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Huitzilopochtli and Coyolxauhqui
The patron god of the Mexicas and also known as "Hummingbird on the Left," guided them during their pilgrimage from Aztlan. As god of war, he also incarnated the provider of blood for the Sun. Under his tutelage, his people became the most powerful group in Mesoamerica during the Postclassic period. He was the son of Coatlicue
brother of Coyolxauhqui, the Moon, and of the Stars, the Centzon Huitznahua, all of them gods of Mexica inspiration and that were inserted in the complex pantheon of ancient Mexico, forming a family-like complex. His most important site is the Templo Mayor, which manifests his significance: warfare and tribute as crucial elements for the economic sustenance of the Mexica empire. The main ceremony held in his honor was in the month of Panquetzaliztli.
In this hall are exhibited different objects related to Huitzilopochtli. Outstanding among them is the pair of Eagle Warriors found in the House of the Eagles, a religious building located to the north of the Templo Mayor. Recently studies conducted by archaeologist Leonardo López Luján offer another interpretation of these figures, calling them Eagle Men who represent the rising sun, or that is to say the tlatoani who is born after his election as ruler. To find out more about this interpretation, see the page on the House of the Eagles written by Leonardo López Luján.
Other objects in this hall were found on the side of the Templo Mayor corresponding to Huitzilopochtli. These include the representation of Mayahuel, goddess of pulque
Coatlicue was the Earth, the mother of Coyolxauhqui, the Moon, and of Centzon Huiznahua, the "Four Hundred of the South" and another name for the Stars. One day, while she was sweeping her temple on top of Coatepec hill, the Earth was miraculously impregnated thanks to a little ball of feathers that floated down from the sky and that she tucked away next to her bosom. The Moon viewed the pregnancy of her mother as an affront and she instigated her brothers, the, Stars to kill her. Huitzilopochtli, the Sun, from her womb, warned the Earth of the danger and decided to defend his life and that of his mother. When the Moon and the Stars were on the point of killing her, the sun Huitzilopochtli was born, fully armed for war with a fire serpent called xiuhcoatl,with which he decapitated his treacherous sister, to then cast her down from the top of Coatepec hill. In her fall, the goddess was dismembered with each turn.
So the Moon dies every month, defeated by the Sun and cut in pieces. Coyolxauhqui and her dismemberment are the explanation for a celestial phenomenon, in which the moon dies and is born in phases, and so she was found at the foot of the stairway of the Huitzilopochtli temple at the Templo Mayor.
The relief shows the goddess decapitated, arms and legs dismembered, drops of blood oozing from her extremities and with the joints of her bones exposed. She is adorned with a two-headed serpent belt bearing a skull seen on her back. The two-headed serpent is repeated on the ties of her thighs and arms. The articulations and talons on her feet are adorned with masks composed of a profile face bearing fangs, the significance of which is still open to considerable conjecture. She wears her characteristic sandals, wristlets and anklets. Her torso, with flaccid breasts, is shown frontally, while her hips are given an unusual twist to be shown in profile along with her extremities. Her head displays a great feather headdress and her hair is adorned with circles. Composed of three geometric figures, her ear ornaments frame her face, which bears the most diagnostic element of her adornment: bells on her cheek, which is also the name of the Moon goddess. Finally, what appears to be her last breath issues from her half-open mouth.
The sculpture has a 3.25-meter average diameter. Weighing 8 tons, it is made of volcanic stone. It was found accidentally by Electricity Company workers who were installing underground cables at the corner of the streets of Guatemala and Argentina on February 21, 1978. This important discovery resulted in the archaeological excavations of the Templo Mayor Project, which until today continues under the direction of archaeologist Eduardo Matos Moctezuma.
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Last Modified: January 11, 1998.
Museo del Templo Mayor, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e História, México.
Seminario #8, Centro Histórico. Cuauhtémoc, México, D.F. 06060
©Copyright 1997
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