Divinity Atlas

Sacred Correspondences
Veintenas

Huey Tozoztli

Veintenas

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Origin 1200 to 1521

The fourth veintena, continuing the vigil of Tozoztontli at greater scale and dedicated to Centeotl alongside Chicomecoatl, the mature maize goddess. Seed corn was blessed at the temple before planting, and reed grass was gathered and displayed at household doorways.

Facts
Origins
Origin Period
1200 to 1521 1
Origin Period
Late Postclassic Period, the Aztec Triple Alliance, kept in living informant memory through Sahagun's mid sixteenth century interviews. 1
Place of Origin
Central 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 Name
The Nahuatl name recorded here, Huey Tozoztli, 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
Language
Classical Nahuatl 3
Observance
Principal Festival
Blessing of the seed corn at the temple 2
Disputed
Approximate Gregorian Span
Early to late April 1
Scholars 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.
Identity
Position
4 of 19 1
Attributions
Day Count
20 Days 1
Ruling Deity
Centeotl and Chicomecoatl 2
Meaning
Literal Meaning
Great Vigil 3
Status
Standing as a Comparative Category
A standard analytic category in the study of religion 1
Cross-Tradition Connections

Belongs to Tradition

Source The Aztecs (Smith, 3rd edition)Michael E. Smith

Under Patronage Of

Huey Tozoztli's ruling deity is recorded as Centeotl and Chicomecoatl; Centeotl exists in this atlas as a lordofthenight entity, linked as such. Chicomecoatl has no live entity yet.

Source The Aztecs (Smith, 3rd edition)Michael E. Smith
Chicomecoatl, Deities

Huey Tozoztli's ruling deity is recorded as Centeotl and Chicomecoatl.

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
Miguel Leon-Portilla, University of Oklahoma Press, 1963View the Source
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