of thought. The Mixtec tale proceeds with a group of incidents. (1) The Deer-God and the Deer-Goddess (the deer is an emblem of fecundity)—known also as the Puma-Snake and the Jaguar-Snake, in which character they doubtless represent the tawny heaven of the day-sky and the starry vault of night—magically raised a cliff above the abyss of waters, on the summit of which they placed an axe, edge upward, upon which the heavens rested. (2) Here, at the Place-where-the-Heavens-stood, they lived many centuries, and here they reared their two boys, Wind-of-the-Nine-Serpents and Wind-of-the-Nine-Caves, who possessed the power of transforming themselves into eagles and serpents, and even of passing through solid bodies. The symbolism of these two boys as typifying the upper and the nether world is obvious; they can only be one more example of the demiurgic twins common in American cosmogony. (3) The brothers inaugurated sacrifice and penance, the cultivation of flowers and fruits; and with vows and prayers they besought their ancestral gods to let the light appear, to cause the water to be separated from the earth, and to permit the dry land to be freed from its covering. (4) The earth was peopled, but a flood destroyed this First People, and the world was restored by the "Creator of all Things."
It is probable that this Mixtec Creator-of-All-Things was the same deity as he who was known to their Zapotec kindred as Coqui-Xèe or Coqui-Cilla ("Lord of the Beginning"), of whom it was said that "he was the creator of all things and was himself uncreated." Seler is of opinion that Coqui-Xèe is a spirit of "the beginning" in the sense of dawn and the east and the rising sun, and that since he is also known as Piye-Tào, or "the Great Wind," he is none other than the Zapotec Quetzalcoatl, who also is an increate creator. Coqui-Xèe, however, is "merely the principle, the essence of the creative deity or of deity in general without reference to the act of creating the world and human beings"; for that act is rather to be ascribed to the primeval pair (equivalent to the Deer-God and Deer-Goddess of the Mixtec), Cozaana ("Creator, the Maker of all Beasts") and Huichaana ("Creator, the Maker of Men and Fishes").
The ideas of the Nahuatlan tribes were similar. Of the Chichimec Sahagun50 says that "they had only a single god, Mixcoatl, whose image they possessed; but they believed in another invisible god, not represented by any image, called Yoalli Ehecatl, that is to say, God invisible, impalpable, beneficent, protector, omnipotent, by whose strength alone the whole world lives, and who, by his sole knowledge, rules voluntarily all things." Mixcoatl ("Cloud-Snake"), the tribal god of the Chichimec and Otomi, is certainly an analogue of Quetzalcoatl or of Huitzilopochtli, like them figuring as demiurge; and Yoalli Ehecatl ("Wind and Night," or "Night-Wind") is an epithet applied to Tezcatlipoca, who also is addressed as "Creator of Heaven and Earth."
All of these gods are of the sky and atmosphere, and all of them appear as creative powers, though mainly in the demiurgic rôle. Back of and above them is the ancient Twofold One, the Male-Female or Male and Female principle of generation, which not only first created the world, but maintains it fecund. This being, sometimes called Tloque Nauaque, or "Lord of the By," i.e. the Omnipresent, is represented as a divine pair, known under several names. Sahagun commonly speaks of them as Ometecutli and Omeciuatl ("Twi-Lord," "Twi-Lady"), and in his account of the Toltec he states that they reign over the twelve heavens and the earth; the existence of all things depends upon them, and from them proceeds the "influence and warmth whereby infants are engendered in the wombs of their mothers." Tonacatecutli and Tonacaciutl ("Lord of Our Flesh," "Lady of Our Flesh") is another pair of names, used with reference to the creation of the human body out of maize and to its support thereby.51 A third pair of terms, appearing in Mendieta and in the Annals of Quauhtitlan, is Citlallatonac and Citlalicue ("Lord" and "Lady of the Starry Zones"). In the Annals Quetzalcoatl, as high-priest of the Toltec, is said to have dedicated a cult to "Citlalicue Citlallatonac, Tonacaciuatl Tonacatecutli ... who is clothed in charcoal, clothed in blood, who giveth food to the earth; and he cried aloft, to the Omeyocan, to the heaven lying above the nine that are bound together." Nevertheless, these deities—or rather deity, for Tloque Nauaque seems to be, like the Zuñi Awonawilona, bisexual in nature—received little recognition in the formal cult; and it was said that they desired none.
PLATE XII.
Figures representing the heavenly bodies. The upper figure, from Codex Vaticanus B, represents the conflict of light and darkness. The Eagle is either the Morning Star or the Sun; the Plumed Serpent is the symbol of the Cosmic Waters, from whose throat the Hare, perhaps the Earth or Moon, is being snatched by the Eagle. Similar figures appear in other codices, the Serpent being in one instance represented as torn by the Eagle's talons.
The lower figure, from Codex Borgia, portrays Sun, Moon, and Morning Star. The Sun-god is within the rayed disk; he holds a bundle of spears in one hand, a spear-thrower in the other; a stream of blood, apparently from a sacrifice offered by the Morning Star, which has the form of an ocelot, nourishes the Sun. The Moon appears as a Hare upon the face of the crescent, which is filled with water and set upon a background of dark sky.
In connexion with these primal creators appear the demiurgic transformers, Quetzalcoatl usually playing the important part. According to Sahagun's fragmentary accounts, the gods were gathered from time immemorial in a place called Teotiuacan. They asked: "Who shall govern and direct the world? Who will be Sun?" Tecuciztecatl ("Cockle-Shell House") and the pox-afflicted Nanauatzin volunteered. They were dressed in ceremonial garments and fasted for four days; and then the gods ranged themselves about a sacrificial fire, which the candidates were asked to enter. Tecuciztecatl recoiled from the intense heat until encouraged by the example of Nanauatzin, who plunged into it; and because of this Nanauatzin became the Sun, while Tecuciztecatl assumed second place as Moon. The gods now ranged themselves to await the appearance of the Sun, but not knowing where to expect it, and gazing in various directions, some of them, including Quetzalcoatl, turned their faces toward the east, where the Sun finally manifested himself, close-followed by the Moon. Their light being then equal, was so bright that none might endure it, and the deities accordingly asked one another, "How can this be? Is it good that they should shine with equal light?" One of them ran and threw a rabbit into the face of Tecuciztecatl, which thenceforth shone as does now the moon; but since the sun and the moon rested upon the earth, without rising, the gods saw that they must immolate themselves to give motion to the orbs of light. Xolotl fled, but was finally caught and sacrificed; yet even so the orbs did not stir until the wind blew with such violence as to compel them—first, the sun, and afterward the moon. Quetzalcoatl, the wind-god, is, of course, thus the giver of life to sun and moon as he is also, in the prayers the bearer of the breath of life from the divine pair to the new-born.
A complete version of the same myth is given by Mendieta,52 who credits it to Fray Andrés de Olmos, transmitted by word of mouth from Mexican caciques. Each province had its own narrative, he says, but they were agreed that in heaven were a god and goddess, Citlallatonac and Citlalicue, and that the goddess gave birth to a stone knife (tecpatl), to the amazement and horror of her other sons which were in heaven. The stone hurled forth by these outraged sons and falling to Chicomoxtoc ("Seven Caves"), was shattered, and from its fragments arose sixteen hundred earth-godlings. These sent Tlotli, the Hawk, heavenward to demand of their mother the privilege of creating men to be their servants; and she replied that they should send to Mictlantecutli, Lord of Hell, for a bone or ashes of the dead, from which a man and woman would be born. Xolotl was dispatched as messenger, secured the bone, and fled with it; but being pursued by the Lord of Hell, he stumbled, and the bone broke. With such fragments as he could secure he reached the earth, and the bones, placed in a vessel, were sprinkled with blood drawn from the bodies of the gods. On the fourth day a boy emerged from the mixture; on the eighth, a girl; and these were reared by Xolotl to become parents of mankind. Men differ in size because the bone broke into unequal fragments; and as human beings multiplied, they were assigned as servants to the several gods. Now, the Sun had not been shining for a long time, and the deities assembled at Teotiuacan to consider the matter. Having built a great fire, they announced that that one among their devotees who should first hurl himself into it should have the honour of becoming the Sun, and when one had
