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The Aztecs believed the sun fought darkness every night and rose to save mankind. They believed the earth was flat. They believed that if they fed the sun blood, it would rise. They also believed in 13 heavens and 9 hells. The Aztecs respected their gods very much. They put their greatest efforts into making strong, beautiful temples to please their gods. Their arts had a part in their religion. They drew pictures that told about their gods. They recorded religious events with hieroglyphics and even number symbols. The Aztecs worshipped about 1,000 gods! But they worshipped the sun god the most. Religious ceremonies took place in a temple called a Teocalli. This temple had sacred pools for ceremonial cleansing, gardens, living quarters for a priest, and racks to hold the skulls of victims. Religion played a great part in Aztec life. Sacrifice was one of the main events in the Aztec religion. Priests made human sacrifices to make the sun god happy. Aztecs fought in wars to capture men to sacrifice. On God's Feast Day, they killed their slaves for the gods. Human sacrifices were offerings to the sun and earth so that food would grow. On the night of the O' Nothing Days, O' priests would dress up as the supreme gods and wait on the top of an extinct volcano. When the evening star reached the top of the sky, the priests would stretch the captive over an altar, or a special stone. Then the high priest would light a fire on the victim's heart and tear it out. After the heart is cut, the priest would hold the heart to the sun, then put it in a sacred dish. Finally, the bodies were rolled down the temple stairs to lie in a heap. Even after that, most victims were happy to die because they thought they would go straight to heaven. The Aztecs strongly believed in the afterlife. It was the way the Aztecs died rather than the way they lived that determined whether they would go to the sun god or go to the dark and dismal underworld. If a person died a normal death, his or her soul would have to pass through the nine lives of the underworld before reaching Mictlan, the realm of the dead. A warrior who died in battle or a woman that died in childbirth would go straight to the sun god in the sky. The head of the gods was Huizilopochtlid, god of war and god of sun. This god had told the Aztecs to wander until they found an eagle with a serpent in its mouth perched on a cactus growing from a rock. When they found this, they claimed the area around it, which is now known as Tenochtitlan. The Aztecs worshipped Tlaloc, the rain god, in the main temple. This god was very important to farmers because drought was a threat in the area. Quetzalcoatl was a feathered snake who represented arts, crafts, and self-sacrifice. Priests and priestesses were very important people. They acted as doctors, and taught science, art, writing, music, dance, history, and counting. They also had to know astronomy and astrology. They had to perform difficult ceremonies. Religion played an important part in Aztecs' lives, and human sacrifice was used to pay homage to their gods.Aztec religion The Aztec (or more properly, the Mexica) civilization recognized many gods and supernatural creatures in their religious beliefs. History Aztec culture is generally grouped with the cultural complex known as the Nahua because of the common language they shared. According to legend, the various groups who were to become the Aztecs arrived from the north into the Anahuac valley around Lake Texcoco. The location of this valley and lake of destination is clear – it is the heart of modern Mexico City – but little can be known with certainty about the origin of the Aztec. There are different accounts of their origin. In the legend the ancestors of the Mexica/Aztec came from a place in the north called Aztlán, the last of seven nahuatlacas (Nahuatl-speaking tribes, from tlaca, "man") to make the journey southward, hence their name "Azteca". Other accounts cite their origin in Chicomostoc, "the place of the seven caves", or at Tamonachan (the legendary origin of all civilizations). The Mexica/Aztec were said to be guided by their god Huitzilopochtli, meaning "Left-handed Hummingbird" or "Hummingbird from the South". When they arrived at an island in the lake, they saw an eagle which was perched on a nopal cactus full of its fruits (nochtli). (Due to a mistranslation of an account by Tesozomoc, it became popular to say the eagle was devouring a snake, but in the original Aztec accounts, the snake is not mentioned. One states that it was eating a bird, another indicates that it was only perched in the cactus, and a third just says it was eating something.) This vision fulfilled a prophecy telling them that they should found their new home on that spot. The Aztecs built their city of Tenochtitlan on that site, building a great artificial island, which today is in the center of Mexico City. This legendary vision is pictured on the Coat of Arms of Mexico. According to legend, when the Mexicas arrived in the Anahuac valley around Lake Texcoco, they were considered by the other groups as the least civilized of all, but the Mexica/Aztec decided to learn, and they took all they could from other peoples, especially from the ancient Toltec (whom they seem to have partially confused with the more ancient civilization of Teotihuacan). To the Aztec, the Toltecs were the originators of all culture; "Toltecayotl" was a synonym for culture. Aztec legends identify the Toltecs and the cult of Quetzalcoatl with the mythical city of Tollan, which they also identified with the more ancient Teotihuacan. Because the Aztec adopted and combined several traditions with their own earlier traditions, they had several creation myths; one of these describes four great ages preceding the present world, each of which ended in a catastrophe. Our age – Nahui-Ollin, the fifth age, or fifth creation – escaped destruction due to the sacrifice of a god (Nanahuatl, "full of sores", the smallest and humblest of the gods) who was transformed into the Sun. This myth is associated with the ancient city of Teotihuacan, which was already abandoned and destroyed when the Aztec arrived. Another myth describes the earth as a creation of the twin gods Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl. Tezcatlipoca lost his foot in the process of creating the world and all representations of these gods show him without a foot and with a bone exposed. Quetzalcoatl is also called "White Tezcatlipoca". |
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