mayectli.

Headword: 
mayectli.
Principal English Translation: 

a dependent person on the land of a noble person; plural: mayeque

Orthographic Variants: 
maye
Attestations from sources in English: 

James Lockhart finds that mayeque were a type of macehualtin, not a separate component of society. He notes that in a document from Tetzcoco in 1589 he saw: "yn macehualtztzintin tomayecauan" = "the poor macehualtin our mayeque." In contrast, in the regions of Cuernavaca and Puebla, it was more common to see "-tech pouhque," = "those who belong to a certain person."
James Lockhart, The Nahuas after the Conquest: A Social and Cultural History of the Indians of Central Mexico, Sixteenth through Eighteenth Centuries (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), 97.

A farm laborer or tenant. In the plural, mayeque. These were "tenants on the patrimonial lands of the nobles, and in lieu of paying tribute to the state directly, they paid it to their noble overlord. They received an allotment of land for their own use, and in return were required to cultivate their master's land, provide domestic service, keep his household supplied with water and firewood, supply kitchen help, give one or more turkeys at specified intervals, spin and weave fibres, and provide other goods and services on a regular basis."
Frederic Hicks, "Dependent Labor in Prehispanic Mexico," Estudios de cultura náhuatl 11 (1974), 251.

Charles Gibson, The Aztecs under Spanish Rule (1964, p. 505 note 83): "Ramírez Cabañas, 'Los macehuales,' pp. 122–23, observes how infrequently the term mayeque occurs in sixteenth-century texts."

James Lockhart, The Nahuas after the Conquest (1992, p. 97): "Indeed, in one of only two occurrences of mayeque that I have found in a Nahuatl document (Tetzcoco, 1589), the term is paired with 'macehualtin': 'yn macehualtzitzintin tomayecauan,' 'the poor macehualtin our mayeque.' In the Cuernavaca basin and in the Puebla region, dependents are found referred to simply as -tech pouhque, 'those who belong to a certain person.'"

Chimalpahin provides an example of "mayeque," in the plural: auh mac conchiaca yn amihiyotzin amotlatoltzin yn amocolhuan mayeque = And let your seinior officials and the field hands await your utterances, your words. Codex Chimalpahin: Society and Politics in Mexico Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, Culhuacan, and Other Nahuatl Altepetl in Central Mexico; The Nahuatl and Spanish Annals and Accounts Collected and Recorded by don Domingo de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin, eds. and transl. Arthur J. O. Anderson and Susan Schroeder (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1997), vol. 2, 238–239.

Attestations from sources in Spanish: 

ynic nicmati ca mocipa hehuatl nictotoca ca timayecahuan = lo se porque siempre yo hago las siembras, pues somos sus mayeque
Luis Reyes García, Eustaquio Celestino Solís, Armando Valencia Ríos, et al, Documentos nauas de la Ciudad de México del siglo XVI, Ciudad de Mexico, 1558 (México: Centro de Investigación y Estudios Superiores en Antropología Social y Archivo General de la Nación, 1996), 99.

auh ynin oc oncatca yn macehualtzizintin tomayecauan yn oquichihuaya = Y así se esparcían los macehualtin, nuestros mayecahuan; así se hacía. (Tetzcoco, 1587)
Benjamin Daniel Johnson, “Transcripción de los documentos Nahuas de Tezcoco en los Papeles de la Embajada Americana resguardados en el Archivo Histórico de la Biblioteca Nacional de Antropología e Historia de México”, en Documentos nahuas de Tezcoco, Vol. 1, ed. Javier Eduardo Ramírez López (Texcoco: Diócesis de Texcoco, 2018), 110–111.

El Códice del Marquesado del Valle, de Yecapixtla en 1564, tiene un padrón de mayeque en la página 15, debajo de la imagen del gobernador don Juan Bautista. Son puros hombres con nombres cristianos (mostrando su bautizo) pero con nombres (y/o títulos) nahuas, además. Ejemplos son: tlacochcalcatl, tuquauhcauhtli, xochitlaneuh, xopeuh, cozcatlaqua, caltoncatl, huistoco, tziuhcohuatl, yaotl, tlilpoton, tlamacazqui, tochtli, matlalaca, xochicalcatl, yecaxochitl, chantli, huitznahuatl, yaoxochitl, petlauhtoc, tecpanecatl, hueyteuhctli, malin, tetlamin, ocexochitl, oyohual, tlaylotlac, quetzalhua, ayhuian, huecamecatl, acal, nehuaton, tlotecatl [sic? toltecatl], yscuinan, tlocuiltecatl, etc.
Ver la publicación del códice en Legajos: Boletín del Archivo General de la Nación 10 (oct.-dic. 2011).