Fray Toribio Benavente or Motolinia, Historia de los Indios de Nueva España, Treatise No. I. Ch. XII.
There have never been seen or heard of before such temples as those of this land of Anahuac or New Spain, neither for size and design nor for anything else; and as they rise to a great height they must needs have strong foundations; and there was an endless number of such temples and altars in this country, about which a note is here made so that those who may come to this country from now onwards may know about them, for the memory of them all has already almost perished.
These temples are called Teocallis, and throughout the land we find that in the principal part of the town a great rectangular court is constructed; in the large towns they measured from corner to corner the length of a crossbow shot, in the lesser towns the courts are smaller.
This courtyard they surround with a wall and many of the walls are embattled; their gateways dominate the principal streets and roads, for they are all made to converge towards the court; and so as to give greater honour to their temples they lay out the roads very straight with rope line for a distance of one or two leagues, and it is a thing worth seeing from the top of the principal temple, how straight all the roads come from all the lesser towns and suburbs and converge towards the Court of the Teocallis.
In the most conspicuous place in this court would stand a great rectangular block (cepa). So as to write this description I measured one in a moderate-sized town named Tenanyocan [Tenayoca] and found that it measured forty fathoms from corner to corner all built up with a solid wall, on the outside the wall was of stone, and the inside was filled up with stone only or with clay and adobe; others were built of earth well tamped.
As the structure rose it contracted towards the centre and at the height of a fathom and a half or two fathoms there were some ledges going inwards, for they did not build it in a straight line, and the thick foundation was always worked towards the centre so as to give it strength and as the wall rose it got narrower; so that when it got to the top of the Teocalli it had narrowed and contracted itself seven or eight fathoms on each side, both by the ledges and the wall leaving the foundation [mound] on the top thirty-four or thirty-five fathoms.
On the west side were the steps and ascent, and above on the top they constructed two great altars, placing them towards the east side, so that there was no more space left behind them than was sufficient to enable one to walk round them. One altar was to the right and the other to the left. Each one stood by itself with its own walls and hood-like roof. In the great Teocallis there were two altars, in the others only one, and each one of these altars[[12]] had upper stories; the great ones had three stories above the altars, all terraced and of considerable height, and the building (cepa) itself was very lofty, so that it could be seen from afar off.
One could walk round each of these chapels and each had its separate walls. In front of these altars a large space was left where they made their sacrifices, and the building (cepa) itself had the height of a great tower, without [counting] the stories that covered the altars.
According to what some people who saw it have told me, the Teocalli of Mexico had more than a hundred steps; I have seen them myself and have counted them more than once, but I do not remember [the number]. The Teocalli of Texcoco had five or six steps more than that of Mexico. If one were to ascend to the top of the chapel of San Francisco in Mexico, which has an arched roof and is of considerable height, and look over Mexico, the temple of the devil would have a great advantage in height, and it was a wonderful sight to view from it the whole of Mexico and the towns in the neighbourhood.
In similar courts in the principal towns there were twelve or fifteen other Teocallis of considerable size, some larger than others, but far from as large as the principal Teocalli.