A Mexica pottery model of a temple on a stepped platform
Temple Model, 1400–1521
Marked Tenochtitlan

SubjectIn outline · lessons being written

Tenochtitlan and the Mexica

The Mexica, often called Aztecs, built their capital on an island in Lake Texcoco and ruled an empire of tribute across central Mexico. Tenochtitlan had causeways, canals, floating gardens and a great twin temple.

Place
Tenochtitlan · Tlatelolco · TexcocoThe Americas
Laid out as
A cityOne city, district by district, from its centre outwards.
Lessons
6 planned, none written yet

The lessons we plan

Titles may change as they are written

  1. IAn eagle on a cactus
  2. IIA city in a lake
  3. IIIChinampas
  4. IVThe Templo Mayor
  5. VTribute and the Triple Alliance
  6. VIMarkets of Tlatelolco

Still to come

The people and objects these lessons will cover

People

  • Itzcoatl
  • Moctezuma I
  • Moctezuma II
  • Eduardo Matos Moctezuma

Objects

  • The Sun Stone
  • The Coyolxauhqui stone
  • The Codex Mendoza

Where it sits

All of human history, era by era

Early human ancestryOur species and the Old Stone AgeFarming and the New Stone AgeFirst cities and the Bronze AgeThe Iron Age and growing statesThe classical worldAfter the empiresMedieval networks and empiresOceans crossedRevolutions and the first factoriesIndustry, empire and world warThe world since 1945

1325 to 1521. Each era is drawn the same width, so the earliest are squeezed: era II alone is over 300,000 years.

Nearby in time and place

This page is an outline. The summary above is a starting point; each lesson, when it is written, will give its sources, its pictures and where historians disagree. Spotted a mistake?