# What happened to the lakes at what is now Mexico City? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 9, 2023, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338 "2023-12-09T22:18:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2023, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/1 "2023-12-09T22:18:06Z")
I recently read _Conquistador_, about Cortes’ conquest of the Aztec empire. I hadn’t realised that the Aztec cities were built on and around a major lake system. So what happened to the lakes? Mexico City isn’t on lakes now? > **[Tenochtitlan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenochtitlan)** > > Tenochtitlan,\[a\] also known as Mexico-Tenochtitlan,\[b\] was a large Mexican altepetl in what is now the historic center of Mexico City. The exact date of the founding of the city is unclear, but the date 13 March 1325 was chosen in 1925 to celebrate the 600th anniversary of the city. The city was built on an island in what was then Lake Texcoco in the Valley of Mexico. The city was the capital of the expanding Aztec Empire in the 15th century until it was captured by the Spanish in 1521. > At its... ---
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2023, 10:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/2 "2023-12-09T22:27:23Z")
It was a very shallow lake. Mexico City suffered from regular flooding before 1700. After that the increased population and cultivation and natural forces saw the lakes recede, much like Tulare Lake in California. So modern Mexico City is on _lakebed_, not lake. Everything’s been filled in over the centuries. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2023, 10:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/3 "2023-12-09T22:54:41Z")
And the city is subsiding as the aquifer below it collapses. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [December 9, 2023, 11:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/4 "2023-12-09T23:17:48Z")
Pretty good potted history and summary of current issues here: > **[Lake Texcoco](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lake_Texcoco)** > > Lake Texcoco (Spanish: Lago de Texcoco; Nahuatl languages: Tetzco(h)co) was a natural lake within the Anahuac or Valley of Mexico. Lake Texcoco is best known for an island situated on the western side of the lake where the Mexica built the city of Mēxihco Tenōchtitlan, which would later become the capital of the Aztec Empire. After the Spanish conquest, efforts to control flooding led to most of the lake being drained. > The entire lake basin is now almost completely occupied by Mexico City, the ... It is weird to wander around there and see some of the highly local subsidence; it is not at all a smooth flat process. ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [December 12, 2023, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/5 "2023-12-12T23:59:11Z")
I wondered about the logistics of feeding a huge population without beasts of burden or wagons to haul in food. The answer provided in another thread mentioned that the Aztec city was built around high yield multi-crop islands which turned much of the lake into an array of rectangular canals around these islands. You can still see some of these canal gardens south of the city (it shows up as _Trajineras Xochimilco Mágico_ on Google maps.) So presumably some of the result was from filling in the lakebed over time to make gardens, also. ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2023, 11:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/6 "2023-12-22T23:19:18Z")
Interesting reconstruction of the old city: > **[a portrait of Tenochtitlan](https://tenochtitlan.thomaskole.nl/)** > > a 3D reconstruction of the capital of the Aztec Empire ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [December 22, 2023, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/7 "2023-12-22T23:31:50Z")
Fascinating! Thanks very much for that link. ---
**Author:** ![EinsteinsHund](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/einsteinshund/32/8400_2.png) [@EinsteinsHund](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EinsteinsHund)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2023, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-happened-to-the-lakes-at-what-is-now-mexico-city/994338/8 "2023-12-23T01:11:08Z")
That’s _really_ impressing. I can’t assess the accuracy of the reimagination, but now I can understand how impressed Cortez and his men were by the city, something that must have looked like a dream to them. I imagined something similar to this from the descriptions I read about Tenochtitlan, but not in that scale.