The gods of Mexico

by Lewis Spence

FORMS OF XOCHIQUETZAL.

XOCHIQUETZAL

(From the Codex Fejérváry-Mayer.)

Diego Muñoz Camargo, in his Historia de Tlaxcala, equates Xochiquetzal with Venus and states that: “She dwells [[191]]above the nine heavens in a very pleasant and delectable place, accompanied and guarded by many people and waited on by other women of the rank of goddesses, where are many delights of fountains, brooks, flower-gardens, and without her wanting for anything, and that where she sojourned she was guarded and sheltered from the gaze of the people, and that in her retinue she had a great many dwarfs and hunchbacks, jesters, and buffoons, who entertained her with music and dancing and whom she sent as her confidants and messengers to the other gods, and that their chief occupation was the spinning and weaving of sumptuous artistic fabrics, and that they were painted so beautifully and elegantly that nothing finer could be found amongst mortals. But the place where she dwelt was called Tamohuanichan Xochitl ihcacan, Chicuhnauh-nepaniuhcan, Itzehecaya, that is, ‘the house of the descent or of birth, the place where are the flowers, the ninefold enchained, the place of the fresh, cool winds.’ And every year she was honoured with a great feast, to which many people from all parts were gathered in her temple.” He continues: “They say that she had formerly been the spouse of the Rain-god, Tlaloc, but that Tezcatlipocâ had abducted her, and brought her to the nine heavens, and made her the goddess of love. And then there was another goddess, Matlalcuêyê, the goddess to whom were attributed witchcraft and soothsaying. Her Tlaloc had made his consort after Tezcatlipocâ had carried off his wife Xochiquetzal.”[32]

Another myth, given by Boturini, recounts her temptation of the holy ascetic Yappan, who dwelt in a desert place in order to lead a continent and solitary life, so that he might win the favour of the gods. He took up his abode on a rock called Tehuehuetl, but the gods conceived a doubt of his piety, and sent an enemy of his, Yaotl (enemy), to watch his movements. Even this bitter foe found nothing to cavil at in his conduct, and women sent by the gods to lead him from the paths of rectitude were sternly repulsed. The divine beings were about to consider his apotheosis, when [[192]]Xochiquetzal, feeling that her reputation as a tempter of men was at stake, angrily assured them that she was able to effect his seduction. Descending to earth, she sought out the hermit, whom she assured of her admiration and esteem, and asked by what path she might ascend to his rocky seat. All unsuspicious of her intent, Yappan descended from his place on the rock and assisted her to climb the rugged eminence. Yappan forgot his vow of chastity, and when the goddess had departed, found himself deserted by the angry gods to the mercies of his enemy, Yaotl, who slew him out of hand. The gods transformed the slain man into a scorpion, and Yaotl having also slain Yappan’s wife, Tlahuitzin, whom he had abandoned for the life ascetic, she was transformed into an animal of the same species, and crawling under a stone, found her husband there. But the gods, wrathful at Yaotl’s excessive cruelty, changed him into a locust.[33]

FESTIVALS

Chicomexochitl (“Seven Flower”).—In the sign ce ocelotl, on the day chicomexochitl, the artists united to hold festival to the goddess, and the laundresses, says Sahagun,[34] fasted forty days. “They joined together, twenty or more, to obtain a better quality of pictures and weaves and to this end offered up quails and incense.” This was one of the movable feasts.

In an illuminating passage in his disquisition upon the Aubin tonalamatl (p. 123) Seler says: “As I have remarked at the opening of the section, the goddess Xochiquetzal is properly the expression of the day-sign xochitl. But owing to the transference of the series of rulers of the day-signs to the weeks in the peculiar way affected by the calendar-makers, that is, by a general shifting of one member,[35] [[193]]Xochiquetzal has been brought into association with the sign ce quauhtli (one eagle). But in Telleriano-Remensis at this week the hand-mark[36] which indicates the feast-day proper of the ruler of the week stands at the first day itself—the sign ce quauhtli, that induced the calendar-makers to effect the above-described dislocation in the second half of the list of rulers. For more than one reason the day ce quauhtli must really have seemed to the priestly savants specially appropriate to the goddess Xochiquetzal, and above all, because this day was one of the five which fell at the beginning or western quarter of the tonalamatl disposed in columns of five members. Hence these five days were collectively regarded as dedicated to the earth-goddesses, and as the days in which the ghostly women dwelling in the west, the Ciuateteô, swooped down upon earth, striking the children with epilepsy and beguiling the men to lust and sin.” These Ciuateteô were stregæ, witches, succubi, and their characteristics, which are touched upon in the section dealing with Tlazolteotl, will be more fully outlined elsewhere.

Quecholli.—The people of Tlaxcallan held a festival to Xochiquetzal in the month quecholli, when the Mexicans celebrated the feast of Mixcoatl. At the Tlaxcaltec feast numbers of young women were sacrificed to the goddess, “to the honour of love,” and the prostitutes were also in the habit of offering themselves for immolation, we are informed by Torquemada,[37] first haling the “honest” women through the mire and subjecting them to the foulest abuse. The Tlalhuica, who lived in the hot lands south of Mexico, themselves, like the Tlaxcaltecs, a people of Nahua race, held a festival in honour of Xochiquetzal in the month tepeilhuitl, which the Mexicans dedicated to the Tlaloque, gods of rain, as is related by the interpreter of the Codex Magliabecchiano. Torquemada, too,[38] states that the Tlaxcaltecs sacrificed many children to Xochiquetzal and to the mountain-gods (Tlaloque) evidently at this season. Xochiquetzal was also connected with the festival of the atamalqualiztli, [[194]]celebrated every eight years. In the picture of that feast in the Sahagun MS. we observe her seated at a loom. From these considerations it is manifest that the verdurous and “watery” attributes of the goddess connected her with the Tlaloque, but that she was not actually of their company.