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Aztec

Member of an American Indian people who migrated south into the valley of Mexico in about 1168. They belonged to the Nahuatl, a Mesoamerican people who remain the largest ethnic group in Mexico today; their language was from the Uto-Aztecan family. The Aztec developed a highly structured civilization, known for its architecture and precious artefacts, and centred on a complex ritual calendar that included large-scale human sacrifice. From 1325 they built their capital Tenochtitlán on the site now occupied by Mexico City. Under Montezuma I (reigned 1437-64), they created an empire in central Mexico which lasted until the arrival of the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés in 1519. The Aztec subsequently became subjects of Spain, but their lineage continues and some Mexicans still use the Uto-Aztecan language.

The Aztec created fine gold, jade, and turquoise jewellery, sculpture, and textiles. Their form of writing combined hieroglyphs and pictographs, and they used an astronomical calendar that combined a sacred period of 260 days with the solar year of 365 days. Rites to pacify the gods were performed at the intersection of the two, called the ‘dangerous’ period, every 52 years, when temples were rebuilt.

Religion

The Aztec had many gods. Their main god was the war god Huitzilopochtli, but they also worshipped Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent, a god inherited from earlier Mexican civilizations. Religious ritual included human sacrifice on a large scale, the priests tearing the hearts from the living victims or flaying people alive. War captives were obtained for this purpose, but the Aztec also sacrificed their own people.

Government

The most powerful person in the Aztec social structure was the emperor. Priests and nobles, who were next in rank, ran the Aztec state, with farmers, artisans, and merchants taxed to support it. Tribute was collected from conquered neighbouring states.

The Aztec were organized as a group of tribes, comprising about 20 clans. The tribal leaders formed a council, which appointed a war leader and a leader for civil and religious matters. Within the tribes each clan had its leaders, who formed the tribal council. The leaders tended to come from the most important families.

The Aztec went to war with neighbouring peoples in order to gain or defend territory, and to settle old feuds. However, the main purpose of war was to take prisoners to supply the human sacrifices needed for the gods. Soldiers wore a form of armour made of quilted cotton and fought using clubs, spears, and bows and arrows.

Agriculture Because good farmland was scarce in the valley, the Aztec resorted to making artificial islands in the marshy lake around Tenochtitlán. The basic crop was corn (maize). The Aztec grew many varieties of beans, as well as squashes, sweet peppers, tomatoes, and pineapples. From the juice of the agave plant they made a kind of beer, and distilled it to make spirits. The stalks of the agave were woven into ropes, the leaves were used to roof huts, and the thorns made needles for sewing. Other crops included cotton and tobacco. The Aztec had few domestic animals. They had dogs, some of which were bred for food, turkeys, ducks, and geese. They had no beasts of burden, and the wheel as means of transport seems to have been unknown.

Economy The Aztec economy was based on agriculture. Trade was conducted by barter, and there was no money as we know it. For small transactions they used cocoa beans, which were also used to make chocolate, a favourite drink. Gold dust and small copper knives were sometimes used as a form of currency.

Buildings Most buildings were made of adobe (sun-dried clay bricks), with thatched roofs. Wealthy people used some stone in the construction of their homes. Temples were built of stone and wood, and were set on top of lofty stone pyramids.

Arts and crafts The Aztec wove cloth and made pottery. They worked in stone, both for building and for sculptures, and fashioned it without metal tools. Stone tools were made from obsidian, a form of volcanic glass. Wood was shaped with stone tools. Metalworking was confined to copper and gold, which were shaped either by hammering while cold, or by melting the metals and casting them in clay moulds.

Using various plants the Aztec made rubber, from which they fashioned balls for games. Pictures show that the Aztec played a type of football, in which the ball was propelled with the legs rather than the feet. Some of the players were killed after the game, but it is not certain whether the losers were sacrificed for having lost, or the winners were promoted to the next world for having won.

Spanish conquest The Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés landed in Mexico in 1519 with 600 men. At first he was received in Tenochtitlán as a god, but was soon expelled. However, Cortés had the advantage of horses and firearms, neither of which the Aztec had ever seen. The Spanish also gained the support of some oppressed classes of Aztec who were tired of being taxed and sacrificed to the gods by the Aztec empire. Cortés took and destroyed Tenochtitlán in 1521, and the Aztec emperor Montezuma II, although restored to his throne as a vassal of Spain, was later killed by dissidents among his subjects.

Many Aztec died from smallpox, a disease carried to the region by Europeans. The Aztec who survived were assimilated into the Spanish culture, but many Mexicans today have Aztec lineage, and some continue to speak the Uto-Aztecan language of the Nahuatl.

Aztec

Town and administrative headquarters of San Juan County, northwest New Mexico,; population (2000) 6,400. It is located in the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, on the Animas River, in the San Juan River Basin. It is 19 km/12 mi south of the Colorado border and 23 km/14 mi northeast of Farmington. It is a trade centre for producers of fruit, vegetables, and grain. The settlement was named for 12th-century Anasazi ruins that were formerly thought to have been part of the Aztec empire; these were preserved as the Aztec Ruins National Monument, and contain the reconstructed Great Kiva.

Aztec art Cortés, Hernán Ferdinand

Kiowa-Tanoan Montezuma I

Paz, Octavio pre-Columbian art

quetzal Tenochtitlán

Texcoco Uto-Aztecan