Toltec Civilization: A History from Beginning to End

The Toltecs are one of the most mysterious and little understood of all the ancient cultures of Mesoamerica. This culture was venerated by later civilizations such as the Aztecs, and even today, “Toltec knowledge” is used as a kind of shorthand for arcane wisdom from an ancient culture. However, discussing the actual history of the Toltecs is extremely difficult. Much of what we know of these people comes from writings and oral traditions of the Aztecs, as translated and interpreted by European invaders. This Aztec history is so mingled with myth and legend that it is very difficult to discern what may be historical fact.

In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, most historians seemed to accept that the Toltecs were a distinct and warlike culture centered around the Valley of Mexico who conquered large parts of Mesoamerica. More recently, there has been debate about whether the Toltecs really were a separate culture at all or whether this term should be taken to represent a set of shared ideas and beliefs which permeated several cultures in Mesoamerica around the end of the first millennium. Even now, much of the information about the Toltecs is vague, contradictory, and subject to debate.

This is the mysterious, baffling, and ever-changing story of the Toltecs.