What did the Spanish and their indigenous allies hope to
gain by presenting this image of Motecuzoma?

what does your friend need with?

polisit can also mean a body of citizens. in modern historiography, polis is normally used to indicate the ancient greek city-states, like classical athens and its contemporaries, and thus is often translated as "city-state". the body of citizens came to be the most important meaning of the term polis in ancient greece.