While most pre-Columbian historians believe that there was ritual cannibalism related to human sacrifices, they do not support Harris's thesis that human flesh was ever a significant portion of the Aztec diet.

Probably after the killings in the main temple, there were few Aztec captains available to take the position.

In pueblos or villages, there are also more exotic dishes, cooked in the Aztec or Mayan style ( known as comida prehispánica ) with ingredients ranging from iguana to rattlesnake, deer, corn fungus, spider monkey, chapulines, ant eggs and other kinds of insects.

As well, there was no spread of this doctrine within the New World and the advanced civilizations of the Aztec, Maya, Inca, Mohican, Delaware, Huron and especially the Iroquois.

A burial ground in Campeche, Mexico, suggests slaves had been brought there not long after Hernán Cortés completed the subjugation of Aztec and Mayan Mexico.

He ran up the hill, and there saw a Lady, about fourteen years of age, resembling an Aztec princess in appearance, and surrounded by light.

The Aztec practiced human sacrifice on an unusually large scale ; a sacrifice would be made every day to aid the sun in rising, the dedication of the great temple at Tenochtitlán was reportedly marked with the sacrificing of thousands, and there are multiple accounts of captured Conquistadores being sacrificed during the wars of the Spanish conquest of Mexico.

The Aztecs prayed to her when there were deaths in water, such as when Hernando Cortez conquered Tenochtitlan ( the Ancient Aztec capital on a lake, now Mexico City ), and the lake was said to be " floating with heads and corpses ".

In New Mexico there is also the Aztec Ruins National Monument, Bandelier National Monument, Capulin Volcano National Monument, Carlsbad Caverns National Park, Chaco Culture National Historical Park, El Malpais National Monument, El Morro National Monument, Gila Cliff Dwellings National Monument, Kasha-Katuwe Tent Rocks National Monument, Pecos National Historical Park, Petroglyph National Monument, and the Salinas Pueblo Missions National Monument.

Hernán Cortés sent Francisco de Orozco to Oaxaca because Moctezuma II said that the Aztec ’ s gold came from there.

However, the Aztec record states that the Spanish attack was unprovoked and there was no plot against them.

Aztec emperors had summer residences there, and even today, many famous people as well as Mexico City residents maintain homes there.

Unlike later Maya or Aztec cities, La Venta was built from earth and clay — there was little locally abundant stone for the construction.

At the entrance of the theatre, there are mascarons in bronze with depictions of Tlaloc, and Chaac, the Aztec and Mayan deities of water, which along with the rest were designed by Gianette Fiorenzo.

In the creation myths which were preserved by the Aztec and other Nahua peoples, the central tenet was that there had been four worlds, or " Suns ", before the present universe.

Using information he had collected during his time spent travelling there, as well as that compiled by other scholars of his time, he published in 1857 – 1859 a history of the Aztec civilization, containing what was then known or speculated about the former empire, which had been overrun and defeated some three hundred years previously by the Spanish conquistadores in alliance with local enemies of the Aztecs.

On the right hand side, there is the date of 1526 depicted in Aztec style, when the Franciscans arrived, accompanied by the coat of arms of that order.

In the second game, monkeys could be seen in the story level called Aztec Ruins and there was a multiplayer mode called " Monkey Assistant " where the player in last place was aided by monkeys.

Mexico City ( Tenochtitlan ) had also been the capital of the Aztec Empire, and many speakers of the Aztec language Nahuatl continued to live there and in the surrounding region, outnumbering the Spanish-speakers for several generations.

Mexico and Peru were kingdoms fashioned under the respectively Aztec and Inca laws and borders.

New World codices were written as late as the 16th century ( see Maya codices and Aztec codices ).

Because cacao would not grow in the dry central Mexican highlands and had to be imported, chocolate was an important luxury good throughout the Aztec empire, and cocoa beans were often used as currency.

Eventually Cortés recovered some gold from a noble's house, but most of the tales about " Aztec gold " were a myth.

During pre-Columbian warfare, Aztec nations were known to have used drums to send signals to the battling warriors.

The only pre-Columbian North American rulers to be commonly called emperors were the Hueyi Tlatoani of the Aztec Empire ( 1375 – 1521 ).

In the codex's description of the first meeting between Moctezuma and Cortés, the Aztec ruler is described as giving a prepared speech in classical oratorial Nahuatl, a speech which as described verbatim in the codex ( written by Sahagún's Tlatelolcan informants who were probably not eyewitnesses of the meeting ) included such prostrate declarations of divine or near-divine admiration as, " You have graciously come on earth, you have graciously approached your water, your high place of Mexico, you have come down to your mat, your throne, which I have briefly kept for you, I who used to keep it for you ," and, " You have graciously arrived, you have known pain, you have known weariness, now come on earth, take your rest, enter into your palace, rest your limbs ; may our lords come on earth.

According to Charles C. Mann's, " 1491 ", only the lower classes of Aztec society were polytheistic.

According to Ross Hassing, author of Aztec Warfare, " between 10, 000 and 80, 400 persons " were sacrificed in the ceremony.

At the start, the levels were supposed to be designed in an Aztec style, but the choice was dropped some months into the project.

The first known states were created in Ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, India, China, the Americas ( e. g. Aztec civilization, Inca civilization ) and others, but it is only in relatively modern times that states have almost completely displaced alternative " stateless " forms of political organization of societies all over the planet.

The tepoztopilli was a pole-arm, and to judge from depictions in various Aztec codices, it was roughly the height of a man, with a broad wooden head about twice the length of the users ' palm or shorter, edged with razor-sharp obsidian blades which were deeply set in grooves carved into the head, and cemented in place with bitumen or plant resin as an adhesive.

Every Atlcahualo festival, seven children were sacrificed in and around Lake Texcoco in the Aztec capital.

This historicist view was first challenged by Daniel Garrison Brinton who argued that the " Toltecs " as described in the Aztec sources were merely one of several Nahuatl speaking citystates in the postclassic period, and not a particularly influential one at that.

Many historicists such as H. B. Nicholson ( 2001 ( 1957 )) and Nigel Davies ( 1977 ) were fully aware that the Aztec chronicles were a mixture of mythical and historical accounts, this led them to try to separate the two by applying a comparative approach to the varying Aztec narratives.

When the Spanish invaded the Aztec empire in what is now Mexico, they were quick to exploit the color for new trade opportunities.

The Mexica / Aztec were said to be guided by their god Huitzilopochtli, meaning " Left-handed Hummingbird " or " Hummingbird from the South.

According to legend, when the Mexicans arrived in the Anahuac valley around Lake Texcoco, they were considered by the other groups as the least civilized of all, but the Mexican / Aztec decided to learn, and they took all they could from other people, especially from the ancient Toltec ( whom they seem to have partially confused with the more ancient civilization of Teotihuacan ).

To the Aztec, the Toltec were the originators of all culture ; " Toltecayotl " was a synonym for culture.

The aztec gods and goddess were mainly taken from the sources of Francisco Javier Clavijero, Alfredo Chavero, Francisco del Paso y Troncoso, Manuel Orozco y Berra and Bernardino de Sahagún, where depending on the source the suffixes of the Aztec names are exchanged " Lli ", " Li ", " Tl ", " Tli ", " Tlli " as occasionally the initials of the Aztec names are changed " Ch ", " C ", " Qu ", " X ", " K ", " Z ".

In the Aztec calendar, Tonatiuh is the lord of the thirteen days from 1 Death to 13 Flint.

In the Aztec calendar, Chalchiuhtotolin is the lord of the thirteen days from 1 Water to 13 Crocodile.

In the Aztec calendar, Itztlacoliuhqui is the lord of the thirteen days from 1 Lizard to 13 Vulture.

In the Aztec calendar, Patecatl is the lord of the thirteen days from 1 Monkey to 13 House.

Tlalocan is the first level of the upper worlds, or the Aztecs ' thirteen heavens, that has four compartments according to the mythic cosmographies of the Nahuatl-speaking peoples of pre-Columbian central Mexico, noted particularly in Conquest-era accounts of Aztec mythology.