Aztec Culture (2159 words)

Aztec Culture
The Aztecs are an ancient culture that had many customs and rituals that by
modern standards are considered barbaric. Their culture was made up of different
social classes, and was primitive yet very advanced. They were located in the
mainland of Mexico, and their empire was quite vast over that area. Their
culture began around 1100, and ended around 1520. The exact numbers of the
Aztecs is not known due to the age of their culture, but judging by the size of
their empire it was quite large. The only figure I could find was that in 1519
there were more than 1,000,000 people living in the civilizations boundaries.

The reason that I was drawn to this culture was some of the practices that they
had. The most interesting being the human sacrifices to the gods, and the large
ball game that they played that sometimes went on for days without a stop. The
Aztecs lived primarily in a fertile volcanic valley of Mexico where they built
their capital city named Tenochtitlan. The land in which they lived was a
plateau seeing that most of the surrounding was mountainous. The soil in the
settled areas was very rich and good for growing crops, due to the volcanic
eruptions that occurred. The valley of Mexico was the heartland of Aztec
civilization. It is a large internally drained basin surrounded by volcanic
mountains that are as high as 9,000 ft in elevation. Thousands of years of soil
erosion had produced deep, rich soils in the valley and a system of shallow,
swampy, salt lakes in its center. This gave the Aztecs a diverse variety of
foods that could be available. The salty lakes made available fish, turtles,
insect larvae, blue-green algae, and salt. The food that was eaten by the Aztecs
varied by social classes. The peasants lived mainly on corn and beans, except
for a duck or a crow that they may have trapped in their garden. Their only
domesticated animals were rabbits, dogs, and turkeys which were fattened and
eaten on special occasions. Corn was the main food of The Aztecs and many foods
were made fresh daily from it. Every morning the woman of the family would grind
up fresh corn, and make bread for the day. The higher classed people, however,
enjoyed eating turtles and crabs imported from the coast. It was odd to the
Spaniards to find that one of the delicacies of the Aztecs was dog. Aztec homes
also differed by social class, peasants built their huts around the edge of the
city. While handymen lived nearer to the center in mud-brick houses. In each of
these homes there was normally a mudbrick tub, and they all consisted of a
single room. Nobles that were higher in society lived in palaces built of
whitewashed stone, and with over a hundred rooms, and were built around the main
plaza. Inside of all houses the rooms were almost bare, light came in from
wooden torches and round the room were stored the family’s possessions and
objects of daily use. Even palaces had no doors but instead had cloth hung over
openings, this allowed for cool air to circulate throughout the house. For the
Aztecs clothing was way of showing social status, so there were very strict laws
about who could wear what. An ordinary citizen wore a loincloth and cloak, which
had to be made of plain undyed maguey-fiber cloth. And if they were caught
wearing sandals in the palace they were put to death. Nobles wore cotton cloaks
with borders of precious stones. Craftsmen were able to dye the cotton green,
and other colors; they also wove geometric designs into their cloak to symbolize
their status in the culture. The Aztecs loved to wear jewelry, but there were
also strict laws about this. Most people pierced their ears to hold plugs of
shell or polished stones. Nobles were allowed to wear gold and carved precious
stones in their lower lips to show their high rank. Farmers were among the
lowest in the dress, they slept in their loincloth, and in the morning he got
his blanket and tied it around his shoulder and he was dressed. Women wore a
woven blouse with an embroidered skirt that held it in place. Every class also
had their own haircuts varying from highest to lowest for the most festive
style. Through my studies of the Aztecs I was shocked to find out how much
dress, and appearance had to do with social status. The