Templo Mayor

1. Templo Mayor By: Kelcie Thomas & Brad Smith

2. History The Templo Mayor was located in the central district of Tenochtitlan, capital of the Aztecs and present day Mexico City. Construction of the first temple began in 1390, and it was rebuilt six times after that. It was finished in 1487 and was destroyed by the Spanish Conquistadors after the fall of the Aztecs in 1521. Ruins of the Templo Mayor

3. Geographical Feat The temple hosted shrines at the top of the structure to worship two seperate gods: Huitzilopochtli, god of war and Tlaloc, god of rain and agriculture. Tlaloc Huitzliopochtli

4. Design At it’s base the Templo Mayor measured approximately 330 ft. by 260 ft. It acended close to 197 ft. And the twin temples at the top were an aproximate 98 ft. The Templo Mayor (digital reconstruction)

5. Sacrifice The Templo Mayor was used for a another kind of worship. In order to secure good rain and harvest as well as success in war, the aztecs would sacrifice humans, usually prisoners of war, by tearing out the heart of the victim and offering the still beating heart to the sun.

6. Sacrifice in Detail Those who werwe sacrificed were from war captives and slaves. Victims would climb the steps and lay on the stone slab then, they would beheld down by four priests and the fifth would cut the abdomen down and across with a knife and take out the beating heart. They would then take the still beating heart and put it in a bowl and point it up to the sky for the Gods and Godesses.

7. Sacrifice in Detail (Continued) People believed if Gods didnt perform the sacrifices the world would come to an end because the Gods would not survive with out frsh humanblood. Cannibalism of the victim was said to be a nessasary part of the Aztec diet.

8. By the Number (Sacrifice of 1487) Sacrifice by the number- - 2,000-20,000prisoners 4 days Average of 1-3sacrifices per MINUTE Compare this to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp, that executed 19,200 prisoners a day at its peak.

9. Sacred Precinct Inside the temple there was a sacred precinct where the Aztec nobles would hold religious festivals. It consisted of an approximate 78 buildings, the most important being the ballroom for this is where the festivals were held. The sacred precinct was meant to honor Quetzalcoatl, Tezcatlipoca and the sun.

10. Destruction of the Sacred Precinct On 14 November 1521, Cortes seized the emperor Moctezuma II and ordered the destruction of all the religious relics of the Aztecs. He ordered a Catholic cross placed on the Templo Mayor. Desecration of the Temple did not stop there. While Cortes left for Veracruz to confront Spaniards looking to arrest him, Pedro de Alvarado learned of a plan to attack the Spaniards, and staged an pre-emptive attack on the Aztecs in the Sacred Precinct while they celebrated a religious festival. Unarmed and trapped within the walls of the Sacred Precinct, an estimated 8,000–10,000 Aztec nobles were killed.

11. Destruction of the Sacred Precinct (Continued) When word of the massacre spread throughout the city, the people turned on the Spaniards, killing seven, wounding many, and driving the rest back to their quarters. The Spaniards were trapped between two Aztec forces and 68 were captured alive. Ten of these Spanish captives were immediately sacrificed at the Temple and their severed heads were thrown back to the Spaniards. The others were sacrificed at the Great Temple that night, which could be seen from the Spanish camps. The sacrificed Spaniards were flayed and their faces — with beards attached — were tanned and sent to allied towns, both to solicit assistance and to warn against betraying the alliance

12. The movie Apocalypto by Mel Gibson tells the tale of human sacrifice by the Mesoamerican people. It helps us depict the struggles that people may have faced in the eye of human sacrifice.

13. Tlaloc Tlaloc ruled the forth layer of the Upperworld or heavens.Tlalocan was the destionation named after him where people who died of a violent death associated with water, lightning, or water borne diseases. Tlaloc

14. Huitzilopochtli His mother was Coatlicue and his father was a ball of feathers. His sister Coyoxauhqui tried to kill his mother because she got pregnant with Huitzilopochtil before Coyoxauhqui killed his mother he sprang from her body fully armed and grown and killed his sister. Huitzilopochtil cut off his sisters head and tossed his sisters head in the sky who became the moon. He then killed the rest of his 500 brothers and sisters and sent them to be the stars of the sky so his mother could still see them. The “H” Dude.

15. Fun Fact They say because there were so many sacrifices at the Templo Mayor, the stairs ascending to the top were stained permanently with blood!