30 May 2025 / 10 House
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Find out moreQuestions about Aztec warriors
Detail from the Tizoc Stone showing Aztec warfare
ORIGINAL QUESTION received from - and thanks to - Daniel Avila: If you could only rank up by capturing prisoners, would they try to catch you using projectiles or would they go after you with a melee weapon? Did warriors have secondary weapons on hand for those or other situations or did they have to go with a recruit to take other weapons? only warriors without any rank used bows and slings? I ask this because in all the illustrations of warriors with at least one prisoner, everyone is seen armed only with melee weapons. And finally, was the Atlatl used exclusively by nobles? That would be all, thanks in advance for reading me and sorry if the question is too long. (Answered by Ian Mursell/Mexicolore)
All good questions!
• Warriors using long-range/projectile weapons were generally NOT the ones who captured enemy warriors. Whilst they usually did start the engagement - hurling darts, arrows and stones at the enemy lines - they would then retreat behind front-line troops as they were at far greater risk. Those that captured enemy warriors were those wielding melee weapons such as broadswords and thrusting spears (see picture 1).
• There are images of warriors carrying secondary weapons, though it’s most common to see a broadsword in one hand and a shield in the other. Shock weapons were used at close range. In picture 2 - an illustration from Stela 5 at the Classic Maya site of Uaxactun - a warrior from Central Mexico is depicted holding an atlatl in the left hand and an obsidian-bladed club in the right.
• Generally, yes, low-ranking warriors fought with bows-and-arrows. Scholars such as Ross Hassig suggest this reflects the idea that the bow-and-arrow was considered by the Aztecs to be a (barbarian) Chichimec weapon. Hassig also believes that the maquahuitl (broadsword) was more of an elite weapon since its use required more specialist training (ie it was a weapon for the nobility). Certainly commoners would have grown up in the countryside learning from a young age to use the bow-and-arrow - as well as the sling - for hunting, so it’s natural to expect warriors with these weapons to be predominantly commoners.
However other scholars such as Marco Antonio Cervera suggest things were more fluid - he cites sources like the Codex Mendoza and stone monuments commissioned by Aztec royalty showing low-ranking warriors bearing the maquahuitl and important - indeed semi-divine - figures holding a bow-and-arrow!
Given that the Mexica army is known to have been a key vehicle for social mobility (a commoner could easily rise to noble status), the conclusion must be that weaponry was apportioned according to proven skill and success in the battlefield rather than along social class lines.
• Following on from this, we can deduce that the atlatl was not exclusively used by nobles. Again, being the most ancient of weapons and hunting tools, the spear-thrower had been in use throughout Mesoamerica for many centuries. Whilst it’s true it requires considerable practice to master, and that gods are sometimes depicted holding an atlatl, Cervera points out that this doesn’t necessarily mean that it was a weapon solely used by the nobility, just as the maquahuitl isn’t depicted in iconography of deities, yet some would claim it to be an ‘elite’ weapon.
It looks like there was much more inclusivity and flexibility in the Aztec army than perhaps we give them credit for...
Sources:-
• Aztec Warfare: Imperial Expansion and Political Control by Ross Hassig, University of Oklahoma Press, Norman, 1988
• Guerreros Aztecas by Marco Antonio Cervera Obregón, Ediciones Nowtilus, Madrid, 2011
• Aztec Warrior AD 1325-1521: Weapons, Armor, Tactics by John Pohl, with illustrations by Adam Hook, Osprey Publishing, Oxford, 2001.
Picture sources:-
• Main: front cover of Aztec Warfare (Hassig, see above) - image based on the Tizoc Stone, Museo Nacional de Antropología, Mexico City
• Pix 1 & 3: colour illustrations by Adam Hook courtesy of Osprey Publishing Ltd.
• Pic 2: image from latinamericanstudies.org, downloaded from https://www.latinamericanstudies.org/uaxactun/uaxactum-stela-5.jpg.
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Detail from the Tizoc Stone showing Aztec warfare
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