain food and drink. There are street porters such as we have in Spain to carry packages . . .

  All kinds of vegetables may be found there. There are many different sorts of fruits . . . All kinds of cotton thread in various colors may be bought in skeins, very much in the same way as in the great silk exchange of Granada, except that the quantities are far less. They have colors for painting of as good quality as any in Spain, and of as pure shades as may be found anywhere . . .

  A great deal of chinaware is sold of very good quality . . . Maize is sold both as grain and in the form of bread . . . Pastries made from game and fish pies may be seen on sale . . .

  There is nothing to be found in all the land which is not sold in these markets, for over and above what I have mentioned there are so many and such various other things that on account of their very number and the fact that I do not know their names, I cannot now detail them. Each kind of merchandise is sold in its own particular street and no other kind may be sold there: this rule is very well enforced. All is sold by number and measure, but up till now no weighing by balance has been observed. A very fine building in the great square serves as a kind of audience chamber where ten or a dozen persons are always seated, as judges, who deliberate on all cases arising in the market and pass sentence on evildoers. In the square itself there are officials who continually walk amongst the people inspecting goods exposed for sale and the measures by which they are sold, and on certain occasions I have seen them destroy measures which were false.3

  The essential features of Cortés's description of the Tlatelolco market – the list of many diverse goods and services, the orderliness of the vendors, and the presence of judges – are repeated in other early accounts. The goods offered for sale included both luxury items and utilitarian goods, plus a wide variety of meat, produce, prepared foods and drink, live animals, and many services. The innumerable tiny stalls selling
utilitarian craft goods were operated by the families of the artisans described in chapter 4. Other stalls were operated by full-time or part-time merchants of various sorts. The well-known, professional pochteca merchants (see below) sold their goods in the market, and also served as the market judges mentioned by Cortés.

  The Tlatelolco market was the major marketplace serving both Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco. It was easily reached from the mainland by either canoe or causeway. Given the limitations on transport in an economy without the wheel or draft animals, the canoe was of paramount importance for moving heavy burdens. Early Spanish observers noted that the lakes around the imperial capital were filled with canoes going and coming from the market. The growth of Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco from small towns into a single giant metropolis was due in no small part to the success of this market, and the city's island location was an important contributor to that success.

  The Valley of Mexico Market System

  The Tlatelolco market did not operate in isolation. It formed part of a larger regional system of markets that covered the entire Valley of Mexico. The Nahuatl term tianquiz was used to refer to any market, large or small. Nearly all cities and towns had marketplaces, but they were considerably smaller than the Tlatelolco market, and they did not excite much comment from Spanish observers. One early writer, Friar Torquemada, stated that there were countless markets in central Mexico, but since he did not have enough space to describe them all, he would limit his description to Tlatelolco.4 Although markets existed in the Early Aztec period, their size and importance increased greatly in Late Aztec times. All of the eyewitness accounts, of course, pertain to the markets of the Late Aztec B period.