After 500 Years, the Aztec Aztec Extinction Mystery Finally Disintegrated

After more than 500 years passed, researchers managed to uncover the reasons behind the extinction of the Aztecs. Cocoliztli or plague of disease is designated as the ringleader that destroys almost the entire tribal population in Mexico.

It started in 1545 where the disaster struck the Aztecs. People start getting high fever, headaches and bleeding from the eyes, mouth and nose. Death will follow them in just 3-4 days.

Quickly, the tribal population declined. Approximately 15 million people or 80 percent of the population were killed in the five-year disaster.

The Franciscan Priest Fray Juan de Torquemada described how the plague destroyed civilization at that time.

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"The fever is contagious, burning and continuous, dry and black tongue, the thirst is extraordinary, the urine is dark green, black, sometimes greenish, pale sometimes fast, sometimes weak," he said.

Torquemada continued, large ditches dug from morning until sunset. Nothing was done except to bring the corpse and throw it into the gutter.

Residents say the disaster was caused by an outbreak of disease. However, no one ever knew for sure what the outbreak was.

Only after 500 years passed, the researcher managed to uncover the cause after studying the dental DNA of the deceased victim.

"The cause of this epidemic has long been debated and now we can provide direct evidence through DNA," says Åshild Vågene researcher from the University of Tuebingen, Germany.

Researchers managed to uncover by analyzing the DNA taken from 29 skeletons buried in the cemetery. Using a new DNA-filtering technique called the Meta Genome Analyzer Alignment Tool (MALT), the researchers found traces of Salmonella enterica bacteria.

These bacteria are known to cause enteric fevers that correlate with typhoid.

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European colonizers spread the disease, brought germs and exposed them to local populations who had never met and had immunity to them, while Salmonella enterica itself had existed in Europe in the Middle Ages.

Many Salmonella strains are spread through infected food or water, or are also carried away from European pets.

"We tested all the pathogenic bacteria and DNA viruses that genome data exist, and S. enterica is the only germ that is detected," said Alexander Herbig, another researcher involved in the study.

Then, despite another undetectable or completely unknown patrol, researchers believe S.enterica is a potent candidate for the outbreak.

"This is an important advance available to ancient disease researchers, and now we can look for molecular traces of many infectious agents in previously unknown archaeological records," said Kirsten Bos, archaeologist and researcher in the study.