Aztec is a 1980 historical fiction novel by American author Gary Jennings. It is the first of two novels Jennings wrote in the Aztec series, followed by Aztec Autumn. The remaining four novels were written by other authors after Jennings died in 1999.

Marina or Malintzin, more popularly known as La Malinche, a Nahua woman from the Mexican Gulf Coast, became known for contributing to the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire (1519–1521), by acting as an interpreter, advisor, and intermediary for the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés. She was one of 20 enslaved women given to the Spaniards in 1519 by the natives of Tabasco. Cortés chose her as a consort, and she later gave birth to his first son, Martín – one of the first Mestizos in New Spain.