CHAPTER 2 LATE POSTCLASSIC MESOAMERICA 115Ah Kuch Cab,were in charge of neighborhood divisions (kuchteel) of particular towns;
they coordinated the logistics of barrio tribute obligations, military service, and cer-
emonies.
The term kuchteellikely refers to a vassal social group and their landholdings.
Sergio Quezada (1993) suggests that they were taxation units. Under Spanish rule,
principal men were incorporated into town councils known by the Spanish term cab-
ildo.Matthew Restall (1997) claims that these included precontact principles of com-
munity oligarchical rule and were significantly different from the Spanish institution
of the same name. Above the cabildo,a Batabwas appointed to rule the towns. Up to
fifty officials (including religious offices) were members of the largest town cabildos.
During the Colonial period, important factions within the community were based
on membership in patronymic groups and social class standing; little evidence for
geopolitical ward or barrio divisions has been found. This situation may have changed
from precontact to Colonial times, as numerous accounts suggest that towns were con-
ceptually quartered into four divisions and that four major entrances to towns were
marked by stone structures. At the walled city of Mayapan, ch’iballineage groups are
named as the guardians of three cardinal gates, although the city actually had twelve
gates (eleven of these are thought to have been in use simultaneously).
Efforts to identity quadripartite organization in the archaeological remains of pre-
contact Mayan cities have thus far been unsuccessful, and such divisions may have
been more important for ritual and cosmological purposes than for defining politi-
cal and settlement sectors. Neighborhoods can be identified archaeologically by set-
tlement clusters that share adjacent houselot walls, and cenotes or roads (sacbe). The
presence of outlying administrative or ritual architecture that is dispersed among
commoner neighborhoods may also testify to the presence of barrio administrators
such as the Ah Kuch Kab.
Political officials shared authority with councils of priests, who were also hierar-
chically organized and specialized according to ritual responsibilities. In the Peten
Lakes, ethnohistorian Grant Jones (1999) has documented an institution of paired
rulership, in which secular lords and high priests governed together over political ter-
ritories. This institution was likely widespread and had considerable time depth, ex-
tending backward in time to at least the site of Chichén Itza. Throughout
Mesoamerica, Epiclassic and Postclassic political officials received the vestments of
governorship from priestly officials, and councils of political and religious authori-
ties administered the affairs of major cities.
This system created a complex and complementary system of power sharing. For
the Mayan area, it represented a major departure from the Classic period institution
of divine kingship, in which secular and religious authority was centralized under
the single office of the king. Postclassic political and religious realms were not entirely
separate as political officials drew upon ritual and mythological bases for legitimation,
and they participated in ritual occasions. Conversely, priests meddled continually in
political affairs; in fact, the fall of Mayapan may have been instigated by the actions
of one high priest, Ah Xupan Xiu, whose political clout also enabled him to help
found the post-Mayapan polity of Ah Kin Chel. The prevalence of the twin institutions