AP® World History: Modern · Unit 4 · Topic 4.7
The Casta System and New Hierarchies
Watch it explained
- How it worksShow me the casta hierarchy as a pyramid and what each level was and was not allowed to do.
- How it worksHow does an existing elite like the Russian boyars or the Ottoman timar-holders get absorbed by a stronger state?
- Common mistakeWhy isn't the casta system a fixed biological ranking rather than a shifting legal one?
- Going furtherWhat happens to a rigid social pyramid when the people at the second level get rich?
Check yourself
Your turn1 of 2
In Spanish colonial society, a person's casta label could sometimes change through legal petition, marriage, accumulated wealth, or relocation to a town where their family's ancestry was less well known. What does this flexibility best show about the nature of the casta system?End of topic.