Ancient Aztec eschatology
Encyclopedia
The term Five Suns in the context of creation myths, describes the doctrine of the Aztec
and other Nahua peoples, supported amply by ancient texts and calendars, in which the present world was preceded by four other cycles of creation and destruction. It is primarily derived from the mythological, cosmological and eschatological beliefs and traditions of earlier cultures from central Mexico and the Mesoamerica
n region in general. The Late Postclassic
Aztec
society inherited many traditions concerning Mesoamerican creation accounts, while however modifying some aspects and supplying novel interpretations of their own.
In the creation myths which were preserved by the Aztec and other Nahua peoples, the central tenet was that there had been four worlds, or "Sun
s", before the present universe. These earlier worlds and their inhabitants had been created, then destroyed by the catastrophic action of leading deity figures. The present world is the fifth sun, and the Aztec saw themselves as "the People of the Sun," whose divine duty was to wage cosmic war in order to provide the sun with his tlaxcaltiliztli ("nourishment"). Without it, the sun would disappear from the heavens. Thus the welfare and the very survival of the universe depended upon the offerings of blood
and heart
s to the sun.
, created itself. Ometeotl was both male and female, good and evil, light and darkness, fire and water, judgment and forgiveness, the god of duality. Ometeotl gave birth to four children, the four Tezcatlipocas, who each preside over one of the four cardinal directions. Over the East presides the White Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl
, the god of light, mercy and wind. Over the South presides the Blue Tezcatlipoca, Huitzilopochtli
, the god of war. Over the West presides the Red Tezcatlipoca, Xipe Totec
, the god of gold, farming and Spring time. And over the North presides the Black Tezcatlipoca, known by no other name than Tezcatlipoca
, the god of judgment, night, deceit, sorcery and the Earth.
It was these four gods who eventually created all the other gods and the world we know today, but before they could create they had to destroy, for every time they attempted to create something, it would fall into the water beneath them and be eaten by Cipactli
, the giant earth crocodile, who swam through the water with mouths at every one of her joints. The four Tezcatlipocas descended the first people who were giants. They created the other gods, the most important of whom were the water gods: Tlaloc
, the god of rain and fertility and Chalchiuhtlicue
, the goddess of lakes, rivers and oceans, also the goddess of beauty. To give light, they needed a god to become the sun and the Black Tezcatlipoca was chosen, but either because he had lost a leg or because he was god of the night, he only managed to become half a sun. The world continued on in this way for some time, but a sibling rivalry grew between Quetzalcoatl and his brother the mighty sun, who Quetzalcoatl knocked from the sky with a stone club. With no sun, the world was totally black and in his anger, Tezcatlipoca commanded his jaguars to eat all the people.
The gods created a new group of people to inhabit the Earth, this time they were of normal size. Quetzalcoatl became the new sun and as the years passed, the people of the Earth grew less and less civilized and stopped showing proper honor to the gods. As a result, Tezcatlipoca demonstrated his power and authority as god of sorcery and judgment by turning the animalistic people into monkeys. Quetzalcoatl, who had loved the flawed people as they were, became upset and blew all of the monkeys from the face of the Earth with a mighty hurricane. He then stepped down as the sun to create a new people.
Tlaloc became the next sun, but Tezcatlipoca seduced and stole his wife Xochiquetzal
, the goddess of sex, flowers and corn. Tlaloc then refused to do anything other than wallow in his own grief, so a great drought swept the world. The people's prayers for rain annoyed the grieving sun and he refused to allow it to rain, but the people continued to beg him. Then, in a fit of rage he answered their prayers with a great downpour of fire. It continued to rain fire until the entire Earth had burned away. The gods then had to construct a whole new Earth from the ashes.
The next sun and also Tlaloc’s new wife, was Chalchiuhtlicue. She was very loving towards the people, but Tezcatlipoca was not. Both the people and Chalchiuhtlicue felt his judgment when he told the water goddess that she was not truly loving and only faked kindness out of selfishness to gain the people’s praise. Chalchiuhtlicue was so crushed by these words that she cried blood for the next fifty-two years, causing a horrific flood that drowned everyone on Earth.
Quetzalcoatl would not accept the destruction of his people and went to the underworld where he stole their bones from the god Mictlantecuhtli
. He dipped these bones in his own blood to resurrect his people, who reopened their eyes to a sky illuminated by the current sun, Huitzilopochtli.
Some of Ometeotl’s later children, the Tzitzimitl, or stars, became jealous of their brighter, more important brother Huitzilopochtli. Their leader, Coyolxauhqui
, goddess of the moon, lead them in an assault on the sun and every night they come close to victory when they shine throughout the sky, but are beaten back by the mighty Huitzilopochtli who rules the daytime sky. To aid this all-important god in his continuing war, the Aztecs offer him the nourishment of human sacrifices. They also offer human sacrifices to Tezcatlipoca in fear of his judgment, offer their own blood to Quetzalcoatl, who opposes fatal sacrifices, in thanks of his blood sacrifice for them and give offerings to many other gods for many purposes. Should these sacrifices cease, or should mankind fail to please the gods for any other reason, this fifth sun will go black, the world will be shattered by a catastrophic earthquake, and the Tzitzimitl will slay Huitzilopochtli and all of humanity.
Other variations on this myth state that Coatlicue
, the earth goddess, was the mother of the four Tezcatlipocas and the Tzitzimitl. Some versions say that Quetzalcoatl was born to her first, while she was still a virgin, often mentioning his twin brother Xolotl
, the guide of the dead and god of fire. Tezcatlipoca was then born to her by an obsidian knife, followed by the Tzitzimitl and then Huitzilopochtli. The most popular variation including Coatlicue depicts her giving birth first to the Tzitzimitl. Much later she gave birth to Huitzilopochtli when a mysterious ball of feathers appeared to her. The Tzitzimitl then decapitated the pregnant Coatlicue, believing it to be insulting that she had given birth to another child. Huitzilopochtli then sprang forth from her womb wielding a serpent of fire and began his epic war with the Tzitzimitl, who were also referred to as the Centzon Huitznahuas. Sometimes he is said to have decapitated Coyolxauhqui and either used her head to make the moon or thrown it into a canyon. Further variations depict the ball of feathers as being the father of Huitzilopochtli or the father of Quetzalcoatl and sometimes Xolotl.
Other variations of this myth claim that only Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca were born to Ometeotl, who was replaced by Coatlicue in this myth probably because it had absolutely no worshipers or temples by the time the Spanish arrived. It is sometimes said that the male characteristic of Ometeotl is named Ometecutli and that the female characteristic is named Omecihualt. Further variations on this myth state that it was only Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca who pulled apart Cipactli, also known as Tlaltecuhtli
, and that Xipe Totec and Huitzilopochtli then constructed the world from her body. Some versions claim that Tezcatlipoca actually used his leg as bait for Cipactli, before dismembering her.
The order of the first four suns varies as well, though the above version is the most common. Each world’s end correlates consistently to the god that was the sun at the time throughout all variations of the myth, though the loss of Xochiquetzal is not always identified as Tlaloc’s reason for the rain of fire, which is not otherwise given and it is sometimes said that Chalchiuhtlicue flooded the world on purpose, without the involvement of Tezcatlipoca. It is also said that Tezcatlipoca created half a sun, which his jaguars then ate before eating the giants.
The fifth sun however is sometimes said to be a god named Nanauatzin
. In this version of the myth, the gods convened in darkness to choose a new sun, who was to sacrifice himself by jumping into a gigantic bonfire. The two volunteers were the young son of Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue, Tecuciztecatl, and the old Nanauatzin. It was believed that Nanauatzin was too old to make a good sun, but both were given the opportunity to jump into the bonfire. Tecuciztecatl tried first but was not brave enough to walk through the heat near the flames and turned around. Nanauatzin then walked slowly towards and then into the flames and was consumed. Tecuciztecatl then followed. The braver Nanauatzin became what is now the sun and Tecuciztecatl became the much less spectacular moon. A god that bridges the gap between Nanauatzin and Huitzilopochtli is Tonatiuh
, who was sick, but rejuvenated himself by burning himself alive and then became the warrior sun and wandered through the heavens with the souls of those who died in battle, refusing to move if not offered enough sacrifices.
Aztec
The Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the late post-classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Aztec is the...
and other Nahua peoples, supported amply by ancient texts and calendars, in which the present world was preceded by four other cycles of creation and destruction. It is primarily derived from the mythological, cosmological and eschatological beliefs and traditions of earlier cultures from central Mexico and the Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica
Mesoamerica is a region and culture area in the Americas, extending approximately from central Mexico to Belize, Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica, within which a number of pre-Columbian societies flourished before the Spanish colonization of the Americas in the 15th and...
n region in general. The Late Postclassic
Mesoamerican chronology
Mesoamerican chronology divides the history of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica into several periods: the Paleo-Indian , the Archaic , the Preclassic , the Classic , and the Postclassic...
Aztec
Aztec
The Aztec people were certain ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, a period referred to as the late post-classic period in Mesoamerican chronology.Aztec is the...
society inherited many traditions concerning Mesoamerican creation accounts, while however modifying some aspects and supplying novel interpretations of their own.
In the creation myths which were preserved by the Aztec and other Nahua peoples, the central tenet was that there had been four worlds, or "Sun
Sun
The Sun is the star at the center of the Solar System. It is almost perfectly spherical and consists of hot plasma interwoven with magnetic fields...
s", before the present universe. These earlier worlds and their inhabitants had been created, then destroyed by the catastrophic action of leading deity figures. The present world is the fifth sun, and the Aztec saw themselves as "the People of the Sun," whose divine duty was to wage cosmic war in order to provide the sun with his tlaxcaltiliztli ("nourishment"). Without it, the sun would disappear from the heavens. Thus the welfare and the very survival of the universe depended upon the offerings of blood
Blood
Blood is a specialized bodily fluid in animals that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells....
and heart
Heart
The heart is a myogenic muscular organ found in all animals with a circulatory system , that is responsible for pumping blood throughout the blood vessels by repeated, rhythmic contractions...
s to the sun.
Legend
From the void that was the rest of the universe, the first god, OmeteotlOmeteotl
Ometeotl is a name sometimes used about the pair of god Ometecuhtli/Omecihuatl in Aztec mythology...
, created itself. Ometeotl was both male and female, good and evil, light and darkness, fire and water, judgment and forgiveness, the god of duality. Ometeotl gave birth to four children, the four Tezcatlipocas, who each preside over one of the four cardinal directions. Over the East presides the White Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl
Quetzalcoatl
Quetzalcoatl is a Mesoamerican deity whose name comes from the Nahuatl language and has the meaning of "feathered serpent". The worship of a feathered serpent deity is first documented in Teotihuacan in the first century BCE or first century CE...
, the god of light, mercy and wind. Over the South presides the Blue Tezcatlipoca, Huitzilopochtli
Huitzilopochtli
In Aztec mythology, Huitzilopochtli, also spelled Uitzilopochtli , was a god of war, a sun god, and the patron of the city of Tenochtitlan. He was also the national god of the Mexicas of Tenochtitlan.- Genealogy :...
, the god of war. Over the West presides the Red Tezcatlipoca, Xipe Totec
Xipe Totec
In Aztec mythology and religion, Xipe Totec was a life-death-rebirth deity, god of agriculture, vegetation, the east, disease, spring, goldsmiths, silversmiths and the seasons. Xipe Totec was also known by the alternative names Tlatlauhca, Tlatlauhqui Tezcatlipoca and Youalahuan...
, the god of gold, farming and Spring time. And over the North presides the Black Tezcatlipoca, known by no other name than Tezcatlipoca
Tezcatlipoca
Tezcatlipoca was a central deity in Aztec religion. One of the four sons of Ometeotl, he is associated with a wide range of concepts, including the night sky, the night winds, hurricanes, the north, the earth, obsidian, enmity, discord, rulership, divination, temptation, jaguars, sorcery, beauty,...
, the god of judgment, night, deceit, sorcery and the Earth.
It was these four gods who eventually created all the other gods and the world we know today, but before they could create they had to destroy, for every time they attempted to create something, it would fall into the water beneath them and be eaten by Cipactli
Cipactli
Cipactli 'Crocodile' or 'Caiman', was the first day of the Aztec divinatory count of 13 X 20 days , and Cipactonal 'Sign of Cipactli' was considered to have been the first diviner. In Aztec cosmology, the crocodile symbolized the earth floating in the primeval waters...
, the giant earth crocodile, who swam through the water with mouths at every one of her joints. The four Tezcatlipocas descended the first people who were giants. They created the other gods, the most important of whom were the water gods: Tlaloc
Tlaloc
Tlaloc was an important deity in Aztec religion, a god of rain, fertility, and water. He was a beneficent god who gave life and sustenance, but he was also feared for his ability to send hail, thunder and lightning, and for being the lord of the powerful element of water. In Aztec iconography he...
, the god of rain and fertility and Chalchiuhtlicue
Chalchiuhtlicue
Chalchiuhtlicue was an Aztec goddess of love, beauty, youth, lakes, rivers, seas, streams, horizontal waters, storms, and baptism. Reputedly universally revered at the time of the Spanish conquest, she was an important deity figure in the Postclassic Aztec realm of central Mexico...
, the goddess of lakes, rivers and oceans, also the goddess of beauty. To give light, they needed a god to become the sun and the Black Tezcatlipoca was chosen, but either because he had lost a leg or because he was god of the night, he only managed to become half a sun. The world continued on in this way for some time, but a sibling rivalry grew between Quetzalcoatl and his brother the mighty sun, who Quetzalcoatl knocked from the sky with a stone club. With no sun, the world was totally black and in his anger, Tezcatlipoca commanded his jaguars to eat all the people.
The gods created a new group of people to inhabit the Earth, this time they were of normal size. Quetzalcoatl became the new sun and as the years passed, the people of the Earth grew less and less civilized and stopped showing proper honor to the gods. As a result, Tezcatlipoca demonstrated his power and authority as god of sorcery and judgment by turning the animalistic people into monkeys. Quetzalcoatl, who had loved the flawed people as they were, became upset and blew all of the monkeys from the face of the Earth with a mighty hurricane. He then stepped down as the sun to create a new people.
Tlaloc became the next sun, but Tezcatlipoca seduced and stole his wife Xochiquetzal
Xochiquetzal
In Aztec mythology, Xochiquetzal was a goddess associated with concepts of fertility, beauty, and female sexual power, serving as a protector of young mothers and a patroness of pregnancy, childbirth, and the crafts practised by women such as weaving and embroidery...
, the goddess of sex, flowers and corn. Tlaloc then refused to do anything other than wallow in his own grief, so a great drought swept the world. The people's prayers for rain annoyed the grieving sun and he refused to allow it to rain, but the people continued to beg him. Then, in a fit of rage he answered their prayers with a great downpour of fire. It continued to rain fire until the entire Earth had burned away. The gods then had to construct a whole new Earth from the ashes.
The next sun and also Tlaloc’s new wife, was Chalchiuhtlicue. She was very loving towards the people, but Tezcatlipoca was not. Both the people and Chalchiuhtlicue felt his judgment when he told the water goddess that she was not truly loving and only faked kindness out of selfishness to gain the people’s praise. Chalchiuhtlicue was so crushed by these words that she cried blood for the next fifty-two years, causing a horrific flood that drowned everyone on Earth.
Quetzalcoatl would not accept the destruction of his people and went to the underworld where he stole their bones from the god Mictlantecuhtli
Mictlantecuhtli
Mictlantecuhtli , in Aztec mythology, was a god of the dead and the king of Mictlan , the lowest and northernmost section of the underworld. He was one of the principal gods of the Aztecs and was the most prominent of several gods and goddesses of death and the underworld...
. He dipped these bones in his own blood to resurrect his people, who reopened their eyes to a sky illuminated by the current sun, Huitzilopochtli.
Some of Ometeotl’s later children, the Tzitzimitl, or stars, became jealous of their brighter, more important brother Huitzilopochtli. Their leader, Coyolxauhqui
Coyolxauhqui
In Aztec mythology, Coyolxauhqui was a daughter of Coatlicue and Mixcoatl and is the leader of the Centzon Huitznahuas, the star gods. Coyolxauhqui was a powerful magician and led her siblings in an attack on their mother, Coatlicue, because Coatlicue had become pregnant.- Attack on Coatlicue :The...
, goddess of the moon, lead them in an assault on the sun and every night they come close to victory when they shine throughout the sky, but are beaten back by the mighty Huitzilopochtli who rules the daytime sky. To aid this all-important god in his continuing war, the Aztecs offer him the nourishment of human sacrifices. They also offer human sacrifices to Tezcatlipoca in fear of his judgment, offer their own blood to Quetzalcoatl, who opposes fatal sacrifices, in thanks of his blood sacrifice for them and give offerings to many other gods for many purposes. Should these sacrifices cease, or should mankind fail to please the gods for any other reason, this fifth sun will go black, the world will be shattered by a catastrophic earthquake, and the Tzitzimitl will slay Huitzilopochtli and all of humanity.
Variations and alternative myths
Most of what is known about the ancient Aztecs comes from the few surviving codices, most of which were burned by the Spanish upon conquest. Their myths can be confusing not only because of the lack of documentation, but also because there are many popular myths that seem to contradict one another due the fact that they were originally passed down by word of mouth and because the Aztecs adopted many of their gods from other tribes, both assigning their own new aspects to these gods and endowing them with aspects of similar gods from various other cultures. Older myths can be very similar to newer myths while contradicting one another by claiming that a different god performed the same action, probably because myths changed in correlation to the popularity of each of the gods at a given time.Other variations on this myth state that Coatlicue
Coatlicue
Coatlicue, also known as Teteoinan , "The Mother of Gods" , is the Aztec goddess who gave birth to the moon, stars, and Huitzilopochtli, the god of the sun and war...
, the earth goddess, was the mother of the four Tezcatlipocas and the Tzitzimitl. Some versions say that Quetzalcoatl was born to her first, while she was still a virgin, often mentioning his twin brother Xolotl
Xolotl
In Aztec mythology, Xolotl was the god with associations to both lightning and death.Although often depicted in relation to the underworld, Xolotl was not a psychopomp in the Western sense. Xolotl did, however, aid the dead on their journey to Mictlan, the afterlife in some myths.Xolotl was also...
, the guide of the dead and god of fire. Tezcatlipoca was then born to her by an obsidian knife, followed by the Tzitzimitl and then Huitzilopochtli. The most popular variation including Coatlicue depicts her giving birth first to the Tzitzimitl. Much later she gave birth to Huitzilopochtli when a mysterious ball of feathers appeared to her. The Tzitzimitl then decapitated the pregnant Coatlicue, believing it to be insulting that she had given birth to another child. Huitzilopochtli then sprang forth from her womb wielding a serpent of fire and began his epic war with the Tzitzimitl, who were also referred to as the Centzon Huitznahuas. Sometimes he is said to have decapitated Coyolxauhqui and either used her head to make the moon or thrown it into a canyon. Further variations depict the ball of feathers as being the father of Huitzilopochtli or the father of Quetzalcoatl and sometimes Xolotl.
Other variations of this myth claim that only Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca were born to Ometeotl, who was replaced by Coatlicue in this myth probably because it had absolutely no worshipers or temples by the time the Spanish arrived. It is sometimes said that the male characteristic of Ometeotl is named Ometecutli and that the female characteristic is named Omecihualt. Further variations on this myth state that it was only Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca who pulled apart Cipactli, also known as Tlaltecuhtli
Tlaltecuhtli
Tlaltecuhtli, Tlaltecutli is a pre-Columbian Mesoamerican deity figure, identified from sculpture and iconography dating to the Late Postclassic period of Mesoamerican chronology , primarily among the Mexica and other Nahuatl-speaking cultures...
, and that Xipe Totec and Huitzilopochtli then constructed the world from her body. Some versions claim that Tezcatlipoca actually used his leg as bait for Cipactli, before dismembering her.
The order of the first four suns varies as well, though the above version is the most common. Each world’s end correlates consistently to the god that was the sun at the time throughout all variations of the myth, though the loss of Xochiquetzal is not always identified as Tlaloc’s reason for the rain of fire, which is not otherwise given and it is sometimes said that Chalchiuhtlicue flooded the world on purpose, without the involvement of Tezcatlipoca. It is also said that Tezcatlipoca created half a sun, which his jaguars then ate before eating the giants.
The fifth sun however is sometimes said to be a god named Nanauatzin
Nanauatzin
Nanauatzin is a deity of both Aztec mythology and Pipil mythology .-Aztec tradition:In Aztec mythology, the god Nanahuatl , the most humble of the gods, sacrificed himself in fire so that he would continue to shine on Earth as the sun, thus becoming the sun god...
. In this version of the myth, the gods convened in darkness to choose a new sun, who was to sacrifice himself by jumping into a gigantic bonfire. The two volunteers were the young son of Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue, Tecuciztecatl, and the old Nanauatzin. It was believed that Nanauatzin was too old to make a good sun, but both were given the opportunity to jump into the bonfire. Tecuciztecatl tried first but was not brave enough to walk through the heat near the flames and turned around. Nanauatzin then walked slowly towards and then into the flames and was consumed. Tecuciztecatl then followed. The braver Nanauatzin became what is now the sun and Tecuciztecatl became the much less spectacular moon. A god that bridges the gap between Nanauatzin and Huitzilopochtli is Tonatiuh
Tonatiuh
In Aztec mythology, Tonatiuh was the sun god. The Aztec people considered him the leader of Tollan, heaven. He was also known as the fifth sun, because the Aztecs believed that he was the sun that took over when the fourth sun was expelled from the sky...
, who was sick, but rejuvenated himself by burning himself alive and then became the warrior sun and wandered through the heavens with the souls of those who died in battle, refusing to move if not offered enough sacrifices.
Brief summation
- Nahui-Ocelotl (Jaguar Sun) - Inhabitants were giants who were devoured by jaguars. The world was destroyed.
- Nahui-Ehécatl (Wind Sun) - Inhabitants were transformed into monkeys. This world was destroyed by hurricanes.
- Nahui-Quiahuitl (Rain Sun) - Inhabitants were destroyed by rain of fire. Only birds survived (or inhabitants survived by becoming birds).
- Nahui-Atl (Water Sun) - This world was flooded turning the inhabitants into fish. A couple escaped but were transformed into dogs.
- Nahui-Ollin (Earthquake Sun) - We are the inhabitants of this world. This world will be destroyed by earthquakes (or one large earthquake).
In popular culture
- The version of the myth with Nanauatzin serves as a framing deviceFraming deviceThe term framing device refers to the usage of the same single action, scene, event, setting, or any element of significance at both the beginning and end of an artistic, musical, or literary work. The repeated element thus creates a ‘frame’ within which the main body of work can develop.The...
for the 1991 Mexican film, In Necuepaliztli in Aztlan (Retorno a Aztlán), by Juan Mora Catlett.
See also
- Aztec mythologyAztec mythologyThe aztec civilization recognized a polytheistic mythology, which contained the many deities and supernatural creatures from their religious beliefs. "orlando"- History :...
- Aztec religionAztec religionAztec religion is the Mesoamerican religion practiced by the Aztec empire. Like other Mesoamerican religions, it had elements of human sacrifice in connection with a large number of religious festivals which were held according to patterns of the Aztec calendar...
- Aztec philosophyAztec philosophyAztec philosophy was the school of philosophy developed by the Aztec Empire. The Aztecs had a well-developed school of philosophy, perhaps the most developed in the Americas and in many ways comparable to Greek philosophy, even amassing more texts than the ancient Greeks...
- Black Sun (mythology)Black Sun (mythology)The Black Sun in Mesoamerican mythology has many mystical meanings, among them it is connected to the god Quetzalcoatl and his penetration in the Underworld through the west door after his diurnal passage on the sky. Amidst the Mexicas there were two suns, the young day sun and the ancient sun,...
- Mesoamerican creation accounts