In 1521, Spanish explorer Hernan Cortez arrived at the capital of the Aztec Empire. Cortez wrote a letter to Emperor Carlos V describing the city of Tenochtitlan -which is now Mexico City- as the “The New Venice.” The city sat an island over Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico.

The city was connected to the shore by three bridges and had an aqueduct system to bring fresh water from the valley. Floating gardens provided food for the population of 400,000 which was larger than the cities of London or Venice at the time.  

A year later, the Spanish destroyed the city by draining the lake, demolished the pyramids and used those stones to build the Metropolitan Cathedral to covert the ingenious tribes. 

The Templo Mayor (or the Great Temple) was the principal temple of the Aztecs (also known as the Mexica people). Initially, anthropologists believed the temple was underneath the Metropolitan Cathedral. This central historic site is now known as the Zócalo.

In 1978, electrical workers stumbled upon a large disk with Aztec symbols and discovered the the pyramids (Templo Mayor) were paved underneath the ground.  

The area has been excavated and turned into a museum known as The Museo de Templo Mayor. The museum has the remains of the Temples, and the artifacts discovered there.

All pictures were take by me.

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All pictures were taken by me.