Origin 1200 to 1521
The seventh veintena, the little feast of the lords, dedicated to Huixtocihuatl, goddess of salt and patron of salt makers, who were its principal celebrants. The veintena closed with the sacrifice of a woman who had impersonated the goddess.
Facts
Origins
Origin Period Origin PeriodLate Postclassic Period, the Aztec Triple Alliance, kept in living informant memory through Sahagun's mid sixteenth century interviews. 1 Place of OriginCentral Mexico, the Basin of Mexico and the wider Nahuatl speaking highlands under the Aztec Triple Alliance of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco and Tlacopan. 1 Origin of the NameThe Nahuatl name recorded here, Tecuilhuitontli, follows the spelling given by Sahagun's informants and set down in the Florentine Codex by Spanish trained scribes; other colonial sources and modern transliterations spell it differently. 2 Disputed
Approximate Gregorian SpanScholars have proposed several correlations between the xiuhpohualli year and the Gregorian calendar. The month range given here follows one widely reproduced reconstruction and is offered for relative placement only, not as a settled date: the 365 day count carried no intercalated leap day, so its alignment with the solar year is understood to have drifted across the centuries of its use, and colonial era testimony was recorded decades after the practice had ended. Attributions
Ruling Deity Observance
Principal FestivalThe salt makers' feast and the sacrifice of Huixtocihuatl's impersonator 2 Meaning
Literal MeaningLittle Feast of the Lords 3 Status
Standing as a Comparative CategoryA standard analytic category in the study of religion 1 Connections
Belongs to Tradition
Source The Aztecs (Smith, 3rd edition)Michael E. Smith
Under Patronage Of
Tecuilhuitontli's ruling deity is recorded as Huixtocihuatl.
Source An Illustrated Dictionary of the Gods and Symbols of Ancient Mexico and the MayaMary Miller and Karl Taube
Sources
1. The Aztecs (Smith, 3rd edition)
Michael E. Smith, Wiley-Blackwell, 2012The chapter on Aztec religion and ritualView the Source 2. Florentine Codex: General History of the Things of New Spain
Bernardino de Sahagun; translated by Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dibble, School of American Research and University of Utah Press, 1950Book 2, The Ceremonies, the chapter devoted to this veintenaView the Source 3. Aztec Thought and Culture: A Study of the Ancient Nahuatl Mind
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