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The Western Hemisphere was, in many ways, the last frontier of exploration during the end of the medieval world and into the Age of Exploration of the 1500s. For many, the Western Hemisphere at that time was not what we know today due to the belief that the nearest landmass to the Atlantic coast of Europe was the Pacific coast of Asia. But when Christopher Columbus and other European explorers who followed him discovered a new continent between Western Europe and East Asia, they also discovered many ancient pagan tribes. One of these – perhaps the most famous of pre-European America – was the dominant force in Central America. These were the Aztecs.