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THE AZTEC
The Aztec were hunter-gatherers living on a small island in northwestern Mexico, when their god, Huitzilopochtli (wee tsee loh POCH tlee), told them to leave their homeland. He said:
"Go where the cactus grows, on which the eagle sits happily…there you shall wait, there you shall meet a number of tribes and with your arrow or with your shield you shall conquer them."

 They journeyed through deserts and over steep mountains.

They were hungry and thirsty, hoping at every turn to see the promised sign:
an eagle sitting on a prickly pear cactus, eating a snake.

There was no time to grow food, so they ate fly eggs and snakes to survive. There was no time to weave cloth, so they wore animal skins for clothing.

 They journeyed through the lands of tribes that were larger and stronger. These tribes called them Dog People because of their barbarian ways. They did not allow the Aztec to settle. Besides, the Aztec still had not seen the sign.

 Finally the Aztec came upon the promised sign. They found the eagle eating the snake on a cactus on a small, swampy island in Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico. After 200 years of wandering, they started to build a powerful empire.

They named their new home Tenochtitlan,(tay nawch tee TLAN) " Place of the Prickly Pear Cactus." No one knows exactly why the Aztec came to the Valley of Mexico. But by the time the Aztec arrived in the early 1300s, powerful tribes had already claimed the best farm lands in the area.

Building an Empire  

So they settled on a soggy, uninhabited island in Lake Texcoco. The island was about 12 miles square in size.

Adapting to the Land     

The future did not look good for the Aztec. Because the land on their island was mostly swamp, they couldn't grow corn for food or cotton for clothing. 
Since there wasn't much wood and stone on the small island to build huts, the Aztec used grass and mud from the swamp to make their houses.

They caught and ate birds and fish that lived on the island or in the water around it. The ate algae from the water too!

From the tribes around them, the Aztec learned a method of farming that worked well in the swampy areas. It was called chinampas, or "floating gardens."  Chinampas are narrow strips of land about 300 feet long and 15 to 30 feet wide, almost completely surrounded by canals. The Aztec built these floating gardens around their central city. 


 Using chinampas, Aztec farmers grew vegetables unknown in Europe: corn, squash, chili peppers, beans, and tomatoes.
       The Aztec used canals to travel by canoe to the city of Tenochtitlan and nearby islands. They also built roads to the mainland called "causeways" . One was over five miles long.

 Aztec neighbors were more powerful and more civilized. They forced the Aztec to serve as soldiers in their armies.
They learned to be skilled warriors.
 
As the number of Aztec warriors increased, and so did their  reputation. They formed an alliance, or union, with two other powerful tribes. 
 
The empire they created covered the southern third of Mexico and included Guatemala,  an area about 375 miles wide and 315 miles long.

One of the greatest rulers of the empire was Ahuitzotl
(ah WEE soh tl).

He made lightning-quick attacks that took his enemies by surprise.
    Ahuitzotl completed the pyramid of the Great Temple, which he dedicated to the god Huitzilopochtli.
When Ahuitzotl died in 1502, his nephew, Moctezuma , became the new ruler. 

He too led his warriors into battles of conquest. 
Under his rule, the empire reached its greatest size, with a population of about 25 million people.
LIVING IN THE EMPIRE
    As the empire expanded, Aztec society became more complex.  
Social Classes


 
The four social classes in each Aztec town were : Commoners, slaves, nobles, and merchants.
Commoners made up the biggest group of the Aztec population. They farmed their own land but also had to farm the nobles' land. Men worked in the fields, women cooked and made cloth and cared for the younger children. At age 10,  boys were sent to school, where they learned Aztec religion and history. Aztec commoners had to pay tribute(a kind of tax) in goods or services to the government.

Tribute could be paid in crops

in handmade items such as jewelry
 
or clothing,

and by work on projects such as temples or canals.

  Slaves were the lowest of the Aztec society. Many slaves were captives of war.
Others had committed crimes or who had not repaid debts.
   
The nobles were the smallest class, but they controlled the other classes. Being a noble was hereditary (passed down from one generation to the next). They were government officials, priests, and warriors. Nobles lived off tribute paid by commoners and conquered peoples.
 

Most of those living in the Aztec Empire were conquered peoples.  
Aztec rule was harsh.
Many tribes were forced to give up so much of their food as tribute that they were nearly starving.
 
These tribes very angry at Aztec rulers.
   Aztec merchants traveled throughout the empire bringing back colored feathers, jade, and cocoa for the nobles.

Slaves carried heavy loads for trips of 250 miles or more. Merchants sold many of their goods in city markets throughout the empire. The Spanish explorer Hernando Cortes later reported that more than 60,000 people visited the city market daily .

The Aztec built fancy palaces, temples, and government storehouses out of stone and brick. 
Aztec craftworkers created beautiful feather headdresses,
stone sculptures

 and jewelry with precious stones
 
Perhaps the most important Aztec artifacts that archaeologists have discovered are the Aztec codices
( a kind of book, with pages made from tree bark).

The pages open and close like folding screens with pictures that stand for words.  At one time there were hundreds of these books.
Unfortunately, the Spanish burned many of the codices, and others simply rotted in the humid climate.    
Fighting for the gods
The everyday lives of all classes of Aztec society revolved around religion.
These are just a few of the 1,000 Aztec gods- most of them represented forces of nature.
Corn

 Water

 Fire

Food
 Mother
 Flowers
Wind
Moon
Sun
 
Because the Aztec lived by farming,  the two most important gods in the Aztec world were the god of rain, 
 		 and the god of the sun and war who could destroy the world whenever he wanted.

Human Sacrifices
The Aztec priests offered sacrifices to the gods to make their crops grow.
Human sacrifice! When the Temple of the Sun in Tenochtitlan was dedicated to the sun and rain gods, the Aztec sacrificed as many as 10,000 people !
  Most of the people sacrificed by the Aztec were captives of war. 
The Aztec believed that sacrificing an enemy warrior especially pleased their gods.  Some think that the Aztec arranged wars just to capture sacrifices for the gods.
 
War and Religion
     The Aztecs also wanted to control the Valley of Mexico, so they made war on any tribes who resisted them. And they conquered more and more tribes.

At schools, the boys learned ruthless fighting methods and became strong warriors.  Aztec warriors fought without fear of death. They believed that if they died in war, they would go live with the gods in the heavens.
"Only this my heart craves: death in war."
(from an Aztec codice)
Warriors also fought hard because the more captives they took, the higher their social rank would be.
 

 But their cruelty led to deep anger among conquered tribes. Later, Spanish invaders would use this anger to help defeat the Aztec.