Archeologists have learned many things about the Aztecs from the artwork found in the ruins of their cities. It tells about their gods and religious ceremonies. The gods are shown in stone and carved sculptures on the walls of the temples. On the inside walls of the temples are what is left of bright colored paintings showing ceremonial rituals, like human sacrifices. A famous Aztec sculpture is the large calendar stone, that is 12 ft. in diameter. The calendar depicts the Aztec universe with the face of the sun god in the middle. The god is surrounded by designs that symbolize the days and months and the locations of bodies in the universe at different times of the year.

Archaeologists have discovered how to decipher some of the Aztec writings, which tell about their history and give accounts of supplies and products for trade. The Aztec developed a record and accounting system that uses pictographs in which each picture represented an object or the sound of a syllable. Their counting system was based on the number 20, in which one picture represented 20 items, another 20 x 20 ( = 400) items and so on.