Main Aztec Gods:

Huitzilopochtli: God of war and sun.

His name means blue hummingbird.
The Aztecs fought a special war every year called the war of
flowers in order to capture victims to sacrifice to this god.
Tezcatlipoca: God of fate and creation
Quetzalcoatl: God of nature (air and earth), learning and
priesthood. His name means feathered serpent.

Some other Aztec Gods and Goddesses:

Tonatiuh: God of sun and his name means ‘Royal Lord’.
Coatlicue: Earth mother.
Teteoinnan: Mother of the Gods.
Chicomecoatl: Corn Goddess
Cihuacoatl: Earth Goddess, goddess of fertility.
Xipe-Totec: God of springtime and of vegetation. Also god of
suffering. His name means our flayed lord.
Xilonen: Princess of the unripe maize (corn).
Tlaloc: God of rain and agricultural fertility.
Chalchiuhtlicue: Water Goddess (Goddess of the lakes and
streams).
Ehecatl: Lord of the winds.
Xuihtecuhtli: Lord of fire.
Patecatl: God of medicine.
Mictlantecuhtil: God of the dead.
Chantico: Goddess of the hearth (home).
The Gods:
The Aztecs believed the gods made the earth and controlled all
aspects of life, even people. The most important aspect of an
Aztecs life is land and crops. So the most important Aztec gods
were those who controlled the natural forces such as wind, rain &
the sun. The Aztecs prayed to over 300 gods & goddesses; each
one with a name and a special responsibility. Inside the ‘Wall of
Serpents’, a wall decorated with snake figures, stood a great
pyramid topped with temples. Inside one temple was a half-
human, half-alligator statue of Tlaloc, the god of rain & fertility.
In the other temple there stood Huitzilopochtli, the terrible god of
sun & warfare.

Magic:
The Aztecs believed in magic. The number 20 was a magic
number because it was the number of toes & fingers a person had.
Therefore there were 20 named days in the Aztec calendar. Each
day had its own god. They believed that miracles occurred on
these days if the god was pleased.

Creation & Armageddon:

Xolotl & Quetzalcoatl created the first man & woman and this
creation took place at the time of the 5th sun-that’s our sun. The
Aztecs therefore believed there were 4 suns before ours and
therefore 4 different times that the world ended before ours.
The first world was destroyed by jaguars that ate the giants who
first inhabited the earth & ate acorns. The second world ended
after a hurricane that reduced the people to monkeys. The third
world ended after fiery rains and the fourth world ended after a
great flood which reduced the people to fishes. After the end of
each world the sun died.
Human Sacrifices:
The Aztec believed that the gods could be made happy if they
were given presents of humans & their blood. The greatest gift
that the gods could give to the humans was life itself, so the
greatest gift the Aztecs could give back to their gods was human
life.
Thousands of prisoners & slaves were killed every year as human
sacrifices on the temple alter. Their hearts were cut out by a sharp
stone knife & offered to the gods. It was an honour to be chosen
as a sacrifice. They believed that dying for the gods would ensure
that they went on ever lasting paradise. If they died bravely &
quickly the gods were pleased. If the gods ere not fed fresh blood,
their essential food, the sun god would struggle against the dark
and would never come back, which then led to the end of the
world.

Priests & Priestesses:

The religion leaders in Aztec society had a number of duties and
roles to fulfil. They made calendars and kept time which was very
important because they had to know when to perform special
ceremonies. They looked after the temples where they had to
carry out there ceremonies and sacrifices. They had a strict
routine where they had to pray 4 times a day and 5 times at night.
For example at night the priests would prick their own flesh to
feed the sun god just in case the sacrificed human blood was not
enough.
They claimed to be able to tell the future and that they talked to
the gods. They also weren’t allowed to marry.
During these special ceremonies the floor of the temple and their
steps would be covered with congealing blood. The priests
smeared the blood of their victims on the idol of the god and
rubbed it into their own hair.
Volador:
Not all aspects of the Aztecs religion was blood thirsty. The
Aztecs also believed that the gods changed into birds therefore the
Aztecs imitated this transformation in the form of the ceremony
called Volador. Four men were fastened by ropes and they wound
a movable platform on top of the pole. The men were dressed as
birds and they jumped off the platform into the air. The ropes
unwound and the platform rotated so that the bird-men seemed to
fly around the pole as they spiralled toward the ground.

The Solar Calendar:

This was an ordinary calendar with 365 days which marked off
things like festival days, planting and harvesting & drought
periods.
The Aztecs believed that every 52 years the world was coming to
an end. To prevent this from happening they
Conducted a fire ceremony which was lit fires, they cleaned their
homes, smashed pottery and they threw out imperfect items.
On the last night the fires were put out and everyone waited. Thy
had to have chosen a perfect human sacrifice, but after the normal
sacrifice was dome a fire was started on the victim’s chest and
this was where sacred torches were lit and were spread throughout
the Aztec territory.
The people then waited for the sun to rise in the morning. If it did
they knew that they would be safe for another 52 years.

The Sacred Calendar:

The Aztecs used this calendar for sacred events, time telling and a
way to keep historical records for things such as when temples
were built and the beginning of the rule of a new king
The Aztecs believed in the magic number 20.
They believed that 20 days made up 1 month.
They believed that there were 18 months in 1 Aztec year.
The remaining 5 days of the Aztec year were believed to be ‘bad
luck days’. This was because they were uncounted for and had no
gods associated with them.

The Stone Of The Sun:

In 1790 in a main plaza in Mexico City the ‘Sone of the Sun’ was
found. It was a carved stone slab that represented and Aztec
calendar. It was there fore not a true calendar. It displayed 20 days
signs and images that represented the 4 previous worlds.