The relief on the back of Moctezuma's Throne , the eagle standing on a cactus that emerges from the reclining body of a goddess and with lines behind that suggest water, is an elaborate version of the name glyph for Tenochtitlan. In the Aztec migration legend, Huitzilopochtli told the Aztecs to settle where they saw an eagle land upon a cactus growing in a lake. This vision is what they saw after being expelled from Chapultepec, and the city they founded, Tenochtitlan. The glyph 2 House on the top of the monument is for 1325, the traditional founding date of Tenochtitlan. The whole monument therefore represents the city of Tenochtitlan, rising from lake Texcoco.
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