ÆÆ
in their own words
Views of the indigenous people of central Mexico
have long been shaped by accounts written by
Spanish invaders and colonial settlers – but, as
Camilla Townsend explains, if we focus instead on the
Aztecs’ own records, a very different picture emerges
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Aztecs
Days of wonder
A page of the so-called Codex
Borbonicus, an Aztec folding
book painted around the
time of the Spanish invasion,
depicts days of the calendar
alongside the deities Xipe
Totec (in a flayed human skin)
and the feathered serpent
Quetzalcóatl. Notes in
Spanish have been added