Aztecs: An Interpretation Reprint Edition

Clendinnen offers a very movingly written exploration of the Aztec mindset. Her chapters on male and female roles within Aztec society, practices of feasting, the raising of children, and especially on Aztec aesthetics help convey how the daily sacrifice of human beings could seem like a reasonable way to make sense of human existence. She does not shy away from the stranger aspects of Aztec life, and does not try to mitigate the bloody nature of Aztec society, yet always renders due respect to the Aztecs themselves.

OK, I'm not an academic, but I've read many books on Mesoamerican archeology and history. While there's good information here, it just about kills me to read more than a dozen pages in a sitting. The author's writing is filled with prose that adds little to the discussion. Check this out:"Among their putative descendants the Mexica had marked themselves out by their early ferocity and their success in the savage game of war, but as the city grew they also, more tremulously, sought to identify themselves as the heirs of these men [Toltecs] who had made a world through art."There's enough value here to fight my way through to the end, but it's going to take awhile. A lot more accessible text will be found in "Aztec Thought and Culture" by Miguel Leon-Portilla

"Aztecs" is a book which changed my life. Here, she says, is what the Aztecs did, without coloring it, without blame, no white man, no red man, just people led by compulsions Clendinnen explores, finds inexplicable, continues to explore, in a dense and gorgeous prose style that becomes its own jungle with all the beauty and terror that implies. I myself find the downfall of great civilizations compelling on any terms (Jared Diamond's "Collapse", for instance), but this is the real thing. And if a reader says, "well, those Aztecs were certainly driven by bizarre, clearly false metaphors", I think that might be a useful thing for that reader to contemplate.

While based on scholarship the book is written in a poetic tone. Rather than give a dry description of the Mexica( the Aztecs name for themselves) she tries to get inside their head and describe how they felt about the world and human existence. The book gives an accurate and alternative picture of this culture as opposed to the Spaniard's view of them as blood thirsty monsters.

This book is terrible. I believe the author was more interested in showing his vocabulary than telling a story or describing the past. Very poorly written and hard to follow.

This book is an exercise in Ethnohistory, attempting to describe a society that ceased to exist about 500 years ago. It is written to give mainly non-specialist readers an insight into the minds of all the Mexica, the people of the capital of the Aztec empire, Tenochtitlan, not just its ruling elite. It claims to be innovative in its focus (concentrating on the people’s religious rituals), in its use of sources, and in its style as a series of essays. As there are very few credible sources for the early history of the Mexica, it can only describe the society of the few decades of the late 15th and early 16th centuries before the Spanish conquest. However, as that empire had risen rapidly in less than a century from a small island settlement, that may not be a major limitation.In her Introduction and note on sources, Inga Clendinnen stresses that she is ignoring the focus of other authors on the rise of Tenochtitlan, state formation, economic and social organisation and official religious practices in favour of trying to understand Mexica religious beliefs and social attitudes on an emotional level. These two sections are rather full of sociological jargon, and are probably the weakest parts of the book. The rest of the book is an interesting read: despite its declared intention, it is perhaps less innovative than the author claims.Clendinnen relies very heavily on a single source, the Florentine Codex. Although this was edited by a Spanish friar in colonial times, she claims that its description of life in Tenochtitlan in Aztec times allowed her to gain access to Mexica voices and actions, because its editor did not impose his views on his informants too strongly. She does also use other colonial sources and modern scholarship, but being reliant on one preferred source risks distortion.A relatively short Part I deals briefly with the rise of Tenochtitlan and more fully with the social relationships there. Mexica society moved from a relatively equal one to a society with major inequalities and social differentiation between nobles, warriors and merchants, who were fiercely competitive and individualistic, and the urban poor. In Part II, Clendinnen tries to get into the minds of the Mexica, and deal with the roles of human sacrificial victims and of different groups of Mexica men and women. At the heart of this part is the discrepancy between the high level of civilisation and artistic achievement and brutal ritual killing, carried out on a large scale. She tries to show how each group in that society understood and participated in the rituals of human sacrifice. Part III discusses different reactions to and representations of sacred matters. Part IV deals with the Spanish conquest: unlike other authors, Clendinnen does not believe the decline of the Aztec empire was inevitable without this intervention.Aztecs: An Interpretation crosses the boundaries between anthropological and historical research and between narrative history and interpretive essay. It is most anthropological when making comparisons with more modern North American tribes, and in detailed descriptions of rituals. Clendinnen’s narrative style is personal, as in an essay, and often very vivid. This means her picture of the Mexica may also be personal, rather than a balanced analysis. Her intention deserves praise, and she went a considerable way towards realising it, but did not quite achieve what she set out to.

This is an excellent study. the product was received as advertised, good condition and on time.

This book is an exercise in Ethnohistory, attempting to describe a society that ceased to exist about 500 years ago. It is written to give mainly non-specialist readers an insight into the minds of all the Mexica, the people of the capital of the Aztec empire, Tenochtitlan, not just its ruling elite. It claims to be innovative in its focus (concentrating on the people’s religious rituals), in its use of sources, and in its style as a series of essays. As there are very few credible sources for the early history of the Mexica, it can only describe the society of the few decades of the late 15th and early 16th centuries before the Spanish conquest. However, as that empire had risen rapidly in less than a century from a small island settlement, that may not be a major limitation.In her Introduction and note on sources, Inga Clendinnen stresses that she is ignoring the focus of other authors on the rise of Tenochtitlan, state formation, economic and social organisation and official religious practices in favour of trying to understand Mexica religious beliefs and social attitudes on an emotional level. These two sections are rather full of sociological jargon, and are probably the weakest parts of the book. The rest of the book is an interesting read: despite its declared intention, it is perhaps less innovative than the author claims.Clendinnen relies very heavily on a single source, the Florentine Codex. Although this was edited by a Spanish friar in colonial times, she claims that its description of life in Tenochtitlan in Aztec times allowed her to gain access to Mexica voices and actions, because its editor did not impose his views on his informants too strongly. She does also use other colonial sources and modern scholarship, but being reliant on one preferred source risks distortion.A relatively short Part I deals briefly with the rise of Tenochtitlan and more fully with the social relationships there. Mexica society moved from a relatively equal one to a society with major inequalities and social differentiation between nobles, warriors and merchants, who were fiercely competitive and individualistic, and the urban poor. In Part II, Clendinnen tries to get into the minds of the Mexica, and deal with the roles of human sacrificial victims and of different groups of Mexica men and women. At the heart of this part is the discrepancy between the high level of civilisation and artistic achievement and brutal ritual killing, carried out on a large scale. She tries to show how each group in that society understood and participated in the rituals of human sacrifice. Part III discusses different reactions to and representations of sacred matters. Part IV deals with the Spanish conquest: unlike other authors, Clendinnen does not believe the decline of the Aztec empire was inevitable without this intervention.Aztecs: An Interpretation crosses the boundaries between anthropological and historical research and between narrative history and interpretive essay. It is most anthropological when making comparisons with more modern North American tribes, and in detailed descriptions of rituals. Clendinnen’s narrative style is personal, as in an essay, and often very vivid. This means her picture of the Mexica may also be personal, rather than a balanced analysis. Her intention deserves praise, and she went a considerable way towards realising it, but did not quite achieve what she set out to.

Was a fan of Inga Clendinnen before I started reading this book. Still a fan but it's really a slog. I stopped reading it a while ago and probably won't return. Kind of a slow and grinding analysis of largely inferred cultural practices. Turns out I like books with stories.

Brilliant service! 10/10