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ON SITE

The Great Aztec Temple

Archaeologists analyze ruins in the heart of Mexico City.

IN 1978, UTILITIES WORKERS DIGGING IN

MEXICO CITY unearthed a colossal stone

relief, depicting an unmistakable figure:

the Aztec goddess Coyolxauhqui, naked,

dismembered and decapitated, after being

slain by her brother, Huitzilopochtli, the

god of sun and war. Archaeologists realized

the carving must be part of Templo Mayor,

the Great Temple of the Aztec Empire,

known to lie somewhere below the city

center based on colonial-era accounts and

previous limited digging projects.

The setting had deterred earlier

archaeological investigation because the

Aztec ruins were buried under functioning

buildings, some erected in Spanish

colonial times, themselves protected

as historic landmarks. However, the

Coyolxauhqui relief sparked

such national excitement

that archaeologists were

permitted to embark on long-

term excavations, first led by

Eduardo Matos Moctezuma

of Mexico’s National Institute

of Anthropology and History.

The government initially

allowed the team to demolish

13 buildings of limited

historical value. Since then,

excavations have continued in

fits and starts, in collaboration

with construction and maintenance projects.

Today, remains of the main temple are

exposed for visitors, right in the city center

— a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

“It’s a beautiful, lively Mexican scene

where you’ve got modern Mexico

City, colonial Mexico City and also pre-

Columbian Mexico,” says Davíd Carrasco,

a scholar of Mesoamerican religions at

Harvard University. The site is so rich that

research could “go on for another 100

years,” says Carrasco, who studies the

temple. Some recent spectacular finds are

shown here.  BRIDGET ALEX CREDIT

TEMPLE 7.

The temple began as a modest structure in the

1300s, but as the Mexica, the ethnic group that

came to rule the Aztec Empire, amassed wealth

and territory, they enlarged the monument. By

the time Spaniards arrived in 1519, Templo Mayor

had undergone six major renovations, becoming

a 10-story pyramid, with earlier structures nestled

inside. This latest and greatest phase is the most

poorly preserved: Only fragments of the floor

remain because the Spanish razed the temple for

materials to build their colonial city.

V

THE CRUX

The ruins of Templo

Mayor lie in the center

of modern Mexico City.

Right: Some skulls

were crafted into

masks with eyeballs

of shell and pyrite.

According to a 2016

Current Anthropology

study, the masks

likely came from

wealthy, captured

warriors because they

were mostly young

and middle-aged

men with healthy

teeth, buried with

precious items.

Left: When workers

found this stone relief

of Coyolxauhqui, they

realized it was part

of Templo Mayor.