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On Carrasco's Use of Theoretical “First Principles”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 January 2017

Jerome A. Offner
Jerome A. Offner*
Affiliation:
Department of Anthropology, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06520
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Abstract

Due to excessive adherence to theoretical "first principles" and consequent erroneous superficial textual analyses, Carrasco overstates political control over land and labor and understates the importance of marketing and forces of supply and demand in Aztec economies. The lack of evidence for price regulation and for the enforcement of sumptuary laws is exposed, while other evidence which indicates that the Texcocan (and other) tribute systems depended in many ways on Mesoamerican marketing systems is pointed out. The inadequacies in Carrasco's comments on the scale of Texcocan tribute income are evaluated along with the lack of diachronic depth in his analyses.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Antiquity , Volume 46 , Issue 1 , January 1981 , pp. 69 - 74
Copyright
Copyright © Society for American Archaeology 1981

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