WARRIORS

 Hello ladies and gents this is the Viking telling you that today we are talking about

The Elite Aztec Warriors

They engaged in flower wars, cannibalism, and gladiatorial fights

The Aztec Empire was a large empire in central Mexico. Military service was mandatory and all male children received combat training. War was a source of prisoners for ritual sacrifices.

Aztec society had four classes: the nobles, the commoners, the serfs, and the slaves. The only way to move up the social ladder was to become an elite warrior — the Jaguar warrior or the Eagle warrior. A commoner had to capture four enemies during a battle to become an elite warrior.

The Jaguar warriors and the Eagle warriors

Working as full-time professional warriors, they engaged in constant warfare. These warriors enjoyed many privileges in Aztec society: they could drink alcohol, have mistresses, and wear jewelry.

A major difference between the Jaguar and the Eagle warriors was their appearance. The Eagle warriors wore quilted cotton armour with eagle feathers and put an eagle head on their helmets. The Jaguar warriors decorated their armours with jaguar skins and jaguar heads.

The best of the best: Otomins and ‘the Shorn Ones’

The best Eagle and Jaguar warriors were the Otomins and the Cuahchicqueh (‘the Shorn Ones’).

The Otomins were elite shock troops, known for their fierceness in battle. They dressed in green or in red and lived inside of the king’s palace.

The most elite warrior class was the Cuahchicqueh. They swore never to retreat from a battle until victory or death. To get into this class, a warrior had to capture at least six prisoners and perform twenty acts of valor.

They wore yellow body armour and shaved their head, except for a short braid around the left ear. They painted half of their head in blue and the second half in red or yellow.

The highest-ranking commanders of the Aztec army belonged to the Cuahchicqueh.

The purpose of the Aztec warriors was to take prisoners

The Aztecs valued how many enemies you captured and not how many you killed. This happened because the Aztec Empire needed captives for ritual sacrifices.

The Aztec warriors used their weapons to disable an opponent and not to kill him.

Macuahuitl — the Aztec sword

A macuahuitl was a wooden sword with obsidian blades embedded into the sides. A blow with such a weapon could decapitate a horse.

Obsidian blades are sharp, but also very brittle, and they shatter at the contact with steel.

It took skill to use macuahuitl. The Aztec warrior would use the weapon to club his enemy unconscious. Afterward, he would split a few obsidian blades into his body in order to disable him.

Ritual gladiatorial fights

Ritual gladiatorial fights were held to honor Tezcatlipoca, a god of night and darkness. The Aztecs tied one leg of a prisoner to a sacrificial stone and gave him a mock weapon. The prisoner had to fight with four armed Jaguar or Eagle warriors.

If the victim defeated all of them, he would be free.

Cannibalism

Huitzilopochtli was a god of the sun. The Aztecs had to feed Huitzilopochtli with human hearts in order to please him.

The Aztec warriors ate sacrificed captives. It was a great honor to engage in ritual cannibalism. For them, eating the flesh of a sacrificed person was a sort of communion.

Also, the ritual sacrificing and cannibalism were intimidating to the Aztec enemies.

Flower wars

Flower wars were the ritual wars fought between the Aztecs and the enemy city-states. These wars involved the same number of warriors on both sides. A battle happened at a pre-selected place and time in which they used only close-range weapons, such as macuahuitl.

A flower war was an Aztec alternative of a football match, but with dire consequences for the defeated team.

The purpose of such wars was to gain captives for the ritual sacrifices and to train young warriors. Flower wars also served as propaganda to show the strength of the Aztec warriors.

The Aztec warriors and the Conquistadors

The Spanish conquistadors respected the battle prowess of the Jaguar and the Eagle warriors. The Aztec warriors were strong, swift, and able to face many opponents at the same time, they could even kill a mounted Spanish knight.

On the 30th of June 1520, Hernán Cortés and his troops, loaded with gold, tried to escape from Tenochtitlan. The Eagle warriors sounded an alarm and caused heavy casualties in the Spanish army. The defeat in the Aztec capital became known as the La Noche Triste (‘The Night of Sorrows’).

Conclusion

The Aztecs were cruel, skilled, and strong warriors. They dominated the pre-Colombian Mexico, exerting fear in their opponents. Despite that, the Spanish conquistadors destroyed the Aztec Empire in 1521.

There are, however, many reasons for the demise of the Aztec warriors. The conquistadors used horses, gunpowder, and steel weapons. There was an outbreak of smallpox among the Aztecs that decimated their population. Also, their enemy tribes sided with the conquistadors.

And as always have a chilled day from the Viking