Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #49

"Tezcatlipoca and Tlazolteotl were the lords of the tlazolli complex. Thus asserting a heterosexual dyad, one might assume the fundamental normativity of this complex. Yet Tezcatlipoca hardly seems male, and, as we will see, Tlazolteotl hardly seems female. Instead, the two together signify the marriage and marginalia of the tlazolli complex."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #48

"Perhaps the tlacuilo plays with a concept in the Nahua imaginary: Tezcatlipoca becomes a fertile being who must play both the masculine and the feminine role, for, as a powerful deity he must reproduce the cosmos in order to produce ritual."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #47

"In figure 16 we see Tezcatlipoca decked out in all of his warrior gear. The figure connects the twenty-day signs with parts of the body of the black Tezcatlipoca. The image also relates the day signs to the magical and curative aspects of his body in its parts.  Tezcatlipoca here signifies aggressive warrior masculinity through his possession of many weapons (darts, clubs, arrows, knives) and through the signifiers of death: the skulls of humans and the heads of animals. He will fight off all enemies and defend the community. He also signifies phallic sexual prowess through his long loincloth.  Yet, emanating from his mouth we find two flower glyphs strung together gether with an element resembling a Nahua signifier of birth, the umbilical cord. These elements suggest that Tezcatlipoca, through his mouth, gives birth to sexual behaviors deemed excessive. Of course, the flower signifies more than excessive sex, and this image has traditionally been interpreted as showing Tezcatlipoca singing, a fact I do not dispute.  . . . Since Tezcatlipoca's tongue gave birth to the flower, his tongue and mouth signify fertility, perhaps through rituals designed to maintain the fertility of humans and the earth. The positioning of sexual excess in Tezcatlipoca's mouth signifies both his excessive nature, as discussed by Klein, and his link to the feminine.  In an image from the same text, Tlazolteotl gives birth to the same glyph (see figure 3, in chapter 2). She, however, gives birth from an umbilical cord between her legs. Tezcatlipoca cannot give birth in a similar manner, as his long, heavily decorated loincloth points out. His masculinity thus assured by the loincloth, Tezcatlipoca seemingly vomits up sex and fertility.  The mouth here signifies Tezcatlipoca's erotic orality, but, as we will see, the penetration of the mouth with sexual excess signifies feminine sexuality in preconquest and early colonial imagery. Tezcatlipoca remains after the production of this image a central figure in the Nahua pantheon, a powerful god who signifies a masculine ideal. Yet the position of the flowers emanating from the mouth suggests Tezcatlipoca's concurrent effeminacy (he gives birth, his sexual behavior is out of control), even as he maintains his masculine prowess through both warfare and the phallus."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #46

"Nevertheless, building upon Klein, I argue that Tezcatlipoca's complex sexuality is central not only to his position but also to the ways in which Nahua commoners and nobles imagined him and gave his being cultural value."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #45

"Or could Klein's notion of the "ideal, married man" still be too wedded to Western concepts of normativity? While I agree with Klein that Nahuas [sic] viewed Tezcatlipoca's sexuality as excessive in relation to the quotidian realities of masculine sexual comportment, I argue that his sexuality signified the necessity of multivalent sexual behaviors in the ritual construction of fertility."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #44

"In an article based on her Dumbarton Oaks talk, Klein expanded on her claim of Tezcatlipoca's bisexuality. She argued that Nahuas [sic] viewed Tezcatlipoca as sexually immature, and that he "represented the sexual behavior that was fundamentally opposite to that of the ideal, married man." Hence the god's sexuality signified a world turned upside down, a system unacceptable for the "ideal" man. Further, Tezcatlipoca had an ambiguous gender identity that Nahuas found unacceptable among humans."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #43

"Juan Vernal, who had lived his entire life in Iguala, stated that he had used this spell many times to kill highwaymen who had come to rob him. He begins the incantation by invoking several gods, including Yaotl, an appellation that literally translates as "war, warrior, enemy" and that is also the name of an ancient war god, used here to refer to Tezcatlipoca. Juan asserts that he will "give pleasure" to his "older sisters," using the term alhuia, pleasure, as a metaphor for his fight. Nahuas commonly used this term to refer specifically to sexual pleasure. He also uses the term nohueltihuan, "my older sisters," as a fictive kinship term feminizing his attackers. By pleasuring his enemies, Juan develops an imaginary incestuous relationship with his older sisters in which he penetrates and overpowers them. Juan asks Yaotl/Tezcatlipoca to provide him with a weapon with which to defeat his enemies. He further demands that the gods make his enemies weak and him strong. And he asserts his strength through the use of a metaphor for fertility: "The stones will become drunk, the trees will become drunk; the land will become drunk at my will." Juan goes on to assert the power of the gods by stating, "I am the priest, I am Yaotl." But his enemies "are accompanying my older sister, Xochiquetzal. They are bringing that which will be her breath, her cotton fluff, and her ball of thread, with which they will give me." Juan then will close the incantation by stating that his enemies will be covered with blood. He also will add some terms in the final stanzas of the incantation, including tonacametzin, "sacred sustenance thigh;"' and several other elements that refer to the land."

The first glimmer of Pete's somewhat unfortunate Lacanian Freudianism and his subsequent obsession with the emasculating power of being penetrated.  While certainly many cultures have drawn a connection between the sexual "top" and power, I find much of Freud's commentary on such a little beyond-the-pale and even unbelievable.  Also, as a committed "bottom", a non-binary/genderqueer transperson, and a transfeminine person, I often find it distasteful, oppressive, offensive, and almost always just plain not reflective of my own reality and the realities of those in my community.  From the last point there, I extrapolate that, at the very least, such interpretations, are missing something, if not that they are entirely false.

I would have expected better from Pete Sigal, as he seems to be an openly kinky gay man, who I would have assumed would have known better.

That being said, I do find it quite believable that Juan Vernal intended the penetration of his enemies in this curse to be a way of describing his power and victory over them.

Alsoalso, I love the mind-feel of the term "sacred sustenance thigh".  It does fun things in my brain.  Just saying ;-)

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #42

"In this chapter I will show that the Nahuas [sic] viewed the warrior deity as a set of characteristics that combined male and female, incorporated notions of violent masculinity and maternal care, and signified fertility. Thus Tezcatlipoca, an icon of Nahua warrior masculinity, still revered today in much of Mexico, combined masculine and feminine attributes in a bisexual whole; and Tlazolteotl, a mother goddess who signified the excesses of feminine sexuality, had a phallus. We shall see that the presence of these and other deities makes it impossible to place Nahua thoughts, histories, and memories into binary formations of gender and sexuality."


I don't think Pete really developed the fascinating idea of the warrior deity incorporating notions of maternal care, sadly, as the specific gendered connection there (war/mother) is more fascinating to me, I think, than the general gender connection (male/female).  He does, however, quite ably demonstrate the bigender (what he calls bisexual, following perhaps the biological terminology) nature of the two deities and also of warfare in that chapter.

Wait a minute, realizing upon reflection that he does so by connecting war to sex.  Really, Pete, are you conflating sex with maternality?  Cuz while one certainly can connect to (and, one might say, is a prerequisite of) the other, they are certainly not inherently the same thing!

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #41

"filthy happiness (tlaelpaquiliztli)."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #40

"some modern-day Nahua communities have Virgin Marys who engage in ritualized sexual activity."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #39

"The priests used the term tlatlacolli to stand in for "sin." Tlatlacolli in the Nahua universe related to the damage done to somebody or something, thing, not to the intent of the act."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #38

"Confession in the preconquest Nahua world did not invoke the same sense of individualization as Catholic confessional rites. Rather, one would confess to losing one's way along the path, tripping, taking a detour, tour, or entering the tlazolli complex when it was not ritually appropriate to do so.
The logic of the confession that Molina had wanted to impart to the Nahuas [sic] was that one had to give to the confessor one's inner sense of self; one had to impart the truth of oneself, never hiding sin. One's own truth, he would go on, had to come from a searing search within oneself, within one's heart. Then one could properly confess and effectively avoid the fires of hell. In a similar vein, an early confessional manual, published by the Dominicans in Mexico in 1548, begins: "I, who am a sinner, confess before God," where the word for confess, yolcuitia, means "to name the heart;' suggesting the internalization of the self and the creation of a confessing being who will reveal all before the priest, God's representative."

Quotes from _Magic from Brazil_ #8

"Iemanja bore three sons:  Ogum, Oxossi, and Exu.  All her children left home -- Ogum to conquer the world, Oxossi to pursue a meditative life in the forest, and Exu to see what the world had to offer.  Only Exu returned.  At first, his mother was delighted to see him.  As they talked, he became agitated and finally blurted out that he had searched the planet in vain to find a woman to equal her perfection, and that because of his failure to discover one he new he was destoned to possess her and her alone.  Then he grabbed his mother and tried to violate her.  In the struggle, Exu ripped open her breasts.  When he saw what he had done, he recoiled in horror and shame, and fled, banished from the kingdom of heaven, never to return.  From the copious tears Iemanja shed the oceans were formed, and from her torn breasts were born all the other gods."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #37

"the Nahuatl term teyolia, which will be used later in other confessional manuals in a variety of contexts. Nor does he use the Nahuatl term tetonal, which he elsewhere translates as "soul." For the Nahuas before the conquest, the term teyolia referred to the entity within the body that went to the land of the gods after death. . . . However, the term could only approximate the Christian concept of the soul, and preconquest Nahua thought does not ever distinguish teyolia from the body. However, for Christianized Nahuas after the conquest, as historian Alfredo Lopez Austin notes, the teyolia was directly identified with the soul."

Quotes from _Magic from Brazil_ #7

"The story goes that Iansa was a bright, intelligent, impetuous girl eager to know everything about the world.  Because of her fervently sexual nature she chose to serve an apprenticeship (so to speak) by seducing all the male Orixas, and convincing them that in return for her favors, they should teach her their secrets.  From Oxossi she learned to hunt, and from his son, Logun-Ode, to fish.  Ogum taught her to wield a sword, and Oxaguia showed her how to use a shield for protection.  Obaluaie initiated her into the mysteries of the spirits of the dead.  Even Exu let her in on the enigmas of fire and enchantment.  When she set her cap for Xango, however, she got more than she bargained for.  Although he revealed to her the magic of thunder and lightning, she fell for him madly and irrevocably, and felt the burning passion and heartache of love.  From their union were born the Ibeji twins."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #36

"the practice of bathing in the temazcal. Duran explains that when bathhouses were built, idols were placed underneath them. Then men and women went to bathe together, for it was considered a bad omen to bathe without a person of the other sex around."

Quotes from _Magic from Brazil_ #6

"In Africa, [Iamsa] is so ferocious that she brandishes a short beard, which she conceals behind a small veil.  This characteristic has not translated to her Brazilian persona."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #35

"The Nahuatl text suggests an interpretation somewhat different from Sahagun's Spanish: "Tlazolteotl: also called Ixcuina and called Tlaelquani. As to being called Tlazolteotl, it was said that was because her realm and domain were the dust and the trash: the life of desire, the pleasurable life. It was said that she was the ruler of the pleasurable life"
. . . .
Auilnemiliztli, for example, which occurs at the end of the quoted passage in the form "aujlnemjlizcutl, derives from auil-, "pleasure, a term used for prostitutes. The life described emanates from the tlazolli complex and signifies excess. But unlike in the Spanish, we find nothing in the way of moral condemnation in the Nahuatl text.
. . . .
And thus the Historia continues: "Confession: It was said that Tlazolteotl inspired and offered trash, dust, and the pleasurable life. Similarly, she forgave.... washed, and bathed one." This world of Tlazolteotl, in which she controls both the pleasurable life that Sahagun so wishes to condemn, and the process of confession, which Sahagun so wishes to promote mote (though in a different form), remains very seductive for our friar, his aides, and their informants.  . . . But as the clerics attempted to engage in a binary division between the dirt and the cleanliness, they needed to beware that both fell under the rubric of the tlazolli complex. And the "heart-straightening" process of preconquest Nahua confession (in which neyolmelahualiztli, the word used to describe the process that literally refers to the straightening of one's heart)"

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #34

"cuilonj ("passive partner in sodomy")
tecuilontianj ("active partner in sodomy")
patlachpul ("lesbian" [?])
tetlanochilianj ("procurer")"

{a short glossary of four Nahuatl words Sahagun wrote into his text}

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #6

"21 [XVI, xviii]
The apostle therefore recommends silence, when he tells us to work in it; the prophet too
testifies that silence is the promotion of justice; and again, in silence and in hope will be your
strength. Therefore we lay down that from the recitation of Compline you are to maintain
silence until after Prime the following day. At other times, though silence is not to be so
strictly observed, you are to be diligent in avoiding much talking, since scripture states and
experience likewise teaches, sin is not absent where there is much talking; also he who is
careless in speech will experience evil, and the one who uses many words harms his soul.
Again the Lord says in the gospel: an account will have to given on the day of judgement for
every vain word. Each of you is to weigh his words and have a proper restraint for his mouth,
so that he may not stumble and fall through speech and his fall be irreparable and fatal. He is
with the prophet to guard his ways so that he does not offend through the tongue. Silence,
which is the promotion of justice, is to be diligently and carefully observed."



"[21] The Apostle would have us keep silence, for in silence he tells us to work. As the Prophet also makes known to us: Silence is the way to foster holiness. Elsewhere he says: Your strength will lie in silence and hope. For this reason I lay down that you are to keep silence from after Compline until after Prime the next day. At other times, although you need not keep silence so strictly, be careful not to indulge in a great deal of talk, for as Scripture has it - and experience teaches us no less - Sin will not be wanting where there is much talk, and He who is careless in speech will come to harm; and elsewhere: The use of many words brings harm to the speaker’s soul. And our Lord says in the Gospel: Every rash word uttered will have to be accounted for on judgment day. Make a balance then, each of you, to weigh his words in; keep a tight rein on your mouths, lest you should stumble and fall in speech, and your fall be irreparable and prove mortal. Like the Prophet, watch your step lest your tongue give offence, and employ every care in keeping silent, which is the way to foster holiness."

Quotes from _Magic From Brazil_ #5

"Devotees do not believe that the Orixa itself incorporates into a medium, but that some part of the deity's powers is transmitted through a lesser evolved spirit that works for the Orixa.  This is why a thousand Iansas, for example, can descend into as many terreiros every night."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #33

"This goddess had three names: the one where she was called Tlazolteotl, which means goddess of carnality; the second name is Ixcuina ... who was made up of four sisters ... who were said to be goddesses of carnality.... The third name of this goddess was Tlaelquani, which means one who commits dirty deeds; carnal men and women confessed their sins to these goddesses."'

{actually a quote from Sahagun}

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #5

"[17] You are to abstain from meat, except as a remedy for sickness or feebleness. But as, when you are on a journey, you more often than not have to beg your way, outside your own houses you may eat foodstuffs that have been cooked with meat, so as to avoid giving trouble to your hosts. At sea, however, meat may be eaten."

I did not know that the Carmelites were vegetarians!

Quotes from _Magic From Brazil_ #4

"Most followers believe that the Orixas evolved without needing to pass through incarnations in order to achieve perfection."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #32

"A priest recorded the following incantation in Nahuatl from a 1620s idolatry investigation: "Come fire, come water, come incense. Come you, Tlazolteteo,... come see me, night tlazolli, white tlazolli, green tlazolli. I have come. I am the priest.... Beware of rising up against me."  The curer then harnessed the power of the Tlazolteteo (the plural of Tlazolteotl), the trash goddesses, to cure the patient of his illness, an unnamed disease coming from sexual activity, represented here as tlazolli.  In fact they had pluralized her-likely likely signifying that these commoners viewed Tlazolteotl as a composite of a series of deities. In other texts recorded in these investigations, the trash goddesses also mandated the growth of maize and performed their role as goddesses of childbirth."

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #4

"16 [XII, xiv]
You are to fast every day except Sundays from the feast of the Exaltation of the Cross until
Easter Sunday, unless illness or bodily weakness, or other just cause counsels a lifting of the
fast, since necessity has no law."

"Necessity has no law" indeed!  Khaire Ananke, khaire!

Quotes from _Magic from Brazil_ #3

"The Orixas . . . do not expend their energies by performing mechanical actions like the elementals in Western Magick."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #31

"Tlazolteotl in this image wears her traditional headdress and contains glyphs of the moon, now on her backpack instead of her clothing. She also wears a skull on her back, and she now wears two excess skins: one animal and one human. In a pot, she carries a human head and hand, perhaps those of a child."

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #3

"15 [XI/xiii]
On Sundays, or other days if necessary, you shall discuss the welfare of the group and the
salvation of souls; at this time excesses and faults of the brothers, if such come to light, are to
be corrected in the middle way of charity."

"15 [XI, xiii] On Sundays, or other days if necessary, you shall discuss the
preservation of order and the salvation of souls; at this time excesses and faults
of the brothers, if such come to light, are to be corrected with boundless charity"

"[15] On Sundays too, or other days if necessary, you should discuss matters of discipline and your spiritual welfare; and on this occasion the indiscretions and failings of the brothers, if any be found at fault, should be lovingly corrected."

I find it fascinating how absolutely different these three translations from the Latin are!  I obviously prefer the first, as I think it actually challenges the community and helps foster their growth, but it's important to know how such a small thing can have such huge effects.

Also, yay for Land Meeting being something similar to this!

Quotes from _Magic From Brazil_ #2

"In African myth, when the great All Father, Olorun, finished creating the world and everything in it, He retired to His lofty realm for a well-deserved rest.  In His place He left certain lieutenants who exercised His will on the material plane.  These divine intermediaries between God and man are called the Orixas.  This is why in the Yoruba language the name means "minor god," that is, a potency second only to the will of the All Father."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #30

"Rather than gender as a reified category, we witness gender as an aspect that needs ritual disarticulation and reformation in order to build and maintain social structure. This relates to modern Western society as explicated by Butler, in which the ritualized performance of gender takes place on a daily basis, but contrasts with the masking of the performance from the performers (except in clearly delineated subcultural forms like the performance of drag)."

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #2

"12 [IX/x]
None of the brothers is to claim something as his own; everything is to be in common and is
to be distributed to each one by the Prior—that is, the brother deputed by him to this office—
having regard to the age and needs of each one."


I love finding examples of way-old Catholic/Christian communistic sentiment!

Quotes from _Magic From Brazil_ #1

"Seven commandments of the Law of Umbanda must be memorized by all devotees.  Translated, they are:
1.  Do not do to your neighbor what you would not wish him or her to do to you.
2.  Do not covet what is not yours.
3.  Help the needy without asking questions.
4.  Respect all religions because they come from God.
5.  Do not criticize what you do not understand.
6.  Fulfill your mission even if it means personal sacrifice.
7.  Defend yourself from evil doers and resist evil.
Besides the seven commandments for mediums, filhos-de-santos (cult followers) must attend all ceremonies.  They are obliged to stretch out before their superiors with heads touching the floor in a gesture of obeisance meant to teach humility (known as bater cabeca, "beating the head").  They are bound to help the leaders and their assistants; and they must always wear clean, correct clothing.
Mediums are required to behave in a dignified manner, not eat heavy meals, not consume meat from Thursday night through Friday, have faith in their spirit guides and terrestrial superiors, not share their knowledge or frequent other centros, and never perform a service for anyone outside their own place of worship."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #29

"According to the Dominican friar Diego Duran, the Huastecs participated in the Ochpaniztli ceremony by guarding the woman representing Tlazolteotl, who was to be sacrificed. After the sacrifice, they fought against the warriors of Tenochtitlan in a mock battle:
A bloody fray took place among them. With sticks and stones countless men came to the combat and fight, something awesome to see, all armed with their quivers, swords, and shields. Fighting all the way, they went to the shrine of the goddess ... that stood at the entrance of the city, called the Shrine of the Woman. The man wearing the skin and maguey-fiber clothes of the woman went behind, among the Huaxtecs. One of these was dressed in white, another in red, another other in yellow, yet another in green, each holding his broom high in his hands." The Huastecs had lost their swords, now replaced with brooms. The movement from sword to broom in the Nahua conceptual universe moved them from the male sphere to the female. The castration works to feminize the Huastecs so as to make them less of a threat. Instead of engaging in ritualistic sexual aggression, a masculine culine activity, they will engage in sweeping and cleaning, a feminine activity. While in Nahua society there was no shame to the feminine sphere, for men such a maneuver would have moved them away from their proper roles, and effectively disempowered them. They could continue tinue to perform productive roles, but unlike the priest from Tenochtitlan, who will wear the slain woman's skin, the Huastecs would no longer be able to perform warrior functions-they would sweep. In both cases, violence and mutilation moved the ceremony forward to maintain gender balance and complementarity. In removing the Huastecs' phalluses luses and placing brooms in their hands, the ritual practitioners effectively controlled the outsiders and protected the city-state of Tenochtitlan. The contrast with the Tenochtitlan priest is instructive: he will take the woman's skin with him as he fights. Her skin in essence empowers him through a ritual gender transformation. Yet the same gender transformation disempowered the Huastecs."

Select Sections from The Carmelite Rule of St. Albert #1

"11 [VIII, ix]
Those who have learned to say the canonical hours with the clerics should do so according to
the practice of the holy Fathers and the approved custom of the Church. Those who do not
know the hours are to say the Our Father twenty-five times for the night office—except for
Sunday and solemn feasts when this number is doubled, so that the Our Father is said fifty
times. It is to said seven times for the morning Lauds and for the other Hours, except for
Vespers when it must be said fifteen times."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #28

"In a recent book, Catherine DiCesare has argued that this particular set of paintings signifies not Ochpaniztli, but rather a particular historical ceremony intended to prevent famine and make the earth become more fertile. In either case, this image shows that the tlacuilo wants Tlazolteotl to signify the ritual renewal of the earth. We see Tlazolteotl toward the bottom of the picture, not in the center, dedicated to Chicomecoatl, the maize goddess. This signifies the conjunction of several goddesses related to the fertility of the earth. In the center of the image we see a powerful priest of Tenochtitlan wearing the flayed skin of a woman said to be the goddess of maize. Here, even with the maize goddess at the center, the ritual requires the presence of Tlazolteotl, encouraging the phallic priests (figure 9).
Tlazolteotl is on the right side of the page at the bottom. She wears her traditional headdress, is fully clothed, and she carries a broom in her left hand. Facing Tlazolteotl is a central priest, said to be from Tenochtitlan. This extensively arrayed priest wears an ornate gown and robe, beautifully colored in red, orange, green, and blue. The priest himself is colored black. He holds in his right hand a long blue snake that emanates from his body in a seemingly phallic manner. Behind him are two other priests, wearing headdresses, masks, and loincloths. They place their right hands on their hyperextended phalluses, made from paper. These priests are not colored in, and they appear to be imagined as similar to Tlazolteotl, who also is not colored in. They are called in the Spanish gloss Huastecs, and we know from other descriptions of this ceremony that this is a representation that Nahuas traditionally gave these priests. As Huastecs, people from the gulf coast, also the area from which Tlazolteotl's image emanates, these priests signified partial outsiders with hypermasculine sexual desires. The joke is on them, though. Upon the successful seduction, presumably including penetration, orgasm, and conception, as this, after all, must lead to a successful harvest, Tlazolteotl will in effect castrate the Huastec priests as she will take away their phalluses and the priests later will have only brooms, a symbol of Tlazolteotl, and of course the ostensible purpose of the ritual in which temples, houses, and streets are swept."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #27

"The Codex Borbonicus, for example, presents Tlazolteotl as mother and seductress. Here we first see Tlazolteotl in a section designed for prognostications, in which she gives birth. Tlazolteotl in this image retains her traditional cotton headdress, along with her traditional necklace. We also can note the presence of moon glyphs on her headdress, huipil, and the blanket beneath her, signifying that Tlazolteotl is a lunar deity. In this image she gives birth to Cinteotl, the god of maize. This act signifies that Tlazolteotl represents fertility of the gods, humans, and the earth. The staple crop, maize, is central to the maintenance of community and the fertility of the earth.  Tlazolteotl also wears the skin of an animal sacrificed to her. And present in the picture is a disguised Tezcatlipoca, "Smoking Mirror," a god often partnered with Tlazolteotl. Between the two of them we see entwined figures of a snake and a centipede, both signifying sexual excess and tlazolli. As I have noted, the snake is also seen as phallic, while the centipede is a symbol of tlazolli and dirt, and hence of Tlazolteotl. Beneath Tlazolteotl and Tezcatlipoca, we see a severed head and a skull on a skull rack. So here Tlazolteotl signifies birth and death, moderation and excess. The tlacuilo wants his readers to know that Tlazolteotl is an important goddess who will maintain the fertility of humans and the earth, but that she also is a dangerous goddess, one who will encourage excess and destruction.
We should note further, however, that the tlacuilo does not condemn the production of excess. The excess signified here is necessary for the completion of the ritual. Mikhail Bakhtin has pointed out that ritualization can and does allow, even mandates, excess that must remain unacceptable in daily life. Hence, here the figure of Tlazolteotl signifies ritual discourse itself, pointing to excess, violence, and death at the same time as she signifies the maintenance of life and the continuity of the people. Indeed, for the community to continue to exist, Tlazolteotl and her priests must engage in violent excess."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #26

"the Ochpaniztli, or "sweeping;' ceremony began with musicians announcing the beginning of the festivities, followed by the participation of priests and other notables. The nobles danced, engaged in mock battles, swept temples, streets, and houses, and sacrificed captives."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #25

"In the image from the Codex Mendoza (figure 6), we see that the tlacuilo places his quill upon a text, just as he speaks with an individual, who presumably tells the tlacuilo what to write. The tlacuilo also speaks back to the person across from him. In Nahua concepts of the tlacuilo's world, then, the tlacuilo neither reproduces a reality placed in front of him (he is not a realistic painter), nor does he simply write down what he is told. Rather, he engages in a creative, reflective, and interactive process that stresses the oral nature of the text he will produce."

Yes!  This!  This is a kind of literature I can really get behind!

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #24

"The Nahuas [sic] viewed tlacuilos [painters, writers, and scribes] as reflective artists. Before the Spanish conquest, Nahuas wrote texts in the form of various types of images painted on paper made from the bark of a tree or the hide of a deer, or on stone edifices."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #23

"So what was the province of Tlazolteotl at the time of the conquest? Evidently, it was wide-reaching. When one wished to confess, one "unburdened one's heart" to her. As a goddess linked with the moon and the fertility of the earth, Tlazolteotl was seen as controlling childbirth and the spinning of cotton. Those who had syphilis and other sexual diseases asked her to rid them of the diseases. Those men and women who wished to perform sexual magic, to seduce a lover or to ward off another, summoned Tlazolteotl. So the Nahuas [sic] did not see Tlazolteotl as a demon of any kind. Rather, they believed her to be a goddess: a mother goddess, a goddess of fertility, but also one who could provoke an individual into sexual excess. She could signify both trash and cleanliness, both excess and moderation."

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #22

"[The phrase] yn tlazolli yn teuhtli, "trash and dust", [was] used by Catholic priests in an attempt to express sexual excess and sin by means of the Nahua avoidance of excess, but actually related to Tlazolteotl"

I had not heard this difrasismo before reading this book.  One of the side things that fascinates me about studying Nahua culture is to see the complete fumbles made by the colonizers (like this one) and to ponder the consequences of those fumbles . . . Kallisti and 23 skiddoo!

Quotes from _The Flower and the Scorpion_ #21

"The term Nahuas used to stand in for sexual activity, tlalticpacayotl, was a term both burdened with and buttressed by the tlazolli complex. The term linked with the earth, seen as a generative being, always signifying fertility. But the earth also spawned both dirt and danger. One always needed to use care to prevent too much dirt from coming into one's life (hence the young nobleman needed to avoid too much tlalticpacayotl). And while one needed to feast (moderately) on the earth, one needed to be wary of that which the earth produced: dangerous animals and poisonous plants could kill."