10 April 2004

Xochimilco’s sunken treasure

Hernán Cortés and his conquistadors caught their first glimpse of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlán in November 1519. As they looked down from the mountains, the city appeared to float on the surface of a vast, shimmering lake. The Spaniards thought they had found another Venice, not realising that much of what they saw was reclaimed land.

The Aztecs had created a labyrinth of islands in the lake with the help of their own sewage. These fertile mounds supported one of the most productive agricultural systems the world has ever seen – but Cortés took scant notice of that. Horrified by the ritual of human sacrifice, he captured and destroyed Tenochtitlán with great energy, and initiated the building of Mexico City on its ruins. Since then, one area of the original lake has resisted centuries of drainage. The floating gardens of Xochimilco are a reminder of Aztec ingenuity, and an ancient practice that might solve some of the modern city’s sanitation problems.

TENOCHTITLAN, the wondrous Aztec capital city, lay in the Valley of Mexico, a vast landlocked basin surrounded by mountains thrown up by volcanic activity. When the Aztecs arrived in the valley in the 14th century, they found five great lakes. They chose to settle on the swamplands around Lake Texcoco and began to build themselves a city on a small island in the lake. It was an inhospitable, impractical location but they were following the directions of the god Huitzilopochtli, who had told them to build where they saw an eagle eating a snake perched on a cactus.

Pushed for space on their island,

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