Cuitláhuac or Cuitláhuac was the 10th Huey Tlatoani (emperor) of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan for 80 days during the year Two Flint (1520). He is credited with leading the resistance to the Spanish and Tlaxcalteca conquest of the Mexica Empire, following the death of his kinsman Moctezuma II.
The Aztecs were a Mesoamerican culture that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica from the 14th to the 16th centuries. Aztec culture was organized into city-states (altepetl), some of which joined to form alliances, political confederations, or empires. The Aztec Empire was a confederation of three city-states established in 1427: Tenochtitlan, city-state of the Mexica or Tenochca, Texcoco, and Tlacopan, previously part of the Tepanec empire, whose dominant power was Azcapotzalco. Although the term Aztecs is often narrowly restricted to the Mexica of Tenochtitlan, it is also broadly used to refer to Nahua polities or peoples of central Mexico in the prehispanic era, as well as the Spanish colonial era (1521–1821). The definitions of Aztec and Aztecs have long been the topic of scholarly discussion ever since German scientist Alexander von Humboldt established its common usage in the early 19th century.
The Nahuas are a group of the indigenous people of Mexico, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. They comprise the largest indigenous group in Mexico and second largest in El Salvador. They are a Mesoamerican ethnicity. The Mexica (Aztecs) are of Nahua ethnicity, as are their historical enemies, the Tlaxcallans (Tlaxcaltecs), and the Toltecs which predated both groups are often thought to have been as well, though in the pre-Columbian period Nahuas were subdivided into many groups that did not necessarily share a common identity.
Tlahtoāni is a historical title used by the dynastic rulers of āltepēmeh, autonomous political entities formed by many pre-Colombian Nahuatl-speaking peoples in the Valley of Mexico during the Postclassic Period. The title of huēyi tlahtoāni was used by the rulers of the Aztec Empire, an alliance between the āltepēmeh of Tenochtitlan, Tetzcoco, and Tlacopan.
Domingo Francisco de San Antón Muñón Chimalpahin Quauhtlehuanitzin, usually referred to simply as Chimalpahin or Chimalpain, was a Nahua annalist from Chalco. His Nahuatl names mean "Runs Swiftly with a Shield" and "Rising Eagle", respectively, and he claimed descent from the lords of Tenango-Amecameca-Chalco. He was the grandson of the late Don Domingo Hernández Ayopochtzin, a seventh-generation descendant of the founding king of the polity. Don Domingo was learned and esteemed, especially for his education and his record-keeping skills in the ancient tradition.
The traditions of indigenous Mesoamerican literature extend back to the oldest-attested forms of early writing in the Mesoamerican region, which date from around the mid-1st millennium BCE. Many of the pre-Columbian cultures of Mesoamerica are known to have been literate societies, who produced a number of Mesoamerican writing systems of varying degrees of complexity and completeness. Mesoamerican writing systems arose independently from other writing systems in the world, and their development represents one of the very few such origins in the history of writing.
Don Luis de Santa María Nanacacipactzin, also known as Cipac, was the last tlatoani ("king") of the Nahua altepetl of Tenochtitlan, as well as its governor (gobernador) under the colonial Spanish system of government. The previous ruler Cristóbal de Guzmán Cecetzin having died in 1562, Nanacacipactzin was installed on September 30, 1563, and ruled until his death on December 27, 1565.
The Crónica Mexicayotl is a chronicle of the history of the Aztec Empire from the early Nahua migrations to the colonial period, which was written in the Nahuatl language around the 16th century. Its authorship is debated because the earliest surviving copy is written in the hand of Chimalpahin (1579–1660), while the manuscript itself states that the author is Fernando Alvarado Tezozómoc. A description of the manuscript is included in the census of central Mexican prose writings in the Handbook of Middle American Indians.
Huehue Zaca or Çaca, also Zacatzin, was a 15th-century Aztec noble, prince and a warrior who served as tlacateccatl under the ruler Moctezuma I, his brother. The name of Zaca is probably derived from Nahuatl zacatl, meaning "grass"; -tzin is an honorific or reverential suffix. Huehue is Nahuatl for "the elder", literally "old man".
Don Juan de Guzmán Itztolinqui was a post-Conquest tlatoani (ruler) of the altepetl of Coyoacán in the Valley of Mexico.
Arthur James Outram Anderson was an American anthropologist specializing in Aztec culture and translator of the Nahuatl language.
New Philology generally refers to a branch of Mexican ethnohistory and philology that uses colonial-era native language texts written by Indians to construct history from the indigenous point of view. The name New Philology was coined by James Lockhart to describe work that he and his doctoral students and scholarly collaborators in history, anthropology, and linguistics had pursued since the mid-1970s. Lockhart published a great many essays elaborating on the concept and content of the New Philology and Matthew Restall published a description of it in the Latin American Research Review.
James Lockhart was a U.S. historian of colonial Spanish America, especially the Nahua people and Nahuatl language.
Francisco Jiménez was a colonial Nahua noble from Tecamachalco. He served as judge-governor of Tenochtitlan for a year and five months in 1568 and 1569, and was the first outsider to govern Tenochtitlan. Despite being a noble, the use of the honorific don with his name is inconsistent.
Don Antonio Valeriano, the younger was a colonial Mexican Nahua politician.
Matlalxochtzin was a daughter of Tlacacuitlahuatzin, the first tlatoani (ruler) of Tiliuhcan, one of the polities (altepetl) of the Tepanec people in the Valley of Mexico during the Late Postclassic period of Mesoamerican chronology. She was born in Tiliuhcan after her father had been elevated as tlatoani—his father Huehuetzin had been leader in Tiliuhcan but was only of eagle warrior rank.
Lisa Sousa is an American academic historian active in the field of Latin American studies. A specialist in the colonial-era history of Latin America and of Colonial Mexico in particular, Sousa is noted for her research, commentary, and translations of colonial Mesoamerican literature and Nahuatl-language historical texts. She has also published research on historical and contemporary indigenous peoples in Mexico, the roles of women in indigenous societies and cultural definitions of gender. Sousa is a full professor in the History Department at Occidental College in Los Angeles, California.
Coxcoxtli was a king of city-state Culhuacán.
Tlapalizquixochtzin was an Aztec noblewoman and Queen regnant of the Aztec city of Ecatepec. She was also a consort of Moctezuma II.
Quinatzin was a King of ancient Texcoco, an Acolhua city-state in Mexico. He was the first known ruler of that city and is also known as Quinatzin II.
