Marine mollusks as evidence of Mexica imperial expansion

Summary

Of the approximately 175 offerings uncovered in the Templo Mayor Project excavations (1978–present) of Tenochtitlan’s sacred precinct led by Eduardo Matos Moctezuma, 60 reportedly contained marine mollusks. Among them, 47 offerings, dating from 1440 to 1521 CE, were explored between 1978 and 2006, while 13, dating from the reign of Ahuitzotl (1486–1502), were recovered between 2007 and 2013. In the first group, 180 species were identified, including 119 endemic to the Caribbean, 41 to the Pacific, and 5 to both areas. The second group added 71 new examples for a total of 251 taxa, including 130 Caribbean, 112 Pacific, and 5 endemic to both coasts. As one can see, these data reveal a notable increase of Pacific species coming to Tenochtitlan during Ahuitzotl’s reign. This preponderance and the presence of species such as Terebra brandi, Nassarius luteostomus, and Hipponix grayanus, whose distribution includes the modern-day Mexican states of Colima, Jalisco, Nayarit, and Sinaloa, and others such as Corbula chittyana and Noetia magna, respectively from the Yucatan Peninsula and Nicaragua, would suggest Mexica imperial expansion to the north and south during this period.

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This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 80th Annual Meeting, San Francisco, CA (2015)   •
• The Seventh Field Season of the Proyecto Templo Mayor: Recent Investigations on the Sacred Precinct of Tenochtitlan

Keywords

Spatial Coverage