Those ancient people who ruled in ancient Mexico

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The story of these individuals retreats back several centuries to 1325 when a tribe of hunted Aztez men took refuge on an island in the middle of a lake lying in Mexico's central plateau. These arrivals called their settlement Tenochtitlán, the title apparently being the name of their religious leader, Tenoch.ÊÊ

Otherwise, the only chronicles I've found relating to the Aztec emergence is that they originated from or near seven caves -- but just where these caves existed is uncertain. But from these "residences" they traveled down the western Mexican coast through Michoacán.

Then somewhere around the 13th century, they settled in or near what is now Chapultepec. But after numerous battles with unfriendly neighbors, after asking the ruler of Colhuacan for land, they received an area called Tizapan, a rattlesnake-infested, barren region.

But after again being imposed upon by unfriendly neighbors, this time, according to myth, "a deity appeared at night to one of the Aztec priests, advising a city be built on the spot where an eagle with a serpent in its claws would appear upon a cactus.

Well, that eagle appeared on an island, a temple thus arising there to the God of War, Huitzilopochtli, that name translating into "The Place of the Cactus Growing From A Rock."

But an even earlier culture, what we sometimes today call Mayan, already flourished there, the culture extending down the coastal region roughly from Veracruz through Yucatán, and through Guatemala and

Honduras. And the following Zapotecan culture thrived in the Mexican state of Oaxaca. Some of its magnificent mountaintop temples, I am told, still stand.

The Toltecs also had an interesting culture, stemming from the legend of Quetzalcoatl, an alleged white-skinned, dark-bearded prophet, he being the last Toltec leader. After promising to return one day and resume his kingly office, he mysteriously vanished.

Oddly, he promised to return one day and assume his rule. And just as oddly, when Cortéz later invaded the country, most Toltecs thought he was Quetzalcoatl, the Cortéz arrival therefore being the fulfillment of the prophecy. And maybe it was.

Within the next two centuries that community mushroomed into a huge city, one complete with temples, towers, moats and causeways ... a city in effect dominating a sizable collection of regional tribes and people.

Then in 1502, a Mexican resident named Moctezuma arrived, a man reserved in manner, cultured and religious, an individual capable of fine manners, tenderness and, when necessary, gravity. He assumed power as the sixth monarch. He become not only an emperor, but supreme commander of the army, as well as the high priest.

In appearance, Moctezuma had relatively short hair, reaching only to his ears, and a scanty black beard. He had sharp eyes, good manners and was around 40 years old when the Spaniards invaded Mexico,

But prior to the Spaniards, Moctezuma became chief of his people, which meant that, among other things, he was in charge of promoting and leading the traditional war to obtain sacrifices for coronation services. Yet these bloody rites ultimately led to his demise.

But the supremacy of the Aztec is but an incident in the development of Indian tribes. It now seems established, and is commonly agreed upon, that the basic stock of the American Indian is Mongoloid, akin to the Chinese. It seems clear that successive migrations from Asia took place across the Bering Straits, and thence down the continent.

Some scholars also believe there may have been arrivals from the Polynesian Islands.