What Abundance Built · Episode 3 of 8 · 49 min
How Aztec Floating Gardens Fed a City of 200,000 — and Built the Pyramids
The Mexica engineered what may be the most productive farmland of the pre-industrial world. Chinampas, artificial garden beds in the lakes of the Valley of Mexico, yielded up to seven crops a year and fed Tenochtitlan's roughly 200,000 people. That surplus paid for the Templo Mayor, the Sun Stone and the codices, and also for a tribute empire and human sacrifice.
Who's who
- Hernán Cortés+1 more episodeSpanish conquistador who led the siege of Tenochtitlan
- Moctezuma IIMexica ruler during whose reign the Sun Stone is dated
Where it happens
- Tenochtitlan, Mexico+2 more episodesIsland capital on Lake Texcoco, site of modern Mexico City
- Xochimilco, MexicoSouthern lake where chinampas survive today
- Lake Texcoco, MexicoBrackish lake held back by dikes and causeways
- Templo Mayor, Mexico CityGreat twin pyramid at the heart of the capital
Timeline
- c. 1325Traditional founding of Tenochtitlan
- 1428Triple Alliance formed, starting the empire's expansion
- c. 1500Chinampa system at its height, about 10,000 hectares
- 1521Spanish conquest and fall of Tenochtitlan
- 1790Sun Stone rediscovered during cathedral works
- 1978Coyolxauhqui monolith found, starting Templo Mayor excavations
Still debated
'Seven harvests a year' is the high end of a range, and the 200,000 population figure sits within estimates from about 150,000 to over 250,000. Spanish accounts of mass sacrifice are likely exaggerated, though the practice is archaeologically real.
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