From the 1300s to the 1500s, the Aztec Empire ruled most of the southern part of North America
and parts of South America. They built their empire by dominating neighboring tribes and
kingdoms. Their sheer hard work was compounded by outright bizarre and nutty rituals and beliefs.
Today on Nutty History, we dive into several of the most creepy facts about the Aztec Empire.
There’s a lot to go over, so let’s get started. The average Aztec had a burial similar to our own.
They buried their dead with all their possessions in hopes they could take them to the afterlife.
However, one crucial detail is that these burials were not in some graveyards. Quite often,
they were in the home of the person. Lots of times there may be someone still living there.
Nowadays, this idea kind of creeps us out. Imagine going to bed knowing your relative is underneath
the floorboards. However, in Aztec society, this burial was a way to honor the deceased.
You think that’s weird? Let’s move onto our next point,
which definitely is a little harder to digest than your average creepy friend under the floorboards.
Let’s begin with something a little easier to digest. Humanity has had a love-hate
relationship with the whiskers of the face. Think about how many times throughout your lifetime
that beards have gone from being disgusting to considered sexy, then back to disgusting again.
Nowadays, more people like beards, as they’re a symbol of masculinity. But for the Aztecs,
they were a huge turnoff! The Aztecs were in the “beards are gross” camp, and they would
use tweezers as a way to remove their beards. Ouch ouch and ouch! Luckily, most Aztecs did not have
thick beards, and there were ways to prevent them from growing. For example, mothers would use a hot
cloth on their sons’ faces to stop beards from growing. If you had clout in the Aztec scene or
you were elderly, you could rock the beard. But if not, that beard had to go by any means possible.
Ancient civilizations sacrificed people on the regular, but when they killed,
they really killed! If you thought that other cultures did it a lot, the number of sacrifices
the Aztecs did will indeed surprise you. The Aztecs may have sacrificed over 20,000 people
within a year’s span of time. When they built a temple dedicated to the god of war and the sun,
Huitzilopochtli, that number grew even further. If you were on the sacrifice chopping block,
you had many ways to go. You could have your heart ripped out a-la Indiana Jones or Mortal Kombat,
but you could also be skinned, dismembered, decapitated, or face another brutal demise.
Isn’t it weird we watch dozens of people die in almost all kinds of ways in movies and feel
apathetic about it, but it only takes one dog’s demise to bring on the waterworks? Well,
prepare your tissues because this one’s, it’s gonna hurt! Dogs were commonly sacrificed when
their owners passed away. The hope was that the dog would help to guide them into the afterlife.
At least they believed that all dogs go to heaven. Here’s hoping that somewhere,
those loyal dogs are still at their owners’ sides. How Aztecs would raise their kids was,
to be honest, brutal. As we mentioned, both the rich and poor were told that life was suffering.
However, in the Aztec land, the rich having privilege was not as prominent as now. If you
were poor, you went to the telpochcalli at 15. You would learn the art of war,
spend time lugging wood around, and become noticed if you could carry more than your weight in wood.
But what if you were rich? Then, you would go off to the calmecac. The calmecac was a school where
children would be trained as priests. Seems like a cushy career compared to the telpochcalli, right?
Wrong! Children would have to paint themselves black, not wear clothes,
be janitors to the temple, starve themselves, and go through other trials and tribulations.
First, from literally the moment they were born, they were told that life was about suffering.
Kids were told they would be brutally killed in a war or they’d be sacrificed.
Talk about being a pessimist! Even those who came from nobility were given the same treatment. One
way the kids suffered? The parents would stretch their kids! Instead of telling them to drink their
milk, they would pull their child's arms, legs, and other body parts to ensure they would grow.
Aztecs were well known for dangling babies by the neck to use gravity to make them grow.
Sadly, seeing children grow with time only confirmed their beliefs. Their punishments
were also brutal too! How did they punish their children though? Did they wash their kid’s mouths
out with soap? Nope, it was much worse. The parents would subject their children to various
disciplines including puncturing with a maguey cactus, burning chili peppers over a fireplace,
and having the child inhale the smoke, and sometimes they would bind their children by the
arms and legs, strip them naked, and then cover them with spines. In some particular instances,
firebrands would be used to punish the naughty child. Perhaps the most brutal punishment was
if a teenager had premarital sex. If someone gave in to their sexual urges, they’d take
the punishment to the next level. The promiscuous offender would be publicly beaten using all of the
punishments we talked about. The next time your uncle on Facebook complains that kids these days
have it easy compared to how they had it, tell him about the history of the Aztec children.
When the first thing you’re told after birth is “welcome to life, it sucks!” it would not
be surprising that the induced depression might make someone want to harm themselves. One aspect
of Aztec civilization is “autosacrifice.” The belief is that if you did something wrong, you
needed to harm yourself. Thus, the maguey cactus we have mentioned came into play, with it used as
a razor blade to make yourself bleed. To move up the ranks of the priesthood, you needed to shed
some of your own blood. Therefore, it was common for midnight rituals where those in the priesthood
had to self-harm. Sometimes, arms had to be cut open with reeds being jammed into those wounds.
Why were plants being bloodied, you may ask? Blame the god Huitzilopochtli for this. Apparently.
This god loves bloody plants when it comes to sacrifice. The steps to his temple were painted
red with blood according to lore, so by decorating the steps with blood, you could be let inside.
If you made it to the top of the priesthood, did the self-harm stop? Of course, it didn't. The
head priest would have to harm himself each day. Self-sacrifice is a practice found in all walks of
faith, but nowadays, self-sacrificing is giving up meat for Lent. As a result, religious rituals have
calmed down a little. This fact almost seems like something out of a heavy metal album!
In Mexico City, where the ancient Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán once resided,
archaeologists uncovered what is known as the Huey Tzompantli. The Huey Tzompantli is a tower made
out of skulls, with over 600 discovered so far. There are no bones about it, see what I did there?
This structure is as impressive as it is creepy. Initially, only the skulls of defeated warriors
were thought to reside there. However, some of the skulls found were women and children.
Using lime to bond the skulls and spread 16 feet in diameter, this tower does seem like a monument
to death. However, the Huey Tzompantli is thought to be a way to please the gods to keep life going.
They had this tower of skulls because they thought by building this out of their sacrifices,
the gods could be glorified. They also would put their captives they obtained from war and battle
here as an offering to the gods as well. So, one may consider this awe-inspiring structure to not
be as sinister as one assumes. In fact, many Aztec rituals are the basis for the modern-day
Day of the Dead, a celebration of life and a way to tell death that we are not scared of it!
This video has been filled with brutal violence, sacrifice, and death. So let’s end things off by
telling you a fact that is more uplifting, sort of. The cuicacalli was a dance party that every
person had to go to regardless of their social status. Now there is a bit of creepiness to this,
with all that said. The cuicacalli was also a way for children to learn about many of the rituals
we have discussed today. Regardless, it was a time to have fun. Stories were told, dance moves
were taught, and the boys met with the girls. With Aztec schooling, the sexes were taught separately.
As such, the cuicacalli was a way for both sexes to mingle and to get into some mischief.
Like every culture, the Aztecs were a product of their time.
They were a society with a lot of good (they popularized chocolate, for example,) but
many of their rituals may seem outright brutal, creepy, or just plain odd by today’s standards.
But before you judge, remember that watching this video may seem like an oddity in 500 years
to future societies. Speaking of watching this video, be sure to subscribe for more and like
the video. And there are also a lot more rituals and beliefs the Aztecs had. If you feel like we
left any of them out, tell us in the comments below! And thanks for watching Nutty History!