Page:Letters of Cortes to Emperor Charles V - Vol 1.djvu/358

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Three features characteristic of the feudal system everywhere are found: A. An overlord or Emperor, supreme in the central government, whose standard all followed in war and whose authority and person were regarded as semi-divine. B. Practically independent nobles or chiefs of tribes, levying their own taxes holding peoples and cities in subjection, transmitting their titles by right of inheritance and ready to contend with the Emperor himself on questions of etiquette, and precedence. Many of these were his kinsmen and all were allied amongst themselves, thus forming an aristocracy of rank and power. C. A people reduced to practical serfage.

Sumptuary laws prescribed the dress of the different orders, and the regulations governing court dress for different occasions were rigidly enforced; all removed their sandals in the emperor's presence, and even the greatest nobles covered their ornaments with a plain mantle when they appeared before him. The Aztec language was extremely polite and contained not only titles, but many ceremonious phrases of respect and expressions of courtesy and deference.

The crown descended in the same family, but a council of six electors, chosen during the lifetime of the sovereign, met immediately after his death and elected a successor from among the eligible princes of the royal family.

Alongside these indications of an advanced civilisation are found several others which show a nation still in its infancy: