This new identity provided them with both the symbolic and material means to distinguish themselves from the masses." (Rounds, 74)
This strategy would prove ingenious. The result was such a greater fluidity of trade and transport of goods that though a class system did persist, the connectivity would improve the opportunity for personal acquisition in all classes. Of course, this would not alter the essential nature of society which, in the details pertaining to its sophistication, is shown to have had a clearly structured and enforced inheritance system. To the point, archaeologically consulted "wills reveal a functioning, coherent inheritance system in which the sex of the testator was probably the single most relevant factor in understanding how rights to property were divided." (Kellogg, 314) In a clear ownership and material-based society, the relevance of economic realities under the rule of the Aztec Empire would be significant. To be sure, the wealthy landowners remained those most proportionally benefited by the system, but commoners in these city-states would also gain greater access to work, to goods and to a personal mobility that, we may suggest, was as great a reason as any for the success experienced by the Aztecs at their height of power.
Of course, this power could have scarcely been possible were the Aztecs not also equipped with an uncommon military prowess. Well-documented in some regards but also often overlooked in the face of overwhelming evidence that Spanish colonization was quite easily won, its military reputation was actually one not just of greatness on the battlefield. In many ways, its success as a military empire would also pertain to its perceptiveness with respect to strategy. Its expansionist premise, which casts a far different light on indigenous American culture than does the nomadic tribalism seen in North America, would be executed with a clear look to military defense. In its targets of conquest, for instance, it complemented the connectivity of its capital city-states with "a frontier strategy. City-states in strategic provinces were incorporated into the Aztec imperial realm, but on a different basis than the tributary provinces. Their geographic location seems especially significant: for the most part they lay along hostile borderlands and had military value; they dominate routes which served as major arteries for trade or extended military action; or they were situated handily for commerce and served as trading entrepots." (Smith & Berdan, 356) It is thus that we can begin to see the clear connection between military and trade routes as they facilitated the Aztec strategy of growth.
That said, the Aztec military tendencies are those which most distinguish the culture to history, both correctly and with some prejudice. Indeed, the Aztecs are seen at their best and worst as brilliant but savagely skilled warriors with no fear for the drawing of blood. The expansion and maintenance of its empire would tie directly into the political and religious precepts which have already been here discussed, with conquest pairing with its own ceremonial conceits. These ceremonial conceits, for obvious reason, would be the practices which gained the most notoriety and which have retained the longest shelf-life in the image of the Aztecs. To the point, Isaac (1983) reports that "virtually everything written in this century on Aztec warfare has stressed its ritual component and, whether intentionally or not, has fostered the impression that the main aim of most or all Aztec warfare was the capture of enemy soldiers for sacrifice to the Huitzilopochtli." (Isaac, 121)
As noted in the introduction to this discussion, there is a conflict in our understanding of this area of Aztec life, particularly because so many of our anthropological sources are originated at the hands of European sources, with their inherent biases. Therefore, the routine characterization of the Aztecs as bloodthirsty and savage may be limited in its reliability. What cannot be denied though is that the Aztecs had built for themselves and extremely formidable fighting force. This was recorded as "killing and wounding without pity whatsoever." (Isaac, 122) Drawn from a description of the coup which led to the triple alliance of ruling city states, this denotes that without too much attention to the implications of their alleged mercilessness, we can conclude that the Aztecs attained their dominance through military campaigning.
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