Ancient Mexico
Here you can download the papers emerged from the PhD research.
Erik Damián Reyes Morales, "Colhuas and Mexicas. Two Histories of the Same Past". 2024.
Abstract: This paper analyzes the two existing versions in the sources on the period that extends from the Mexica defeat and the expulsion from Chapultepec, to the arrival of Acamapichtli in Mexico- Tenochtitlan. The first of them, and best known, is the one that emerges from Chronicle X, while the second has its backbone in the sources linked to the Codex Colhuacan and the Mexica annals, but it also appears in a significant group of documents, both manuscripts and pictographs, related to the historiographic traditions of different peoples of the Anahuac valley. From this analysis it is possible to conclude that the version that emerges from Chronicle X could have been the reformed history in the times of Itzcoatl and that, contrary to what is commonly accepted, in Mexico-Tenochtitlan two well-differentiated groups lived together, the Colhua nobility and the Mexica people.
Erik Damián Reyes Morales, "The Great Flood of the Eleventh Century and the Migration of the Aztec-Mexica and the Anahuac Peoples", 2023.
Abstract: TThis work relies on the proposal that Aztlan was on the same islets of Texcoco Lake where Mexica founded Mexico-Tenochtitlan, that Teocolhuacan was where Iztapalapa town is today and that the Aztec-Mexica migration happened in the context of the great flood of the eleventh century. Based on human geography, this article aims to take a step forward and test this proposal by developing the migration routes that the Aztec-Mexica and the eight peoples that walked with them, according to the Tira de la peregrinación, might have followed. From the analysis carried out, this essay proposes that these peoples walked south and split themselves in the valleys of Cuauhtla or Cuernavaca. From there, this work suggests migration routes for these eight peoples and argues that most of them came back to the Anahuac Valley because of the high political value of this territory. Finally, this article locates the migrations of the Toltec, Colhua, Chichimeca, Acolhua, and Otomi in the context of the flood and provides a general panorama of the migratory process that this natural catastrophe could have caused. This examination reinforces the claim that the Aztec-Mexica were in the Anahuac Valley in Toltec times.
José Rubén Romero Galván and Erik Damián Reyes Morales, "Chimalpahin’s Correction to Tezozomoc’s Chronology in the Crónica mexicáyotl", 2023.
Abstract: This article analyzes the correction that Domingo de Chimalpahin made to the correlation of years in the section of the Crónica mexicáyotl that can be attributed to Hernando Alvarado Tezozómoc. For this purpose, the year counts of the sources linked to the Mexica are examined, those that make up the “Tira de Peregrinación Group,” the manuscripts related to the Colhuas, the Anales de Cuauhtitlan and the Relación de la genealogía, as well as the sources written by the Chalca historian himself and those that make up the Códice Chimalpahin. This analysis made it possible to establish that the dates in the original manuscript were 1247 for the defeat and expulsion of the Mexica from Chapultepec and 1273 for the arrival of the peoples who left Aztlan to the islets of the lake where they founded Mexico-Tenochtitla.
Erik Damián Reyes Morales, "Ce Acatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl and his Position in the Succession of Toltec Rulers: An Interpretation through Colhua History", 2020.
Abstract: One of the main discussions regarding Ce Acatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl in Mesoamerican history has focused on the role he played in ruler succession at Tula. Paul Kirchhoff and Wigberto Jiménez Moreno began this historical dispute. Since then, some authors have maintained that Ce Acatl was one of the first tlahtoque of the Toltecs; others, that he was a contemporary of Huemac and a witness to the fall of Tula. This paper offers an analysis of Ce Acatl’s story through Colhua history. Through this analysis it is possible to determine that Ce Acatl was in the middle of the line of succession. In addition, this paper addresses topics such as Ce Acatl’s family ties, the context in which the first Excan Tlahtoloyan was established, as well as the characteristics of the Toltec system of government.
Erik Damián Reyes Morales and José Rubén Romero Galván, "Aztlan, Teocolhuacan, the Beginning of a Migration and the End of a Triple Alliance. Times and Places", 2019.
Abstract: Based on the information provided by the XVI century sources, as well as the data from archaeological studies, the aim of this work is to propose that the fall of the first Triple Alliance and the beginning of the migrations, among them the Mexicas’ migration, happened in the context of a great flood that affected the Basin of Mexico for around a century. In this context, we suggest that the city of Aztlan was located in the very place where was later founded the city of Mexico-Tenochtitlan and that Teocolhuacan was located where was established, after the flood, the pre-Hispanic city of Iztapalapa.