in a mountain, where it lies dismembered forever. By the year 1325 their capital city was finished. They called it Tenochtitlan. - At its height, the Aztec Empire included millions of people. Even though no one knows exactly how many people there were, it seems clear that the Aztec Empire had a population equal to the large European countries at the time! Tenochtitlfin alone, which may have had as many as 200,000 people, was larger than any European city. Along the shores of Lake Texcoco were other cities. These cities were connected to Tenochtitlfin by a system of causeways, or raised earthen roads, built across the lake. Bridges on the causeways allowed canoes to go from one part of the lake to another. In the capital city, aqueducts were constructed, bridges were built, and chinapas were made. Chinapas were little islands formed by pilled up mud. On these chinapas Aztecs grew their food. The Aztec Empire included many cities and towns, especially in the Valley of Mexico. The early settlers built log rafts, then covered them with mud and planted seeds to create roots and develop more solid land for building homes in this marshy land. Canals were also cut out through the marsh so that a typical Aztec home had its back to a canal with a canoe tied at the door. In the early 1400s, Tenochtitlan joined with Texcoco and Tlacopan, two other major cities in the Valley of Mexico. Good farming practices helped to support the large population of Tenochtitln. For example, the Aztecs built irrigation systems, constructed terraces on nearby hillsides, and enriched the soil with fertilizer. They developed a completely new agricultural technique for making more farmland out of the swampy land around the city by creating artificial islands, called chinampas, or "floating gardens". The chinampas were made by piling rich earth from the bottom of Lake Texcoco onto rafts made of weeds. After awhile, the roots of plants and trees grew down to the lake bott...
