Religion

There are many gods. Some control nature, like plants and the harvest or rain, water, and wind. These gods all work together usually with Chicomicoatl, the god who produces food. Some of our most important gods include Tlaloc, god of rain, Huitzilopochtli the patron god of the Mexico tribe and god of war, Quetzalcoatl the god of culture, civilization, and order, and Tezcatlipoca the god of destiny and fortune, as well as war and sorcery.
The gods need rest just like us humans. This is why we have two war gods. One fights with us during the day, the other at night. Our warriors are ready to fight at any time because we know one of our gods will always be with us.
The gods have family, related either through blood or marriage. For example, Quetzalcoatl is brother to Tezcatlipoca, one of the war gods. The other, as mentioned, is Huitzilopochtli.
It is very important to worship the gods every day. You can be punished horribly for not doing so, in fact, you can be punished for worshiping them every day but not enough in their eyes. This is why worship is an important part of every Aztec person's daily life.
Priests help us to worship. They tell us how to behave so we wont bring the wrath of the gods upon us. This makes priests very important in our culture. They are religious leaders, but some are active in our government. They are also teachers, and create records written in hieroglyphics.
Priests also do human sacrifices to feed our gods and keep them happy. Men and women are both sacrificed, but usually it was men. This is because most sacrifices are enemy warriors captured during battle. However, if we run out of captured people or there is famines we will sacrifice our own people.
Sacrifices are done in temples, which are built to honour our gods. It is also a place for musical worship or for a private ceremony of personal bloodletting. Temples are super cool! They can be huge! The great temple of Tenochtitlan can fit 8,000 people in its plaza.

Journey of a Princess

This story is directly quoted from the website Aztec empire for Kids. Check out the rest of this website here! http://aztecs.mrdonn.org/princess.html

When the Aztecs settled down on the magical island that had appeared at "The Place of the Prickly Pear Cactus", they did not go to war, as they usually did. They still had to feed their hungry gods, but they used their own people instead of captives. That's what their god had told them to do. (Actually, according to Aztec legend, their god had told them not to go to war for a while, as they needed to built up their strength.)

After a while, the Aztec emperor sent a messenger to a nearby tribe, inviting the chief's daughter to visit the Aztec capital, and meet his son. His invitation was accepted. The princess of the nearby tribe arrived at the capital city, with many servants and many presents for the royal family. She was delighted to meet the emperor's son. They had a lovely dinner together. By the end of the evening, she was more than willing to become his bride.

A few days later, her father arrived in Tenochtitlan, the Aztec capital city. He expected to discuss would goods his daughter would bring to her marriage with the emperor's son. That's when he heard that his daughter and her many attendants had been sacrificed to feed the many hungry Aztec gods. In fact, he probably would have been sacrificed  himself, only fortunately for him, he had traveled to the city with many armed guards. The emperor tried to explain that it was an honor to be sacrificed. But the chief would have none of it. He hurried home to his people, and the very next day sent his army to destroy the awful Aztec people.

As their god had told them to do, the Aztecs had taken time to grow in strength before they had contacted this nearby king. Their young men had become capable warriors. They had many weapons. They won easily. The Aztecs demanded tribute in the form of jewels, food, clothing, and of course captives to feed their hungry gods. That made the Aztecs very happy. The Aztecs went on to conquer other tribes in the area. That made them very rich.

Economy

The Aztec economy is divided into a political sector, which is controlled by nobles and kings, and a commercial sector which is independent. The Political sector is focused on the control of land and labor by kings and nobles. Nobles own all the land and commoners get to us farmland and other fields by payments. These payments support the lavish lifestyles of the upper class and help finance the city-states as well. Luxury items, like featherwork, sculptures, and jewelry are made by full-time commoner specialists who work for noble patrons.

Markets are extremely important to our economy. It is the center of trade, profit and the commercial sector. Your average town will probably have a weekly market, in the center of town, every 5 days, but larger cities have markets every day. In Tlatelolco, another large city close to Tenochtitlan, 60,000 people visit the market. Even though our economy is commercialized by using money, markets, and vendors, we aren't capitalists because our land and labor aren't for sale.
What can you find in a market? We some sellers are just small vendors, but each profession sells their wares; farmers sell their produce and potters sell their pottery. You can find tools, food like agriculture and wild game, gold, silver, precious stones, cloth, cotton, animal skins, and woodwork. Some people are professional merchants called pochteca, like my late father, who travel from marketplace to marketplace and manage long distance trade. These merchants have a high status in our society, being just below the noble class.
The highest officials of the pochteca are called the pochtecatlatoqe. They are elders who don't travel anymore, but instead are administrators and oversee the younger pochteca. The second group of pochteca are slave traders, called tlatlani. They are the richest of the merchants and are important in capturing slaves for sacrifice. The 3rd group are long distance traders called tencuenenque. My father was one and helped the rulers by carrying out personal trades. The last group are naualoztomeca. They are trader spies and search for rare items. Because of this they must disguise themselves so they can get information in markets and report it to higher pochteca.

What do you pay with?

There are several types of money that we use. Small purchases are made with cacao beans. These have to be imported from lowland areas. In an Aztec market place, a small rabbit is 30 beans, a turkey egg is 3 beans, and a tamal is one bean. A larger purchase is made with standardized lengths of cotton cloth, called quachtli. Different qualities of quachtli can be 65 to 300 cacao beans. To put this in perspective, about 20 quachtli can support your average commoner for a year in Tenochtitlan. If your running low on cash, a man can always sell his daughter as a sex slave or for religious sacrifice. She would be worth about 500 to 700 beans.

Geography

The Aztec Empire is located in the central and southern regions of Mexico. It grew during the 15th and 16th centuries to stretch from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. The empire was made up of separate city-states. The capital city is Tenochtitlan, which is located on Lake Texcoco.
When the Aztecs were trying to find a place to build their city they saw an eagle perched on a cactus with a snake in its talons. They took that as a sign to build their city in the marshy lands near there. The city of Tenochtitlan is suurrounded by two of Mexico's highest mountains, Iztaccihuatl, and an active volcano, Popcatepetl. Lake Texcoco is made up of fresh water and swampy lands, so to create their city the Aztecs dug up through the swampy fresh lakes and placed mud on top of itself to create islands, canals, and drained fields called chinampas. This created really fertile land to plant gardens and create foundations for the city.
The climate is very hot and humid. To keep the city clean, the Aztecs kept the canals full of fresh water from the mountain springs. Sometimes there were periods of low rain and water so Tenochtitlan would ask neighboring city-states, like Tlaxcala and Huejotzingo to open their canals and let fresh water flow. This could be dangerous. Once when my mother was young the canals and lake systems were unpredictable and filled with water. the while city flooded and everyone had to evacuate.

Aztec Government

Our government started out as a warrior ruler who gained authority over a region through battle. Once we had gained territory our society started a system kind of similar to European monarchy. The rules of each region, called tlatoani, determined the major rituals, guided warfare, protect the rights of commoners and nobility, and were patron to the poor. The governments were devoted and focused on their city-states, or altepetl. These city-states were communities created by territory gained through battles.  This system did not exert supreme authority on their territories,only expecting tributes to be paid and allowing those who proved themselves fit to rule in a warrior society to be seen as equal to the regions deity. Under a Kings rule there were many minor rulers, called Tlatoque, who owned private land and had wealth that ranked them as lower nobility. They controlled the tributes that had to be payed to the king.
The empire is discontinuous because not all of their territories were connected. Local rulers were given their positions once their city-states were conquered and the Aztec people didn't interfere with local issues. They just expected their tribute payments to be made.
The city-states created alliances with each other, depending on each other for military and political protection. Rulers governed their domain independently and throughout the 14th and 15th century they would shift their alliances with different states. By the 16th century the Aztecs created the Triple Alliance which brought them together as a community.

Poor vs Rich

Our society is highly structured. At the top are the rich and at the bottom are the poor and slaves.

The rich: live in homes built of sun dried brick and sometimes stone. Their homes have a white wash coating that make them sparkle in the sunshine. They have a separate area for bathing. Water is poured over hot stones to make steam. Bathing is really important and done everyday. Their clothes are colourfully decorated with embroidery and feathers. I've seen many of them carry fans made out of feathers. As you can tell, feathers are a sign of status.

The poor: They are mostly farmers . They live in huts with thatched roofs with scarce furniture. They weave their own mats for the floor and caskets for belongings. They also have blankets and pots to cook with. Each home has a little garden to grow food to eat. Their clothes are very simple and can never be decorated with feathers. Its actually against the law for a commoner to carry anything made of or decorated with feathers, and if this law is broken its punishable with death.