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THE METAPHORICAL UNDERPINNINGS OF AZTEC HISTORY

The case of the 1473 civil war

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 August 2007

Emily Umberger
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Abstract

The article discusses the 1473 civil war between the two polities that formed the capital of the Aztec empire, Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco, as presented in the Codex Durán. I argue that the literal, European-style rendition of the events of the war includes remnants of the pre-Conquest symbolic thought behind those events' original choreography. The remnants indicate that the war was staged to follow the outlines of the story of the battle between the god Huitzilopochtli (“Hummingbird, Left”) and his sister Coyolxauhqui (“Bells, Painted”) at the mountain site of Coatepetl (“Serpent Mountain”), an allegory for the rise and fall of powerful rulers. I also suggest that the enemy king and his second in command, after being thrown from the Tlatelolco Templo Mayor, were buried in the funerary vessels beside the Great Coyolxauhqui Stone discovered in 1978 at the base of the Tenochtitlan Templo Mayor, proved by the war to be the “true” and only Coatepetl.

Resumen

El artículo discute la relación de Diego Durán sobre la guerra civil de 1473 entre las dos entidades políticas que formaban la capital del imperio azteca, Tenochtitlan y Tlatelolco. Los actores en cuestión son el victorioso tlatoani tenochca Axayacatl y el derrotado tlatoani tlatelolca Moquihuix. La metodología combina el análisis de los textos e imágenes de Durán con el de los restos arqueológicos para proponer la tesis de que la representación al estilo europeo de los acontecimientos de la guerra incluye residuos del proceso de pensamiento simbólico de la pre-conquista detrás de su coreografía original. Estos residuos indican que la guerra fue orquestrada siguiendo los esquemas de la historia de la batalla en la que el dios Huitzilopochtli (“Colibrí, Izquierda”) derrota a su hermana Coyolxauhqui (“Cascabeles, Pintadas”) en la monte de Coatepetl (“Monte de la Serpiente”), una alegoría del ascenso y derrocamiento de los gobernantes. De acuerdo a Durán, durante la guerra civil se pelearon dos batallas, una en Tenochtitlán y la otra en Tlatelolco. En la primera batalla, los tlatelolcas invaden Tenochtitlan en un probable (e inútil) intento de capturar el Templo Mayor tenochca, el cual era una representación urbana del mítico Coatepetl. En la segunda batalla, los tenochcas toman con éxito el Templo Mayor Tlatelolca, considerado como otro Coatepetl, y su líder Axayacatl lanza a su enemigo desde la plataforma del templo hasta su base, de la misma manera en que Huitzilopochtli había lanzado a su hermana desde la cima del monte. La pirámide tlatelolca fue después destruída y se cometieron varias humillaciones contra la ciudad derrotada. Estas incluyeron, probablemente, el entierro de los restos cremados de Moquihuiz y su teniente Teconal al lado de la Gran Piedra de Coyolxauhqui al pie del Templo Mayor de los victores tenochcas. Esta explicación de la guerra relaciona materiales tanto arqueológicos como coloniales, reafirma el valor de su correlación y demuestra la flexible adaptación del pensamiento azteca a circunstancias individuales.

Type
Research Article
Information
Ancient Mesoamerica , Volume 18 , Issue 1 , Spring 2007 , pp. 11 - 29
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2007

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