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 given nominally to the head war-chief, still was 'for all the Mexicans in common.'

"The various classes of lands which we have mentioned were, as far as their tenure is concerned, included in the 'calpulalli' or lands of the kinships. Since the kin, or 'calpulli,' was the unit of governmental organization, it also was the unit of landed tenure. Clavigero says: 'The lands called altepetlalli, that is, those who belonged to the communities of the towns and villages, were divided into as many parts as there were quarters in a town, and each quarter held its own for itself, and without the least connection with the rest. Such lands could in no manner be alienated.' These 'quarters' were the 'calpulli'; hence it follows that the consanguine groups held the altepetlalli or soil of the tribe.

"We have, therefore, in Mexico the identical mode of the tenure of lands which Polo de Ondogardo had noted in Peru and reported to the King of Spain, as follows: * * * 'Although the crops and other produce of these lands were devoted to the tribute, the land itself belonged to the people themselves. Hence a thing will be apparent which has not hitherto been properly understood. When any one wants land, it is considered sufficient if it can be shown that it belonged to the Inca or to the sun. But in this the Indians are treated with great injustice; for in those days they paid the tribute, and the land was theirs. * * *

"The expanse held and occupied by the calpulli, and therefore called 'calpulalli' was possessed by the kin in joint tenure. It could neither be