The Aztecs were latecomers to Mesoamerica. As nomadic or seminomadic Chichimecs they migrated into Mesoamerica from the northern deserts, carrying some cultural features shared by other, similar migrants, along with other traits unique to themselves. Within a few generations after their arrival in the Basin of Mexico, they had incorporated much of the well-established Mesoamerican way of life into their own traditional cultural milieu. This chapter pursues the place of the Aztecs in Mesoamerica – just how typical, or how unique, were they?

Mesoamerica: A Matter of Perspective

As a culture area, Mesoamerica traditionally encompasses approximately the lower two-thirds of Mexico, all of Belize, Guatemala, and El Salvador, and adjacent portions of Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica (Figure 2.1). In 1943 Paul Kirchhoff defined this cultural region by assembling a rather long list of diverse and very specific culture traits, such as agriculture based on maize, beans, and squash; chinampas (cultivated plots built up in shallow lakebeds); wooden swords studded with flint or obsidian; pyrite mirrors; stepped pyramids; ballcourts; eagle and jaguar military orders; merchants who occasionally served as spies; hieroglyphic writing; ritual use of paper and rubber; and two intertwined calendars yielding a fifty-two-year cycle (Kirchhoff 1943: 99–101). The idea was that although some of these traits were also found in other culture areas, their combination was distinctive to the geographical area defined as “Mesoamerica,” and hence signified a certain amount of historical and cultural unity among the peoples living in that region. These commonalities were considered to result from “a shared history of diffusion and migration linking Mesoamerican societies” (Schortman and Urban 2001: 365).