The 1475 Tenochtitlan earthquake (9 Cane of the Aztec calendar) was an

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, from ...

that occurred in Ancient

Mexico-Tenochtitlan , ; es, Tenochtitlan also known as Mexico-Tenochtitlan, ; es, México-Tenochtitlan was a large Mexican in what is now the historic center of Mexico City. The exact date of the founding of the city is unclear. The date 13 March 1325 was c ...

(current

Mexico City Mexico City ( es, link=no, Ciudad de México, ; abbr.: CDMX; Nahuatl: ''Altepetl Mexico'') is the capital and largest city of Mexico, and the most populous city in North America. One of the world's alpha cities, it is located in the Valley o ...

), during the reign of Tlatoani Axayacatl. Because it happened during Pre-Hispanic times, little is known about this earthquake, but it is considered to be perhaps the most significant of those dates. The only record appears in the

Aubin Codex The Aubin Codex is an 81-leaf Aztec codex written in alphabetic Nahuatl on paper from Europe. Its textual and pictorial contents represent the history of the Aztec peoples who fled Aztlán, lived during the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire ...

, and thanks to Spanish franciscan friar Juan de Torquemada who reported in his

book A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this physical arr ...

, Monarquia Indiana according to the codex, that the earthquake "Was so strong that not only did many houses fall, but the mountains and mountains in many places they crumbled and fell apart". The

Mexicas The Mexica (Nahuatl: , ;''Nahuatl Dictionary.'' (1990). Wired Humanities Project. University of Oregon. Retrieved August 29, 2012, frolink/ref> singular ) were a Nahuatl-speaking indigenous people of the Valley of Mexico who were the rulers of ...

considered the earthquake as the

prophecy In religion, a prophecy is a message that has been communicated to a person (typically called a ''prophet'') by a supernatural entity. Prophecies are a feature of many cultures and belief systems and usually contain divine will or law, or prete ...

of the end of their

Empire An empire is a "political unit" made up of several territories and peoples, "usually created by conquest, and divided between a dominant center and subordinate peripheries". The center of the empire (sometimes referred to as the metropole) ex ...

Damage

This earthquake left all the houses in the

Valley of Mexico The Valley of Mexico ( es, Valle de México) is a highlands plateau in central Mexico roughly coterminous with present-day Mexico City and the eastern half of the State of Mexico. Surrounded by mountains and volcanoes, the Valley of Mexico wa ...

destroyed and caused considerable damage to the

palace A palace is a grand residence, especially a royal residence, or the home of a head of state or some other high-ranking dignitary, such as a bishop or archbishop. The word is derived from the Latin name palātium, for Palatine Hill in Rome which ...

s and

teocalli A ''teocalli'' (Nahuatl: "God-house") is a Mesoamerican pyramid surmounted by a temple. The pyramid is terraced, and some of the most important religious rituals in Pre-Columbian Mexico took place in the temple at the top of the pyramid. The famou ...

s in the area. Several

chinampa Chinampa ( nah, chināmitl ) is a technique used in Mesoamerican agriculture which relies on small, rectangular areas of fertile arable land to grow crops on the shallow lake beds in the Valley of Mexico. They are built up on wetlands of a lake o ...

s sank, the

hill A hill is a landform that extends above the surrounding terrain. It often has a distinct Summit (topography), summit. Terminology The distinction between a hill and a mountain is unclear and largely subjective, but a hill is universally con ...

s were washed away, crumbled and disintegrated, cracks were created in the earth and caused a

tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater explo ...

Lake Texcoco Lake Texcoco ( es, Lago de Texcoco) was a natural lake within the "Anahuac" or Valley of Mexico. Lake Texcoco is best known as where the Aztecs built the city of Tenochtitlan, which was located on an island within the lake. After the Spanish con ...

."La relación en los temblores ocurridos en la Ciudad de México" de Linda Manzanilla, 28 February 2022.

Earthquake

''SIMMSA'' geologists have carried out various studies which have determined that the possible epicenter of this earthquake would be in the current

Cuajimalpa Cuajimalpa de Morelos (; more commonly known simply as Cuajimalpa) is a borough (''demarcación territorial'') in the Mexico City. It is located on the west side of the city in the Sierra de las Cruces mountains which separate Mexico City from the ...

, due to local faults and with an approximate magnitude of 7.5 on the

Richter scale The Richter scale —also called the Richter magnitude scale, Richter's magnitude scale, and the Gutenberg–Richter scale—is a measure of the strength of earthquakes, developed by Charles Francis Richter and presented in his landmark 1935 ...

References

{{coord missing, Mexico Tsunamis in Mexico Earthquakes in Mexico 15th-century earthquakes