page_title: Women in Aztec civilization
section_title: Spanish rule
hierarchical_section_title: Women in Aztec civilization / Spanish rule
context_page_description: Women in Aztec civilization shared some equal opportunities. Aztec civilization saw the rise of a military culture that was closed off to women and made their role complementary to men. The status of Aztec women in society was altered in the 15th century, when Spanish conquest forced European norms onto the indigenous culture. However, many pre-Columbian norms survived and their legacy still remains.
context_section_description: The Spanish
  conquest of Aztec territories decreased much of the indigenous population, through warfare and by bringing new diseases, such as smallpox, for which the Aztecs had no immunities. The population that did survive these threats was confronted by profound attacks upon their culture in the form of Spanish institutions such as the Roman Catholic religion.
  As early as 1529, the Spanish began coercively converting Aztecs to Catholicism. They focused on the Aztec nobility initially, to create an example for the other Aztecs to follow. Nobles such as Quetzalmacatzin, King of Amaquemecan (Chalco), were forced to choose one wife and abandon the others, to comply with the current Christian institution of marriage, which meant monogamy. Aztec polygamous arrangements, with secondary wives and children, were not legally recognized by the Spanish, who considered such women and children illegitimate and disinherited from claims to ranks or property. This also tore apart the political and economic fabric of Aztec culture, since noble marriages were made with political and territorial claims in mind.
  Working demands became harsh for women after the Spanish arrived and the encomiendas were created. Aztec communities had already lost many men to war and epidemics, and the encomiendas meant that more men worked outside of their villages for the encomenderos. Traditional gender-based divisions of labour became irrelevant. Women no longer had men to do plowing, and were left to do all the agricultural tasks themselves, which included the planting and harvesting, as well as growing enough produce to meet the tribute demands of the encomiendas. . Over several generations, many young women left the rural areas to work as domestic servants or as market vendors in the cities. By the 17th century, Andean women were the majority of the market vendors in colonial cities such as La Paz (Bolivia), Cuzco (Peru), and Quito (Ecuador).
  The new Spanish culture prohibited women working outside of their home as their priority was to raise children. Their independence as workers with paid occupations was ended by the Spanish, particularly in textile work. When the Spanish eventually set up industrial textile mills, they had only men working in the mills.
caption: Illustration of an Aztec woman blowing on maize (corn) before putting it into the cooking pot, so that it will not fear the fire. From the late 16th-century Florentine Codex
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