Battle of Coyoacan. Illustration of Aztec soldiers fighting with war clubs and shields in the Battle of Coyoacan, near what is now Mexico City. A burning temple is at upper right, beside a river. Some women are fighting at lower left. The war leader (quetzal headdress, by temple) may be the Aztec general Tlacaelel (1397-1487) whose conquests expanded the Aztec Empire. Ruled by the Mexica, this empire was an alliance of three city states that ruled in central Mexico from 1428 until their defeat by Spanish conquistadors in 1521. Artwork from a 19th-century copy of a 16th-century post-conquest codex and history of the Aztecs by Jesuit missionary Juan de Tovar.