Aztec Art III - A Fantastic Bestiary

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Ahuizotl

The real Ahuizotl was an Aztec emperor who reigned from 1486 to 1502, his regime with a despotic streak. His insignia bore a mythical creature that resembled a dog with a long tail ending in a human hand. The beast was believed to live in a lake, where it imitated human cries to bring would-be rescuers. They would be grabbed by the hand, drowned, and resurfaced three days later without eyes, teeth or fingernails. The monster was so horrible that even seeing it would cause one to die of fright.

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Macuilxochitl

Macuilxochitl, or Five Flower, was a vegetation god related to Xochipilli, and more specifically a festive god of songs, dances and games. Gamblers would invoke Five Flower's name upon casting dice to ensure the roll value of a 5. In this stone sculpture Macuilxochitl has a human head and hands that emerge from a turtle's shell.

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Tezcacoatl Year Serpent

The Xiuhcoatl Year Serpent is a cosmic being in the sense that it symbolizes so many aspects of the heavens. The fire on its back represents the new fires burning from the heat of the older flames, now dying to give way to the new fire. The small dots lined around its belly are the stars of the Milky Way. Tezcatlipoca often assumed the form of one of these creatures, including a time when he and the Feathered Serpent parted the heavens and the earth. Because Tezcatlipoca's face does emerge from this body, the figure here is specifically the Tezcacoatl, 'Mirror Serpent.'

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Xiuhcoatl Year Serpent

Here is an enormous Xiuhcoatl head. Here, as on the Sun Stone, the serpent's upturned nose is lined with seven half-shut eyes. The closing eyes suggest motion, as if they were blinking. The seven blinking eyes were the Pleiades, the Seven Sisters in the Taurus constellation. That stellar group passed over the zenith above an extinct volcano every 52 years; the Aztecs used this as the marker for the Binding of the Years, when they anticipated the destruction of the sun and the earth.

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Composite Creatures

Animal sculptures by the Aztecs were often imaginary combinations of two or more creatures. As the animals themselves embodied certain qualities or concepts, it is certain that these chimeric beasts were meant to combine them in a more intelligible, tangible form through their art. At left is a creature with a flea's body and a monkey head. The figure at right has the body and paws of a feline with an armadillo's shell. It recalls how the Aztec armadillo was ayotochtli, literally 'turtle-rabbit'!

National Museum of Anthropology and History, Worcester Art Museum


Cricket

This cricket, carved from a red stone, presents a simple, natural insect. The solid color and smooth texture brought out from the stone also give this piece its own distinction. It also gives name to the nearby hill of Chapultepec.

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Scorpion

This low relief comes from the side of a cubic stone piece, whose four horizontal sides each feature a different nocturnal creature. The legend of Yappan tells of a man who pledged a life of celibacy, only to break his vow by the deception of the Enemy god Yaotl. In retribution, the gods transformed Yappan into a scorpion that still hides its shame by crawling under rocks. Yaotl was transformed into a cricket, and to this day the scorpion still chases the latter for revenge.

National Museum of Anthropology and History


Xolotl

The nagual companion spirit animal is a very old concept in Mesoamerica, and it is related to the otherworldly travel experiences in shamanism. Many shamans describe the ability to transform into their spirit animals in this out-of-body state, to better cross the land, sky, or sea. Even many gods had companion spirits, and the most well-known from the Aztec world was Xolotl, often portrayed with a dog's head. One myth tells how the Feathered Serpent Quetzalcoatl entered the underworld with Xolotl, in order to retrieve the bones of ancestors from a previous age and from them create the current generation of man.

National Museum of Anthropology and History