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The Nahuas () are a group of the
indigenous people of Mexico Indigenous peoples of Mexico ( es, gente indígena de México, pueblos indígenas de México), Native Mexicans ( es, nativos mexicanos) or Mexican Native Americans ( es, pueblos originarios de México, lit=Original peoples of Mexico), are those ...
,
El Salvador El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south ...
,
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by Hon ...
,
Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...
, and
Nicaragua Nicaragua (; ), officially the Republic of Nicaragua (), is the largest country in Central America, bordered by Honduras to the north, the Caribbean to the east, Costa Rica to the south, and the Pacific Ocean to the west. Managua is the coun ...
. They comprise the largest indigenous group in Mexico and second largest in El Salvador. The Mexica (
Aztecs The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl ...
) were of Nahua
ethnicity An ethnic group or an ethnicity is a grouping of people who identify with each other on the basis of shared attributes that distinguish them from other groups. Those attributes can include common sets of traditions, ancestry, language, history, ...
, and the Toltecs are often thought to have been as well, though in the pre-Columbian period Nahuas were subdivided into many groups that did not necessarily share a common identity. Their
Nahuan languages The Nahuan or Aztecan languages are those languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family that have undergone a sound change, known as Whorf's law, that changed an original *t to before *a. Subsequently, some Nahuan languages have changed this to ...
, or
Nahuatl Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have small ...
, consist of many
variants Variant may refer to: In arts and entertainment * ''Variant'' (magazine), a former British cultural magazine * Variant cover, an issue of comic books with varying cover art * ''Variant'' (novel), a novel by Robison Wells * "The Variant", 2021 e ...
, several of which are
mutually unintelligible In linguistics, mutual intelligibility is a relationship between languages or dialects in which speakers of different but related varieties can readily understand each other without prior familiarity or special effort. It is sometimes used as ...
. About 1.5 million Nahuas speak Nahuatl and another million speak only Spanish. Fewer than 1,000 native speakers of Nahuatl remain in El Salvador. It is suggested that the Nahua peoples originated near Aridoamerica, in regions of the present day Mexican states of
Durango Durango (), officially named Estado Libre y Soberano de Durango ( en, Free and Sovereign State of Durango; Tepehuán: ''Korian''; Nahuatl: ''Tepēhuahcān''), is one of the 31 states which make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico, situated in ...
and
Nayarit Nayarit (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Nayarit ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Nayarit), is one of the 31 states that, along with Mexico City, comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 20 municipalities and its ...
or the
Bajío El Bajío (the ''lowland'') is a cultural and geographical region within the central Mexican plateau which roughly spans from north-west of the Mexico City metropolitan area to the main silver mines in the northern-central part of the country. Thi ...
region. They split off from the other Uto-Aztecan speaking peoples and migrated into central Mexico around 500 CE. The Nahua then settled in and around the Basin of Mexico and spread out to become the dominant people in central Mexico. However, Nahuatl-speaking populations were present in smaller populations throughout Mesoamerica.


Nomenclature

The name is derived from the
Nahuatl Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have small ...
word-root , which generally means "audible, intelligible, clear" with different derivations including "language" (hence "to speak clearly" and both "something that makes an agreeble sound" and "someone who speaks well or speak one's own language").Kartunnen 1992, p. 157-158. It was used in contrast with , "to speak unintelligibly" or "speak a foreign language". Another, related term is (singular) or (
plural The plural (sometimes list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated pl., pl, or ), in many languages, is one of the values of the grammatical number, grammatical category of number. The plural of a noun typically denotes a quantity greater than the ...
) literally "Nahuatl-speaking people". The Nahuas are also sometimes referred to as
Aztecs The Aztecs () were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl ...
. Using this term for the Nahuas has generally fallen out of favor in scholarship, though it is still used for the
Aztec Empire The Aztec Empire or the Triple Alliance ( nci, Ēxcān Tlahtōlōyān, �jéːʃkaːn̥ t͡ɬaʔtoːˈlóːjaːn̥ was an alliance of three Nahua city-states: , , and . These three city-states ruled that area in and around the Valley of Mexi ...
. They have also been called (singular), (plural) or in Spanish "
Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...
s", after the
Mexica The Mexica (Nahuatl: , ;''Nahuatl Dictionary.'' (1990). Wired Humanities Project. University of Oregon. Retrieved August 29, 2012, frolink/ref> singular ) were a Nahuatl-speaking indigenous people of the Valley of Mexico who were the rulers of ...
, the Nahua tribe which founded the
Aztec Empire The Aztec Empire or the Triple Alliance ( nci, Ēxcān Tlahtōlōyān, �jéːʃkaːn̥ t͡ɬaʔtoːˈlóːjaːn̥ was an alliance of three Nahua city-states: , , and . These three city-states ruled that area in and around the Valley of Mexi ...
.


Geography

At the turn of the 16th century, Nahua populations occupied territories ranging across Mesoamerica as far south as
Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...
. However, their core area was Central Mexico, including the
Valley of Mexico The Valley of Mexico ( es, Valle de México) is a highlands plateau in central Mexico roughly coterminous with present-day Mexico City and the eastern half of the State of Mexico. Surrounded by mountains and volcanoes, the Valley of Mexico w ...
, the
Toluca Valley The Toluca Valley is a valley in central Mexico, just west of the Valley of Mexico (Mexico City), the old name was Matlatzinco. The valley runs north–south for about , surrounded by mountains, the most imposing of which is the Nevado de Toluca Vo ...
, the eastern half of the Balsas River basin, and modern-day
Tlaxcala Tlaxcala (; , ; from nah, Tlaxcallān ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Tlaxcala ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Tlaxcala), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Political divisions of Mexico, Federal Entities of Mexico. It is ...
and most of
Puebla Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
, although other linguistic and ethnic groups lived in these areas as well. They were also present in large numbers in
El Salvador El Salvador (; , meaning " The Saviour"), officially the Republic of El Salvador ( es, República de El Salvador), is a country in Central America. It is bordered on the northeast by Honduras, on the northwest by Guatemala, and on the south ...
, southeastern
Veracruz Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
, and
Colima Colima (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Colima ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Colima), is one of the 31 states that make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It shares its name with its capital and main city, Colima. Colima i ...
and coastal Michoacan. Classical Nahuatl was a lingua franca in Central Mexico before the Spanish conquest due to Aztec hegemony, and its role was not only preserved but expanded in the initial stage of colonial rule, encouraged by the Spaniards as a literary language and tool to convert diverse Mesoamerican peoples. There are many Nahuatl place names in regions where Nahuas were not the most populous group (including the names of
Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by Hon ...
and several Mexican states), due to pre-Hispanic Aztec expansion, Spanish invasions in which
Tlaxcaltecs The Tlaxcalans, or Tlaxcaltecs, are a Nahua people who live in the Mexican state of Tlaxcala. Pre-Columbian history The Tlaxcaltecs were originally a conglomeration of three distinct ethnic groups who spoke Nahuatl, Otomi, and Pinome that compri ...
served as the main force, and the usage of Nahuatl as a lingua franca. The last of the southern Nahua populations today are the
Pipil Pipil may refer to: *Nahua people of western El Salvador *Pipil language Nawat (academically Pipil, also known as Nicarao) is a Nahuan language native to Central America. It is the southernmost extant member of the Uto-Aztecan family. It was spo ...
of El Salvador. Nahua populations in Mexico are centered in the middle of the country, with most speakers in the states of
Puebla Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
,
Veracruz Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
, Hidalgo,
Guerrero Guerrero is one of the 32 states that comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 81 municipalities and its capital city is Chilpancingo and its largest city is Acapulcocopied from article, GuerreroAs of 2020, Guerrero the pop ...
and
San Luis Potosí San Luis Potosí (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of San Luis Potosí ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de San Luis Potosí), is one of the 32 states which compose the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 58 municipalities and i ...
. However, smaller populations are spread throughout the country due to recent population movements within Mexico. Within the last 50 years, Nahua populations have appeared in the United States, particularly in
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
,
Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world ...
, and
Houston Houston (; ) is the most populous city in Texas, the most populous city in the Southern United States, the fourth-most populous city in the United States, and the sixth-most populous city in North America, with a population of 2,304,580 ...
.


History


Pre-conquest period

Archaeological, historical and linguistic evidence suggest that the Nahuas originally came from the deserts of northern Mexico ( Aridoamerica) and migrated into central Mexico in several waves. The presence of the Mexicanero people (who speak a Nahuatl variant) in this area until the present day affirms this theory. Before the Nahuas entered Mesoamerica, they were probably living for a while in northwestern Mexico alongside the
Cora Cora may refer to: Science * ''Cora'' (fungus), a genus of lichens * ''Cora'' (damselfly), a genus of damselflies * CorA metal ion transporter, a Mg2+ influx system People * Cora (name), a given name and surname * Cora E. (born 1968), German h ...
and
Huichol The Huichol or Wixárika are an indigenous people of Mexico and the United States living in the Sierra Madre Occidental range in the states of Nayarit, Jalisco, Zacatecas, and Durango, as well as in the United States in the states of Californi ...
peoples. The first group of Nahuas to split from the main group were the Pochutec who went on to settle on the Pacific coast of
Oaxaca Oaxaca ( , also , , from nci, Huāxyacac ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Oaxaca ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Oaxaca), is one of the 32 states that compose the Federative Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 570 municipaliti ...
possibly as early as 400 CE. From c. 600 CE the Nahua quickly rose to power in central Mexico and expanded into areas earlier occupied by Oto-Manguean, Totonacan and Huastec peoples. Through their integration in the Mesoamerican cultural area the Nahuas adopted many cultural traits including maize agriculture and urbanism, religious practices including a ritual calendar of 260 days and the practice of human sacrifices and the construction of monumental architecture and the use of logographic writing. Around 1000 CE the Toltec people, normally assumed to have been of Nahua ethnicity, established dominion over much of central Mexico which they ruled from Tollan Xicocotitlan. From this period on the Nahua were the dominant ethnic group in the Valley of Mexico and far beyond, and migrations kept coming in from the north. After the fall of the Toltecs a period of large population movements followed and some Nahua groups such as the
Pipil Pipil may refer to: *Nahua people of western El Salvador *Pipil language Nawat (academically Pipil, also known as Nicarao) is a Nahuan language native to Central America. It is the southernmost extant member of the Uto-Aztecan family. It was spo ...
and Nicarao arrived as far south as Nicaragua. And in central Mexico different Nahua groups based in their different "Altepetl" city-states fought for political dominance. The Xochimilca, based in Xochimilco ruled an area south of Lake Texcoco; the Tepanecs ruled the area to the west and the
Acolhua The Acolhua are a Mesoamerican people who arrived in the Valley of Mexico in or around the year 1200 CE. The Acolhua were a sister culture of the Aztecs (or Mexica) as well as the Tepanec, Chalca, Xochimilca and others. The most important poli ...
ruled an area to the east of the valley. One of the last of the Nahua migrations to arrive in the valley settled on an island in the Lake Texcoco and proceeded to subjugate the surrounding tribes. This group were the
Mexica The Mexica (Nahuatl: , ;''Nahuatl Dictionary.'' (1990). Wired Humanities Project. University of Oregon. Retrieved August 29, 2012, frolink/ref> singular ) were a Nahuatl-speaking indigenous people of the Valley of Mexico who were the rulers of ...
who during the next 300 years became the dominant ethnic group of
Mesoamerica Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area in southern North America and most of Central America. It extends from approximately central Mexico through Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and northern Costa Rica. Wit ...
ruling from
Tenochtitlan , ; es, Tenochtitlan also known as Mexico-Tenochtitlan, ; es, México-Tenochtitlan was a large Mexican in what is now the historic center of Mexico City. The exact date of the founding of the city is unclear. The date 13 March 1325 was ...
their island capital. They formed the
Aztec Empire The Aztec Empire or the Triple Alliance ( nci, Ēxcān Tlahtōlōyān, �jéːʃkaːn̥ t͡ɬaʔtoːˈlóːjaːn̥ was an alliance of three Nahua city-states: , , and . These three city-states ruled that area in and around the Valley of Mexi ...
after allying with the Tepanecs and Acolhua people of Texcoco, spreading the political and linguistic influence of the Nahuas well into Central America.


Conquest period (1519–1523)

In 1519 an expedition of Spaniards sailing from Cuba under the leadership of
Hernán Cortés Hernán Cortés de Monroy y Pizarro Altamirano, 1st Marquess of the Valley of Oaxaca (; ; 1485 – December 2, 1547) was a Spanish ''conquistador'' who led an expedition that caused the fall of the Aztec Empire and brought large portions of w ...
arrived on the Mexican gulf coast near the Totonac city of Quiyahuiztlan. The Totonacs were one of the peoples that were politically subjugated by the Aztecs and word was immediately sent to the Aztec Emperor (in Nahuatl, Tlatoani) of Tenochtitlan Motecuhzoma II. Going inland the Spaniards encountered and fought with Totonac forces and Nahua forces from the independent
Altepetl The (, plural ''altepeme'' or ''altepemeh'') was the local, ethnically-based political entity, usually translated into English as "city-state," of pre-Columbian Nahuatl-speaking societiesSmith 1997 p. 37 in the Americas. The ''altepetl'' was ...
of Tlaxcallan. The Tlaxcaltecs were a Nahua group who had avoided being subjugated by the Aztecs. After being defeated in battle by the Spaniards, the Tlaxcalans entered into an alliance with Cortes that would be invaluable in the struggle against the Aztecs. The Spanish and Tlaxcaltec forces marched upon several cities that were under Aztec dominion and "liberated" them, before they arrived in the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan. There they were welcomed as guests by Motecuhzoma II, but after a while they took the ruler prisoner. When the Aztec nobility realized that their ruler had been turned into a Spanish puppet they attacked the Spaniards and chased them out of the city. The Spaniards sought refuge in Tlaxcala where they regrouped and awaited reinforcements. During the next year they cooperated with large Tlaxcaltec armies and undertook a siege campaign resulting in the final fall of Tenochtitlan. After the fall of Tenochtitlan Spanish forces now also allied with the Aztecs to incorporate all the previous Aztec provinces into the realm of
New Spain New Spain, officially the Viceroyalty of New Spain ( es, Virreinato de Nueva España, ), or Kingdom of New Spain, was an integral territorial entity of the Spanish Empire, established by Habsburg Spain during the Spanish colonization of the A ...
. New Spain was founded as a state under Spanish rule but where Nahua people were recognized as allies of the rulers and as such were granted privileges and a degree of independence that other indigenous peoples of the area did not enjoy. Recently historians such as Stephanie Wood and Matthew Restall have argued that the Nahua did not experience the conquest as something substantially different from the sort of ethnic conflicts that they were used to, and that in fact they may have at first interpreted it as a defeat of one Nahua group by another.


Colonial period 1521–1821

With the arrival of the Spanish in Mesoamerica a new political situation ensued. The period has been extensively studied by historians, with Charles Gibson publishing a classic monograph entitled ''The Aztecs Under Spanish Rule''. Historian James Lockhart built on that work, publishing ''The Nahuas After the Conquest'' in 1992. He divides the colonial history of the Nahua into three stages largely based on linguistic evidence in local-level Nahuatl sources, which he posits are an index of the degree of interaction between Spaniards and Nahuas and changes in Nahua culture. An overview of the Nahuas of colonial Central Mexico can be found in the ''Cambridge History of the Native Peoples of the Americas''.


Stage one (1519–c. 1550) Conquest and early colonial period

The early period saw the first stages of the establishment of churches by mendicant friars in large and important Indian towns, the assertion of crown control over New Spain by the high court (''Audiencia'') and then the establishment of the viceroyalty, and the heyday of conqueror power over the indigenous via the
encomienda The ''encomienda'' () was a Spanish labour system that rewarded conquerors with the labour of conquered non-Christian peoples. The labourers, in theory, were provided with benefits by the conquerors for whom they laboured, including military ...
. In the initial stage of the colonial period, contact between Spaniards and the indigenous populations was limited. It consisted mostly in the mendicants who sought to convert the population to Catholicism, and the reorganization of the indigenous tributary system to benefit individual Spaniards. The indigenous system of smaller settlements' paying tribute and rendering labor service to dominant political entities was transformed into the ''
Encomienda The ''encomienda'' () was a Spanish labour system that rewarded conquerors with the labour of conquered non-Christian peoples. The labourers, in theory, were provided with benefits by the conquerors for whom they laboured, including military ...
'' system. Indigenous of particular towns paid tribute to a Spanish ''encomendero'' who was awarded the labor and tribute of that town. In this early period, the hereditary indigenous ruler or ''tlatoani'' and noblemen continued to hold power locally and were key to mobilizing tribute and labor for encomenderos. They also continued to hold titles from the pre-conquest period. Most willing accepted baptism so that records for this period show Nahua elites with Christian given names (indicating baptism) and many holding the Spanish noble title ''don''. A set of censuses in alphabetic Nahuatl for the Cuernavaca region c. 1535 gives us a baseline for the impact of Spanish on Nahuatl, showing few Spanish loanwords taken into Nahuatl. As the Spaniards sought to extend their political dominance into the most remote corners of Mesoamerica, the Nahua accompanied them as auxiliaries. In the early colonial period, new Nahua settlements were made in northern Mexico and far south into Central America. Nahua forces often formed the bulk of the Spanish military expeditions that conquered other Mesoamerican peoples, such as the
Maya Maya may refer to: Civilizations * Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America ** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples ** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples * Maya (Ethiopia), a popul ...
, Zapotecs, and
Mixtec The Mixtecs (), or Mixtecos, are indigenous Mesoamerican peoples of Mexico inhabiting the region known as La Mixteca of Oaxaca and Puebla as well as La Montaña Region and Costa Chica Regions of the state of Guerrero. The Mixtec Cult ...
s. With the arrival of Christian missionaries, the first priority of the colonial authorities was eradicating indigenous religious practices, something they achieved by a combination of violence and threats of violence, and patient education. Nahua were baptized with Spanish names. The Nahua who did not abandon their religious practices were severely punished or executed. The Nahua, however, often incorporated pre-Christian practices and beliefs into the Christian religion without the authorities' noticing it. Often they kept practicing their own religion in the privacy of their homes, especially in rural areas where Spanish presence was almost completely lacking and the conversion process was slow. The Nahua quickly took the Latin alphabetic writing as their own. Within 20 years of the arrival of the Spanish, the Nahua were composing texts in their own language. In 1536 the first university of the
Americas The Americas, which are sometimes collectively called America, are a landmass comprising the totality of North America, North and South America. The Americas make up most of the land in Earth's Western Hemisphere and comprise the New World. ...
, the '' Colegio de Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco'' was inaugurated. It was established by the Franciscans whose aim was to educate young Nahua noblemen to be Catholic priests who were trilingual: literate in Spanish, Latin and Nahuatl.


Stage two (c. 1550 – c. 1650)

There are a large number of texts by and about Nahuas in this middle period and during this period Nahuatl absorbed a large number of loanwords from Spanish, particularly nouns for particular objects, indicating the closer contact between the European sphere and the indigenous. However, Nahuatl verbs and syntax show no evidence of the impact of Spanish contact. In the mid-sixteenth century, cultural change at the local level can be tracked through the production of Nahuatl alphabetic texts. The production of a wide range of written documents in Nahuatl dates from this period, including legal documents for transactions (bills of sale), minutes of indigenous town council (''cabildo'') records, petitions to the crown, and others. Institutionally, indigenous town government shifted from the rule of the tlatoani and noblemen to the establishment of Spanish-style town councils (''cabildos''), with officers holding standard Spanish titles. A classic study of sixteenth-century Tlaxcala, the main ally of the Spaniards in the conquest of the Mexica, shows that much of the prehispanic structure continued into the colonial period. An important set of cabildo records in Nahuatl for Tlaxcala is extant and shows how local government functioned in for nearly a century. Regarding religion, by the mid- to late 16th century, even the most zealous mendicants of the first generation doubted the capacity of Nahua men to become Christian priests so that the Colegio de Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco ceased to function to that end and in 1555 Indians were barred from ordination to the priesthood. However, in local communities, stone-built church complexes continued to be built and elaborated, with murals in mixed indigenous-Spanish forms. Confraternities (''cofradías'') were established to support the celebrations of a particular Christian saint and functioned as burial societies for members. During this period, an expression of personal piety, the Church promoted the making of last wills and testaments, with many testators donating money to their local Church to say Masses for their souls. For individual Nahua men and women dictating a last will and testament to a local Nahua notary (''escribano'') became standard. These wills provide considerable information about individuals' residence, kin relations, and property ownership provides a window into social standing, differences between the sexes, and business practices at the local level. showing not only that literacy of some elite men in alphabetic writing in Nahuatl was a normal part of everyday life at the local level and that the notion of making a final will was expected, even for those who had little property. A number of studies in the tradition of what is now called the New Philology extensively use Nahuatl wills as a source.


Stage three (c. 1650 – 1821) Late colonial period to independence

From the mid-seventeenth century to the achievement of independence in 1821, Nahuatl shows considerable impact from the European sphere and a full range of bilingualism. Texts produced at the local level that in the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries were sometimes a mixture of pictorial and alphabetic forms of expression were now primarily alphabetic. In the late eighteenth century, there is evidence of text being written in "Nahuatlized Spanish", written by Nahuas who were now communicating in their own form of Spanish. Year-by-year accounts of major occurrences, a text known as an annal, no longer reference the prehispanic period.Lockhart, ''Nahuas After the Conquest'', p. 428. Local level documentation for individual Nahuas continued to be produced, in particular last wills and testaments, but they are much more simplified than those produced in the late sixteenth century. Nahuas began to produce an entirely new type of text, known as "primordial titles" or simply "titles" (''títulos''), that assert indigenous communities' rights to particular territory, often by recording local lore in an atemporal fashion. There is no known prehispanic precedent for this textual form and none appears before 1650. Several factors might be at work for the appearance of titles. One might be a resurgence of indigenous population after decades recovering from devastating epidemics when communities might have been less concerned with Spanish encroachment. Another might be the crown's push to regularize defective land titles via a process known as ''composición''. The crown had mandated minimum land holdings for indigenous communities at 600 ''varas'', in property that was known as the ''fundo legal'', and to separate indigenous communities from Spanish lands by more than 1,100 varas. Towns were to have access to water, uplands for gathering firewood, and agricultural land, as well as common lands for pasturage. Despite these mandated legal protections for Indian towns, courts continued to find in favor of Spaniards and the rules about minimum holdings for Indian towns were ignored in practice. Labor arrangements between Nahuas and Spaniards were largely informal, rather than organized through the mainly defunct
encomienda The ''encomienda'' () was a Spanish labour system that rewarded conquerors with the labour of conquered non-Christian peoples. The labourers, in theory, were provided with benefits by the conquerors for whom they laboured, including military ...
and the poorly functioning
repartimiento The ''Repartimiento'' () (Spanish, "distribution, partition, or division") was a colonial labor system imposed upon the indigenous population of Spanish America. In concept, it was similar to other tribute-labor systems, such as the ''mit'a'' of t ...
. Spanish landed estates needed a secure labor force, often a mixture of a small group of permanent laborers and part-time or seasonal laborers drawn from nearby indigenous communities. Individual Indians made arrangements with estate owners rather than labor being mobilized via the community. The indigenous communities continued to function as political entities, but there was greater fragmentation of units as dependent villages (''sujetos'') of the main settlement (''cabecera'') sought full, independent status themselves. Indigenous officials were no longer necessarily noblemen.


National period (1821-present)

With the achievement of
Mexican Mexican may refer to: Mexico and its culture *Being related to, from, or connected to the country of Mexico, in North America ** People *** Mexicans, inhabitants of the country Mexico and their descendants *** Mexica, ancient indigenous people ...
independence in 1821, the
casta () is a term which means "lineage" in Spanish and Portuguese and has historically been used as a racial and social identifier. In the context of the Spanish Empire in the Americas it also refers to a now-discredited 20th-century theoretical f ...
system, which divided the population into racial categories with differential rights, was eliminated and the term "Indian" (''indio'') was no longer used by government, although it continued to be used in daily speech. The creation of a republic in 1824 meant that Mexicans of all types were citizens rather than vassals of the crown. One important consequence for Nahuas and other indigenous was that documentation in the native languages generally ceased to be produced. Native towns did not cease to exist nor did indigenous populations speaking their own language, but the indigenous were far more marginalized in the post-independence period than during the colonial era. In the colonial era the crown had a paternalistic stance toward the Indians, in essence according them special rights, a
fuero (), (), () or () is a Spanish legal term and concept. The word comes from Latin , an open space used as a market, tribunal and meeting place. The same Latin root is the origin of the French terms and , and the Portuguese terms and ; all ...
, and giving support to structures in indigenous towns and giving natives a level of protection against non-Indians. This can be seen in the establishment of the General Indian Court where Indian towns and individual Indians could sue those making incursions on their land and other abuses. These protections disappeared in the national period. One scholar has characterized the early national period of Nahuas and other indigenous "as the beginning of a systematic policy of cultural genocide and the increasing loss of native languages."Schreyer, "Native Peoples of Central Mexico Since Independence" p. 229. Lack of official recognition and both economic and cultural pressures meant that most indigenous peoples in Central Mexico became more Europeanized and many became Spanish speakers. In nineteenth-century Mexico, the so-called "Indian Question" exercised politicians and intellectuals, who viewed the indigenous as backward, unassimilated to the Mexican nation, whose custom of communal rather than individual ownership of land was impediment to economic progress. Non-Indian landowners of estates had already encroached on indigenous ownership in the colonial era, but now liberal ideology sought to end communal protections on ownership with its emphasis on private property. Since land was the economic basis for Indians' ability to maintain a separate identity, land tenure became a central issue for liberal reformers. The liberal
Reforma REFORMA: The National Association to Promote Library & Information Services to Latinos and the Spanish Speaking, more commonly known as REFORMA, is an affiliate of the American Library Association formed in 1971 to promote library services to Lat ...
enshrined in the
Constitution of 1857 The Federal Constitution of the United Mexican States of 1857 ( es, Constitución Federal de los Estados Unidos Mexicanos de 1857), often called simply the Constitution of 1857, was the liberal constitution promulgated in 1857 by Constituent Co ...
mandated the breakup of corporate-owned property, therefore targeting indigenous communities and the Roman Catholic Church, which also had significant holdings. This measure affected all indigenous communities, including Nahuas, holding land. Liberal
Benito Juárez Benito Pablo Juárez García (; 21 March 1806 – 18 July 1872) was a Mexican liberal politician and lawyer who served as the 26th president of Mexico from 1858 until his death in office in 1872. As a Zapotec, he was the first indigenous pre ...
, a Zapotec who became president of Mexico, was fully in support of laws to end corporate landholding. The outbreak of the
Mexican Revolution The Mexican Revolution ( es, Revolución Mexicana) was an extended sequence of armed regional conflicts in Mexico from approximately 1910 to 1920. It has been called "the defining event of modern Mexican history". It resulted in the destruction ...
in Morelos, which still had a significant Nahua population, was sparked by peasant resistance to the expansion of sugar estates. This was preceded in the nineteenth century by smaller indigenous revolts against encroachment, particularly during the civil war of the Reforma, foreign intervention, and a weak state following the exit of the French in 1867. A number of indigenous men had made a place for themselves in post-independence Mexico, the most prominent being Benito Juárez. But an important nineteenth-century figure of Nahua was
Ignacio Manuel Altamirano Ignacio Manuel Altamirano Basilio (; 13 November 1834 – 13 February 1893) was a Mexican radical liberal writer, journalist, teacher and politician. He wrote ''Clemencia'' (1869), which is often considered to be the first modern Mexican novel. ...
(1834–93), born in Tixtla, Guerrero who became a well respected liberal intellectual, man of letters, politician, and diplomat. Altamirano was a fierce anticlerical politician, and was known for a period as "the Marat of the Radicals" and an admirer of the French Revolution. Altamirano, along with other liberals, saw universal primary public education as a key way to change Mexico, promoting for upward mobility. Altamirano's chief disciple in this view was Justo Sierra.


Demography

The Mexican government does not categorize its citizens by ethnicity, but only by language. Statistical information recorded about the Nahua deals only with speakers of the Nahuatl language, although unknown numbers of people of Nahua ethnicity have abandoned the language and now speak only Spanish. Other Nahuas, though bilingual in Nahuatl and Spanish, seek to avoid widespread anti-indigenous discrimination by declining to self-identify as Nahua in
INEGI The National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI by its name in es, Instituto Nacional de Estadística, Geografía e Informática) is an autonomous agency of the Mexican Government dedicated to coordinate the National System of Sta ...
's decennial census. Nor does the census count as indigenous children under 5 (estimated to be 11-12% of the indigenous population). An INI-Conepo report indicates the Mexican indigenous population is nearly 250% greater than that reported by INEGI. Across Mexico, Nahuatl is spoken by an estimated 1.4 million people, including some 190,000 who are
monolingual Monoglottism (Greek μόνος ''monos'', "alone, solitary", + γλῶττα , "tongue, language") or, more commonly, monolingualism or unilingualism, is the condition of being able to speak only a single language, as opposed to multilingualism. ...
. The state of Guerrero has the highest ratio of monolingual Nahuatl speakers, calculated at 24.8%, based on 2000 census figures. The proportion of monolinguals for most other states is less than 5%. The largest concentrations of Nahuatl speakers are found in the states of
Puebla Puebla ( en, colony, settlement), officially Free and Sovereign State of Puebla ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Puebla), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 217 municipalities and its cap ...
,
Veracruz Veracruz (), formally Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Veracruz de Ignacio de la Llave), is one of the 31 states which, along with Me ...
, Hidalgo,
San Luis Potosí San Luis Potosí (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of San Luis Potosí ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de San Luis Potosí), is one of the 32 states which compose the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 58 municipalities and i ...
, and
Guerrero Guerrero is one of the 32 states that comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided in 81 municipalities and its capital city is Chilpancingo and its largest city is Acapulcocopied from article, GuerreroAs of 2020, Guerrero the pop ...
. Significant populations are also found in
México State The State of Mexico ( es, Estado de México; ), officially just Mexico ( es, México), is one of the 32 federal entities of the United Mexican States. Commonly known as Edomex (from ) to distinguish it from the name of the whole country, it is ...
,
Morelos Morelos (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Morelos ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Morelos), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of Mexico. It is divided into 36 municipalities and its capital city is Cue ...
, and the
Mexican Federal District Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley of Me ...
, with smaller communities in
Michoacán Michoacán, formally Michoacán de Ocampo (; Purépecha: ), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Michoacán de Ocampo ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Michoacán de Ocampo), is one of the 32 states which comprise the Federal Entities of ...
and
Durango Durango (), officially named Estado Libre y Soberano de Durango ( en, Free and Sovereign State of Durango; Tepehuán: ''Korian''; Nahuatl: ''Tepēhuahcān''), is one of the 31 states which make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico, situated in ...
. Nahuatl was formerly spoken in the states of
Jalisco Jalisco (, , ; Nahuatl: Xalixco), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Jalisco ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Jalisco ; Nahuatl: Tlahtohcayotl Xalixco), is one of the 31 states which, along with Mexico City, comprise the 32 Federal ...
and
Colima Colima (), officially the Free and Sovereign State of Colima ( es, Estado Libre y Soberano de Colima), is one of the 31 states that make up the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. It shares its name with its capital and main city, Colima. Colima i ...
, where it became extinct during the 20th century. As a result of internal migrations within the country, all Mexican states today have some isolated pockets and groups of Nahuatl speakers. The modern influx of Mexican workers and families into the United States has resulted in the establishment of a few small Nahuatl-speaking communities, particularly in
Texas Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...
,
New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...
and
California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...
. 64.3% of Nahuatl speakers are literate in Spanish compared with the national average of 97.5% for Spanish literacy. Male Nahuatl speakers have 9.8 years of education on average and women 10.1, compared with the 13.6 and 14.1 years that are the national averages for men and women, respectively.


Culture


Economy

Many Nahua are agriculturists. They practice various forms of cultivation including the use of horses or mules to plow or
slash-and-burn Slash-and-burn agriculture is a farming method that involves the cutting and burning of plants in a forest or woodland to create a field called a swidden. The method begins by cutting down the trees and woody plants in an area. The downed veget ...
. Common crops include corn, wheat, beans, barley, chilli peppers, onions, tomatoes, and squash. Some Nahuas also raise sheep and cattle.


Language

Nahuatl Nahuatl (; ), Aztec, or Mexicano is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family. Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about Nahua peoples, most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have small ...
,
Pipil Pipil may refer to: *Nahua people of western El Salvador *Pipil language Nawat (academically Pipil, also known as Nicarao) is a Nahuan language native to Central America. It is the southernmost extant member of the Uto-Aztecan family. It was spo ...


Religion


Notes


References

* * * * * * * * * * * * *


External links

* {{Authority control Mesoamerican people Indigenous peoples in Mexico Mesoamerican cultures