The Sacrificial Temple was a very important structure to the Aztecs. They were extremely religious people and believed in sacrifices to please the gods. They were not monotheistic but polytheistic (believing in many gods). The purpose for building a Sacrificial Temple was to sacrifice people as an offering to the gods. The Aztecs believed so strongly in pleasing the gods they worshiped, over 20,000 people were sacrificed a year. The construction of a temple wasn�t done in a traditional manner; buildings were not built on an empty spot. If a new temple was constructed in the place of an older temple, the older temple was not destroyed; rather, the new temple was built over the older one.
The builders added new layers to the old temple until many new layers made the new temple larger, more extravagant and more intricate. This was often done by adding more stairs and making the sacrificial areas larger. To the emperor this was as acceptable as a brand new temple because the gods has already blessed the original one. The appearance of all the Sacrificial Temples was similar. Each one resembled an Egyptian Pyramid without the pointed top. On the outside there were terraces of steps. They reached toward the top of the temple and the sky.
Some of the more detailed parts of the temple were the staircases. For instance, they placed decorations such as stone serpent heads at the end of the staircases. There was no known meaning to why they did that. It is thought that if they used poisonous or dangerous animals it would ward away the bad spirits. This shows how religion played a big part in their lives. The Sacrificial Temple was one of the most important structures in the religious life of the Aztecs. In contrast to the diversity of the external structures of the shrines, their internal structure was more common.
The interior had a circular shape that had been cut from rock. In the middle of the room there was a small circular table that was used to hold as many offerings as would fit. Since the Aztecs made so many offerings, there was not enough room for all them to fit in many of the shrines. Most of the time, a second building had to be added. The additional structure had a rectangular room that led into a smaller circular room. In the center of this room, there was a fire in which to burn offerings. A lot of times this second building would burn down because the roof of the shrine was thatched (made of grass and straw).
Aztec Architecture is very important because it reveals much about the ancient civilization of the Aztecs. From all of the studies today, we see how elaborate and detailed each work of design is. Sadly, there is not much left of this ancient and intriguing architecture because of the Spanish conqueror Cortez. The Aztec Empire was ruined when this Spaniard took over their capital of Tenochtitlan in 1521. Even though so much of this architecture was destroyed, the ruins have taught us a lot about the great civilization and way of life of the Ancient Aztecs. This would account for more and more shrines being built. This is one of the reasons why they were so abundant throughout the empire