The American Society for Ethnohistory

The Woman's Room: Some Aspects of Gender Relations in Tenochtitlan in the Late Pre-
Hispanic Period
Author(s): Susan Kellogg
Source: Ethnohistory, Vol. 42, No. 4, Women, Power, and Resistance in Colonial Mesoamerica
(Autumn, 1995), pp. 563-576
Published by: Duke University Press
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The Woman'sRoom: Some Aspectsof Gender
Relationsin Tenochtitlanin the
Late Pre-HispanicPeriod

Susan Kellogg, Universityof Houston

Abstract.Mexicasocietydefinedgenderdifferentiation by parallelmaleandfemale
spheresin which menandwomenplayedsignificantpublicroles.In economiclife,
politics,andreligiousrituals,womenheldpositionsof authoritythatdidnot differ-
entiatebetweenpublicandprivaterealms,andclassplayeda criticalrolein shaping
theseexperiences.

Nahuatl, the language spoken by most people living in the Valley of Mexico
during the late pre-Hispanic period, has a word for "woman's room," cihua-
calli. The cihuacalli existed within the multiroom house structures of the
Mexica in Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco. Spaniardsreferred to this room as
a kitchen, but its function is not easily determined from legal texts of the
early-colonial period. The indeterminatenature of the cihuacalli symbolizes
the indeterminate nature of the cihuatl, the Mexica woman. Many schol-
ars who have looked at the available evidence, especially that provided by
Spanish chroniclers, have concluded that the cihuatl was something of a
drudge: birthing, weaving, cleaning, and cooking her way through life.'
In this essay, I make two arguments. First, there was no one single
cihuatl; class played a critical role in shaping many aspects of women's
experiences. Feminist theorists have recently emphasized this point when
studying the interrelationships among gender, race, and class.2 The same
point has been made by Irene Silverblattfor the pre-Hispanic Andes.3Sec-
ond, women's experiences suggest that although gender differentiationwas
central to Mexica ideology and the organization of society, describing this
differentiation in terms of public and private domains would be inappro-
priate. Instead, the Mexica appear to have conceived of parallel male and

4z:4 (fall I995). Copyright? by the AmericanSocietyfor Ethno-

Ethnohistory
history. ccc OoI4-I80I/95/$I.50.

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564 SusanKellogg

female spheres in which men and women played significant public roles.
Men and women were viewed as very different from each other, yet each
was seen as an independent adult whose duties, whether economic, politi-
cal, or religious, were necessary for the balanced functioning of the Mexica
world. Women's roles outside the home, then, are the main focus of this
essay. After examining how the concept of gender parallelism can be ap-
plied to Mexica society, I discuss women's roles and activities in three
areas: as leaders and administrators, as priestesses and practitioners, and
as producers and traders. Though the woman's sphere encompassed many
activities and aspects of Mexica social life-it was female, but not "femi-
nine" - it did not survive the reorganization of indigenous life that took
place after the Spanish conquest.

Gender Parallelism in Mexica Society

During the fifteenth century "gender parallelism" characterized Mexica

society.4 The concept refers to parallel social structures and cultural con-
figurations for males and females. However, gender parallelism does not
connote equality. I am not arguingthat Mexica society was egalitarian.Par-
ticularly in the realm of politics, gender parallelism was compatible with
some degree of gender hierarchy.But the Mexica esteemed many women's
activities, and in diverse areas of life women and men played parallel and
complementary roles. Thus, in late pre-Hispanic Tenochtitlan, gender roles
and relationships consisted of both complementary and hierarchical ele-
ments. Generally, however, the former outweighed the latter. The comple-
mentaryaspects expressed themselves in various ways, including genealogy
and kinship, politics, labor and work, and religion. Complementary gen-
der relations were also frequently expressed through parallel structures
of thought, language, and action in which males and females were con-
ceived of and through which they played different yet parallel and equally
necessary roles.
The basis for Mexica gender parallelism lay in the particular forms
of culture and thought-kinship beliefs and structures, and rights to prop-
erty, especially those gained through inheritance-that characterized this
society. These forms of thought and culture prominently featured dualities
and complementarities that sometimes emphasized contrast and opposition
and sometimes merged the differences into a higher unity.5The kinship sys-
tem was based on an ideology of descent best characterized as cognatic-
that is, descent could be traced from and through men and/or women.6The
Mexica believed that both the mother and father contributed bodily fluids

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GenderRelationsin Tenochtitlan 565

that formed a fetus, and the new child was considered to be the descendant
of ancestors related through each parent.7Gender parallelism also rested,
to some degree, on a practical division made in both beliefs and practices
between a male domain centered on war, battlefields, and men's work and
a female domain centered on households and women's work.8
Bilateral inheritance patterns also reinforced gender parallelism. Both
female and male children inherited rights and property from their mothers
and fathers.9In the late-precolonial period, women's access to property-
whether gained through inheritance, dowry, or work -meant that women
possessed some independent materialresources.10The property that women
brought into marriage remained separate from that brought into marriage
by men.1'Further,the Mexica distinguished between household goods that
belonged to men and those that belonged to women.12Thus, women cannot
be viewed as having been economic dependents.

Women as Leaders and Administrators

One way women's autonomy and gender parallelismwas expressed in social

action and in everyday life was through the Mexica political system. In
Mexica society, as well as in the broader Nahua society of central Mexico,
women participated in political life in various ways. At the highest level,
rulers, known in Nahuatl as tiatoani, were the supreme, dynastic rulers of
the altepetl (regional, ethnic states) that characterized the central Mexican
region.'3 Leaders of the constituent parts of states and smaller towns were
sometimes known as teuctlatoani.'4Lords and nobles who held offices of
variable statuses were known as teteuctin (sing., teuctli) and pipiltin (sing.,
pilli). Each term could be modified by the term cihuatlto refer to the female
consorts of the rulers, lords, or nobles (e.g., cihuatlatoanifor queen). Rela-
tively little is known about the positions or the actual women who held
them. Did these roles form a parallel hierarchy of leadership over women,
as has been demonstrated in Andean societies? 15
Under unusual circumstances, women did serve as paramountrulers.16
However, the historical writings outlining the political histories of cen-
tral Mexican states tend to emphasize the connective roles of noblewomen
as wives, mothers, sisters, and daughters, rather than their roles as politi-
cal actors.'7 But the wives of the highest officials may well have had some
political responsibilities. The tlatocacihuatlwas "a woman ruler, governor,
leader-a provider, an administrator."She also was to be obeyed and, if
she was not obeyed, could punish. The cihuateculti "governs, leads, pro-
vides for one, arrangeswell, administers peacefully."18 Clearer evidence of

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566 SusanKellogg

women holding gender parallel, significant supervisory and administrative

positions can be found by examining the important institutions of everyday
life in Tenochtitlan.
Women held administrative authority in a variety of institutions. In
the marketplace, women were not only buyers and vendors (see below),
they were administrators as well (tianquizpan tlayacanqui, "marketplace
judge or administrator"), a position that was also held by men.19The re-
sponsibilities of the marketplace administrators included overseeing the
fairness of the prices of goods, supervising the production of war provi-
sions, and assigning tribute. Thus female administrators oversaw certain
women's productive tasks.
Supervisory positions in marketplaces were not the only economic
posts held by women. It appears that women could hold official, hier-
archically ranked positions within guilds associated with craft production,
although it is unclear whether there were women's divisions within guilds
or parallel women's guilds. A ceremony described in Durain'sHistoria, per-
formed to increase the number of sacrificial victims to the goddess Cihua-
coatl, featured important women's crafts producers and merchants.20The
ritual involved taking a child's cradle and placing a stone knife in it, then
delivering it, first to "la mas principaljoyera"who then took it to the market
to "la mas principalmercadera."
Women also held quasi-political, quasi-religious supervisory positions
in the cuicacalli (song house), which were either part of the royal palace or
attached to major temples.21 During the month of Uey tecuilhuitl(great feast
of the lords), couples living in concubinage (nemecatilizatli)were brought
for judgment before the cuicacalli. A man would be punished by having
his possessions taken, and he was beaten, burned, and expelled from the
cuicacalli. Sahaguin'sinformants then explained that the "mistresses of
women" (cihuatetiachcahuan)expelled the woman. "Nevermore was she to
sing and dance with the others; nevermore was she to hold others by the
hand. Thus the girls' matrons [ichpochtlayacanqui]established; thus they
resolved."22 Ichpochtlayacanquimeans "administratoror director of young
women and, in conjunction with the term cihuatetiachcahuan,is similar to
the paired terms tiachcahuanand telpochtlatoqueused for the male teach-
ers in the telpochcalli.The description of these women's positions in the
Florentine Codex, however brief, places the ichpochtlayacanqui and the
cihuatetiachcauh in a religious context.
Other evidence depicts women functionaries in quasi-political or ad-
ministrative contexts. Durin's account of the "schools of dance" (his term
for the cuicacalli) reinforces the picture of a parallel structuring of male

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GenderRelationsin Tenochtitlan 567

and female leadership roles within the institutions of daily life, affecting
the masses of people who made up Tenochtitlan's population.
In order to collect and bring these young men to teach them [to dance],
there were old men, assigned and chosen only for that office, in all the
barrios,who were called teanque,which means "men who go to collect
young men." In order to collect the young women there were old Indian
women, appointed by all the barrios,who were called cibuatepixque
which means "women guards" or "mistress.
Early-colonial legal documents for both Tenochtitlan and Culhuacan in-
dicate that women were included among the tepixque (and were referred
to as cibuatepixque,or "women guards") and tlaxilacalle (called cibuatla-
xilacalle, "women ward elders"). The men and women who filled these
positions likely had responsibilities for overseeing daily affairs within local
subdivisions (tlaxilacalli) of the city.24
This parallel gender structuring had certain limits at the highest levels
of administration and governance. Prominent governing positions were vir-
tually always held by men. Warfareand the warrior hierarchyalso excluded
women, though Mexica ceremonies drew a symbolic equivalence between
females giving birth and males taking prisoners. Mexica rituals also drew a
parallel between dying in childbirth and being killed or captured in battle.25
Yet even if the highest levels of governance excluded women, the
Mexica used a political language that drew on gender parallels. The ruler
of the Mexica, the tlatoani, was often referred to as the father and mother
of his people, as in a speech made by a noble to Tenochtitlan's popula-
tion at the occasion of the installation of a new tlatoani, when he sought
to assure those gathered that the tlatoani was "thy real mother, thy real
father" (vel monantzin, vel motatzin).26Other high officials might be re-
ferred to as mothers and fathers and deities might be conceptualized in a
similar fashion as well.27Such statements suggest that a close conceptual
parallel was drawn between the duties of rulership and those of parenting,
but they also suggest that both the male and female aspects of parenting
were deemed necessary for adequate leadership. It is also interesting to note
that the second-in-command and closest adviser to the tlatoani was called
the cibuacoatl(woman serpent). The female deity associated with the "rain-
moisture-agricultural fertility" complex of deities also went by the name
Cihuacoatl. The cihuacoatl did not replace a tlatoani who died, but the
cihuacoatl could substitute for the tlatoani at ceremonial occasions. One
scholar of Nahuatl believed that the use of the term cibuacoatlembodied the
representation of a "female principle" at this highest level of government.28

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568 SusanKellogg

The Mexica thus envisioned leadership as combining paternal and mascu-

line qualities with maternal and feminine ones. If the imagery of leadership
rested on a benign concept of parenthood, images of deities expressed more
complex aspects of Mexica beliefs about their world.

Women as Priestesses and Practitioners

Gender parallelism is also evident in the religious realm. The major deities
of sustenance-dedicated to maize (Xilonen, Iztac Cinteotl, Chicomecoatl),
salt (Uixtocihuatl), and maguey (Mayahuel)-were all female, as was one of
the water deities, Chalchiuhtlicue, the wife of Tlaloc. Other female deities,
Toci and Cihuacoatl, represented earth and fire. Many significant male
deities had female consorts who were variously depicted as mothers, sisters,
and/or wives, whose identity was closely linked with the males in an "easy
androgeny," as Inga Clendinnen has observed.29The female deities were
worshiped during the eighteen monthly calendrical ceremonies, and some
were also worshiped in their own temples as patron goddesses of ethnic or
occupational groups.30
Female deities could also express powerfully negative images even
when associated with important, positive values of Mexica culture. Mexica
goddesses were depicted as powerful, earthy, active, sexual, even violent.
The combative Coyolxauhqui - a fire goddess -ready to do battle with her
brother Huitzilopochtli; the fearsome, bloody Coatlicue, the mother of
Huitzilopochtli and an earth goddess; and the fierce and sexual Tlazolteotl
giving birth-another earth goddess-presented images of female agency
and power.3'The organization of worship of all the Mexica deities can only
be glimpsed through the descriptions of particular ceremonies, but here
again we see evidence of gender parallelism.
Temples could be staffed by both male and female priests. The terms
tlamacazque(sing., tlamacazqui)and cihuatlamacazquewere used for lower-
level priests and priestesses and cuacuiltin (sing., cuacuilli) and cihuacua-
cuiltin for higher-level priests and priestesses.32Parents could offer their
infant daughters to the calmecac to become priestesses, though relatively
few women remained as such for their whole lives, in contrast to male
priests.33Priestesses trained women in religious service and oversaw their
education and well-being.34Males held the highest-status priestly posi-
tions and carried out human sacrifice, but women helped prepare sacrificial
victims.35Women priestesses may be depicted in the Primerosmemoriales
as sacrificing a female victim during the month of ochpaniztli (sweeping
the road).36
Whereas the cihuatlamacazque lived in temples and helped carry out

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GenderRelationsin Tenochtitlan 569

calendrical rituals, the cihuacuacuiltin were older priestesses of higher

status. The holder of one particular priestly title, the Iztaccihuatl cihua-
cuacuilli, watched over the women who swept and kept the fire at Toci's
temple, Atenchicalcan.This position would have been one of authority:
"And any who made supplications [to the goddess] spoke to the Iztac ciua-
quacuilli. This one determined all that was done here at [the Temple ofl
Atenchicalcan."37
Women played other roles in education and life-cycle rituals. The ich-
pochtiachcauhin the telpochcalli was in charge of young girls.38And the
cihuateopixquitaught dancing to girls in the cuicacalli. Midwives (sing.,
ticitl; this term also referred to healers) not only delivered babies but also
officiated during the ceremonies conducted after a child was born, includ-
ing those right after the birth as well as the naming ceremony, which usually
took place four or five days later.39Rich in gender symbols, the birth and
naming ceremonies established the fundamental gender distinctions made
by the Mexica: that men and women were different kinds of human beings,
with distinct responsibilities and fates. Men were envisioned as warriors
and women as spinners and weavers, but each was acknowledged as provid-
ing essential labor necessary to the proper functioning of Mexica society.40
Women also played key strategic and ceremonial roles at marriage.
Severalolder women, cihuatlanque,negotiated a marriageonce the groom's
family had selected a bride.41 Their role in the marriage was symbolized
during the wedding ceremony, when they tied the shirt of the groom to the
skirt of the bride after the couple had been presented gifts by their respec-
tive mothers-in-law.The matchmakersthen placed the couple in a chamber
and "put them to bed" ("qujmontecain cioatitici").42

Women as Producers and Traders

Gender parallelism rested partly on conceptualizations of kinship and

family relations and partly on a utilitariandivision drawn both in ideologies
and practices between a male domain and a female domain. Women's prop-
erty rights and the diverse labor they performed, sometimes in the home,
but often outside it, underlay their status and independence in Mexica
society. As shown above, female administrators, rather than husbands,
often oversaw women's tasks.
Women performed essential productive tasks within and for the house-
hold, including cooking, cleaning (which had both sanitary and religious
implications),43 caring for children, marketing, spinning, weaving, and
carrying out daily household rituals. They also performed various activi-
ties in palaces, temples, markets, schools, and craftsworkers'organizations.

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570 Susan Kellogg

Women worked as priestesses, teachers, merchants, healers and midwives,

professional spinners, weavers, and embroiderers." Thus, women-like
men-provided the labor necessary to sustain their families and to fulfill
the labor, tribute, and ceremonial obligations of their households.45Men
valued this labor and were reluctant to abandon polygamy in the early colo-
nial period precisely because of its value.46In fact, women's capacity for
labor and hard work was described by Sahaguin'sinformants in the Floren-
tine Codex as among the traits associated with good women. The mother
who fulfilled her intended role was described as constantly working, as
were the "middle-aged" woman (iollococihuatl) and the "maturewoman"
(omaciccihuatl).
Given women's property rights and labor contributions, it is not sur-
prising to find that adult Mexica women were considered autonomous, not
dependent on men. The day sign discussion in book 4 of the Florentine
Codex strongly supports this interpretation. In the description of the very
first day sign, ce cipactli, or "One Crocodile," Sahaguin'sinformants sug-
gested that women as well as men had the capacity to merit or earn the
good fortunes due them for being born on this day. Noble or commoner
men would be rulers or brave warriors; a woman would prosper and be
able to feed others.
She would have food and drink available. She would have food for
others to eat; she would invite others to feast. She would be respectful.
She would be visited by others; she would revive and refresh the spirits
and bodies of those who lived in misery on earth.... Of her fatigue
and effort, nothing would be in vain. Successful would be her dealings
around the marketplace in the place of business; it was as if it would
sprinkle, shower, and rain her wares upon her.48
But men and women also shared the capacity to destroy their good fortune
by neglecting their responsibilities. Women born under the fourth sign, ce
xochitl, or "One Flower," were said to be skilled embroiderers. But this
sign was described as "indifferent"(tianepantla),and thus for a woman to
be skilled in embroidery, she had to do penances, fast, and draw blood. If
she did not perform her penances, she would harm her sign and thereby
merit "complete poverty and misery" (can moch icnoitl, netoliniliztli).9 She
would then fall into poverty and would sell herself into prostitution. Not
only were women viewed as economically autonomous, but they passed on
the fruits of their hard work and good fortune to their children, as shown
by the discussion of the ninth sign, ce coatl, or "One Serpent," a special
sign for merchants. Women merchants born on this day were thought to
be particularly successful. "She would be quite rich, she would be a good

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GenderRelationsin Tenochtitlan 57I

provider; she would be well-born. She would look to and guard the services
and the property of our lord. She would be a guardian and administrator.
Much would she gather, collect, save, and justly distribute among her chil-
dren."50Thus, women-like men-were capable of influencing their own
economic well-being and could contribute to the estates and well-being of
their children and descendants.
In the war-oriented society of the Tenochcan Mexica, women's labor
possessed special significance. Whether noble or commoner, women often
had to manage households and productive activities in the absence of hus-
bands and other kinsmen.5'In fact, the daily demands placed upon women
appear to have been quite heavy.52Large numbers of men were frequently
absent from their households for prolonged periods of time because of fre-
quent warfare and the expansion of the empire of the Triple Alliance.53
Moreover, the Mexica birthrate appears to have been high, since during
the precolonial period the population of the Valley of Mexico grew rapidly,
as did its density.54Not only were women bearing and caring for these
children, they labored for households and crafts groups to meet the heavy
demands of palaces, temples, and the state owing to high levels of popula-
tion increase and warfare, which in turn drew men out of households and
craft production.
Mexica women practiced specific rituals when their husbands went
off to war, and public recognition was given for the sadness brought on
by the lengthy absences of husbands, fathers, and male kin.55The women
of merchant families also experienced frequent leave-takings, participat-
ing in feasts to mark the departures of the long-distance merchants.56The
merchants would trade goods consigned to them by the women merchants
(pochtecacihua).57 Many of the goods brought back by long-distance mer-
chants would be stored at the houses of female kin who may then have
served to move some goods into the market system.58Women were active
in the markets as sellers and as buyers.59Mexica women's productive ac-
tivities and their property rights thus provided some measure of autonomy
and independence.

Conclusion

From economic to religious to political domains, the Mexica structured

activities and ceremonies so that women and men had semiseparaterespon-
sibilities and organizations. The structuring of production, politics, and
rituals ensured that women had access to positions of authority and did not
differentiate strongly between public and private realms. Although women
did not serve at the very highest levels of governance (though even at this

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572 Susan Kellogg

level, they may have held some responsibilities) and were excluded from
the warrior hierarchy,women - like men - held administrativeauthority in
temples and houses of song, in markets, and in neighborhoods. The frequent
absences of men because of warfare and long-distance trading reinforced
the existence of semiseparabledomains, female and male, which both con-
ceptually and practically organized and differentiated women's and men's
experiences.
Women played significant public roles. Yet the cihuatlatoani and the
woman selling atole, feathers, or herbs in the market would have had very
different experiences in relationship to their labor, their daily activities,
their housing and possessions, and even, perhaps, in their relationshipswith
husbands and children. The more ethnographic sources such as the Floren-
tine Codex or the Codex Mendoza treat gender, and especially female iden-
tity, as a fundamental division within Mexica society. Although both men
and women were "jural adults," that is, fully capable of taking social and
legal responsibility for themselves (the identity of Mexica women as jural
adults would not survive the transition to colonial rule),60these sources de-
pict the life courses of women and men as totally different.The Codex Men-
doza, for example, shows many careers for men and very few for women.
The variety of and ranking within women's activities simply do not appear
clearly in many sources. To understandthe range of women's activities, we
not only must depend on subtle fragments of evidence and clues but also
must make transparent the cultural biases, especially involving class and
gender, of both the Spaniardswho collected and those Mexica who gave the
information that such reconstructions depend upon. We cannot reconstruct
the richness of any one pre-Hispanic woman's life-neither its events nor
even the agency, domination, hierachy, compromise, even fate, embedded
in that life -as Ruth Behar has shown in her recent biographical and auto-
biographical work dealing with a contemporary Mexican woman.6' Yet
the image of the cihuacalli, the woman's room-that separate space within
the household-provides a clue to the material and social bases for the
parallel gender structuring, differentiated by class and occupation, of late
pre-Hispanic Mexica society.

Notes

i See, for example, Inga Clendinnen, Aztecs: An Interpretation (New York, i99i),
chaps. 6-8; Maria Rodriguez, La mu/erazteca (Mexico City, i988); S. L. Cline,
ColonialCulhuacan,I58o-i6oo: A SocialHistoryof an Aztec Town(Albuquerque,
NM, i986), iiz-zo; Colin M. MacLachlan, "The Eagle and the Serpent: Male
over Female in Tenochtitldn," Proceedingsof the Pacific Coast Councilof Latin

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Gender Relations in Tenochtitlan 573

AmericanStudies 5 (I976): 45-56; June Nash, "The Aztecs and the Ideology of
Male Dominance," Signs 4 (I978): 349-6z.
z Importantworks within this literatureinclude Patricia Hill Collins, BlackFemi-
nist Thought:Knowledge,Consciousness,and the Politics of Empowerment(New
York, i99i); bell hooks, Yearning:Race, Gender, and CulturalPolitics (Boston,
I990); Cherri6Moraga and Gloria Anzaldia, eds., This Bridge CalledMy Back:
Writingsby Radical Womenof Color (New York, I983); and Chandra Talpade
Mohanty, Ann Russo, and Lourdes Torres, eds., Third World Womenand the
Politics of Feminism(Bloomington, IN, I99I).
3 Irene Silverblatt, Moon, Sun, and Witches: Gender Ideologiesand Class in Inca
and Colonial Peru (Princeton, NJ, I987), esp. chaps. 5-7. See also her recent,
thoughtful discussion of the multiple complexities that feminist ethnohistories
must reconstruct ("InterpretingWomen in States: New Feminist Ethnohisto-
ries," in Gender at the Crossroadsof Knowledge:Feminist Anthropologyin the
PostmodernEra, ed. Micaela di Leonardo [Berkeleyand Los Angeles, CA, I99I],
I40-7I).
4 Silverblatt, Moon, Sun, and Witches,zo.
5 On Nahua forms of thought and culture see Louise M. Burkhart, The Slippery
Earth: Nahua-Christian Moral Dialogue in Sixteenth-CenturyMexico (Tucson,
AZ, I989), 36-39; Miguel Le6n-Portilla, Aztec Thoughtand Culture: A Study
of the Ancient Nahuatl Mind (Norman, OK, i963), 36, 8z-83; Alfredo L6pez
Austin, Cuerpohumanoe ideologia:Las concepcionesde losantiguosnahuas,z vols.
(Mexico City, I980); and Henry B. Nicholson, "Religion in Pre-Hispanic Cen-
tral Mexico," in Handbookof Middle AmericanIndians, ed. Gordon F. Ekholm
and Ignacio Bernal, vol. IO, Archaeologyof Northern Mesoamerica(Austin, TX,
I97I), 395-446.
6 Edward Calnek, "The SahaguinTexts as a Source of Sociological Information,"
in Sixteenth-CenturyMexico: The Workof Sahagun, ed. Munro S. Edmonson
(Albuquerque, NM, I974), I89-z04; Calnek, "Kinship, Settlement Pattern, and
Domestic Groups in Tenochtitlan" (manuscript);Pedro Carrasco,"Social Orga-
nization of Ancient Mexico," in Ekholm and Bernal, Handbook,IO:366-72;
Susan Kellogg, "Kinship and Social Organization in Early Colonial Tenochti-
tlan," in Supplementto the Handbookof Middle American Indians, ed. Ronald
Spores, vol. 4, Ethnohistory (Austin, TX, i986), I03-zI. For a differing view of
Nahua kinship patterns that deemphasizes the role of descent see Jerome A.
Offner, Law and Politics in Aztec Texcoco (Cambridge, I983), 163-zI3; and James
Lockhart, The Nahuas after the Conquest:A Social and Cultural History of the
Indiansof CentralMexico, SixteenththroughEighteenthCenturies(Stanford, CA,
i99z), chap. 3. For further discussion of the significance of kinship in Mexica
culture see Susan Kellogg, Law and the Transformationof Aztec Culture,I5oo-
1700 (Norman, OK, I995), chap. 5.
7 Bernardino de Sahagun, FlorentineCodex, rev. ed. I4 vols. in i3, ed. and trans.
Arthur J. 0. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble (Salt Lake City, UT, I950-8z),
Io.27.I30, I32; 6.27.I56-57, 32.I75, 40.zi6 (hereafter cited as FC, followed by
part, chapter, page number).
8 The parallel forms of training are depicted in Frances F. Berdan and Patricia
Rieff Anawalt, The Codex Mendoza, 4 vols. (Berkeley and Los Angeles, CA,
I992), 3: 57r-60r (hereaftercited as CM).

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574 Susan Kellogg

9 Susan Kellogg, "Aztec Inheritance in Sixteenth-Century Mexico City: Colo-

nial Patterns,PrehispanicInfluences,"Ethnohistory
33(I986): 3I3-30; Cline,
ColonialCulhuacan,65-77.
io Although dowries may have been limited to elite women, as Cline has shown in
Colonial Culhuacan(ii6), the ability of women to work and accumulate prop-
erty was not limited only to elite women, as shown in the section on women as
producers and traders.
ii Diego Duran, Historiade las Indiasde Nueva-Espanay islasde tierrafirme,z vols.
(MexicoCity,I967), I.5.57 (volume,chapter,pagenumber).
I2 FC, 7.I2.3I.
I3 Lockhart,Nahuasafterthe Conquest,
I4-20.
I4 Carrasco, "Social Organization," 35z; Lockhart, Nahuas after the Conquest,i6.
I5 Silverblatt, Moon, Sun, and Witches,53-66.
i6 Examples are to be found in Susan D. Gillespie, The Aztec Kings: The Construc-
tion of Rulershipin MexicaHistory(Tucson,AZ, I989), chaps. 2-4. See also
Susan Schroeder, "The Noblewomen of Chalco," paper presented at the Pacific
Coast Branch of the American Historical Association Meeting, Portland, OR,
August I989.
I7 The genealogical histories of Chimalpahin and Tezozomoc illustrate this char-
acteristic. See, for example, Domingo Francisco Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuani-
tzin, Relacionesoriginalesde Chalco Amaquemacan,trans. S. Rend6n (Mexico
City, I965); and Fernando Alvarado Tezozomoc, Crdnica mexicayotl (Mexico
City,I975).
i8 The descriptions are in FC, IO.I3.46. The quoted passages in Nahuatl read "ca
cioatlatoani, tepachoani, teiacanani, tetlataluiani, tlanoatiani" and "tlapacho,
tepachoa, tlaiacana, tenemitia, tlauelmanitia, iuian iocuxca tlauica."
I9 FC, 8.I9.67-69.
zo Duran,Historia,I.I3.I30.
2i Sahagun's informants described the cuicacalli as part of the palace, whereas
Duranstatedthatit was attachedto majortemples(seeFC, 3.I8.43, andDuran,
Historia, i.zi.i90; see also Edward Calnek, "The Calmecacand Telpochcalliin
Pre-Conquest Tenochtitlan,"in The Workof Bernardinode Sahagun:PioneerEth-
nographerof Sixteenth-CenturyAztec Mexico, ed. J. Jorge Klor de Alva, H. B.
Nicholson,andEloiseQuifionesKeber[New York,I988], I69-71).
22 FC, 2.27.97: "Aoqujcno teoa cujcoianoz,aoqujcno tenaoaz,ic qujcennaoatia,
qujcenmacaca, yn ichpuchtlaiacanquj."
23 Duran, Historia, i.zi.i89: "Pararecoger y traer estos mozos a enseniarse,habia
hombres ancianos, diputados y electos para solo aquel oficio, en todos los bar-
rios, a los cuales (ancianos) llamaban teanque, que quiere decir 'hombres que
andan a traer mozos.' Para recoger las mozas habia indias viejas, sefialadas por
todos los barrios, a las cuales llamaban cihuatepixque,que quiere decir 'guarda
mujeres,' o amas."
24 Cline, Colonial Culhuacan,54; Lockhart, Nahuas after the Conquest,44. These
women's titles were also occasionally attached to indigenous women's names
listed as witnesses for wills in early-colonial Mexico City. See Francisca Tecu-
chu's will (I56o), Archivo Generalde la Nacion, ramoTierras4z-5: 3r (hereafter
cited as AGNT); Maria Tiacapan'swill (I56i), AGNT2729 -20, 3v;JuanaAntonia's
will (I595), AGNT 59-3, i8r.
25 Louise Burkhart, "Mexica Women on the Home Front: Housework and Reli-

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Gender Relations in Tenochtitlan 575

gion in Aztec Mexico," in Indian Womenof Early Mexico: Identity, Ethnicity,

and Gender Differentiation,ed. Susan Schroeder, Stephanie Wood, and Robert
Haskett (Norman, OK, forthcoming).
z6 FC, 6.I5.79.
27 For a reference to the tlacatecutlior tlacochcalcatlas a mother and father see FC,
6.I7.89. For references to deities as such see FC, 6.3.I3; I4.73, 74; 32.I75.
z8 See the glossary to the i967 edition of Durdn's Historia, 2:584, where Father
Angel Garibay provides definitions of Nahuatl terms and states about the term
cihuacoatl,"es el representantedel 'principio feminino.' De ahi su nombre, que
puede traducirse, 'Mujer serpiente' or mejor 'Comparte feminino.' Es el que
sustituye al rey, como la mujer al marido en casa."
z9 Clendinnen,Aztecs,249.
30 On female deities see Anna-BrittaHellbom, La participacidnculturalde las muje-
res indias y mestizas en el Mexico precortesanoy postrevolucionario(Stockholm,
I967), 36-42, 44-47; Betty Ann Brown, "Seen but Not Heard: Women in Aztec
Ritual -The SahagunTexts," in Text and Image in Pre-ColumbianArt: Essays on
the Interrelationshipof the Verbaland VisualArts (Oxford, I983), IzI-22; Susan
Kellogg, "Cognatic Kinship and Religion: Women in Aztec Society," in Smoke
and Mist: MesoamericanStudies in Memory of Thelma D. Sullivan, 2 vols., ed.
J. KathrynJosserandand KarenDakin (Oxford, I988), 2:672-73; Cecelia Klein,
"Rethinking Cihuacoatl: Aztec Political Imagery of the Conquered Woman,"
in Josserandand Dakin, Smokeand Mist, I:237-77; and ThelmaD. Sullivan,
"Tlazolteotl-Jxcuina: The Great Spinner and Weaver,"in The Art and Iconog-
raphyof Late Post-ClassicCentralMexico, ed. Elizabeth Hill Boone (Washington,
DC, i98z), 7-35.
3I Nicholson, "Religion," 408-30; Clendinnen, Aztecs, I95-209.
32 Nicholson, "Religion," 436-37.
33 FC, 2.*app.2I5-i6.
34 Duran, Historia, 2.74.544; FranciscoJavierClavijero, Historiaantiguade Mexico
(Mexico City, I976), 2o6.
35 See, for example, FC, 4.7.25.
36 Brown, "Seen but Not Heard," I27.
37 FC, z.app.i98: "Yoan in aqujn vmpa monetoltiaia, iehoatl conilhujaia in cihoa-
quacujlli iztac cihoatl, muchi iehoatl quitzontequja in tlein vncan muchivaia
atenchicalca."
38 FC, 6.39.2IO.
39 Duran, Historia, I.5.57; FC, 6.36.I98; 37.20I; CM, 3: 57r.
40 FC, 4-I-3-4; 6.3I.I7I-73; Duran, Historia, I.5.57.
4I FC, 6.23.iz8; CM, 3: 6ir; Duran, Historia, I.zi.I9I.
42 FC, 6.23.I32.
43 Burkhart,SlipperyEarth, IIO-24.
44 The most useful source on Mexica women's labor is the Florentine Codex. This
material is ably summarized in Hellbom, La participacioncultural,iz6-45.
45 Elizabeth Brumfiel, "Weaving and Cooking: Women's Production in Aztec
Mexico," in EngenderingArchaeology:Womenand Prehistory,ed. Joan M. Gero
and Margaret W. Conkey (Oxford, I99I), 224-5I.
46 Fray Toribio de Benavente o Motolinia, Memoriales o libro de las cosas de la
Nueva Espaniay de los naturalesde ellas (Mexico City, I97I), I89.
47 FC, IO.I.2; 3.II-Iz.

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576 Susan Kellogg

48 FC, 4.1.2: "Oniez in qujz, in qujquaz, teltlaqualtiz, tecoanotzaz, tetlacamatiz,

ipan calacoaz, qujtechieltiz in ati, in tlaqualli: ypal ihiiocujoaz, ypal ceviz in
jiollo, in jnacaio, in tlaihiiovitinemj tlalticpac . . . muchi onieoatiz, in tlein
maailia, atle nenquijqaz, in jqiaviz, yn jtlapaliviz, atle nenvetziz, vel motitian-
qujz in tianquiznaoac, in nentlamachoian: iuhqujn pipixaviz, ipan tepeviz, ipan
tzetzeliviz in jtiamjc."
49 Ibid., 4.7.25.
50 Ibid., I5.59: "[auh intla cioatl,] vel motlacamatiz, vel motlaiecoltiz, vel motlaca-
tiz, qujttaz, qujpiaz in jteicneliliz, in jcococauh totecujo, tlacaloanj, tlapachoanj
iez, vel qujntlacalhujz, qujntlapachilhujz, qujntetzz, qu, qujntlatlamachiz in
jpilhoan."
5I Duran, for example, describes the customary rituals practiced by women when
their husbands went off to war (Historia, i.19.i64-65).
52 Brumfiel, "Weaving and Cooking," 2z6, 234-36, 239-42.
53 Ross Hassig, Aztec Warfare:ImperialExpansionand Political Control (Norman,
OK, I988), chaps. 2-4.
54 William T. Sanders, Jeffrey R. Parsons, and Robert S. Santley, The Basin of
Mexico: EcologicalProcessesin the Evolutionof a Civilization(New York, I979),
I84-86.
55 In addition to Duran's description of leave-takingrituals for warriors (see n. 5I),
see also his description of the sadness felt by the kin of those pressed into army
service (Historia, z.zz.I86; 46.359).
56 FC, 9.3.I2.
57 Ibid., 9.3.I4.
58 Ibid., 6.3I.
59 Ibid., 6.I4.73.
6o See Susan Kellogg, "From Parallel and Equivalent to Separate but Unequal:
Tenochca Mexica Women, I500-I700," in IndianWomenof EarlyMexico: Iden-
tity, Ethnicity,and GenderDifferentation,ed. Susan Schroeder,StephanieWood,
and Robert Haskett (Norman, OK, forthcoming).
6i Ruth Behar, TranslatedWoman:Crossingthe Borderwith Esperanza'sStory (Bos-
ton, I993).

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