Another of her distinguishing characteristics, as has been remarked, is the black colouring in the region of the mouth, which frequently extends to and includes the tip of the nose and chin and, as Sahagun states, this was effected with liquid rubber, as in the case of the Fire-god. The small patch or circle on her cheek is also commented upon by Sahagun, who says, “a hole has she placed on her cheek”—the “hole” being probably a disk of rubber with a perforated centre. As an alternative to this we find in Codex Borgia two broad horizontal lines and in Codex Borbonicus several short, vertical black lines below the eye, and it would seem that the concentric circle on the shield of the goddess in the Sahagun MS. has the same meaning—that is, it is probably [[158]]a symbol of sex.[2] In some representations her skirt is covered with crescent-shaped objects perhaps typical of her symbol—excrement.
When Tlazolteotl appears as ruler of the thirteenth week she often lacks the ripe-maize colour with which she is represented elsewhere. Thus in Telleriano-Remensis she is painted about the mouth with liquid rubber, and in Borbonicus her face-paint is in two colours. A black stroke is seen descending from brow to nose, but she has the yellow skin-colour. In both cases she is, like Xipe, clothed in the skin of a victim. In Telleriano-Remensis and the Aubin tonalamatl her arms and legs are powdered with white chalk and small feathers are affixed to them, probably with ulli gum. In Telleriano-Remensis these cover part of her costume as well. In this codex, too, her Huaxtec nose-ornament is replaced by one having a stepped motif, or a butterfly formed of the spotted feathers of the quail.
The cotton fillet of the goddess is worthy of further remark. It is made from the unspun produce of the plant, covers the top of the head and reaches the shoulders on either side of the face. Spindles are stuck into the mass, which is marked upon its surface with acute-angled figures or groups of parallel lines on a white ground, which may be regarded as hieroglyphic of raw cotton.
In certain of the MSS., for example in the Aubin tonalamatl and in Telleriano-Remensis, Tlazolteotl wears a feather coronal, which in other codices takes the shape of a fan or nape-ring like that frequently worn by Quetzalcoatl. Occasionally, too, it rises from a rubber ball which rests upon the head. In Codex Borgia (sheet 68) the feathers are dark in colour, but are brightened by the red plumes which spring from them in turn. Elsewhere we find white, brown, or yellow feathers, the latter prepared artificially from palm-leaves, which, like the fan-shaped ornament itself, are Huaxtec in character. In the picture in Borbonicus of Tlazolteotl as ruler of the week ce olin (one reed) we see the conical Huaxtec [[159]]hat, as worn by Quetzalcoatl, peeping above her cotton headdress, and the palm-leaf plume rising from a feather fan, which springs from a ball of rubber. In Telleriano-Remensis Tlazolteotl is seen wearing a string of snail-shells depending from the waist. This is known as citallicue, or “star-skirt,” another Huaxtec article of dress.
In none of the representations alluded to was Tlazolteotl pictured with the broom characteristic of her and of her feast-day, ochpanitztli (“when they sweep the ways”). This was made from hard, stiff, pointed grass, which was cut with sickles in the mountain-forests of Popocatepetl.[3] It was bound with a coloured leather strap, and the paper which held it together was flecked with the V-shaped cotton symbol.
MYTHS
Tlazolteotl is described in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis as “the woman who sinned before the deluge, who was the cause of all evil, of all deceit”; but this would appear to be an error for Ixnextli or Xochiquetzal (q.v.). The Anales de Quauhtitlan says of her: “In the same year (8 Rabbit) came the so-called Ixcuiname female demons [to Tollan] and, as they say from the reports of the old people, they came from Huaxteca. And in the place Cuextecatl ichocayan (“Where the Huaxtecs weep”) they summoned these captives whom they had taken in Huaxteca and explained to them what was about to be done, saying—‘We go now to Tollan. We wish to couple the earth with you, we desire to hold a feast with you, for till now no battle offerings have been made with men. We wish to make a beginning of it and shoot you to death with arrows.’ ”
SACRIFICE BY SHOOTING WITH ARROWS
This indicates that the goddess, one of the Ixcuiname, was regarded as the inventress of that especial mode of sacrifice by which the victim was tied to a framework and shot to death with arrows. We have no classical statement that [[160]]such a proceeding took place at her festival, however, but it is known that it formed part of the ritual at the festival of Xipe (q.v.). The expression, “We wish to couple the earth with you,” when taken along with the straddling attitude of the victim on his frame, has given rise to the assumption[4] that such a sacrifice was intended to symbolize a sexual connection between the victim and the earth or earth-mother. It appears to me as more probable that its intention was to draw down rain by sympathetic magic, the dropping blood from the arrow wounds symbolizing the rain, and the tear which the victim sheds in the representation of this sacrifice in the Codex Nuttall and Codex Telleriano-Remensis, combined with the fact that such sacrifices are supposed to have been made in years of drought, strengthens my belief in the soundness of this theory.
Ixcuine means “four-faced,” and may apply to the circumstance that ancient idols of Tlazolteotl were, like those of Janus, provided with more than one face, so that they might look upon every direction whence the rain might come. Later, however, the Ixcuiname were regarded as a fourfold manifestation of Tlazolteotl and as personifying four sisters of different age, Tiacapan, Teicu, Tlaco and Xocoyotzin, who “represented the carnal passions.”[5]