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Below the Tlatoani were the high priests of these two temples. Both high priests were called by the title Quetzalcoatl—the high priest of Huitzilopochtli was Quetzalcoatl Totec Tlamacazqui and the high priest of Tlaloc was Quetzalcoatl Tlaloc Tlamacazqui. [28] Other important temples were located in the four divisions of the town.
The cult of the God of Fire, of the Year, and of Turquoise perhaps began as far back as the middle Preclassic period. [13] Turquoise was the symbolic equivalent of fire for Aztec priests. [14] A small fire was permanently kept alive at the sacred center of every Aztec home in honor of Xiuhtecuhtli. [14]
Among the Aztecs, the name Quetzalcoatl was also a priestly title, as the two most important priests of the Aztec Templo Mayor were called "Quetzalcoatl Tlamacazqui". In the Aztec ritual calendar, different deities were associated with the cycle-of-year names: Quetzalcoatl was tied to the year Ce Acatl (One Reed), which correlates to the year 1519.
The Aztecs [a] (/ ˈ æ z t ɛ k s / AZ-teks) were a Mesoamerican civilization that flourished in central Mexico in the post-classic period from 1300 to 1521. The Aztec people included different ethnic groups of central Mexico, particularly those groups who spoke the Nahuatl language and who dominated large parts of Mesoamerica from the 14th to the 16th centuries.
Priests were allowed on the battlefield as chaplains, and could only defend themselves with clubs. [4] The Aztecs had a vanguard of warrior priests who carried deity banners and made sacrifices on the battlefield. [5] In more recent times, the warrior-priest was a common figure in the First Serbian Uprising (1804–13). [6]
Pictographic codices in which the Aztecs recorded their history say that the empire's place of origin was called Aztlán. Early migrants settled the Basin of Mexico and surrounding lands by establishing a series of independent city-states. These early Nahua city-states or altepetl were ruled by dynastic heads called tlahtohqueh (singularly ...
The Aztecs performed ritual self-sacrifice (also called autosacrifice or blood-letting) on a daily basis. [17] The Aztecs believed that Huitzilopochtli needed daily nourishment (tlaxcaltiliztli) in the form of human blood and hearts and that they, as “people of the sun,” were required to provide Huitzilopochtli with his sustenance. [18]
Annotated image of Xipe Totec sculpture. In Aztec mythology, Xipe Totec (/ ˈ ʃ iː p ə ˈ t oʊ t ɛ k /; Classical Nahuatl: Xīpe Totēc [ˈʃiːpe ˈtoteːk(ʷ)]) or Xipetotec [3] ("Our Lord the Flayed One") [4] was a life-death-rebirth deity, god of agriculture, vegetation, the east, spring, goldsmiths, silversmiths, liberation, deadly warfare, the seasons, [5] and the earth. [6]