Did the floating city actually have lots of trees?
Yes, chinampas can have some types of trees on their borders.
3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
61–70 of 98 posts
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#62The Reconquista had finally driven out the Moors from Spain in 1492 - 26 years before Cortez entered Tenochtitlan and began the dismantling of indigenous religion. The Spanish Catholics were the Wahhabis of the day. Thought Experiment: If the Iberian Moors were still in power in 1518,would we today be calling Latin Americans "Arabs"? Similarly, popular opinion in Israel likes to call Palestinians "Arabs" because they…
> Similarly, popular opinion in Israel likes to call Palestinians "Arabs" because they adopted the language of their conquerors.
That's not a practice imposed by the Israelis. The (genuine) Arabs, as you would expect, favored themselves. So, everywhere in their empire, social climbers claimed to be Arabs.
When you read about the history of the region, the luminaries who appear tend to be Persians, but this is obscured.
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#63The Reconquista had finally driven out the Moors from Spain in 1492 - 26 years before Cortez entered Tenochtitlan and began the dismantling of indigenous religion. The Spanish Catholics were the Wahhabis of the day. Thought Experiment: If the Iberian Moors were still in power in 1518,would we today be calling Latin Americans "Arabs"? Similarly, popular opinion in Israel likes to call Palestinians "Arabs" because they…
That's an interesting juxtaposition. I was going to comment on another (insightful!) comment here about how "the only indigenous-majority country is Greenland" brings up just how Americas-centric (plus the commonwealth...) the term "indigenous" is in the first place, and this is a great illustration of that IMO. Hopefully we can all agree that applying the term even to the British Isles gets really tough, and it gets…
> "the only indigenous-majority country is Greenland"
Mongolia? Kazakhstan? Kyrgyzstan? Korea? Indonesia? Madagascar? Egypt?
Do the Greenlanders of today predate or postdate the Vikings?
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#64The thing thats wild about Tenochtitlan, as the story goes, is that the Aztec people discovered it themselves, and no one really knows who originally built it!
> The thing thats wild about Tenochtitlan, as the story goes, is that the Aztec people discovered it themselves
Considering that the Aztecs were a recent conquering group, the southern extremity of their ethnicity, that isn't surprising at all, whether or not it's true.
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#65I'm reading a book about the Aztecs now (Fifth Sun). The meeting of the Spanish with the Mexica has to be the most epic event in human history. Tragic what was lost. Kudos to the artist for this.
Also check out Álvaro Enrigue’s fictionalized account You Dreamed of Empires. Vividly told from the perspectives of the principals, it makes for unforgettable reading…
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/127938747-you-dreamed-of...
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#66I’m not sure why there isn’t more of an active association between so-called “Hispanics” in North America and the Aztecs and other pre-European cultural groups in the area. The current “Hispanics” are largely descended from the natives, I think? I put “Hispanics” in quotes because it’s pretty weird to be labeled by the language of your conquerors who don’t even control anything in the area anymore.
This seems like a very Anglo and anachronistically racialist take.
Catholic colonial empires were characterized by a different ethos than, say, the Protestant English. The former involved a good deal of intermarriage (beginning with Cortes himself) and saw what could be described as cultural transfiguration and fusion. The latter tended to see the natives through the lens of Amalek (ask the Acadians about their experiences with the British). So, the distinction between conqueror/conquered is a false dichotomy, as Hispanic peoples are heirs to the heritage of both. And even where the heritage of non-Spanish origin is concerned, here, too, it is not quite so simple. After all, Cortes did not conquer Tenochtitlan with his merry band of men alone. He did so in alliance with the enemies of the Aztecs (e.g., Tlaxcalans, Tetzcocans, Cempoalans, Huejotzingans) who numbered in the thousands, and these do not include the historical enemies of the Aztecs, some of whom were conquered by them.
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#67For anyone interested in what the Americas looked like before and after Columbus, I highly recommend the two books, 1491[1] and 1493[2], by Charles C. Mann. I finish the first one and I'm half way through the second one and really openend my eyes. Great reads! [1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39020.1491?ref=nav_sb_ss... [2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9862761-1493
Strongly second these recommendations. I enormously enjoyed them for both their information density, but also their extremely clear and proficient writing style. Absolute class journalism.
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#68For anyone interested in what the Americas looked like before and after Columbus, I highly recommend the two books, 1491[1] and 1493[2], by Charles C. Mann. I finish the first one and I'm half way through the second one and really openend my eyes. Great reads! [1] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39020.1491?ref=nav_sb_ss... [2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9862761-1493
Also great is The Fall of Civilizations' episode about Tenochtitlan [1].
The podcast is the work of a British historian named Paul M. M. Cooper, who's also published a book derived from the podcast. Each episode is really well researched, incorporating recent discoveries rather than uncritically repeating old tropes. No filler, no theatrics, just really well-told history, backed by real sources.
Another excellent history podcast is The Rest is History [2], who also devoted an excellent (albeit much shorter) episode to the same topic.
Re: 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec empire
#69The Reconquista had finally driven out the Moors from Spain in 1492 - 26 years before Cortez entered Tenochtitlan and began the dismantling of indigenous religion. The Spanish Catholics were the Wahhabis of the day. Thought Experiment: If the Iberian Moors were still in power in 1518,would we today be calling Latin Americans "Arabs"? Similarly, popular opinion in Israel likes to call Palestinians "Arabs" because they…
Spanish colonialism in the new world was largely an extension of the reconquista abroad. The Spanish crown used wealth from conquered territories to placate and balance the power of Iberian nobility. With the conquest of the canaries and the fall of Granada, the only obvious place to continue that system was North Africa, which would have brought the Spanish crown into direct conflict with the kingdom of Portugal.
Then Columbus returned with news of a route to the indies that avoided the increasingly powerful Ottomans. The war machine just got pointed in a new direction until the realities of the new world eventually caught up.
A moorish kingdom would not have had the same approach to the new world, even if someone had discovered it.