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CLSM · World History · Progress Check 1
Mesoamerica: Tribute & Markets
Read the situation. Connect the ideas. Show how you know.
Name ___________________________Class __________ Date __________
01 Recall, then make a connection.
Tribute
Market exchange
Subject community
Contrast tribute with market exchange. How could these two routes of moving resources affect a subject community differently even when the goods reached the same city?
Read the situation.
Mesoamerica is a region with many societies and long histories; it is not another name for one empire. This activity focuses on the Mexica, often called Aztecs, and their capital Tenochtitlan. The city was connected to markets and a system of tribute from subject communities. Goods could arrive through different relationships, including exchange and political obligation.
02 Organize the information.
Two routes into the city
The fictional records distinguish required deliveries from negotiated exchanges.
Classify each transaction by the relationship described.
A. Tribute obligationB. Market exchange
Example
Category letter
1. A subject town must deliver cloth to the ruling center.
2. A buyer and seller agree to exchange food for a tool.
3. Officials record a required delivery of goods from a province.
4. A craftsperson trades a finished item for materials.
5. A community’s scheduled payment is enforced by political authority.
Explain one placement using a detail from the example.
CLSM · World History · Progress Check 1
What does the evidence show?
Mesoamerica: Tribute & Markets
03 Follow the evidence.
Whose burden?
Claim: “The ledger alone proves that every household found the tribute easy to supply.”
Select all records that would help test that claim.
Household production and consumption records from the same community and period.
Community accounts describing how deliveries were collected and distributed.
A picture of the ruler’s ceremonial clothing.
A list of market goods from a different region a century later.
Name the useful records and explain how they answer the claim.
04 Apply the idea.
Write a bounded conclusion
The practice case includes markets, tribute, and a colonial-era manuscript.
Which conclusion best fits the evidence?
The Aztec case combined different economic relationships; their effects need evidence from both rulers and communities.
Every Mesoamerican society had exactly this system.
All resources reached Tenochtitlan through voluntary purchases.
Choose a conclusion and explain why it fits the situation.
05 Carry the idea forward.
Write a short museum commentary explaining how tribute could support imperial power and create demands on subject communities. Contrast it with market exchange, and include one source limitation.