Tattoo Blog

Aztec Warrior

November 28th, 2007

I was asked to do an Aztec Warrior and when I’m asked to do tattoos or Illustrations I try to do research about the subject especially something with as much history. Most Aztec Warriors you see on people look more at home on the hood of an Impala then on somebody’s arm.

It was hard to find any info on the Net regarding the Aztecs beyond; they lived in temples and worshipped the sun. When we were in school they didn’t talk so much about the warriors or how violent they were. So I had to go to the dreaded library leaving the net behind. I got several books and found all the artwork I’ve seen was really wrong and in actuality the Movie Apocolypto was more accurate then most things I have seen.

There were two basic Aztec warriors the Jaguar warrior then the eagle warrior. The jaguars were scouts and the eagles were the Infantry or cavalry. In Apocolypto the main bad guy was a jaguar warrior complete with Armour helmet and flint knife. One thing that movies or art really don’t show is these guys wore simple Armour, stiff cotton or were practically if not fully naked.

What I did was combine things from several areas including the movie and books to get what you see here. They didn’t really have a set uniform and each warrior customized his own look which was good so I didn’t have to worry if I was creating him wrong.

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Entry Filed under: In progress works