Formation of the Aztec Triple Alliance
- Date
- 1428 CE
- Category
- Politics & governance
- Region
- Central Mexico (Valley of Mexico)
- Era
- Post-Classical / Medieval
- Significance
In 1428, under the Mexica ruler Itzcoatl, the city-states of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco and Tlacopan joined in a military and political pact that historians call the Aztec Triple Alliance, the institutional foundation of the Aztec Empire.
The alliance emerged from victory in a war against the Tepanec capital of Azcapotzalco, which had previously dominated the Valley of Mexico and held the Mexica as tributaries. With the Tepanecs overthrown, the three allied cities divided conquered lands and tribute among themselves and turned outward in campaigns of expansion. Although nominally a partnership, the alliance was unequal, and Tenochtitlan steadily became the senior partner and the centre of imperial power. Over the following ninety years the alliance conquered much of central and southern Mexico, organising subject provinces into a vast tribute system that funnelled goods, labour and sacrificial captives to the capital. The 1428 settlement also accompanied a reshaping of Mexica history and ideology under Itzcoatl and his adviser Tlacaelel. The empire built on this foundation was the dominant Mesoamerican power encountered by the Spanish in 1519.
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Empires active in 1428 CE
- Malacca Sultanate1400 CE – 1511 CE
- Ming Dynasty1368 CE – 1644 CE
- Kanem-Bornu Empire700 CE – 1900 CE
- Ottoman Empire1299 CE – 1922 CE
- Solomonic dynasty1270 CE – 1974 CE
- Portuguese Empire1415 CE – 1999 CE
Related politics & governance events
- Founding of Tenochtitlan by the Mexica1325 CE
- Founding of the Iroquois Confederacy and the Great Law of Peacec. 1450 (scholarly estimate; oral tradition as early as 1142)
- Inca imperial expansion under Pachacuti1438 CE
- Kublai Khan founds the Yuan dynasty and conquers Song China1271 CE (conquest completed 1279)
- Sonni Ali seizes Timbuktu and forges the Songhai Empire1468 CE
- Rise of Timur (Tamerlane) and his Central Asian empirec. 1370 CE (empire to 1405)
Further reading
The wider story
1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
Best-selling reappraisal of the sophisticated societies of the pre-Columbian Americas.
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