The economic contribution of women in Aztec society

11th Oct 2022

Mexicolore contributor Dra. Miriam López Hernández

We are most grateful to Miriam López Hernández for writing specially for Mexicolore this detailed analysis of the economic role of women in Mexica society. She received her doctorate in Anthropology from UNAM (Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México) and lectures in the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences at the University of La Salle, México. Dra. López is the author of three books on pre-Hispanic Mexico, and specialises in women and gender issues in Indigenous societies both ancient and contemporary.

Ancient Nahua society in the Postclassic period was characterised by social stratification, centralisation of power, and complex, specialised economic systems. The life of each citizen was connected to the process of production, and everyone in some way contributed to the economy at some level, the population’s needs being fulfilled by maximising its own productive capacity.
Far from being passive beings, as has been constantly suggested in the past, Nahua women in pre-Hispanic times were always productive and active. The aim of this article is to spell out in detail their economic contributions to Nahua society. They toiled at home, in the fields, in the marketplace and in the houses of nobles, participating directly in the productive life of their society.
Nahua women played an integral role in the economy in three ways: through domestic work, in professional employment, and through labour (in work or in kind) undertaken as part of tribute obligations.

Domestic labour and diverse female occupations
Domestic work refers to all the daily chores that a woman in charge of her home undertakes, determined by the division of labour by gender. In the case of macehualtin (commoners) these activities included: cleaning the house, washing clothes, washing cooking tools, preparing food, childcare (with all that that implies), care of domestic animals, tending to the family’s vegetable garden, fetching water, gathering foodstuffs and firewood, and making ceramic vessels and clothes for her family.
Further, wherever necessary, Nahua women had to assist their husbands in carrying out their duties and to undertake domestic work in the houses of nobles. At the same time they sold goods and services in the market in order to provide for the household.

Given the rudimentary nature of their equipment, women spent long hours preparing food and making clothes for the family, not to mention producing blankets demanded as tribute payments. For cooking, they could only count on three tools: metate (grinding stone), molcajete (pestle and mortar) and griddle. For weaving, the shuttle and backstrap loom – employed as its name implies:-
’The weaver could be found kneeling in front of a tree or wooden post, attached to which was the warp beam. To apply tension the woman passed round her waist a mecapalli or rope support, joined to the pole at one end; she could thus begin to warp the skein of yarn, creating the weave that would go into making the desired textile, using the tzotzopaztli or shuttle, a long strip of wood, rounded and thinned at both ends, with which she pressed together the fabric’ (Manjarrez, 2010: 153).

In parallel, women from the nobility were able to develop culinary arts, to weave and to spin. These women did not, however, undertake work outside of the home. In the words of a huehuetlatolli (‘Ancient word’ – ethical-moral speeches given by elders) (García Quintana, 1978: 58-59):-
’Before all else, the woman must fulfil her work duties with the spindle, with the tzotzopaztli, with the water, with the metate; and as for the jewels, the life-bearing feathers, born from her womb, from her breast, and brought to life, keep watch.’
Similarly, we have access to a range of sources on the role expected of women. A noble father admonishes his daughter with the following:-

‘[…] Then begin carrying out thy duties, whether it be making cacao, grinding maize, or spinning or weaving […] If perhaps already the misery of the nobility dominateth, look well, apply thyself well to the really womanly task, the spindle whorl, the weaving stick. Open thine eyes well as to how to be an artisan, how to be a feather worker; the manner of making designs by embroidering; how to judge colours; how to apply colours [to please] thy sisters, thy ladies, our honoured ones, the noblewomen. Look with diligence; apply thyself well as to how heddles are provided; how leashes are provided, how the template is placed.’ (Sahagún 1950-1982 Book VI, chapter 18, p. 96)

TRADE: description -
• Market traders: sellers of feathers, roots, medicinal herbs, vegetables and herbs, stews, maize and egg tortillas, atole and tamales, chocolate, and of cotton hanks for embroidery
• Fortune-tellers: Making predictions through various media – maize kernels, her own hands, cords…
• Healers: curing inflammations, fevers, pains, tiredness, arthritic discomfort, urinary illness, gout, ulcers, treating bone dislocations and fractures, etc.
• Midwives: caring for women during pregnancy, birth and post-birth, and carrying out birth ceremonies
• Matchmakers: elderly ‘matrons’ involved in arranging marriages

• Priestesses: providing incense for deities, tending sacred fires, sweeping temples, preparing food offerings, spinning and weaving vestments to adorn images of gods and altars
• Painters: during religious festivities, specially trained women painted the bodies of those due to perform ceremonial dances
• Tlacuiloque: assisting their male counterparts in painting codices and other documents
• Featherworkers: artisans who assisted their fathers or husbands in creating feather artworks
• Prostitutes: poor women who resorted to this morally condemned profession; they tended to work in markets and at the roadside.
(Source: Florentine Codex, 1950-1982, IV, VI and X; Sahagún, 2002, vol. 1, book IV, vol. 2, books VI, X.)

Next, we will outline the professions that women pursued. Women’s occupations did not represent competition for men – effectively they carried out jobs that men were not prepared to do themselves, often linked to tasks undertaken by women at home (such as preparing food or textiles to be sold later in the market).
Selling in the marketplace was performed by men as well as women (Zantwijk, 1970:2). Nevertheless, as Cervantes de Salazar (1971, 1:327) has shown, most were women; this is also confirmed by the images in the Florentine Codex. And whilst they did not take part in long-distance trading expeditions, women did negotiate deals. Sahagún (1959 Book IX, chap. III: 14, 16) notes:-
‘[…] Everything was there assembled; all the loads of merchandise, all the consignments, the possessions of the principal merchants, and the goods of the merchant women, were arranged separately… Then they went forth… If perchance [a long-distance trader] had gone forgetting something… neither did even one of all the old merchants [and] merchant women go following them.’

The weavings that the women sold were made by them themselves. The sellers of feathers generally farmed the birds whose feathers they prepared in various ways prior to selling them. Subsistence foods too were generally provided by the women sellers themselves, particularly the stews. Products such as maize, beans and seeds were first collected by the women who went on to sell them, or by their relatives. Equally, medicinal herbs were harvested and then sold by women medical specialists.

Blankets and weavings
Despite seeing them active in the economy, women from every social class were in one way or another economically dependent on their menfolk, to judge from the ‘capital’ of five blankets that a newly-wed received from her husband (Florentine Codex, 1950-1982, VI: 132).
As mentioned above, women fabricated all the clothes worn by their family, textile articles for sale in the market, as well as blankets demanded in tribute. These were called quachtli and they functioned as a medium of exchange, like money, alongside cacao and other items. Amongst the Aztecs, however, it was blankets and capes that held the highest value in monetary terms.

In ancient Mexico, weaving was the activity par excellence for women, alongside domestic tasks. Spinning and weaving defined their sphere of work (García Quintana, 1978: 58-59). The Codex Mendoza (1964: fols. 58r, 59r, 60r) shows women teaching their daughters to spin and weave.
Making textiles was part of the domestic economy and came to symbolise the female role. Since birth, girls were provided with their cihuatlatquitl (gender-related materials), consisting of spindle, tiny basket with cotton, and broom (Sahagún, 1969: 141; Torquemada, 1975, IV: 204).
Clearly, gender-based division of labour was ordained by the gods, who created Cipactonal and Oxomoco, intermediaries between humanity and the divine. In the Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas (2002, chap. II: 27, 29) we read:-

‘Then a man and a woman were created; the man they called [Cipactonal*] and the woman [Oxomoco*]. And they were commanded to work the land, and she to spin and weave; from them would be created the macehuales [commoners] who should not cease to work; and to her the gods gave a number of grains of maize, that with them she should do cures, tell fortunes and cast spells. And this they do to this day.’
*Note: in the original narrative Oxomoco is given as the man and Cipactonal as the woman; however, this is an error: Oxomoco means ‘First woman’ and Cipactonal was a male name, according to plate 21 of the Codex Borbonicus (1993) (see pic 12).

Every Aztec woman learned to spin as a young girl (ichpuchtontli) and every young woman of marriageable age (ichpuchtli) was taught to weave (Sachse, 1966: 82). Weavings in the hands of women as a custom is mentioned by Bernal Díaz (1975: 189) and confirmed by Sahagún, who provides the following concepts: tlamachchiuhqui – those who weave and embroider decorated blankets; tzauhqui – spinners; and tlatzonqui – seamstresses or embroiderers (Florentine Codex, 1950-1982, X: 35-36, 51-52).
Again, Carrasco (1977: 226) points out that weavers ‘were hired to go and weave in households that employed them’. Moreover, the finest quality textiles were produced in the homes of well-to-do families, probably because the women who worked there ‘were free from the most onerous of domestic chores, such as grinding, and the men were able to have several wives and offspring’, leading to even greater textile production (ibid).

The use of backstrap looms is illustrated in the work of Sahagún (Florentine Codex, 1950-1982, X, ills. 3, 21, 58, 104, 190) and in the Codex Mendoza (1964: fol. 60r). The wide range of weaving styles is mentioned in several sources – here, we quote from just one, Torquemada (1975, IV: 255):-
‘They made these clothes with cotton, some white, others black and adorned with different colours. Some were thick, like heavy netting, others thin and closely woven, like Moorish gauze veils; according to how they desired them. Others, most unusual, were made from rabbit fur interwoven with silk, worn by the nobility as cloaks to protect them from the cold, being very warm, soft and smooth, and so contrived as to wonder how rabbit fur could be incorporated into them.’

The combination of high demand, simple technology and lengthy production time led to textiles being valued as a currency and as prestige goods (Hicks, 1994: 90). Weaving was seen by Tenochtitlan as one of the leading tribute products (Rojas, 1986: 161). Every year the city received 2,076,000 cotton and 296,000 agave fibre capes (Molins-Fabrega, 1954: 314), and just 4,400 bales of natural cotton (ibid: 315), giving a total of 101,217.6 kgs of cotton annually. Besides this, the city received 240,000 naguas (skirts) and huipiles (sleeveless blouses) and 144,000 maxtlatl (loincloths) (ibid).

So great was the economic strength of the textiles industry that almost anything could be paid for by means of capes or blankets, which proved to be a convenient means of accumulating wealth and value. Amongst the Aztecs severe penalties, including slavery, were imposed for robbery, unless the offender paid a stipulated number of capes (Alcobiz, 1941: 280; Calnek, 1978: 111). Capes as well as slaves were placed as bets in the ritual ballgame (Codex Tudela, 1980, I: 286; II: fol. 67r-67v). A player who bet his own life on the game and lost was estimated to be worth 20 capes (Bosch, 1944: 55).

Furthermore, capes were used during wars to reward whoever should provide information on the movement of enemy forces (Mendieta, 1945, 1: 142). Similarly, youths who wanted to leave the telpochcalli (school for commoners) in order to marry had to pay from 10-20 large capes (quachtli) (Florentine Codex, 1950-1982, III: 59). It’s also recorded that “people of wealth might lend quachtli on the understanding that if someone should ask them for capes on loan or on trust, should they be unable to repay them, he would be [their] slave’ (Las Casas, 1958, II: 237).

We have to suppose that in spinning and weaving, every woman produced a surplus. This labour permeated every aspect of Aztec society: even female slaves destined to be sacrificed were obliged to spin and weave before dying (Garibay, 1995: 121); in contrast, male ‘bathed slaves’ were free from any such labour commitment. We see then that textile production comprised a means of appropriating power that did not reside in the hands of those who made them.
To conclude, Aztec women’s participation in economic activities was associated with: labour considered an extension of domestic work and which required no travel, jobs based on little formal training (market seller, prostitute, matchmaker), the skills for which they would have learnt since childhood (cook, weaver, spinner), and learnt from parents (healer, midwife, fortune-teller), acting as assistants to spouses or fathers (scribe, featherworker), and part-time occupations that did not interfere with their regular female duties.

As such, textiles production constituted a heavy burden in the form of tribute imposed on women, the benefits and profits from which were enjoyed by male political authorities; they also formed a conduit by which alliances were brokered or favours curried. They were, in truth, bargaining tools and the means by which political deals could be negotiated.

Bibliographic references:-
• Alcobiz, Fray Andrés de 1941 “Estas son las leyes que tenían los indios de la Nueva España, Anahuac o México”, en Relaciones de Texcoco y de la Nueva España, Juan Bautista Pomar, México, Editorial Salvador Chávez Hayhoe, pp. 280-286.
• Bosch, Carlos 1944 La esclavitud prehispánica entre los aztecas, México, El Colegio de México
• Calnek, Edward E. 1978 “El sistema de mercado en Tenochtitlan” en Economía política e ideología en el México prehispánico, Pedro Carrasco y Johanna Broda (eds.), México, Editorial Nueva Imagen, pp. 97-114
• Carrasco, Pedro 1977 “La sociedad mexicana antes de la conquista” en Historia General de México vol. 1, México, El Colegio de México, pp. 165-288
• Cervantes de Salazar, Francisco 1971 Crónica de la Nueva España, Madrid, Ediciones Atlas, Biblioteca de Autores Españoles
• Códice Borbónico 1993 Manuscrito mexicano de la biblioteca del Palais Bourbon: libro adivinatorio y ritual ilustrado, descripción, historia y exposición del Códice Borbónico por Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, con un comentario explicativo por E. T. Hamy, edición facsimilar, México, Siglo XXI Editores, 429 pp.
• Códice Florentino 1979 Códice Florentino, México, Secretaría de Gobernación, 3 vols.
• Códice Mendocino 1979 Manuscrito mexicano del siglo XVI que se conserva en la Biblioteca Bodleiana de Oxford, editado por José Ignacio Echegaray y prefacio de Ernesto de la Torre del Villar de la Academia Mexicana, correspondiente de la Real de Madrid, México, San Ángel Ediciones, 194 pp.
• Códice Mendoza o Códice Mendocino 1964 en Antigüedades de México, basadas en la recopilación de Lord Kingsborough, palabras preliminares de Antonio Ortiz Mena, prólogo de Agustín Yáñez, estudio e interpretación de José Corona Núñez, México, Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público, vol. I, pp. 1-149
• Códice Telleriano-Remensis 1964 en Antigüedades de México, basadas en la recopilación de Lord Kingsborough, palabras preliminares de Antonio Ortiz Mena, prólogo de Agustín Yáñez, estudio e interpretación de José Corona Núñez, México, Secretaría de Hacienda y Crédito Público, vol. I, pp. 151-337
• Códice Tudela 1980 Edición fascimilar del original existente en el Museo de América de Madrid, José Tudela (compl.), Madrid, Instituto de Cooperación Iberoamericana, Editorial Cultura Hispánica, 2 vols.
• Díaz del Castillo, Bernal 1975 Historia verdadera de la conquista de la Nueva España, Madrid, Espasa, Calpe
• Florentine Codex, see Sahagún, 1950-1982
• García Quintana, Josefina 1978 “Exhortación del padre que así amonesta a su hijo casado, tlazopilli” en Estudios de Cultura Náhuatl, vol. 13, pp. 49-67
• Garibay, Ángel Ma. 1995 Vida económica de Tenochtitlan. 1. Pochtecayotl (Arte de traficar), paleografía, versión, introducción y apéndices preparados por Ángel Ma. Garibay K., México, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas
• Hicks, Frederic 1994 “Cloth in the Political Economy of the Aztec State” en Economies and Polities in the Aztec Realm, Mary G. Hodge and Michael E. Smith (ed.), Studies on Culture and Society, vol. 6, Institute for Mesoamerican Studies, The University of Albany, State University of New York, Albany, New York, pp. 89-111
• Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas 2002 en Mitos e historias de los antiguos nahuas, paleografía y traducciones de Rafael Tena, Consejo Nacional para la Cultura y las Artes, Colección Cien de México, México, pp. 13-95.

Aztec limerick no. 39 - Ode to weaving -
Women’s labour conTRIBUTEd through weaving
Meant the Aztec state’s coffers were heaving.
Was the twirl of the spindle -
A gender-based swindle?
Men’s wealth and control came through thieving…

‘Aztec Women: Capable Partners and Cosmic Enemies’The author’s website