All language subtitles for The Children of The Sun - S01E01 - The Aztecs_track3_[eng]

[dramatic theme music plays]

They appeared out of thin air

and within a few generations,
they became masters

of a great empire.

[narrator]
In the center of the Aztec Empire:

a floating fairytale city
in the middle of a lake.

At that time,

one of the largest cities in the world.

[man's voice]
A city which eclipsed anything

the Spanish had ever seen
in size and glory.

[narrator] The Aztec rulers
are skillful statesmen.

Everything in their empire

is perfectly regulated.

Their empire is much more modern
than European societies of the time.

The school system of the Aztecs
was particularly impressive,

because it was compulsory
for both boys and girls.

[narrator] But this advanced civilization
also has a dark side:

cruel rituals in honor of the gods.

For a hundred years,
the Aztecs rule over Central Mexico.

But at the peak of their power,

they make a crucial mistake.

[battle cries]

[narrator] Their fall is unstoppable.

[male voice] It was the year 1519.

We called it the Year of the Reed.

A messenger

brought news of strangers
who had come to our country.

I can still picture them
to this very day.

They were carried by strange animals

and had terrible weapons.

They were so pale.

Some of us believed
they were messengers of the gods.

Our enemies had become their allies.

But we did not yet know what misfortune

their arrival signified.

[narrator] With eleven ships,
500 Spanish conquistadors

land on the coast
of the Aztec Empire in April 1519.

Their leader: Hernán Cortés.

They are attracted
by the legendary wealth

of the Aztec capital, Tenochtitlan.

The news of the arrival
of the Spanish spreads fast.

Relay runners carry the message

over paved roads into the capital.

They can cover 500 kilometers a day.

That makes them faster than the mounted

messengers of Europe of that era.

[male voice]
Our wise leader, Moctezuma, received

daily reports of the approaching aliens.

I was a young scribe at the time

and had the honor
of taking notes of their news.

You can't say the Aztecs
were unsuspecting.

We know that the Aztec ruler
had his spies.

He knew they were there as soon as
the Spanish set foot on the Gulf Coast.

He had very precise descriptions of them.

[narrator] Moctezuma
wants to avoid unnecessary bloodshed.

So at first, he warmly receives
these mysterious strangers.

He had such a great empire.

He had such large military units,
which were immediately ready for action.

But in my opinion, he didn't see
the Spaniards as a threat.

Which was a mistake.

[narrator] His guilelessness
suits the conquistador Hernán Cortés

and his men very well.

In November 1519,

the Spanish reach
the mountain villages above Tenochtitlan.

So far, nobody has stood in their way.

The legendary riches of the Aztec capital
now seem within reach.

The sight of this huge metropolis
exceeds all their expectations.

The sources tell us that when the
Spaniards descended from the mountains,

they saw the whitewashed buildings
reflected in front of them,

and they could not even grasp
the size of this city in a lake.

None of them
had ever seen anything like it,

and some of the people
accompanying Cortés had traveled far,

had seen Rome and other cities in Europe.

But this eclipsed anything
they had ever seen before.

[narrator] Tenochtitlan looks like
a floating city to the Spanish,

in the middle of this large lake.

Over 250,000 people live here.

At the center of the city:

the holy district with temples,
pyramids and the ruler's palace.

Where once the city of the Aztecs was,

the metropolis of Mexico City
rises 500 years later.

The lake is long since drained.

Today, 21 million people live

in the densely populated basin.

For a long time, it seemed as if
the Spanish had erased all traces

of the "floating" city of Tenochtitlan
after the conquest.

But there is still
much of Tenochtitlan to be found

beneath the modern Mexico City.

The current center of Mexico City
was once

the sacred district of the Aztecs.

The Spaniards simply built over it.

The ruins of Templo Mayor,

the most important sanctuary
of the Aztecs.

In 1978,

the temple pyramid is rediscovered
during construction work.

Since then, researchers
have been searching the entire city

for traces of the built-over past.

Raúl Barrera coordinates the excavations.

Mexico City possesses
immense archaeological wealth.

And the Templo Mayor is probably the most
important archaeological site in the city.

[narrator] This temple pyramid resembles
the success story of the Aztecs.

With the expansion of their power,
their central sanctuary also grew.

They are still clearly visible today:

the foundation walls
of the various stages of expansion.

Again and again, older versions
of the pyramid were simply built over.

Archaeologists
can now accurately reconstruct

the dimensions and appearance
of this impressive structure.

The pyramid was about 60 meters high.

On the top platform
there were two shrines

dedicated to the god of war
and the god of rain.

Like all other buildings in the city,

this pyramid rested on piles
that were laboriously

driven into the muddy subsoil
of the lake.

Remains of this construction
can still be seen today.

Archaeologists are on site
at every major construction project

to make sure no valuable relics

are lost forever.

We must protect these traces,
preserve them.

For they are our past.

They give us our identity.

That's why the finds we make here
in Mexico City are so important for us.

[narrator] Each find tells a story,

gives the scientists a deeper insight

into a world
as the Spanish experienced it

500 years ago.

Hernán Cortés meets the Aztec ruler

for the first time

on November 18th, 1519.

Moctezuma presents the Spaniard

with a valuable necklace
and precious fabrics.

Cortés thanks with beads
of cheap green glass.

For Moctezuma, an exotic gift.

The Aztecs weren't familiar with glass.

Moctezuma invites
the Spanish into his palace.

[man's voice 2] There's a lot of stories
that he was treated like a godlike figure,

that nobody can look directly at him.

Those are stories that were created
during the colonial period and later

in creating this image of an
oriental despot. Which was not the case.

[narrator] Cortés himself later reports
about the legendary wealth

of the Aztec prince
to justify his actions.

The reality must have been
somewhat different.

[Fargher] These sorts of stories
probably emerged to glorify him in a sense

and make him to be
something that he wasn't.

And actually, the amount
of portable wealth in gold and so on

really disappointed the Spaniards.

[narrator] So far the archeologists

haven't found much gold
during their excavations.

[Fargher] There was a find
a few years ago,

but apart from that, you could only fill

a little table with gold.
It's not like the Inca.

The Inca were famous
for their amount of gold.

[narrator] But at the beginning,
the Spaniards still hope

for great riches.

Cunningly, Cortés tells Moctezuma
about the "Spanish disease."

Only gold could cure it.

But the ruler and his advisors

probably quickly recognize the danger
that threatens their empire.

They wanted to convince him
that they're really...

"Okay, so yeah, I live pretty nice,
but I don't have a lot of stuff and so on.

So you guys
don't really want to conquer us.

You know, we can be friends.

You know if you want us
to make some sort of alliance

with your ruler, we're willing
to do that and so on, and then go home."

That was, sort of,
let's manage this on a political level.

[speaks indistinct Spanish]

[narrator] The Spanish should see
with their own eyes that an alliance

with the Aztec Empire

would be worth more
than chasing after treasures of gold.

[male voice] Our wise Tlatoani allowed
the Spaniards to explore our city.

I was allowed to accompany them.

[narrator] The tour through the city
does not miss its effect.

Cortés will later give
an impressive description to his king.

When the Spanish reach
the central market,

they are overwhelmed by the sight.

So many people in one place...

They had never seen anything like it.

20,000 to 40,000 people
flock to this market every day.

Farmers from the surrounding area

come here to offer their goods
for sale under the shade of the arcades,

as do long-distance merchants
from the entire Aztec Empire.

Whether everyday goods, food, animals,

luxury articles or even slaves
and military equipment,

at this market,

you can simply buy everything.

[male voice] The Spanish
saw many new things.

They especially admired our fine fabrics,

which we dyed red
with the juice of pressed lice.

It was quite clear that this marketplace
eclipsed anything they had ever seen.

And the goods,
most of which were foreign to them,

fascinated them even more.

Especially if they contained gold,

which was of course
what these conquerors wanted most.

But they were also fascinated
by the smaller things:

the order that prevailed at the market,

the fact that market supervisors
carefully made sure

that everything was in its proper place.

All of this
made a huge impression on the Spanish.

[narrator]
State inspectors inspect the goods

offered here, and traders must register.

There is a separate area
for each type of goods on offer.

If the goods are particularly valuable,
payment is made with grains of gold.

Cocoa beans are a popular currency
for all other products.

A hare costs about 100 beans,

a tomato only one.

It often happened that the cocoa beans
as a means of payment were forged.

There were people that attempted
to fake the cacao beans.

They'd take wood...

Cut wood out,

polish it and shape it
so it looked like a cacao bean.

And so that was one of the major reasons

that they wanted people
to trade in the markets.

Not only
could they tax them in the markets,

but they could provide market security.

[narrator] Thieves and fraudsters

are handed over
to the market judges on the spot.

On pain of death, the accused must swear
to tell the truth to the judges.

The sentence is carried out on the spot.

For the maintenance of public order
is the first priority.

Those who have stolen must pay off
their debts through slave labor.

In medieval Europe at the time,

there was very little judicial structure.

In contrast, the Aztecs
were very concerned with that.

They were very concerned
with public order and protecting citizens.

[narrator] Unlike in European cities,

the Aztec state
also pays attention to cleanliness.

Cleaning staff sweep paths
and public places daily.

The cleanliness in the city itself

couldn't be compared
with the grubby cities in Europe

in the 15th and 16th centuries,
if I may say so.

We know there was hardly any functioning
sewage system.

There was hardly
any functioning drinking water supply.

And Tenochtitlan had achieved all this.

[narrator] To prevent the city's canals
from becoming cesspools,

the Aztecs even had
an ingenious toilet system.

They probably had public toilets
for very urgent business.

Excrement and urine
are collected separately in clay jugs.

A good deal for the city's
fecal matter merchants.

They sell the composted excrement
as fertilizer for the fields.

The urine is used for dyeing fabrics
and for tanning leather.

In some ways, the urban life of the Aztecs

was reminiscent of what we would
today call a "zero waste" society.

For example, the collection of feces
and recycling as fertilizer,

recycling of waste in general.

All this was done systematically here.

[narrator] A world
as if carved out artificially.

A state created out of thin air.

Because 200 years before
the arrival of the Spanish,

the Aztecs were still
simple nomadic warriors.

It all starts with a myth.

[male voice]
Our people were without a home.

But our tribal god showed us the way.

[narrator]
According to legend, the Aztec people

wandered aimlessly for many generations.

Finally, on a small island
in Lake Texcoco,

their mythical leader Tenoch

sees the divine sign
promised to them by their tribal god:

[intense atmospheric music plays]

[male voice] An eagle on a cactus,
devouring a snake.

This is where we should settle down

and build a temple
to honor our god Huitzilopochtli.

[narrator] And so their chief
lays the foundation stone

for the city of Tenochtitlan...
the city of Tenoch.

But what are the facts behind the legend?

Today, we assume the Aztecs
created this founding myth themselves.

They could thus present themselves
as colonizers of a new country,

as the first arrivals.

Although, as we know today,

they were not the first,
but in fact the last

to arrive in the basin of Mexico.

[narrator] Scientists suspect that the
Aztecs immigrated around the year 1215

from northern Mexico
or the southwestern parts of today's USA

to the already
densely populated Mexican highlands.

There, the nomadic warriors
encounter the descendants

of the once powerful Toltecs

and the pyramids
of the mysterious megacity Teotihuacan.

At the time of the Aztecs,
it's already in ruins.

Only giants or gods,
so the newcomers believe,

could have built
these enormous buildings.

According to their belief,
this is where the world came into being.

The American archaeologist David Carballo

has been researching this unique place
for many years.

He and his colleagues
have ascertained by now

that the Aztecs took these ruins
as a model for their own city.

This is what they wanted it to look like.

They wanted to imitate the gods.

The Aztecs were very inspired
by Teotihuacan,

the first great city of Central Mexico.

They saw it as a place of creation,

as a place where the gods
sacrificed themselves for humanity

and to get time started.

[narrator] The floor plans
of the residential buildings and palaces

that once dominated the cityscape
are still clearly visible.

They give the researchers
an impression of what Tenochtitlan,

the city of the Aztecs,

must have looked like later on.

But the Aztecs
not only copy the architecture.

[Carballo] They looked to Teotihuacan
as the civilized precursor

who had arts and calendar systems
and writing systems

that they drew on very consciously
in creating their own empire.

[narrator]
In the beginning, the warrior nomads

hire themselves out as paid mercenaries.

They go to war
for the local lords of small city states.

But they are unwelcome.

And the only place left for them to go,

because they had angered just about
everybody in the Southern Basin,

was this little tiny island
in the middle of the brackish swamp.

There was only about
two square kilometers an area,

and that's where
they were almost forced to settle.

[narrator] At that time,
the island is considered uninhabitable.

What they need to survive,

the Aztecs have to bring
from the mainland in their canoes.

On the island itself,
there is neither timber for huts

nor drinking water.

The lake is very salty,
and its water is brackish.

It's a meager life

that the first settlers are living.

The future splendor of Tenochtitlan

is still a long way off.

Systematically,
the inhabitants of the small island

also engage in land reclamation

behind an artificial dam

that separates salt water
from fresh water.

On a subsoil of water lilies and reeds,

they pile up ever new layers of mud

in the shallow water of the lake,
which later solidifies.

In this way, the Aztecs
created "floating" gardens

to practice agriculture.

The Chinampas.

On the outskirts of Mexico City,
they still exist today.

Farmers still cultivate

these "floating" gardens
and grow the same plants

as their Aztec ancestors did

500 years ago:

corn, beans, pumpkins.

But also tomatoes, avocados,

chilies and sweet potatoes.

These are plants that were first
domesticated in Mesoamerica,

and are now grown all over the world.

The Chinampas create more space

and make the Aztecs independent
of food from the mainland.

This will become the basis
for their incredible ascent.

So the Aztec system of Chinampa fields

was a highly productive
form of agriculture.

It could allow between
three to eight crops grown per year,

depending on what the plant was.

So the population boomed
as a result of it.

And so at the height
of the Aztec empire, there was at least

a million people
living in the basin of Mexico.

[narrator] In just 200 years,

the small island settlement has
developed into a flourishing metropolis

covering 13 square kilometers,

the center of the largest
state power in Mesoamerica.

[male voice] I am one of the last to make
the past glory of our people known.

All is destroyed, and most of those
who could remember

are dead.

[narrator] Decades after the fall
of their empire, Aztec scribes

under the supervision of Spanish monks

wrote reports about their lost culture.

Today, these records

are the only authentic
written legacy of the Aztecs,

in their own pictographic writing.

We know the Aztecs had a lot of books.

They had veritable libraries.

Unfortunately,
these were burned, destroyed.

And even after the fall of Tenochtitlan,
systematically eliminated to drive out

"the belief in the devil,"
as the Christians put it.

And the codes that have survived

are all the more important
for us historians,

because they give us
an insight into history,

into the life of the Aztecs
from their own point of view.

[narrator] One of the few
remaining manuscripts

is the Codex Mendoza.

For a long time, the pictographic
writing of the Aztecs

was barely deciphered.

Text annotations by Spanish monks

help scientists
to understand the records.

The Codex Mendoza contains a large book
about the everyday life of the Aztecs.

And this is particularly unique.

[narrator] A life in which everything
is regulated,

from the cradle to the grave.

The Aztecs consider the birth of a child

as a life-threatening and bloody battle.

[dramatic music plays]

[narrator] The "battle of the mother"
equates her to a warrior.

To die in childbirth

is as honorable
as death on the battlefield.

[groaning]

[baby cries]

[traditional ululations]

[narrator]
A shrill battle cry of the midwife

is therefore the first thing
an Aztec baby hears.

[male voice] I was born
in the year of the 10th rabbit.

My mother was a slave. But I was free.

[narrator] In the Aztec world,
the children of slaves are born free.

After birth, the umbilical cord of girls

is buried
under the fireplace of the house,

that of boys is given to a warrior.

He must later bury it on the battlefield,

so that one day,
the child will become a great fighter.

The Aztecs also had godparents.

They give presents to the newborns

symbolizing
what the future holds for them.

For boys these are miniature weapons,

as a reminder and warning
that they were born to be warriors.

On several pages,

the code gives precise instructions
for the education of children.

Yes, we can see that the children
were assigned specific tasks

according to their age.

The younger children
had to help in the household,

and the boys were mostly given
smaller auxiliary tasks outside the house.

Increasing with age.

[narrator]
Boys fetch firewood,

go to the market,

work in the fields or help with fishing.

Girls learn to prepare corn dough,
weave and sweep the house.

If they do not obey,
children are punished severely.

Some of these punishments seem
particularly harsh and torturous to us.

For example,
this scene of an Aztec teacher

holding a boy over smoking chili peppers,

clearly bringing tears to his eyes.

[narrator] Boys who don't want to obey
are beaten or even pricked with thorns.

Intractable girls get their hands tied,
and they are threatened with beatings.

The Aztecs certainly loved their children.

However, they had a different
understanding of life and the world.

They were firmly convinced
that each person,

according to his or her status and age,

took his or her place in society

and had to uphold the established rules.

The state takes care of young people's
education,

maintaining schools, paying for teachers.

For us today, the Aztec school system

seems modern because it was obligatory
for both boys and girls.

A general school system.

If we compare it to Europe at the time,
they only had schools for the chosen few,

but not for the general public,
and it was not compulsory to go to school.

[narrator]
Between the ages of eight and ten,

girls and boys are introduced
to the gods and religious ceremonies

and learn to dance and sing.

[male voice]
I was allowed to go to school and study.

That's how I could become a writer.

[narrator] Even for the children of
slaves, compulsory schooling applies.

Schooling for girls
usually ends after five years.

For boys, education continues.

Aztec history,
agriculture and military drill

are on the curriculum for them.

In the schools, general knowledge was
imparted about the history of the Aztecs.

It can also be said that a certain
ideology was imparted here.

Of course this strengthened the identity
and the affiliation of the children

to the Aztec society.

More so than if they had been educated
by their own families.

[male voice] I, too,
wanted to become a great warrior,

but the gods had a different plan for me.

I proved to be particularly adept

at interpreting our characters.

So my teachers decided
that I should become a scribe.

That was one way to work
your way up: through education.

If you're a brilliant individual,
they didn't really care

what social strata you came from.

They wanted to get you into
the administrative structures.

[narrator] Especially gifted boys,
even from the lower classes,

have access to secondary schools,

which are normally reserved
for the nobility.

They attend a Calmecac.

Here, the future state elite is trained.

The daughters of the nobility
also have access, as priest's pupils.

[male voice] This is where
I first saw her.

She was called Ahuic,

like the goddess of the rivers.

[narrator]
Those who are admitted to the Calmecac

have painful rituals waiting for them.

[dramatic music plays]

[narrator] Self-mortification
and blood sacrifice to appease the gods

are part of everyday school life.

[male voice] Ahuic gave me strength,

but the priests were not supposed
to know of our love.

[narrator] Contact
with the temple disciples is forbidden

to the young men on pain of death.

The punishments of the Aztecs
were draconian.

In our opinion, very, very severe.

But they ensured
that the social system was preserved,

that everyone took his place
in this order and did not leave it.

[narrator] State-trained and paid judges
monitor compliance with these laws.

Trials are public.

Judgments are made jointly by the judges,

and repeat offenders
are punished particularly severely.

Anyone caught stealing twice
is liable to be stoned to death.

If you are drunk in public,

your head will be shorn,
and you may even lose your house.

Adultery is punishable by death,

not only for the adulterers,
but also for their confidants.

There was also a concept
of judicial equality,

so when people came into the court,
whether they were

commoners or the nobility,

they were treated essentially as equals.

There is a strong focus on having laws

and enforcing them
and treating people justly.

[narrator]
And those who confess their offence

before it is discovered
can even count on forgiveness.

[male voice] For Ahuic and me,
everything came to a good end.

We both escaped
punishment by the priests.

The priests gave us their blessing.

In 1518, Ahuic became my wife.

[narrator]
Only if the highest priests agree,

their disciples may give up
their service to the gods

and marry a man who seems suitable.

Four days of celebration.

The family and neighbors give
the couple advice for a long marriage.

The couple's garments
are knotted together

as a sign of the marriage bond.

But even in the world of the Aztecs,
not every marriage endures.

There was a regulation
that spouses could get divorced,

and this right applied
to both men and women.

We don't know, of course, what the social
consequences were for both spouses.

But we do know that there were rules
on how property was divided

and who was allowed to raise the children.

The girls stayed with the mother
and the boys stayed with the father.

[narrator] But marriage
is still intended as a bond for life.

Because marriage and family are of
particular importance to the Aztecs.

They ensure the continuity
of their community.

[male voice] It was a good time.

The gods were good to our people.

[narrator]
It's a seemingly perfect world,

but at a high price for the individual.

The Aztec manuscripts also document

human sacrifice through cruel rituals.

On the altars, men's and women's hearts
are cut out while still alive.

Every year, tens of thousands

are supposed to have found
their terrible fate in this way.

[Fargher] It may seem very barbaric
and very violent to us today,

but for them it wasn't that way.

It's a different cultural context
that they were living in.

The relationship
between humans and the supernatural

is through blood,
so human blood nourishes the deities,

and if you nourish the deities,
then they can give you life back,

so death and life are reciprocal.

It's not one ends the other.

Each one is necessary
for the other to exist.

[narrator] The manuscripts describe

how the skulls of the victims
were literally pierced by the priests

and hung on a wooden scaffolding

in front of the great pyramid
in the center of the city.

For a long time,
scientists were of the opinion

that these were
exaggerated representations

that the Aztec scribes
had to make at the behest

of the Spanish conquerors

as justification for their own atrocities
against the Aztecs.

But then, in 2015,

archaeologists
make an incredible discovery

during excavations around Templo Mayor.

A wall of human skulls

almost two meters high.

And they also come across the traces
of the wooden scaffolding

described by the Aztec chroniclers.

The stakes themselves
are long since weathered,

but scattered everywhere:
the pierced skulls.

According to the Aztec view of the world,
paradoxically,

it was a place that gave life.

For the Aztecs' great concern

was that the gods might die.

Therefore, one had to provide
food for the sun.

And how could one do that?

Through human sacrifices,
which feed the sun with their energy.

[narrator] In the meantime,

the archaeologists
can reconstruct the site precisely

on the basis of the gruesome finds.

The size of the frame
and the two towers suggest

that there were indeed
thousands of skulls

displayed in front of the great temple.

Testimony of a human sacrifice industry
that is without equal.

Even for the skeptics,

those who believed that human sacrifice
was a pure invention of Europeans,

this find is the final proof that
human sacrifice actually took place.

[narrator]
Laboratory tests of the skulls prove:

75 percent of the victims were men,

most of them
between 20 and 30 years of age.

DNA analyses
and chemical tests of teeth and bones

also confirm that almost all victims
came from far-flung places.

They were prisoners of war

and slaves from conquered provinces.

The human sacrifice,
apart from its religious significance,

was also a demonstration of power.

Especially at big feasts,

the princes of the many
subjugated cities were invited,

and they were obliged to participate.

The Aztecs offered
several thousand human sacrifices

to demonstrate their power

and the power of their gods.

[narrator] It is a nation
in a permanent state of war.

Shortly before the arrival
of the Spanish,

the Aztec dominion
reaches its greatest expansion.

It stretches from the Atlantic coast

over the plateau of Mexico
to the Pacific Ocean.

The Aztecs control
about six million people.

From their campaigns,
the Aztec fighters bring

loot, tribute,
and prisoners of war to Tenochtitlan,

destined for slavery and human sacrifice.

The system of the Aztec Empire
was based on the tribute system.

Tributes were paid, and without them,

this huge city
would hardly have been able to survive.

So this applied from raw materials
to the finest luxury goods.

All this had to be brought in
from far away,

and of course, due to the tribute,

the Aztec Empire
was able to gain further wealth,

and it created the possibilities
to expand further and further.

[narrator] The tributary city-states

have precise requirements
as to what they have to produce

and how much they have to pay.

It's systematic exploitation.

This sheet of the Codex Mendoza
shows us a very nice tribute list.

It was specified exactly what
the tributary city-states had to deliver.

Here we find these ornate armors,

but then also food, like beans,
or jewelry.

This was all regulated in detail,

because the Aztecs
attached great importance

to the punctual arrival of the tributes.

If this was not the case,
harsh consequences were the result.

[narrator] The greed
of the Aztec metropolis

for goods, slaves and human sacrifices
increases from year to year.

[Gunsenheimer] The far-reaching expansions
and the tribute demands

associated with them, naturally meant

that many provinces had to put a
heavy burden on the local population.

And it brought them much closer
to the limits of their economic capacity.

And that of course makes
such a structure very fragile, very frail.

It is vulnerable.

As soon as someone
puts a match to it, it burns.

[narrator] When Hernán Cortés and his men

travel through the Aztec Empire in 1519,

this moment has come.

[male voice] I still remember
the first time I saw them.

I never thought it possible
that they would betray the hospitality

of our great Moctezuma so shamefully.

He had given them gifts,

but the white men lured
our revered Moctezuma into a trap.

First, they captured him.

Then, they killed our Tlatoani
and threw his body into the lake.

[narrator] How Moctezuma
actually died is still disputed.

Some say that he was accidentally injured

or even deliberately hurt
by his own people,

while indigenous sources claim

that the Spaniards got rid
of the useless hostage by murder.

[narrator] The fact is,
after the death of Moctezuma,

the Spaniards have to flee at first.

They try to escape

over the floating gardens

and embankment streets of the city.

In the Noche Triste, the Sad Night,

450 Spaniards die,
and only about 100 survive.

It was the first great defeat of
the Spanish in a battle in the New World.

[narrator] But their victory
does not save the Aztecs.

[male voice]
The gods had no mercy on our people.

Many of us fell ill
with a mysterious ailment.

Even my poor wife.

The Spaniards had brought us the fever.

[narrator] Diseases
introduced by the Spaniards,

such as typhoid and smallpox,
rage among the inhabitants of the city.

The locals have no immune defense

against the foreign pathogens.

Within one year,

almost half of the population
of Tenochtitlan dies.

[male voice] Ahuic couldn't
watch our daughter grow up.

Our end was near.

[narrator] Hernán Cortés
and his men were to return to the lake

and plan the storming of the city
with their local allies.

The leaders of the tribes
that were enemies of the Aztecs

had excellent knowledge of the place.

They besiege Tenochtitlan
for three months,

and starve out the people.

[Fargher] After having seen the city,
they developed this plan

of assaulting it
from the water instead of across land.

They were gonna build a series of boats
essentially in pieces,

and then they were going to carry it
across the mountains to the area.

And that's how they did it.

[narrator] Then the attack begins.

In August 1521,

the Spaniards storm

the surrounded city

together with more
than 20,000 allied warriors.

[screaming]

It was not the small handful
of Spaniards alone

who were responsible
for the downfall of the Aztec Empire,

which brought down a huge empire here,

but above all the fact that the Spaniards

had very, very many
powerful indigenous allies

who fought the Aztec Empire
and who tried to free themselves

from the domination of the Aztec Empire.

[screaming]

[narrator]
They fight street after street.

The last Aztec contingent

offers fierce resistance.

Even women and children

stand in the way of the attackers.

On August 13, 1521,
the slaughter is over.

At the end of this conquest,
240,000 Aztecs are dead.

Only a few manage to escape.

[male voice] I got away,
but our town was lost.

Nothing remains but songs of pain.

[narrator] The conquistadors
and their allies

plunder and pillage the city.

Then they raze the once powerful

Tenochtitlan to the ground.

With the destruction of the Aztec Empire,

the Spaniards lay the foundations
of their colonial empire

in Mexico and Central America.

Their allies, however, will soon meet
a new, more merciless oppressor.

We don't know how long the Aztec Empire
could have lasted.

We know that it lasted
almost a hundred years

in the form in which we know it today,
and that is of course a short time.

And it's a tragic end,
because they failed because of enemies

they didn't know
and had no idea how to deal with.

[narrator] For the indigenous peoples,
it is the end of their world.

There could have been much more to come
and much more to develop.

But that was lost
in this clash of civilizations.

[narrator] The heritage of the Aztecs
has been preserved for posterity

in the records of their scribes.

The scribes were,
if you like, the memory of the Aztecs.

They recorded what the Aztecs had achieved
in their past.

They depicted the history
that this people referred to.

They illustrated their strength,

on which the power
of this people was based.

[male voice]
When we die, we're not really dead.

We will live. We will ascend and revive.

For we are the children of the sun.

[narrator] The Spanish
built Mexico City on the ruins

of the former Aztec metropolis.

[rousing music plays]

[narrator]
Only with the country's independence

three centuries
after the arrival of the Spaniards,

the awareness
of the Aztec legacy is revived.

Today, many Mexicans see themselves
again as the descendants of the Aztecs.

Their heritage is celebrated.

It lives on in everyday life.

In the Día de los Muertos,
the festival of the dead,

Aztec and Christian culture mix.

The national flag connects modern Mexico

with the country's Aztec roots:

The eagle on the cactus
with a snake in its beak.

This is the founding myth
of the perished Aztec empire.