Humanities T4 Spanish Conquest Flashcards
Where is the Aztec Empire located?
Connecting Mexico and Panama in North America.
Who were the Aztec’s?
An ethnic and cultural group who settled in Mesoamerica (Mexico area - where their empire is) from the 1300s.
What did the Aztec’s do in 1500’s?
Rose to great heights of wealth, power and sophistication.
When did Spanish explorers arrive in Mesoamerica? What were they called and what happened?
1519
Spanish conquistadors
In the two subsequent years from their invasion, they destroyed the Aztec civilisation through war.
What does it suggest about the Aztec’s when illustrated in the mural are: sellers of medicinal herbs and plants and a child having their teeth examined?
Shows that they has many modern concepts of medicine and healthcare.
People used ______ to pay for items? This shows how…
Cacao beans
Shows that they had an economy, trade and currency.
What was the central area of the Aztec civilization knows as?
Basin of Mexico.
What were the Aztec’s independent cities known as?
Altepetl
What were the Aztec’s smaller communities called?
Calpulli
Why did some Altepetl fight eachother?
They engaged in a civil war to:
- maintain land
- secure tribute
- demonstrate the power of their ruler
Define tribute
Payment in goods or services to a ruler.
E.g. Families owed allegiance to their local nobles who owned all the land and therefore had to pay tribute to them.
How were each different community organised?
By occupation - all the goldsmiths and feather workers worked and lived together.
What was the heirachy for the Aztec people?
Rulers
Nobles (tlatoani)
Higher commoners (merchants)
Commoners - pay tribute to local noble and served him as soldiers
Lower commoners - worked as laborours
Enslaved people - made own clothes, could be sold, had no autonomy
What does Tlatoani mean?
King
They ruled and owned a city-state
What were the sumptuary laws?
Rules that stated what clothes people from different social groups can wear
Aztec’s showed their status through clothes and body ornaments
Created to reinforce good behaviour and stop young wealthy boys from wasting their inheritance on the latest fashion trends
How did the commoners show loyalty to the nobility?
They paid tribute to them and would serve as soldiers if needed.
How many Aztecs lived in and around the basin of mexico (Mesoarmerica)?
Therefore _______ was very important.
200 000 - agriculture
List some staple Aztecs food.
Maize (corn), beans, tomatoes, avocados, vanilla, honey, maguey cactus, fish deer, lizards, insects
What were some common uses of maguey cactus and cotton?
To make alcohol, ropes, cloth, treat wounds
Cotton - was a very big exporter, they traded it heaps. Commoners would use cotton to pay tribute to landowning nobles
What were some everyday practices that the aztecs used which suggests something about how they felt about the environment?
They would use their household waste as fertilizer for the soil to grow better crops.
What methods of irrigation did they use?
They dug canals between water sources and fields so that water could get to dry land and drain away from areas that were too wet. These systems needed constant maintenance.
Explain chinampas?
Artificial fields build along edges of islands and lakes.
- they would put wooden stakes/posts into the lakebed and then would fill with mud and soil to plant crops in. This created a raised ‘garden bed’.
They could yield up to 7 crops per year by using chinampas.
Which part of Aztec life required lots of organization on a community level?
Agriculture - farming took co-operation
Was a shortage of food just a problem for the commoners?
No, food shortages in Aztec society weren’t just a problem for commoners. While commoners (farmers, laborers, etc.) were the most directly impacted by food shortages because they relied on their crops and local resources for survival, the entire society could feel the effects.
Even the nobles and ruling class could be affected by food shortages, especially if the agricultural systems failed or warfare disrupted trade and farming. However, the nobles had more access to stored resources, tribute from conquered lands, and trade networks, which helped cushion them from the worst impacts.
Commoners would suffer the most, as they were the ones directly producing the food. But during severe shortages, even the upper classes could feel the pressure, and the entire social structure could become unstable as a result.
In short, everyone was affected, but commoners felt it the hardest.
Explain markets
There were slave markets
There were normal markets in every single antepetl.
Aztec officials made sure trading was fair - shows they had a justice system
Professional merchants were known as…
What did they do?
Pochteca and they would carry out long-distance trades on foot. This meant that they saw everything which was why they also acted as spies for the Aztec ruler. They were able to take military action when necessary.
They also brought in cacao beans which were highly valued because they were used as currency and also made chocolate milk called xocolatl which only the nobles were allowed to drink.
Why were the Pochteca powerful in Aztec society - they were commoners?
They had to do slave work but were needed so also were valued.
