Aztecs (n, pl)
people who, in the 15th and early 16th centuries, conquered a large empire in what is now central and southern Mexico. The Aztecs began as a tribe of hunters and gatherers on the northern Mexican plateau before migrating to the valley of Mexico in the 12th century. They settled on islands in Lake Texcoco and in 1325 founded Tenochtitlán, which became the Aztec capital. The Spaniard Hernando Cortés (1485-1547) conquered this civilization in 1519.

The Aztecs’ success as a society was due to sophisticated farming practices as well as a powerful military organization and cultural beliefs. The society was governed by a warlord ruler and supported by a priestly and bureaucratic class. At the bottom of the society were serfs, indentured servants, and slaves.

The Aztecs shared many of the cosmological beliefs of earlier cultures, most notably the Teotihuacanos, the Toltecs, and the Mayans. Many ritual ceremonies occurred on a rotating basis, set by the Aztec calendar, which comprised a solar year of 365 days and a sacred year of 260 days. Human sacrifice was commonly practiced in Aztec ritual as part of the human obligation to the gods, and to maintain the orderly succession of seasons.

The Chimú capital of Chan Chan, located on the northern seacoast of Peru, remains one of the world's grandest archaeological sites, with miles of streets, great walls, reservoirs, and pyramid temples, all constructed out of sun-baked, adobe bricks. At the city’s height, the population of Chan Chan is estimated to have numbered in the many thousands. The Inca conquerors of Chimú absorbed much of its old high culture into their own imperial society, including elements of Chimú political organization, irrigation systems, and road engineering.