Download The Amazing Aztecs

The Amazing
Aztecs
Who were the Aztecs?
• The Aztecs were rich and powerful people from
the valley of Mexico.
• They were farmers, warriors, traders, engineers,
artists and sculptures.
• They originally lived in the desert lands of
northern Mexico.
• Huitzilopochtli, one of the gods of the Aztecs
commanded the people to travel south and to look
for an eagle perched on a cactus. This is where
they should settle and build a great city.
Settling Down
• In 1325 the Aztecs arrived in the
Valley of Mexico. It was a wide
plain with rich soil, lots of water
and a mild climate. Main
thousands of people already lived
there in large cities.
• The only unoccupied land was a
swampy island in Lake Texoco.
They saw the eagle and called
their home Tenochtitlan.
• They transformed the island into a
great city.
The Physical
Landscape
• Mountains were more than a physical landscape.
• The Aztecs saw a mountain as a sacred site that
brought people physically closer to the Gods.
• Temples that Aztecs build were pyramids in the
shape of mountains.
• The mountains surrounded Tenochtitlan gave the
Aztecs a sense of security – they protected the city
from attack by invaders.
• Steep mountains caused flash floods from rainstorms
in low areas.
Tenochtitlan
Tenochtitlan
The Physical
Landscape
• In 1500, Aztec engineers built an earthen dam across
the lake to the east of the city. This helped control
the water levels.
• The mountains kept out the clouds which often
brought rain.
• The Aztecs built aqueducts to ensure they had water –
even in times of drought.
Earthen Dam
Then they built causeways and bridges to
connect the city to the mainland.
Aztec Aqueducts
Aztec Aqueducts
• The water of the lake was too salty to drink.
• The solution was to bring in freshwater from the
springs that flowed on the mainland.
• An aqueduct was built from the mainland. It was five
kilometres long and 1.5 metres wide
An Island Home
• Lake Texcoco surrounded Tenochtitlan and provided
safety from enemies.
• The Aztecs built three causeways linking the island to
the mainland. Bridges that connected the causeways
could be destroyed to protect the city from invaders.
• The Aztecs grew from a few thousand into several
hundred thousand people.
• They became amazing plant cultivators who grew
more than enough food to support the growing
population and the Aztec army.
Chinampa
• The Aztecs made the swampy,
shallow lake into chinampas
(floating islands).
• They drove stakes into the
lakebed in a rectangular shape.
• The builders then laid reed mats
with stakes and piled soil on top.
• They repeated the process until
they had made a thick sandwich
of mud and mats rising above the
water’s surface.
Chinampa
• In order to prevent the roots from being waterlogged, the chinampa plot was above the lake
level.
• A narrow canal for the passage of canoes would be
left in between these two chinampa plots.
• To further stabilise these plots of land, willows
were planted around the perimeter.
• As for fertilisers, the Aztecs used human
excrement collected in canoes from the city of
Tenochtitlan.
Chinampa
• Once the chinampa was in place, farmers planted
vegetables, flowers and medicinal herbs.
• Each chinampa had to be small and productive
because they had no beasts of burden or plows.
• All labour was done by hand using simple tools.
• Farmers used canoes to travel to their crops.
Changing the
Geography
• The chinampa they built enlarged the original island on
which Tenochtitlan was situated.
• There was a series of five lakes.
• There was no river for water to flow out of the lakes.
• The lakes had become salty due to water evaporation.
The Sacred Landscape
• The Aztecs believed that their gods controlled every
thing in their world.
• Some of their gods were more important than others.
• They looked to their gods for signs on how to live.
• The Aztecs kept large libraries of codices (books) in
which they recorded information about their society.
• Codices only contained images not an alphabet.
• The Spanish destroyed almost all of the Aztec codices.
Aztec Codex
The Aztec Calendar
• The Aztec calendar showed the close connection between
the gods and human beings.
• The Aztecs had two calendars: a sacred calendar and a
solar calendar.
• The sacred calendar was 260 days long.
• It took the sacred calendar 52 years to catch up with the
solar calendar.
• The great stone calendar was dedicated to
Huitzilopochtili and it shows how the world began and
how it will end.
The Aztec Calendar
• The Aztecs believed that there had been four eras before
the present one and each had been destroyed.
• According to legends, the first era was destroyed by
jaguars, the second by hurricanes, the third by fiery rain
and the fourth by a flood.
• Legend states that the fifth era will be destroyed by
earthquakes.
The Aztec Calendar
Human Sacrifice
• The Aztecs believed that their gods
had to be fed with human hearts and
blood. This was nourishment.
• Killing another person as a sacrifice
was the strongest expression of their
devotion to the gods.
• Without the victim’s blood the god
would grow sick and die.
• If the gods were not fed, the Aztecs
believed that the world would end.
Human Sacrifice
• War was important to the Aztecs
because they could capture new
victims for sacrifice.
• The “New Fire” ceremony took
place every 52 years. The people
waited on the roof tops to see the
sacred flame lighting.
• A courier carried the flame from
house to house to relight the flame.
The Centre
of the World
• The Aztecs believed the Earth was a round, flat disc
divided into four sections. In the middle, where the
sections meet (like pieces of pie) was Tenochtitlan.
• They believed that the gods had assigned them a special
location in the universe.
• The city was divided into four sections – the four
directions.
• In the middle was a large square where temples and the
Great Temple at the very centre.
• Tenochtitlan was a model of the world.
The Centre
of the World
• The Aztecs believed that gods lived in the sky and other
places.
• Aztec priests sometimes built temples on mountaintops
where the physical and spiritual worlds met.
• As city-dwelling people, the Aztecs created sacred places
inside their cities.
• Most were built in a pyramid shape to represent a sacred
mountain.
Expanding
Through Trade
• The Aztecs formed trading and defensive partners with
the people around them
• The Aztecs were both: traders and warriors.
• The city was high in the mountains. The Aztecs could
not produce tropical fruits (avocados, papayas, and
cacao) which grew in the rainforests on the coasts.
• Tropical birds (with brightly coloured feathers) did not
grow well in the city.
• The cities did not deposits of gold or silver.
• They traded with others to get the goods they needed or
wanted.
Expanding
Through Trade
• They had to trade with other cultures.
• Aztec merchants took hundreds of slaves to carry the
goods they bought on trading expeditions.
• They were often gone for months to trade for goods in
remote areas of the empire.
• The merchants acted as spies for the army. They drew
maps to show which cities were strong and which were
easy to conquer.
• The maps and reports help Aztec leaders to expand the
empire.
Expanding
Through War
• The Aztecs believed that their society
was more important than the
individuals within it.
• Every Aztec was prepared to sacrifice
his/her own life for the good of the
group.
• New born babies were given bows and
arrows and children were brought up
to fight.
• The law required every young man to
serve in the army.
Expanding
Through War
• The worst Aztec insult was to call someone a coward.
• When boys were 18, they took place in their first battle.
• Once they had captured their first prisoner, they became
a warrior.
• The main weapon for the Aztec soldier was a war club
made from a heavy wood
(like mahogany) and
edged with blades of
obsidian.
What is Tribute?
• No, it is not the Hunger Games!
• Once the Aztecs conquered another group, they began to
collect tribute, or valuable gifts and taxes from the
conquered group.
• They kept careful records of the tribute they collected.
• They collected cotton blankets, feathered headdresses,
shields, strings of jade beads, and cocoa beans.
• Cocoa beans were important because they made a
special drink from them including hot chilli peppers and
cornmeal. Cocoa beans were used for currency.
• They believed the drink gave them wisdom and power.
Aztec Gods
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Chalchiuhtlicue – goddess of the lakes and streams
Chantico – goddess of the hearth
Chicomecoatl – goddess of maize
Coatlicue – goddess for the pain of life
Huehuetectim - god of fire
Huitzilopochtli – god of war, sun and the nation
Mictlantecuhtl – god of the dead
Quetzalcoatl - god of knowledge, creation, priesthood, and wind
Tezcatlipoca – god of magic, war and death
Tezcatlipoca – god of speech and language
Tlaloc – god of rain
Tloque Nahuaque - Lord of everywhere, the one supreme force, bothmale
and female
• Xipe Totec – god of spring and new life, god of suffering
• Xochipilli - prince of flowers, god of dawn, dance and love