Sacred & Savage: 25 Historical Aztecs Facts

SACRED & SAVAGE: 25 HISTORICAL AZTECS FACTS

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Some of the most horrifying and enlightening facts about the Aztecs:

HUMAN SACRIFICE RITUALS

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The Aztecs routinely performed massive human sacrifices to appease gods like Huitzilopochtli. They actually believed the sun required blood to rise! During the sacrifice, like the scene in a horror film, victims’ hearts were ripped out while still beating.

CHINAMPAS (FLOATING GARDENS)

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Chinampas, or engineered artificial islands, were created by the Aztecs on lakes to grow crops like maize, beans, and squash.

CACAO BEANS AS CURRENCY

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Chocolate was so valued by the Aztecs that cacao beans were used as money. Sometimes, people counterfeiting using clay beans—if discovered it was punishable by death.  

FLOWER WARS (XŌCHIYAOYŌTL)

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The Aztec Flower Wars were ritualized conflicts between city-states. Warriors wielded wooden clubs studded with obsidian to wound rather than kill. These battles were used to capture noble prisoners for heart-extraction ceremonies atop temple pyramids.

UNIVERSAL EDUCATION

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All Aztec children, including commoners, attended school—boys learned trades/warfare, girls studied homemaking and religion.  

TLACHTLI BALL GAME

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The Mesoamerican ballgame tlachtli combined lethal sport with sacred ritual. Players struck a 9-pound rubber ball using only their hips, attempting to send it through high stone rings. Bones were often broken, and the losing team was often condemned to death.

QUETZALCOATL’S RETURN

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According to Aztec oral tradition—the feathered serpent deity Quetzalcoatl—who had pale skin and a thick beard—would one day sail eastward across the Gulf of Mexico, vowing to return one day to reclaim his throne. Hernán Cortés, arriving from Cuba in 1519—cultivated this resemblance to convince Montezuma II and other Aztec nobles that he was the returning god.

TZOMPANTLI (SKULL RACKS)

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The Aztecs built racks of human skulls from sacrifices that they displayed in temples. One structure held an estimated 300,000 skulls!

RITUAL CANNIBALISM

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Some scholars argue sacrificial victims’ flesh was eaten by the Aztecs, though this remains debated.  

CHILD SACRIFICES TO TLALOC

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Aztecs drowned or dismembered children to honor the rain god. Their tears were seen as auspicious.  

HALLUCINOGENIC RITUALS

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Aztec priests used psychedelic mushrooms (teonanácatl) and morning glory seeds to talk with the gods.  

MULTIPLE AFTERLIVES

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In the Aztec religion, your final breath determines where you go when you die. Warriors who died went to live with the sun. Those who drowned explored the jade gardens of Tlalocan. But most people endured a brutal four-year journey through nine layers of Mictlan, where they had to traverse a river of blood, climb an obsidian mountain, and face winds sharp enough to slice flesh.

MOCTEZUMA’S ZOO

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Aztec Emperor Moctezuma II kept a zoo of jaguars, eagles, and deformed humans. It was later destroyed by the Spanish.  

TLATELOLCO MARKET

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Tenochtitlan (the capital of the Aztecs) had a bustling marketplace that attracted 60,000 daily traders. They sold everything from gold to slaves.  

CHOCOLATE AS BITTER DRINK

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Reserved for Aztec elites, chocolate was mixed with chili, vanilla, or honey—but not the sugary candy bar’s we are used to today.

SMALLPOX DEVASTATION

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In 1520, a single infected Spanish slave sparked a smallpox outbreak that killed 8 million Aztecs in just 10 months. The death rate was so high that bodies clogged Tenochtitlan’s canals. Survivors were often too weak to remove their dead relatives from their homes. The Spanish chronicler Fray de Sahagún described the victims’ skin as “covered in pustules that made them look like a pine cone with its seeds.”

XOLOITZCUINTLI DOGS

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Xoloitzcuintli Dogs were bred by the Aztecs as companions and symbols of Xolotl (the underworld god). They were also used as food. One notable 2008 discovery in Mexico City revealed over 1,400 ceremonially arranged Xoloitzcuintli skeletons in a single burial chamber.

ALGAE SUPERFOOD

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Aztecs harvested spirulina from lakes to make protein-rich cakes called tecuitlatl.

OBSIDIAN BLADES

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The Aztecs used volcanic glass tools that were sharper than steel. They used them for weapons, surgery, and ritual bloodletting.  

ADVANCED SANITATION

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While medieval London’s streets flowed with human waste, the Aztec capital Tenochtitlan’s 150,000 residents used a network of 50 public latrines that emptied into beds of water-purifying water lilies. The city had an army of 1,000 workers who swept the streets each dawn with reed brooms.

WOMEN MERCHANTS (POCHTECA)

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Unlike medieval Europe, Aztec female merchants could gain wealth and status, though society remained patriarchal.  

ISLAND CAPITAL

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The Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan was built on Lake Texcoco, connected by causeways and featuring grand temples—until Spanish cannons destroyed it. Modern day Mexico City sits on top of it.

VOLUNTEER SACRIFICES

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Some Aztec victims willingly offered themselves to be sacrificed, believing death in ritual granted honor and afterlife rewards.  

DIVINE CANNIBALISM MYTH

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Aztecs believed gods sacrificed themselves to create the sun. They thought that humans had to repay the debt with blood.  

EMPIRE’S COLLAPSE

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After a 93-day siege, Hernán Cortés destroyed Tenochtitlan (the Aztec capital), a city so vast its central market alone served 60,000 people daily—ending the Aztec Empire and founding Mexico City atop its ruins.

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