Explorations in Ethnohistory: Indians of Central Mexico in the Sixteenth Century

318 Pages·1984·4.758 MB·English

by  H.R. Harvey, Hanns J. Prem

Explorations
in Ethnohistoiy
Indians of Central Mexico
in the Sixteenth Century
Edited by
H. R. Harvey
Hanns J. Prem
University of New Mexico Press / Albuquerque
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Main entry under title:
Explorations in ethnohistory.
Includes bibliographies and index.
1. Indians of Mexico—Mexico, Valley of—History—Addresses, essays, lectures.
2. Indians of Mexico—Mexico, Valley of—Social life and customs—Addresses, essays,
lectures. 3. Indians of Mexico—Mexico, Valley of—History—Sources—Addresses, es­
says, lectures. 4. Nahuas—History—Addresses, essays, lectures. 5. Mexico, Valley of
(Mexico)—History—Addresses, essays, lectures. I. Harvey, H. R., 1931- . II. Prem,
Hanns J., 1941- .
F1219.1.M53E96 1983 972'.500497 83-16853
ISBN 0-8263-0712-4
© 1984 by the University of New Mexico Press. All rights reserved.
Manufactured in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number 83-16853.
International Standard Book Number 0-8263-0712-4.
First edition.
Contents
Figures vii
Tables ix
Maps ix
1 Introduction; H. R. Harvey and Hanns J. Prem 1
2 Some Problems of Sources; Woodrow Borah 23
3 Royal Marriages in Ancient Mexico; 41
Pedro Carrasco
4 Aspects of Land Tenure in Ancient Mexico; 83
H. R. Harvey
5 Mexican Pictorial Cadastral Registers; 103
Barbara J. Williams
6 Household Organization in the Texcocan 127
Heartland; Jerome A. Offner
7 Rotational Labor and Urban Development in 147
Prehispanic Tetzcoco; Frederic Hicks
8 Agricultural Implements in Mesoamerica; 175
Teresa Rojas Rabiela
9 Early Spanish Colonization and Indians in the 205
Valley of Atlixco, Puebla; Hanns J. Prem
10 Mexican Toponyms as a Source in Regional 229
Ethnohistory; Ursula Dyckerhoff
11 The Impact of Spanish Conquest on the 253
Development of the Cultural Landscape in
Tlaxcala, Mexico; Wolfgang Trautmann
12 Land Tenure and Land Inheritance in Late 277
Sixteenth-Century Culhuacan; S. L. Cline
Note on Contributors 311
Illustrations
FIGURES
5.1. The graphic convention in the milcocoli usually
portrays approximate shape but not linear scale of
agricultural fields 108
5.2. Occasionally both linear scale and shape of fields are
depicted in the milcocoli register 109
5.3. “Cutouts” in milcocoli fields suggest the presence of
houses, paths, rocks, and trees 110
5.4. Land subdivision conventions from the Códice de
Santa María Asuncion 113
5.5. The tlahuelmantli convention as an expression of field
area 116
5.6. Reconstructed cadastral map of sixteenth-century
Chiauhtlan showing field and settlement pattern and
soil types 119
6.1. Codex Vergara with ten households 131
8.1. Instruments and other objects of obsidian 176
8.2. Uitzoctli, digging, or planting, stick being used by
two workers 179
8.3. Uictli, or coa de hoja, wooden spade, being used for
planting corn 182
8.4. Uictli, or coa de hoja, used in weeding a hill of
com 183
8.5. Uictli, or coa de hoja, as a symbol of the tributary
worker obliged to clean the canals in the city of
Mexico 184
8.6. Indian tributaries of Mexico City working in the
garden of a Spaniard in the vicinity of the
city 185
8.7. Artisans who make mirrors, utilizing the digging
spade and a mallet 186
8.8. Uictli axoquen, or hoe with zoomorphic
handle 189
8.9. Uictli, or coa de pie, shovel 191
8.10. Scene in which a man is shown felling a tree with an
ax of Type 4 and another carving a wooden figure
with an ax of Type 3 193
8.11. Axes, Types 1, 2, 3, and 4 194
8.12. Axes, Types 5, 6, 7, and 8 195
8.13. Ax, Type 1, in the hand of a Mexican merchant
disguised in the costume of the province of
Tziacantla 196
8.14. Representation of the god Ometochtli with two axes,
one of Type 1 and the other of Type 4 197
8.15. Instruments of work of the common man in the Yope
region 198
8.16. Fragment of an illustration, showing a canoe
containing a paddle and a tool of unknown
origin 199
9.1. Land purchased by Diego de Ordás
Villagomez 210
9.2. Spanish landholdings in the Valley of Atlixco around
1643 212
9.3. Irrigation in the Valley of Atlixco during colonial
times 217
11.1. Occupation of land 256
11.2. Foundations of monasteries and abandonment of
pueblos 257
11.3. Genesis of the haciendas 258
11.4. Movements of population 259
11.5. Model of the factors determining spatial processes in
the colonial period 265
TABLES
3.1. Types of royal marriage alliances in ancient
Mexico 46
3.2. Teotihuacan and their alliances with Tetzcoco 49
3.3. Kings of Tenochtitlan 5 8
3.4. Tenochtitlan governors of royal rank under Spanish
rule 64
3.5. Kings of Ecatepec and their alliances with
Tenochtitlan 65
3.6. Succession of the Cihuacoatl of Tenochtitlan 71
3.7. Kings of Itztapalapan and their alliances with
Tenochtitlan and Tetzcoco 73
5.1. Hieroglyphic conventions depicting cadastral data in
the Codex Vergara and the Códice de Santa María
Asuncion 106
6.1. Types of household organization 136
6.2. Household organizational statistics 143
7.1. Lands for the support of the city of
Tetzcoco 154
9.1. Lots {suertes) purchased by Diego de Ordás
Villagomez 216
9.2. Spanish-owned property in the Atlixco Valley,
1643 218
10.1. Comparison of cognate settlement names indicating
ethnic differences 243
12.1. Male testators’ land bequests 298
12.2. Female testators’ land bequests 300
MAPS
Southern Mexico 4
Nahuatl-speaking area 13
Lake Texcoco region 15
1
Introduction
H. R. Harvey
Hanns J. Prem
The native cultures and societies of Central Mexico have stimulated
a widespread interest since the days of the Spanish conquest. The
study of what in recent years has been termed “ethnohistory” is
rooted in the writings of that era. In the past two decades especially,
significant advances have been made in this old but newly labeled
field, as methodological perspectives from many disciplines have
been increasingly applied to a more ample and reliable data base.
For the Europeans, contact with New World cultures resulted in
an intellectual challenge. For the native cultures, the challenge was
physical survival in the face of a new, and often disastrous, set of
circumstances, further exacerbated by the loss of cultural self-reli­
ance. European conquerors, colonizers, missionaries, and admin­
istrative officials wrote and assembled numerous reports on diverse
subjects relating to the Spanish dominions in the New World; above
all, they wrote about the central highlands of Mexico. Correspond-
l
2 H. R. Harvey & Hanns J. Prem
ingly there were efforts on the part of the Indians to analyze their
own past and the colonial present, to preserve and legitimize their
identity by means of the written record. The different literary bases
of European and Indian authors became clear in the early postcon­
quest years. Subsequently these differing perspectives merged; the
unique synthesis is particularly evident in indigenous, pictographic
historical reports from the colonial period. The interweaving of the
two traditions, native and European, along with the survival of a
considerable mass of documents, have combined to create an unusual
stimulus for Mexican ethnohistorical research.
The awareness that ethnohistory is a legitimate, distinct subdis­
cipline that cuts across the boundaries of anthropology and history
has had important implications, not the least of which has been the
continuing debate as to where or even whether its methodological
and substantive boundaries should be drawn. Among others, two
anthropologists (Sturtevant 1966; Carmack 1972) and a historian
(Cline 1972-75) have commendably reviewed the subject. More
recently Spores ( 1980) has carefully examined the enormous growth
in the field of ethnohistory in the 1970s. Proper ethnohistoric goals
are now generally accepted to include both synchronic and diach­
ronic emphases. The former takes prehispanic ethnography as its
objective, while the latter is concerned with the transformation of
native society—the process of adjustment and accommodation to
changed conditions imposed by the Spanish presence. Beginning in
the first half of the sixteenth century, humanistically educated Eu­
ropeans, with their broad range of interests, pursued what we have
come to call ethnohistory as they wrote comprehensive works about
native civilization, regardless of what their original purpose was.
When applied to Central Mexico, then, “ethnohistory” both em­
braces a broad spectrum of analytical approaches and treats widely
diverse themes. Its unifying theme is a concern with what Europeans
encountered in their conquest and the all-pervasive impact of their
presence in the decades and centuries that followed.
CENTRAL MEXICAN ETHNOHISTORICAL RESEARCH
Over four and a half centuries have elapsed since native society
in Central Mexico was first the subject of attempts by Western
observers to chronicle its past and describe its present. Over this
Introduction 3
long period objectives and methodologies have changed from time
to time. It is not our purpose here to provide a detailed summary
of Central Mexican ethnohistorical sources and syntheses; that task
is admirably performed by H. B. Nicholson (1975). Rather, it is
sufficient to examine and evaluate the general directions in terms
of their present relevance.
The rich and varied corpus of sixteenth-century writings contains
materials of both European and Indian authorship. Unfortunately
the missionary zeal of the Spaniards resulted in the wholesale de­
struction of preconquest pictorial records, but copies or redrafts of
a few were made and the substance of others was preserved in the
textual record. From its start the textual record also included eth­
nographic descriptions and accounts of native history and traditions.
The earliest writers were able to draw upon personal observations
and first-hand accounts from native informants. Some, such as Sa-
hagún and Durán, utilized native artists to provide the illustrations
which complement their texts.
As the generation of primary observers thinned, emphasis shifted
to the production of compilational synopses of existing materials,
mostly derived from secondary sources, which were then processed
into comprehensive historical works. Torquemada’s Monarchta in­
diana (1615) is a giant compendium of “facts” about native culture
and history, assembled (often uncritically) from a multitude of sources
and, as was the custom of the times, without acknowledgment. A
well-written synthesis, also compiled largely from available pub­
lished sources, is Clavigero’s Historia antigua de México (1780-81).
Because of the expulsion of the Jesuit Order from Mexico, the
Historia was written during Clavigero’s ex¡ile in Italy, where he had
access to only a limited selection of source materials, basically older
compendia. Among them was Torquemada, his most important
source.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, writers largely ig­
nored native pictorials as sources. An exception was the native
historian Alva Ixtlilxóchitl, who drew upon his own private col­
lection. He may have used, for example, the Codex Xolotl and
other pictorial documents from Acolhuacan. A century later Lorenzo
Boturini, an Italian, spent seven years in Mexico (1736-43) engaged
in an indefatigable pursuit of native source materials. His efforts
Southern Mexico