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Power concedes nothing without a demand.
Name:
Date:
Mr. Carey/Mr. Clarke
Zooming Out: Aztecs and Incas
Zooming Out: Aztecs and Incas
I. Overview
While the “Mongol moment” was happening—and coming to
a close—over in Eurasia, the Americas were going through a
civilization moment of their very own. While centers of
civilization had long flourished in Mesoamerica and South
America, the 1400s witnessed new, larger, and more politically
organized versions of those civilizations, as seen in the Aztec
and Inca empires (see map). Both were the work of previously
small peoples who had taken over and absorbed older
cultures, giving them new energy, and both were destroyed in
the 16th century at the hands of Spanish conquerors and their
diseases (more on that later).
Directions: Actively read and annotate the provided texts on
the Aztec and Inca empires. While you read, keep the
question below in mind. When you finish reading, respond to
this question in the “Homework” section of your AP World
History notebooks.
1.
Contrast the political and economic structures of the Aztec and Incan Empires. Support your response with at least
two pieces of evidence from each text. Use the SPICE fragments at the end of this handout to support your reading.
II. The Aztec Empire
The empire known to history as the Aztec empire was largely the work of the Mexica people, a seminomadic group from northern Mexico who had migrated south and by 1325 had established themselves
on a small island in Lake Texcoco. After forming a series of alliances with surrounding peoples, the
Mexica people launched an aggressive campaign of conquest, and in less than 100 years, brought most of
Mesoamerica under a single empire: the Aztec Empire. (1)
With a population of roughly 5 to 6 million people, the Aztec Empire had a loosely structured
government that experienced frequent rebellions from conquered people. Conquered peoples and cities
were required to provide labor for Aztec projects and to deliver to their Aztec rulers large amounts of
textiles and clothing, military supplies, jewelry and other luxiries, foods, animal products, building
materials, rubber balls, paper, and more. This process was managed by local tribute collectors, who sent
the required goods on to Tenochtitlan, the capital city of the empire, where all goods were carefully
stocked and recorded. (2)
As a center of the Aztec Empire, Tenochtitlan featured numerous canals, dikes, causeways, and bridges.
A central walled area of palaces and temples included a pyramid almost 200 feet high. Surrounding the
city were “floating gardens,” or islands created from swamplands that supported agriculture. Vast
marketplaces marked Technotitlan as a center of trade. (3)
Beyond tribute from conquered peoples, ordinary trade, both local and long-distance, was a main activity
of the Aztec Empire. Virtually every part of the empire, from Tenochtitlan to the smallest village, had a
marketplace that hummed with activity during weekly market days. The largest marketplace was
Tlatelolco, near the capital city, which stunned many with its huge size, good order, and range of goods
available. Professional merchants, known as pochteca, often gained great wealth and rose to the upper
classes of Aztec society. (4)
Power concedes nothing without a demand.
Among the “goods” that the pochteca traded in were slaves, many of whom were destined for sacrifice in
the bloody rituals so central to Aztec religious life. Human sacrifice assumed a huge rule in Aztec public
life and thought during the 15th century. The Aztecs believed that their god, Huitzilopochtli, was locked
in a fight against evil forces. If he did not receive enough energy, he would lose this battle, and the Aztec
world would be destroyed. The Aztecs came to believe that one of the only ways to provide
Huitzilopochtli with this much-needed energy was through human sacrifice. This set of beliefs drove
Aztec expansion, as conquering other peoples provided the Aztecs with more people for human sacrifice.
Aztec priests and rulers, who worked hand-in-hand at the top of Aztec society, actively supported this
process. (5)
III. The Inca Empire
While the Aztec Empire was developing in Mesoamerica, a relatively small community of people—known
as Incans—began to build the largest empire in the Americas of the time along the Andes Mountains of
South America. The Inca Empire was much larger than the Aztec; it stretched some 2,500 miles along the
Andes and contained perhaps 10 million people. Although the Aztec Empire controlled only a part of the
Mesoamerican region, the Inca state contained practically the whole of Andean civilization during its
short life in the 15th and early 16th centuries. (1)
In the Aztec Empire, Aztec rulers largely left their conquered people alone, so long as they paid tribute.
No complex government system existed to connect the conquered territories. The Incas, on the other
hand, created a more organized government. At the top reigned the emperor, and each of the provinces
within the empire had an Inca governor. The Incan government was said to own all the land and
resources of the empire. In the central regions of the empire, people were grouped in units of 10, 50, 100,
500, 1,000, 5,000, and 10,000 people, each headed by local officials, who were appointed and supervised
by an Inca governor or the emperor himself. A separate set of “inspectors” provided the emperor with a
check on local officials. Births, deaths, marriages, and other population data were carefully recorded on
quipus, the knotted cords that served as an accounting device. Newly conquered peoples were expected
to learn the Incan language of Quechua in order to further connect peoples throughout the empire. (2)
Like the Aztec Empire, the Inca state represented an especially dense and extended network of economic
relationships, but these relationships took shape in a quite different fashion. Inca demands on their
conquered people were expressed not in terms of tribute, but as labor service, known as mita, which was
required of every Incan household. What people produced at home usually stayed at home, but almost
everyone also had to work for the government. Some worked on large state farms or “sun farms,” which
supported temples and other religious institutions; others herded, mined, served in the military, or toiled
on state-directed construction projects. (3)
Political
Economic
The political elements of a society/civilization often
concern the groups/individuals that control a
society/civilization, as well as how that society/civilization is
built to run. What kind of government exists within the
society/civilization in question? Is the society/civilization in
question stable, or is it prone to revolts and revolutions?
How does the society/civilization in question approach
outside societies/civilizations around it?
The economic elements of a society/civilization often
concern the systems of trade/exchange at work within that
society/civilization. How does a society/civilization in
question get its resources or accumulate wealth? How does
this society/civilization then trade these resources for other
resources, or use the wealth it gains?