Indigenous societies — political authority and economy

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The 1428 alliance of three city-states — Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan — that together conquered and ruled central Mexico, with Tenochtitlan as the dominant partner.

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The huey tlatoani, meaning 'great speaker.' He was chosen from the royal family by a council of nobles, not simply the eldest son, and combined military, political, and religious roles.

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Calpulli were kinship-based neighbourhood wards, each with its own leader who collected tribute, organized labour, and ran a local school, connecting ordinary families to the central state.

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He was presented as chosen by the god Huitzilopochtli and responsible for feeding the sun with sacrifices, so obeying him was framed as a religious duty, not just a political one.

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A ritualized, limited war fought against nearby states mainly to capture prisoners for sacrifice and to train warriors, blurring the line between warfare and religious practice.

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Raised, highly fertile artificial garden-plots built up from lake mud in the shallow waters around Tenochtitlan, allowing several harvests a year and feeding a huge city population.

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Whether the empire was a fully centralized, unified state, or a looser network of tribute-paying provinces that kept their own rulers and customs and could break away — most historians favour the second view.

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Tribute was paid in specific goods (cotton, cacao, feathers, food, warriors) fixed by conquest agreements and recorded in tribute registers like the Codex Mendoza, not in a single universal currency.

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A hereditary class of professional long-distance merchants who traded luxury goods, sometimes acted as spies and diplomats, and grew wealthy enough to worry the nobility.

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An exchange of obligations between rulers and communities — for example allied city-states supplying troops and labour in return for a share of tribute and protection — rather than a one-way demand.

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Aztec law punished drunkenness, adultery, and theft severely (even by nobles), and judges operated in structured courts — showing the state relied on formal rules, not just force.

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Because conquered states were left largely self-governing as long as tribute was paid, some historians argue this made the empire efficient but unstable, since Cortes could exploit resentment and gather thousands of Indigenous allies.