Acolhua

Not to be confused with Culhua.

Ethécatl, the Acolhua God of Wind, Musée du quai Branly

The Acolhua are a Mesoamerican people who arrived in the Valley of Mexico in or around the year 1200 CE. ^[1] The Acolhua are included under the term Aztec and were a sister culture of the Mexica as well as the Tepanec, Chalca, Xochimilca and others. The Acolhua settled most of the eastern Basin of Mexico, Acolhuacan. Their capital was Tetzcoco. ^[2]

According to Ixtlilxochitl, the Acolhua originated from the northwest beyond Michoacan, being similar to Chichimecs but having temples and idols. At this time, their patron deity was called Cocopitl. ^[3] It is likely that the ruling family of the Acolhua were descended from Otomí speakers and did not speak Nahuatl until decreed by their ruler ( tlatoani ) Techotlalatzin. ^[4]

The most important political entity in ancient Mesoamerica was the Triple Alliance (Nahuatl, excan tlatoloyan), founded in 1428 when the rulers of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan formed an alliance that replaced the Tepanec Empire of Azcapotzalco and eventually integrated into a single polity the most developed regions of western Mesoamerica. ^[2] Because of the predominance of Tenochtitlan, it has also been called the Mexica, Aztec, or Tenochca Empire. It came to an end with the Spanish conquest of 1521.

Each of the three allied kings led a group of lesser kingdoms that coincided with the three major ethnic components and political powers of previous times: the Colhuas, the Acolhua-Chichimecs, and the Tepanecs. The domain of Tenochtitlan was the southern part of the Basin, with the Colhua towns of Xochimilco, and Cuitlahuac. Tetzcoco's domain comprised the Acolhua kingdoms in the eastern Basin and beyond to Tollantzinco and Cuauhchinanco. Tlacopan ruled the Tepanec towns of the western Basin, including Azcapotzalco and Coyoacán, and towns farther north to the Otomí center of Xilotepec.

These three allied groups of kingdoms constituted the core area of the empire, which as a unit then expanded its power over more distant areas. ^[5]

References

1. Smith, Michael E. "The Aztlan Migrations of the Nahuatl Chronicles: Myth or History?" (1984, p.171), who arrives at this date by averaging six dates mentioned in early codices.
2. Evans, Susan T. (1985). "The Cerro Gordo Site: A Rural Settlement of the Aztec Period in the Basin of Mexico". Journal of Field Archaeology. 12 (1): 1–18. doi:10.2307/529371. JSTOR   529371.
3. Wauchope, Robert; Ekholm, Gordon F.; Bernal, Ignacio (2015). Handbook of Middle American Indians, Volumes 10 And 11: Archaeology of Northern Mesoamerica. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. p. 466. ISBN   9781477306758.
4. Davies (1980, p.129); Smith (1984, p.170).
5. Carrasco, Pedro. "Triple Alliance." In Davíd Carrasco (ed.). The Oxford Encyclopedia of Mesoamerican Cultures. : Oxford University Press, 2001.