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ing wood to tend the fire.
33 At the age of fifteen they began their formal instruction in the use of weapons.34 |
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The sons of nobles and warriors were held to be more inclined to the warrior's life than were others.35 They probably did excel, since the sons of nobles, whether trained in the telpochcalli or the calmecac, received military instruction in the houses of the eagle and jaguar military ordersthe cuauhcalli (eagle house)from the members of the order that each had vowed to join (see fig. 1).36 Thus the military training of noble youths was better than that of commoner youths. |
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While accompanying the warriors on campaigns, the youths learned about military life and lost their fear of battle. At the age of twenty those youths who wanted to become warriors went to war. But first the youth's parents approached the veteran warriors with food, drink, and gifts, to seek a sponsor to take their son to war. The nobles' greater ability to pay doubtless resulted in their sons' being watched over by better and more experienced warriors than were the sons of poorer parents, and the success rate in battle was predictably higher for the noble youths. The warriors took great care of the youths in the wars, and they showed the youths how to take captives once the tide turned in the Aztecs' favor.37 |
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If he was fortunate, the youth took a captive unaided. If he had assistance (from up to five others), a decision was made about who had actually made the capture, and the captive was apportioned among those helping, in the following manner: the actual captor took the body and the right thigh; the second who had helped him received the left thigh; the third took the right upper arm; the fourth took the left upper arm; the fifth took the right forearm; and the sixth took the left forearm. A captor's tuft of hair was cut. If the capture had required the help of others, however, the hair was shorn on the left side of his head, but the right side was left long, reaching the bottom of his ear. Thus the youth was honored, but he was also told to take another captive unassisted to prove that he was a man.38 |
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A youth who had failed to take a captive after going to war three or four times was called a cuexpalchicacpol, or "youth with a baby's lock." Thus shamed, he redoubled his efforts to take a captive, but if he failed to take one unassisted, his head was pasted with feathers. One who took no captives at all, even with assistance, had the crown of his head shaved, and he would never achieve martial fame.39 This was a consideration only for youths aspiring to a military career. The |
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