Ideas for EVERY-DAY LIFE SCENES (5)

Continuing our series based on ‘The Sun Kingdom of the Aztecs’ by Victor W. von Hagen (1958/1960), Von Hagen tells the story of the Aztecs through the eyes of a 14-year-old Aztec youth, Speaking Eagle...

At the end of the causeway, in the centre of the city, was the great square. The Teocalli, the god house of the Aztecs, stood in the great square. This pyramid was over 200 feet high and towered above everything else. This was the way it was planned; everything else was dwarfed by it. 114 high stone steps leading to the top of the pyramid were cut into the side of it. At its summit there were two large temples. In one of them the sacred fire could be seen smoking. It was never allowed to go out except at the end of the year, on the five empty days of the Aztec calendar...

On the morning of the weekly fair, everyone in Speaking Eagle’s family was loaded down with the produce they intended to barter. The father carried a large collection of mirrors made from black volcanic glass which he had polished. Speaking Eagle and his brother had neatly rolled ‘petate’ mats to sell, along with boxes plaited from the small grass fibre. His mother and sisters - all expert weavers - carried beautifully woven cotton cloths on their backs. Their slaves carried corn...’