Source: “The Aztec Civilization of Mexico” from Bernal
Diaz, The Memoirs of the
Conquistador Bernal Diaz de Castillo (1522)
The moment we arrived…. We first of all visited those divisions of the market
appropriated for the sale of gold and silver wares. Of jewels… This slave
market was upon as great a scale as the Portuguese market for negro slaves
at Guinea… And yet I have
not mentioned the paper, which in this country is called
amatl; the tubes filled with
liquid amber and tobacco, the various sweet-scented salves, and
similar things; nor the various seeds which were exposed for
sale in the porticoes of this market, nor the medicinal herbs.
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