Aztec Floating Gardens (chinampa)

Timeline

1. 1100–1325Lake region of the Valley of Mexico · Valley of MexicoValley residents built rectangular frames of wooden stakes and reeds in shallow lake bays, dug mud from the lake bottom to raise the field surface and planted willows to hold the soil, creating permanent farmland that rose and fell with water levels, growing mainly maize, beans, squash, and flowers.
2. 1325–1450Around Tenochtitlan · Mexico CityAfter the Aztecs established their capital at Tenochtitlan, they expanded floating gardens on a large scale, transporting agricultural products into city markets via a canal network; around the 1440s, floating-garden area and population grew in step, supporting the imperial capital's food needs of hundreds of thousands.
3. 1441–1450Xochimilco—Xochimilco · Mexico CityOn the eve of the empire's zenith, the floating-garden system reached its maximum scale, with individual fields yielding seven to eight harvests a year, closely tied to tribute distribution and market trade, becoming the agricultural infrastructure on which Mesoamerican urban civilization depended.