Barbara_E._Mundy]_The_Death_of_Aztec_Tenochtitlan

waTeR and The sacRed ciTy • 49

of the Teocalli shows us, then, that Mexica artists drew
on long-standing and widespread spatial templates, but
in their particular case, it was the sacrifice not of a female
earth deity but of Chalchiuhtlicue that gives rise to an axis
mundi, a world tree. As expressed in the Teocalli, it was the
sacrifice of Chalchiuhtlicue that made the foundation of
the city possible, much as on the experiential plane, it was
the taming of the lakes in the fifteenth century that allowed
the city to survive.

PLace-names and myThic hisToRy

If the world—including the spaces of Tenochtitlan—came
about because of the dismemberment of Tlaltecuhtli, her
presence was marked in place-names, a key representation
of space that we will return to again in the chapters that
follow. The creation story told in Histoyre du Mechique
tells us that after the sacrifice of Tlaltecuhtli, “from her
eyes [came] springs and fountains and little caves, from
her mouth, rivers and huge caves, from her nose, mountain
valleys, mountains from her shoulders.” 69 The constant
presence of this earth deity, welling up in the groundwa-
ter and lurking at the base of all earthly spaces, is felt in
the way place-names were written using the iconic script
of central Mexico. In the Codex Mendoza, for example,
the place-name for the town of Xico (from xictl, “navel”)
is represented in circular form with a ropelike umbilicus
emerging from its puckered center (figure 2.17, left). The
area around the cord is yellow, and this is encased in a red
ring. If we compare the Xico sign to the familiar glyph for

“hill” (tepetl) in the same manuscript, here as part of the

place-name Pochtepec, which means “smoking hill,” the

artist has used the same yellow and red colors at the base

of the hill symbol, but here they appear as bands; that is,

they are being seen from the side, and the umbilicus is

hidden on the underside of the glyph (figure 2.17, center).

Thus hills are visually likened to body parts, each with its

own umbilicus. The symbol for “cave” (oztotl) reiterates that

caves are the open mouth of the earth deity, and we see this

in the place-name Oztoma, which means “cave of the hand,”

where the cave is depicted as the open mouth of the earth

deity, and here, the red band surrounding a yellow center is

used for the mouth (figure 2.17, right). In indigenous land

maps created as late as the 1570s, like one from the state

of Veracruz in figure 2.18, tepetl signs, seen at the left and

right edges, still retained traces of the diamond-patterned

skin of Tlaltecuhtli, who was believed to resemble a spiny

caiman, and water, the snaky rope cutting across the center

of the map, was shown with a pattern of alternating spirals,

rectangles, and chevrons that show us the movements that

marked the presence of Chalchiuhtlicue. Thus, manuscript

art reminds us that all places come from these primordial

deities, and many retain traces of their presence. 70

But most residents of the city did not encounter the

traces of these cosmic templates and historical events on

figuRe 2.17. Place-names revealing the presence of the earth deity,

Tlaltecuhtli. From left, Xico (navel place), Poctepec (smoking hill), and

Oztoma (cave of the hand). Author drawing after Codex Mendoza, fols.

20v, 17v, and 18r.