Pochteca Merchant Guild

Timeline

1. 1428–1450Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco · TenochtitlanAfter Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan formed the Triple Alliance in 1428, long-distance merchant bands were incorporated into the empire's tribute and luxury-goods supply system. Merchants lived in hereditary calpulli, and entry required peer consent and a leader's approval. The Tlatelolco market became the empire's largest trading venue, where the pochteca managed measures, arbitrated disputes, and organized trading caravans for campaigns.
2. 1451–1519The great market of Tlatelolco and imperial trade routes · Valley of MexicoThe pochteca led porter caravans, bringing luxury goods such as feathers, jade, cocoa, cotton cloth, and slaves from the Gulf Coast lowlands, Oaxaca, and Mesoamerica back to the capital, while exporting highland manufactures. They often traveled through hostile regions, gathering geographic and military intelligence for the king, sometimes even providing pretexts for war. Guild leaders were accountable to the tlatoani while maintaining internal judicial autonomy.
3. 1519–1521Tenochtitlan · TenochtitlanDuring the 1519–1521 siege by the Spanish–Tlaxcalan allied forces, the imperial markets and long-distance trade routes collapsed. After the capital fell, the pochteca lost court orders, tribute channels, and autonomous courts, and ceased to exist as an independent political-economic guild. Indigenous traders continued some long-distance commerce in the early colonial period, but the guild institution itself had ended.