This book describes the general development of the prehispanic Mexican capital of Tenochtitlán. Many writers have previously dealt with parts of this formidable task. However, the present work is one of the few that attempts to synthesize archaeological and documentary information for the ancient urban center as a whole. A short introductory section reviews several theoretical frameworks of urbanism as a state and a process. A second major section uses ethnohistorical sources to deal with the development of Tenochtitlán, from its semi-mythological foundation in the early 14th century through the reigns of successive rulers to the time of Spanish conquest. A third major section characterizes various aspects of the center as it existed during the reign of Moctezuma II in the early sixteenth century.
The work is basically descriptive and synthetic. It offers a useful summary of many existing studies, perspectives, and data. There is little attempt to develop new insights into the processes of urbanization or the role of Tenochtitlán in Aztec polity. The introductory review of theoretical frameworks is promising, but there is little subsequent effort to analyze data in terms of a coherent theory of urbanism. The book’s contribution is the formulation of a general picture of architecture, spatial organization, economy, and polity from a scattered body of source materials. A number of maps and plans, some of which have seldom appeared in print, add significantly to its utility in this regard. Another particularly useful feature is the incorporation of some little-known results of the massive program of salvage archaeology under taken in connection with the recent construction of Mexico City’s new metro system.
Some particularly important aspects of Tenochtitlán’s economic role are developed and emphasized. One example is the strategic aspect of the center’s island location in terms of the coordination and management of waterborne goods and services. Another is the complex barrio organization and its relationship with occupational specialization and social structure. However, throughout the book I detect the persistence of two inter-related views of Aztec society that may hinder the development of some new interpretative insights: first, that the Aztec migration legend represents an historical reality; second, that Aztec society at Spanish contact was a hierarchical, stratified system still in the process of developing from an essentially egalitarian, clan-based tribal group of the early fourteenth century.
These views are widely accepted today, and few have questioned their validity. However, I find both unacceptable in view of what we now know about pre-Aztec culture in the Valley of Mexico. Well over a millennium prior to Tenochtitlán’s existence, nearby Teotihuacán had been the center of a highly developed polity whose influence was felt throughout Mesoamerica. By 700 A.D. the Teotihuacán system had collapsed and new major urban centers had developed at Tula, Cholula, Xochicalco, and probably elsewhere in central Mexico. The original development of Tenochtitlán occurred in the context of a long-existing hierarchical structure. It is difficult to understand how a small egalitarian group could have had any measurable impact within such a system. Archaeologically there is little trace of such a group. The well-known ceramic tradition of Tenochtitlán is one that finds its most immediate roots in the Valley of Mexico and in the Cholula area to the southeast. It seems more probable that the considerable achievement of Aztec society at Tenochtitlán is to be understood as the product of a whole series of equally impressive achievements of pre-Aztec society in the same area.
