Pre-Columbian
Aztec society was a highly
complex and
stratified society that developed among the
Aztecs of central
Mexico in the centuries prior to the
Spanish conquest of Mexico, and which was built on the cultural foundations of the larger region of
Mesoamerica. Politically, the society was organized into independent city-states, called
altepetls, composed of smaller divisions (
calpulli), which were again usually composed of one or more extended kinship groups. Socially, the society depended on a rather strict division between nobles and free commoners, both of which were themselves divided into elaborate hierarchies of social status, responsibilities, and power. Economically the society was dependent on agriculture, and also to a large extent on
warfare. Other economically important factors were commerce, long distance and local, and a high degree of trade specialisation.