Treaty of Tordesillas: 1493 treaty between
Spain and Portugal that gave Spain the
rights to all lands to the west of a certain
line and Portugal the rights to all lands to
the east of the line; in the Americas only
Brazil lies to the east of this line.
vigesimal: base-20 numerical system; the
typical system in ancient Mesoamerica.
GLOSSARY 539world-system: a model articulated by Im-
manuel Wallerstein and others of a social
system that supersedes political boundaries
and is characterized by unequal exchange
between core, semi-peripheral, and pe-
ripheral regions, and an international di-
vision of labor.