City on a Lake
These were the floating gardens the Aztec used to create farmland in Lake Texcoco.
Chinampas
This title, meaning "Great Speaker," was given to the supreme leader of the Aztec Empire.
Huey Tlatoani
This vegetable, along with beans and squash, was a staple of the Aztec diet and grown on chinampas.
Maize (corn)
This year marks the arrival of the Spanish on the coast of Mesoamerica, a significant date for the fall of the Aztec Empire.
1519
The two most important Aztec gods, the sun god and the rain god, had shrines built on top of the Templo Mayor.
Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc
The Aztec demanded this, or taxes, from all conquered city-states, often paid in goods like cacao and feathers.
Tribute
This market, one of the largest in the world at the time, was located north of Tenochtitlan and impressed the Spanish.
Tlatelolco
The Spanish brought this deadly, highly contagious disease to the Americas, which decimated the Aztec population.
Smallpox
This architectural feature of Tenochtitlan was a wide artificial road connecting the island city to the mainland.
Causeways
Commoners could become nobles by capturing four prisoners in battle and joining an elite group such as this warrior society.
Eagle Warriors
This social unit, similar to a neighborhood, was made up of several families who shared land and a temple in Tenochtitlan.
Calpulli
This Nahuatl word was the name of the Aztec capital, meaning "place of the fruit of the nopal cactus."
Tenochtitlan
These sundried clay bricks were the material used by commoners to build their one-story houses in the calpullin districts.
Adobe
The Spanish conquistador who led the expedition that arrived in Mesoamerica in 1519 CE.
Hernan Cortes
A noble could own this class of people, typically those who owed a debt, though their children were born free.
Slaves
This powerful Aztec emperor greeted Cortés upon his arrival in Tenochtitlan.
Moctezuma II
The name of the alliance formed in 1428 CE between Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan to conquer neighboring cities.
Triple Alliance
The name for the ceremonial battles, fought solely for the purpose of acquiring sacrificial victims, which symbolized blood in Aztec poetry.
Flower wars
The name of the two separate school systems, one for noble boys and one for commoners, that Aztec children attended.
Calmecac and Telpochcalli
The Spanish were joined by these native people who were historical enemies of the Aztec and vital to the victory of the invaders.
Tlaxcalans