The gods of Mexico

The constituent elements of the insignia of the octli-gods may be generally described as follows:

(1) A two-coloured face-painting, the front half of the facial profile (i.e. the middle part of the face) being painted red in its entire length, both sides at the temples black (or dark green), or else black with longish yellow spots.

(2) A nasal plate, handle-shaped, the ends involuted outwardly, or crescent-shaped, the golden Huaxtec nose-ornament, yaca-metztli. It is usually marked on all articles dedicated to the octli-gods.

(3) A four-cornered ear-pendant, which agrees substantially with that of the Rain-god.

(4) A neck-ornament falling far down, loose in texture, made of malinalli grass fibre.

(5) A crown of heron-feathers, such as is worn by the Rain-god, but here combined with the cuecaluitoncatl, Quetzal’s neck-ornament made of dark feathers, with some projecting arara plumes.

(6) A stone axe as a weapon.

The most striking of these objects are the first two. So characteristic are they of the octli-gods, that a juxtaposition of red and black lines on a tilmatli is explained in the Codex [286]Magliabecchiano as “manta de dos conejos,” or shoulder-covering of the Two-rabbit octli-god.1

Sahagun, speaking of the octli-gods,2 says that Tezcatzoncatl3 was the parent or brother of the rest, who were called Yiauhtecatl, Izquitecatl, Acolua, Tlilhua, Patecatli, Toltecatl, Papaztac, Tlaltecayoua, Ome tochtli, Tepuztecatl, Chimapaleuecatl, and Cohuatzincatl.

One of the hymns in Sahagun’s collection alludes as follows to the octli-gods:

I have followed Seler’s translation of this hymn, but, like him, can glean little from it. It seems to me to allude vaguely to the cutting of the agave-plant, and the consequent withdrawal of the sap from which octli is made.

A report on the Huaxtec territory dated 1579 evidently relates to the octli-gods. It states that:

“They related another fable, that they had two other effigies as gods, one called Ometochtli, who is the god of wine; the other Tezcatlipocâ, which is the name of the most exalted idol worshipped by them, and with these they had painted the figure of a woman named Hueytonantzin, that is, ‘our great mother,’ because they said she was the mother [287]of all those gods or demons. And those four above-mentioned male demons, they related, had killed this great mother, founding with her the institution of human sacrifice, and taking her heart out of her breast and presenting it to the sun. Similarly, they related that the idol Tezcatlipocâ had killed the god of wine with his consent and concurrence, giving out that in this way he gave him eternal life, and that if he did not die, all persons drinking wine must die; but that the death of this Ometochtli was only like the sleep of one drunk, that he afterwards recovered and again became fresh and well.”

The principal festival of the octli-gods was ome tochtli (“two rabbit”), and this calendrical name became in a measure deified as a separate god, who was the same as Tepoxtecatl.4 Sahagun says of this festival:

“In the sign ce maçatl, on the second day called ome tochtli, they made a great feast to the god Izquitecatl, who is the second god of wine, and not only to him, but to all the gods of wine, who were very numerous. They ornamented his image in the temple, offered him food, and made songs and played on instruments in his presence. They placed a great jar of octli in the court of the temple, and whoever wished drank from it. The duty of replenishing the jar was given to the men who cut the maguey. They carried to the house of the god the first-fruits of the first sap, which they drew from it.”

A stone figure of this god from Tacubaya shows him in the recumbent position often observed in the statues of the octli-gods, and holding a large octli jar on his stomach. A headdress resembling that of an Arab covers the head, and from underneath it descend the strands of what seems to [290]be a wig. What appears to be a serpent motif, the ends of which are square in form, encircles the eyes almost like a pair of spectacles, and he wears the usual lunar nose-plug of the octli deities. An elaborate necklace, wristlets, and leg-pieces of precious stones are worn, and the underside of the statue is incised to represent the ripples of water and is covered with representations of marine animals and shells.

A passage in a report on the Huaxtec territory, dated 1579, states that Tezcatzoncatl was killed and revived by Tezcatlipocâ, by which act the drunkard’s sleep became harmless in the future for men. The passage runs:

“They related that the idol Tezcatlipocâ had killed the god of wine with his consent and concurrence, giving out that in this way he gave him eternal life, and that if he did not die, all persons drinking wine must die; but that the death of this Ometochtli was only like the sleep of one drunk, that he afterwards recovered and again became fresh and well.”

Allusion is made to Vetancurt’s mention of a special ceremony to Tezcatzoncatl on the preceding page.

Sahagun says9 that a priest called by the same name as the god was charged with the preparations for the festival of tepeilhuitl, in which four victims, one of whom bore the name of Mayauel, an octli-goddess, were slain. (See Tlaloc—Festivals.)

In the Codex Magliabecchiano, Tepoxtecatl is pictured as wearing the peculiar nose-plug of the octli-gods, the motif of which reappears on his shield. He is crowned with a panache from which leaves sprout, and lunar and stellar symbols appear here and there in his insignia. He carries the copper axe symbolical of the octli-gods, and wears the malinalli herb necklace.

The best-known temple of Tepoxtecatl is that at Tepoxtlan so fully described by Seler (see Bulletin 28 of U.S. Bureau of Ethnology, pp. 341 ff.), and Professor Marshall H. Saville (Proc. of Amer. Assoc. for the Advancement of Sciences, vol. viii of the Bulletins of the American Museum of Natural History).

Codex Borgia.—Sheet 57: He sits opposite Tlazolteotl and wears a crescent-shaped Huaxtec nasal ornament, and on his breast a remarkable comma-shaped curved ornament which is, perhaps, a piece of a large spiral snail’s shell, and which is peculiar to Patecatl and Tlazolteotl. He has the half-black, half-light face of the octli-gods. He wears Quetzalcoatl’s fan-like nape adornment, the fillet of unspun cotton distinctive of Tlazolteotl, and an ear-plug of the same material. He holds a stone hatchet, which is the symbol and weapon of the octli-gods, painted blue to indicate nephrite or some such stone. Sheet 13: He wears a fillet which affects the form of the Mexican royal crown, consisting of white fur with an ape’s head set on the frontal side, evidently a barbaric ornament peculiar to the district whence he came.

Codex Fejérváry-Mayer.—Sheet 35: Here he wears a wedge-shaped Huaxtec cap, painted blue and red, and a disk-shaped shell on his breast. His earring is formed of a trapeze-and-ray motif, like those on the stone head of Coyolxauhqui. The ends of his loin-cloth are rounded like Quetzalcoatl’s. Sheet 90: He wears a breast-ornament consisting of a black, leaf-shaped, obsidian knife. [293]

Aubin Tonalamatl.—He holds in his left hand some spikes of the agave-leaf, and in his right hand Quetzalcoatl’s throwing-stick, which is involuted snail-fashion at the end and painted with a stellar design. An eagle and jaguar stand before him holding paper flags, these symbols of the warrior signifying the courage-giving nature of octli drink. They are in sacrificial array, with the sacrificial cord round their necks and the sacrificial flag in their claws. The half-night and half-day symbol is above them, signifying the time of the octli orgies.

Codex Magliabecchiano.—Instead of the stone axe he holds in his hand Quetzalcoatl’s throwing-stick, and also wears his shell breastplate.

The interpreter of the Codex Vaticanus A says: “Patecatl was the husband of Mayaguil (Mayauel), the woman with four hundred breasts, who was metamorphosed into the maguei plant or vine, and was properly the root which they put into the water or wine which distils from the maguei in order to make it ferment. And the unhappy man to whose industry the art of making wine by causing fermentation by means of this root was due, was afterwards worshipped as a god.”

The interpreter of the Codex Telleriano-Remensis states that: “Patecatle was the god of these thirteen days, and of a kind of root which they put into wine (the opactli or peyote); since without this root no quantity of wine, no matter how much they drank, would produce intoxication. Patecatle taught them the art of making wine, for wine was made according to his instructions; and as men when under the influence of wine are valiant, so they supposed that those who were born during this period would be courageous. They considered these thirteen days all as fortunate, for Patecatle, the god of wine, the husband of Mayaquel, who was otherwise called Cipaquetona, he who was saved from the deluge, ruled over them. They placed the eagle and the lion near him as a sign that their sons would be valiant men.” [294]

Codex Borgia.—Sheet 12: She is painted yellow, the women’s colour, and is seen issuing from an agave-plant. In sheet 16 she has the general aspect of Tlazolteotl, and her hair is bound up with a band of unspun cotton, a plug of which also hangs from her ear. About the mouth she is painted with black rubber, and as a nasal ornament wears the golden crescent. Her face is white, and her tippet and skirt are painted in the semblance of water and both garments have a fringe of snail-shells. She suckles a fish. Sheet 68: In this place she is represented as ruler of the eighth week. She has a two-coloured face-painting, the upper half yellow, and the lower green or blue. The octli colour is represented in her garments, which are white. In the pictures of the Borgia group generally she is shown wearing the blue indented nose-plate which is assigned to Xochiquetzal. In Codex Borgia generally she wears as a back-device a quemitl after the style of Tlaloc, but coloured white and blue or green. On her flame-coloured locks she sometimes wears a jewelled chain with a conventional bird’s head decorating the front of it, while the feather-tuft on her head resembles that worn by the Sun-god in Codex Borgia (sheet 15), and is intended to symbolize the fiery nature of the octli liquor.

Aubin Tonalamatl.—Sheet 8: She is painted the colour of the Maize-goddess and her maidens—red. As a headdress she wears a bandage with a neck-loop formed and coloured like that of the goddess Chalchihuitlicue, and connected with a high crown. She bears a copal incense bag.

Codex Vaticanus A.—She is shown with the upper half of her face yellow and the lower blue, thus depicting the typical two-coloured face-painting of the octli-gods. On her head she wears the characteristic octli-god’s headdress, also worn by Tlaloc, and holds a drinking-vessel brimming with octli.

Codex Borbonicus.—Her face is blue with a few oblique lines after the style of the warrior’s face-paint. She wears as a headdress a bandage of unspun cotton (usually the characteristic of Tlazolteotl), spindles in her hair, a quail’s wing and long plumes of a yellow colour. In her hand she [296]bears a bunch of octli-wort, a root which, if added to the agave liquor, makes its powers of intoxication more potent.

Codex Vaticanus B.—Sheets 31 and 89: She is represented wearing the headdress typical of Tlaloc and of the octli-gods—a bandage coloured white and blue, with knots to the right and left, which leaves these tips or tippets sticking out. Two large white and blue rosettes with similarly coloured tassels depend by strings from the right and left of this bandage.

Codex Fejérváry-Mayer.—Sheet 28: Clothed in a yellow-striped tippet like that of Chalchihuitlicue, with a border painted in the colours of the jewel, she lies in her agave-plant. She is crowned with a wreath of flowers and wears a blue skirt.

Codex Laud.—Sheet 9: The agave-plant rises from a turtle resting upon a dragon. Adjacent to this lie a copper hatchet and a throwing-weapon, while in her hand she holds an octli bowl ornamented with gems and flowers.

Secondary Aspects.—She is very often suggested by the octli jug, which in the Borgia group is represented as a big two-handed vessel standing on serpentine coils, while to it are attached votive papers of the type frequently offered to the Tlaloquê, and bannerets are placed on the sides, on which the V-shaped point is depicted. The night-and-day symbol surmounts the whole. Though she is spoken of as having many breasts, the goddess is very rarely depicted in this manner.

The interpreter of Codex Vaticanus A says of her:

“They feign that Mayaguil was a woman with four hundred breasts, and that the gods on account of her fruitfulness changed her into the maguei, from which they make wine.”

He also speaks of her as the mother of Cinteotl, remarking that all the gods had their origin from the vine which bears the grape (the maguey-plant).

The third interpreter of Codex Telleriano-Remensis calls [297]her “Mayaquel, who was otherwise called Cipaquetona” (Cipactonal), and wife of Patecatl.

General.—In both Codex Vaticanus B and Codex Borgia he is painted a yellow colour, but in Borgia very deep yellow, almost brown, to distinguish the rectangularly bordered yellow field which is seen in the neighbourhood of the eye, and is characteristic of all the gods of the “Macuil” series. In Codex Vaticanus B this process is reversed, the yellow field being painted a darker, greyer shade. In this MS., too, the god resembles Macuil Cozcaquauhtli, but has a bundle of stone knives before his mouth, and he wears at the frontal side of the head-fillet a flower, from which stone knives project. On his breast is seen the eye, the original form of Tezcatlipocâ’s white ring, and on his upper arm he has a large armlet, painted a blue colour.

Sahagun MS.—The Sahagun MS. describes him as having the hand motif in the region of the mouth. On the head is a feather helmet surmounted by a comb of feathers, and he wears a necklet of animal claws. A red-bordered cloth is twisted round the hips. The sandals are white. The shield, which is described as a “sun-shield,” is red, and has claw ornaments. The god carries an obsidian axe, and a staff with a heart inset and painted with quetzal-feathers.

Sahagun MS.—The face is painted in two different colours, and the head is surmounted by a crown of feathers. The god [299]wears the half-moon nose-plug of the octli-gods, and an ear-plug made of paper. On his back he wears the wing of the red guacamayo, and he has a feather collar. A net cloth decorated with the figures of scorpions is hung round his hips. On his feet he wears bells and shells, and the sandals peculiar to the octli-gods. The shield common to the octli-gods hangs on his arm, and he carries in his hand the obsidian or copper axe with which they are usually represented.