Source

Incarnations of the Aztec Supernatural: The Image of Huitzilopochtli in Mexico and Europe

Elizabeth Hill Boone is a scholar of Mesoamerican art and iconography, and this study, published in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, is her academic analysis of the imagery of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec patron deity of Tenochtitlan, in both indigenous and later European sources, including the Coatepec birth narrative in which he slays his sister Coyolxauhqui. Its strength is close iconographic and textual analysis grounded in the actual surviving colonial-era pictorial and written sources, tracing how Huitzilopochtli's image changed as it passed through Spanish colonial recording. Its limit is that it is a focused iconographic study of one deity and one narrative cycle, so a claim about Aztec religion more broadly, outside Huitzilopochtli's own cult and imagery, needs a source with wider scope than this specific monograph provides.

Facts

Citation

Author

Elizabeth Hill Boone

Publisher

American Philosophical Society

Publication Year

1989

URL

https://www.pennpress.org/9781422374269/incarnations-of-the-aztec-supernatural-the-image-of-huitzilopochtli-in-mexico-and-europe/

Source Type

academic monograph

Assessment

Reliability Tier

A scholarly study, published in the Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, of the imagery of Huitzilopochtli and the Coatepec birth narrative.

Notes

A study of the imagery of Huitzilopochtli and the Coatepec birth narrative in which Coyolxauhqui is slain; Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 79.2.

Connections

Associated With

Coyolxauhqui

This source names Coyolxauhqui directly: "narrative in which he slays his sister Coyolxauhqui."

Source Incarnations of the Aztec Supernatural: The Image of Huitzilopochtli in Mexico and EuropeElizabeth Hill Boone

Huitzilopochtli

This source names Huitzilopochtli directly: "academic analysis of the imagery of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztec patron deity of Tenochtitlan, in both indigenous and later European sources, including the Coatepec birth narrative in which he slays..."

Source Incarnations of the Aztec Supernatural: The Image of Huitzilopochtli in Mexico and EuropeElizabeth Hill Boone

Tenochtitlan

This source names Tenochtitlan directly: "the Aztec patron deity of Tenochtitlan, in both indigenous and later European sources, including the Coatepec birth narrative in which he slays his sister Coyolxauhqui."

Source Incarnations of the Aztec Supernatural: The Image of Huitzilopochtli in Mexico and EuropeElizabeth Hill Boone

Claims Backed By This Source (48 claims)

This source backs 48 claims across the atlas. As facts: 29 well-attested, 1 scholarly debate. As cited relationships: 10 holds. Plus 8 entities citing it as a general reference with no single fact or relationship attached.

Disposition By Topic

Deities, 15 claims: 8 well-attested, 1 scholarly debate, 3 holds, 3 general references.
Sources, 11 claims: 8 well-attested, 3 holds.
Articles, 7 claims: 7 well-attested.
Religious Events, 6 claims: 3 well-attested, 2 holds, 1 general references.
Empires & Polities, 4 claims: 1 well-attested, 2 holds, 1 general references.
Bodies of Water, 2 claims: 1 well-attested, 1 general references.
Cultures, 2 claims: 1 well-attested, 1 general references.
Hymns & Liturgical Texts, 1 claims: 1 general references.