[55] [There was no such thing as feudalism among the Aztecs. There could not be where the communism which the clan system implies prevailed. Feudalism was a social-political system based upon land. Under it there was a well-defined gradation of ranks, and each lower was bound to the next higher order by protection given in return for service rendered. Moreover, where feudalism prevailed the ownership of the land was vested in one person while the occupancy belonged to another. Feudalism exalted the individual and assured to each man his _rights_. The clan knew nothing whatever of individual rights. When the conception of personal ownership was developed, and kinship ceased to be the bond which held men together, the clan system of communal living of necessity passed away. But among the Aztecs the feudal conception of personal property never was developed. The Spaniards, knowing no civilization but their own, naturally supposed that the Aztec institutions were similar to the Spanish, and historians generally accepted that view.--M.] [56] [See summary of Bandelier’s studies, p. 36.--M.] [57] This magistrate, who was called _cihuacoatl_,{*} was also to audit the accounts of the collectors of the taxes in his district. (Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. ii. p. 127.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 11, cap. 25.) The Mendoza Collection contains a painting of the courts of justice under Montezuma, who introduced great changes in them. (Antiq. of Mexico, vol. i., Plate 70.) According to the interpreter, an appeal lay from them, in certain cases, to the king’s council. Ibid., vol. vi. p. 79. {*} [This word, a compound of _cihuatl_, woman, and _coatl_, serpent, was the name of a divinity, the mythical mother of the human species. Its typical application may have had reference to justice, or law, as the source of social order.--K.] [58] Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. ii. pp. 127, 128.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., ubi supra.--In this arrangement of the more humble magistrates we are reminded of the Anglo-Saxon hundreds and tithings, especially the latter, the members of which were to watch over the conduct of the families in their districts and bring the offenders to justice. The hard penalty of mutual responsibility was not known to the Mexicans. [59] Zurita, so temperate, usually, in his language, remarks that, in the capital, “Tribunals were instituted which might compare in their organization with the royal audiences of Castile.” (Rapport, p. 93.) His observations are chiefly drawn from the Tezcucan courts, which in their forms of procedure, he says, were like the Aztec. (Loc. cit.)