Order in the Pre-Columbian World

Old movies about the conquerors invading Mesoamerica and taking over the native people there always typify Mesoamericans as primitive and unintelligent easy prey. The conquerors would dupe them with the simplest of ruses and treat them with disdain, regarding them as uncivilized. This perception of the Mesoamericans has persisted to the present day, the general tendency being to stereotype them as dumb savages, people who unlike the purportedly enlightened Spaniards who conquered them are lacking in civilization. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, Mesoamericans were a highly civilized society, with very distinct and complex hierarchies, symbology, customs, and religious beliefs; in short, they had an extremely ordered society and also viewed their universe as one of order:

Extending from the Eskimos and Indians of Canada and North America to the Araucans and Pampas of Chile and Argentina is an immense complex of myths, traditions, symbols, rites, usages and customs, ways of life, and so on, which, despite their variety, articulate in a coherent manner (Gonz�lez, "The Precolumbian World").

Their society was stratified into castes, as well as highly specialized and characterized by an imperial administration ("The Aztecs/Mexicas"). The Aztecs had a trading network and a tribute system, as well as a highly developed and well-maintained agricultural economy that was sophisticated in its ability to adjust to the land ("The Azte

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