The feast of the following month, Hueytecuilhuitl, or 'great feast of the lords,' occurred at the time of the year when food was most scarce, the grain from the preceding harvest being nearly exhausted and the new crop not yet ripe for cutting. The nobles at this time gave great and solemn banquets among themselves, and provided at their personal expense feasts for the poor and needy. On the eleventh day a religious celebration took place in honor of Centeotl, under the name of Xilonen, derived from xilotl, which means a tender maize-ear, for this goddess changed her name according to the state of the grain. On this occasion, a woman who represented the goddess and was dressed in a similar manner, was sacrificed. The day before her death a number of women took her with them to offer incense in four places, which were sacred to the four characters of the divisions of the cycle, the reed, the flint, the house, and the rabbit. The night was spent in singing, dancing, and praying before the temple of the goddess.[305] On the day of sacrifice certain priestesses and lay women whirled in a ring about the victim, and a number of priests and principal men who danced before her. The priests blew their shells and horns, shook their rattles and scattered incense as they danced, the nobles held stalks of maize in their hands which they extended toward the woman. The priest who acted as executioner wore a bunch of feathers on his shoulders, held by the claws of an eagle inserted in an artificial leg. Towards the close of the dance this priest stopped at the foot of the temple, shook the rattle-board before the victim, scattered more incense, and turned to lead the way to the summit. This reached, another priest seized the woman, twisted her shoulders against his, and stooped over, so that her breast lay exposed. On this living altar she was beheaded and her heart torn out. After the sacrifice there was more dancing, in which the women, old and young, took part by themselves, their arms and legs decorated with red macaw-feathers, and their faces painted yellow and dusted with marcasite. The whole pleasantly finished with a feast. Offerings were also presented to the household gods. This festival inaugurated the eating of corn.[306]
During the next month, which was called Tlaxochimaco, or 'the distribution of flowers,'[307] gifts of flowers were presented to the gods and mutually interchanged among friends. At noon on the day of the great feast, the signal sounded and a pompous dance was begun in the courtyard of the temple of Huitzilopochtli, to whom the honors of the day were paid, in which the performers consisted of various orders of warriors led by the bravest among them. Public women joined these dances, one woman going hand in hand with two men, and the contrary, or with their hands resting on each other's shoulders, or thrown round the waist.[308] The musicians were stationed at a round altar, called momuztli. The motions consisted of a mere interwinding walk, to the time of a slow song. At sunset, after the usual sacrifices, the people went home to perform the same dance before their household idol; the old indulging in liquor as usual. The festival in honor of Iyacacoliuhqui, the god of commerce, was, however, the event of the month, owing to the number and solemnity of the sacrifices of slaves, brought from all quarters by the wealthy merchants for the purpose, and the splendor of the attendant banquets. The Tlascaltecs called this month Miccailhuitzintli, 'the small festival of the dead,' and gathered in the temples to sing sorrowful odes to the dead, the priests, dressed in black mantles, making offerings of food to the spirit of the departed. This seems to have been a commemoration of the ordinary class only, for the departed heroes and great men were honored in the following month. Duran and others assert, however, that the festival was devoted to the memory of the little ones who had died, and adds that the mothers performed thousands of superstitious ceremonies with their children, placing talismans upon them and the like, to prevent their death.[309]
FEAST OF THE FALL OF FRUIT.
The feast of the next month, called Xocotlhuetzin, 'fall, or maturity of fruit,' was dedicated to Xiuhtecutli, the god of fire. At the beginning of the month certain priests went out into the mountains and selected the tallest and straightest tree they could find. This was cut down and trimmed of all except its top branches.[310] It was then moved carefully into the town upon rollers, and set up firmly in the courtyard of the temple, where it stood for twenty days. On the eve of the feast-day the tree was gently lowered to the ground; early the next morning carpenters dressed it perfectly smooth, and fastened a cross-yard five fathoms long, near the top, where the branches had been left. The priests now adorned the pole with colored papers, and placed upon the summit a statue of the god of fire, made of dough of amaranth-seeds, and curiously dressed in a maxtli, sashes, and strips of paper. Three rods were stuck into its head, upon each of which was spitted a tamale, or native pie. The pole was then again hoisted into an erect position.
Those who had captives to offer now appeared, dancing side by side with the victims, and most grotesquely dressed and painted. At sunset the dance ceased, and the doomed men were shut up in the temple, while their captors kept guard outside, and sang hymns to the god. About midnight every owner brought out his captive and shaved off his top hair, which he carefully kept as a token of his valor. At dawn the human offerings were taken to the Tzompantli, where the skulls of the sacrificed were spitted, and there stripped by the priests of their dress and ornaments. At a certain signal each owner seized his captive by the hair and dragged or led him to the foot of the temple-steps. Thereupon those priests who were appointed to execute the fearful sacrifice descended from the temple, each bearing in his hand a bag filled with certain stupefying powder extracted from the yiauhtli plant, which they threw into the faces of the victims to deaden somewhat the agony before them. Each naked and bound captive was then borne upon the shoulders of a priest up to the summit of the temple, where smoldered a great heap of glowing coal. Into this the bearers cast their living burdens, and when the cloud of dust was blown off the dull red mass could be seen to heave, human forms could be seen writhing and twisting in agony, the crackling of flesh could be distinctly heard.[311] But the victims were not to die by fire; in a few moments, and before life was extinct, the blackened and blistered wretches were raked out by the watching priests, cast one after another upon the stone of sacrifice, and in a few moments all that remained upon the summit of the temple was a heap of human hearts smoking at the feet of the god of fire.
These bloody rites over, the people came together and danced and sang in the courtyard of the temple. Presently all adjourned to the place where the pole before mentioned stood. At a given signal the youths made a grand scramble for the pole, and he who first reached the summit and scattered the image and its accoutrements among the applauding crowd below, was reckoned the hero of the day. With this the festival ended, and the pole was dragged down by the multitude amid much rejoicing.
FEASTS OF TEPANECS AND TLASCALTECS.
The Tepanecs, according to Duran, had a very similar ceremony. A huge tree was carried to the entrance of the town, and to it offerings and incense were presented every day during the month preceding the festival. Then it was raised with many ceremonies, and a bird of dough placed at the top. Food and wine were offered, and then the warriors and women, dressed in the finest garments and holding small dough idols in their hands, danced round the pole, while the youths struggled wildly to reach and knock down the bird image. Lastly, the pole was overthrown.[312]
The Tlascaltecs called the same month Hueymiccailhuitl, 'the great festival of the dead,' and commemorated the event with much solemnity, painting their bodies black and making much lamentation. Both here and in other parts of Mexico the priests and nobles passed several days in the temple, weeping for their ancestors and singing their heroic deeds. The families of lately deceased persons assembled upon the terraces of their houses, and prayed with their faces turned towards the north, where the dead were supposed to sojourn. Heroes who had fallen in battle, or died in captivity, defunct princes, and other persons of merit were, in a manner, canonized, and their statues placed among the images of the gods, whom, it was believed, they had joined to live in eternal bliss.[313]