The Tira de Tepechpan: Negotiating Place under Aztec and Spanish Rule

The Tira de Tepechpan The Tira de Tepechpan Negotiating Place under Aztec and Spanish Rule Lori Boornazian Diel Uni...

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The Tira de Tepechpan

The Tira de Tepechpan Negotiating Place under Aztec and Spanish Rule

Lori Boornazian Diel

University of Texas PressAustin

The publication of this book was made possible in part by a generous contribution from Texas Christian University.

Copyright © 2008 by the University of Texas Press All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America First edition, 2008 Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to: Permissions University of Texas Press P.O. Box 7819 Austin, TX 78713-7819 www.utexas.edu/utpress/about/bpermission.html ♾ The paper used in this book meets the minimum requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (R1997) (Permanence of Paper). Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Diel, Lori Boornazian, 1970– The Tira de Tepechpan : negotiating place under Aztec and Spanish rule / Lori Boornazian Diel. — 1st ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-292-71831-9 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Tira de Tepechpan. 2. Aztecs—Mexico—Tepexpan—History—Chronology. 3. Tepexpan (Mexico)—History—Chronology. 4. Aztec art—Mexico—Tepexpan. 5. Aztecs—First contact with Europeans. 6. Mexico—History—To 1810. 7. Mexico—History—Spanish colony, 1540–1810. 8. Spain—Colonies— America—Administration. I. Title. F1219.56.T46D54 2008 972´.02—dc22 2008025314

Contents

Acknowledgments vii 1. Introduction 1 2. The Tira de Tepechpan: Its Structure, Contributors, and History 13 3. Pre-Imperial History 23 4. Imperial History 51 5. Colonial History of Painter A 73 6. Colonial Histories of Painters B, C, and D 93 7. The Alphabetic Annotations 113 8. Indigenous Histories as Strategies for Survival 125 Appendix. Transcription and Translation of Annotator 1’s Glosses 133 Notes 137 Bibliography 145 Index 155 Plates follow page 22

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Acknowledgments

This project began as my doctoral dissertation in Latin American Studies at Tulane University. Faculty and staff in the Stone Center for Latin American Studies and the Departments of Anthropology, Art History, and History provided key assistance and instruction that allowed me to formulate the ideas expressed in this work. At Tulane, I had the good fortune to study under Elizabeth Boone, whose work on the Aztec pictorials has obviously been a major foundation for this study. I am grateful to Elizabeth for offering so generously of her time and expertise throughout this project as dissertation advisor, mentor, and friend. I also thank Victoria Bricker and Susan Schroeder for serving on my dissertation committee and supplying thoughtful support, advice, and encouragement. I would also like to warmly acknowledge Richard Greenleaf, whose course at Tulane on Colonial Mexico quickly captured my interest in this subject, and Rebecca Stone, with whom I took my first course on Pre-Columbian art history at Emory University. This book could not have been written without Xavier Noguez’s pioneering work on the Tira de Tepechpan. I am grateful to Xavier for meeting with me in Mexico to discuss the Tira and his willingness to pass me the torch, so to speak. Also, I am indebted to Judy Maxwell, who first introduced me to the study of Nahuatl, supported at Tulane by a Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship. I fondly remember and greatly appreciate her willingness to meet with myself and others outside of class to help us with Classical Nahuatl translations. More-

over, I am grateful to Susan Schroeder, once again, for graciously providing advice on the Nahuatl translations in the Tira. I am admittedly more comfortable in the visual realm and take responsibility for any mistakes and simplifications in the Nahuatl translations here. Numerous institutions generously allowed me access to rare books and manuscripts in the course of my research, and I am grateful to them and their staffs for their considerate assistance. I am especially thankful to Madame Monique Cohen, conservateur general of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Département des Manuscrits, Division Orientale, for granting me permission to view the original Tira de Tepechpan, and the directors of the Archivo General de Indias, Seville, and the Archivo General de la Nación, Mexico, for allowing me access to key documents speaking of Tepechpan. Numerous libraries also allowed me access to their collections: the Dumbarton Oaks Research Library, the Latin American Library of Tulane University, the Benson Library of the University of Texas at Austin, the Regenstein Library of the University of Chicago, and the Newberry Library, Chicago. Moreover, the Interlibrary Loan Office of the Mary Couts Burnett Library of Texas Christian University was always helpful in tracking down key resources. My colleagues at Texas Christian University in the Department of Art and Art History have provided invaluable advice and support throughout this project. I am also grateful to the dean of the College of Fine Arts, the Department of Art and Art Hisvii

tory, the TCU Research and Creative Activity Fund, and Vicki Vinson Cantwell; all provided generous financial assistance for the purchase of images, as well as funds to secure permissions and to support the inclusion of color plates in this book. A Frances V. Scholes Research Fellowship supported my initial research in Mexico, where I realized that the Tira de Tepechpan still had more to tell about life under Aztec and Spanish rule. Then, a Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research Dissertation Fieldwork Grant generously provided funds to support research into the Tira and Tepechpan in Mexico, Spain, and France. A Summer Fellowship from Dumbarton Oaks allowed me to expand the scope of the dissertation outward from Tepechpan to other community histories and to formulate the theoretical framework of the study. Of course, Dumbarton Oaks also provides an ideal intellectual environment in which to work, and this project benefited greatly from my conversations there with Jeffrey Quilter and Joanne Pillsbury, as well as with the other Summer Fellows. At Tulane and beyond, I have had the good fortune of sparking a number of friend-

viii

ships in the field. My exchanges with William Barnes, Delia Cosentino, Carmen FernandezSalvador, Patrick Hajovsky, Bryan Just, and Susan Spitler have surely generated ideas that appear in this book. William Barnes, in particular, has read and commented on portions of this project and has always been available to answer questions and hear my ideas. Also, this book has profited greatly from the insights of my writing group at TCU; thanks to Tony Burgess, Andrea Harris, and Fran Huckaby. I greatly appreciate the University of Texas Press and Theresa May, assistant director and editor-in-chief; Lynne Chapman, manuscript editor; and Alexis Mills, copyeditor, for their support of and assistance with this work, and for the helpful advice and thoughtful comments offered by the anonymous reviewers of the manuscript. Finally, I thank my family and friends, who may not have always understood what I have been working on all these years but who always feigned interest. I am most thankful to my husband, Tom, whose friendship, humor, and patience always provide the perfect balance and escape.




1. Introduction

T

he Tira de Tepechpan is an annals history created in Tepechpan, a relatively minor altepetl, or city-state, in Central Mexico (plates 1–20). Painted by several historians working in the second half of the sixteenth century and then annotated alphabetically over a span of perhaps two hundred years, the main goal of this history was to establish the antiquity, autonomy, and prestige—political, religious, even intellectual—of the patron city.1 To fulfill this goal, important events from 1298 through 1596 were written pictographically above and below a continuous line of indigenous year signs that runs the length of the Tira, with the upper register pertaining to Tepechpan and the lower to Tenochtitlan, capital of the Aztec empire. In 1519, Spaniards entered Tepechpan’s history, but they did not bring it to a close; instead, they simply replaced the Mexica ruling apparatus with their own, at least according to the contributors to the Tira. In 1891, Eugene Boban published a general explanation of this manuscript, and in 1978, Xavier Noguez expanded on this work with his thorough reading of the entire document. Building upon these studies that explained what is represented in the manuscript, I now ask, why is this so? Why did these painters and annotators, working at different times, record the histories that they did? In the years since Noguez’s publication, there have been numerous advances in our understanding of the Aztec pictorial writing system.2 Moreover, a corpus of documents— pictorial and alphabetic; mundane, religious, and historical—that speak of the pre- and

post-conquest periods has been published and explicated. We now have a more nuanced picture of the Aztec and Spanish empires and their impacts on the larger Nahua world. We also have a greater appreciation for the role of history in shaping these worlds. For the indigenous peoples of Central Mexico, history was political argument, a tool of persuasion that could be manipulated to argue for power and status in the pre-conquest and colonial worlds, hence the micropatriotic focus of many of these histories, including the Tira de Tepechpan. The Tira provides a regional perspective on the Aztec and Spanish empires, while it also presents the unique point of view of a city that was clearly a minor player within both empires. In this book, I reconcile the various histories recorded in the Tira by reading the manuscript critically and by comparing it to other Nahua histories. In essence, I trace the intertextual threads, the recurring historical tropes that form the content of the Tira, from Tepechpan to the larger Aztec and Spanish empires and then back to Tepechpan again. I reveal how history in Tepechpan was manipulated to argue for political advancement, as also occurred in other indigenous communities both powerful and powerless. Indeed, if the Tira were our only source on Late Post-Classic (1200–1521) and Early Colonial (1521–1600) Mexico, we might assume that Tepechpan was second only to Tenochtitlan within the Aztec empire and that it was the major indigenous power under Spanish colonial rule. However, other sources clearly present a different picture of Tepechpan, which until now has hindered a

clear understanding of this important manuscript. Ultimately, by tracking these manipulations in the Tira and explicating the ways in which history in the larger Nahua world functioned as a tool of persuasion, I make the Tira make sense. Tepechpan in the Late Post-Classic and Early Colonial Worlds The Aztec empire, the dominant power in Late Post-Classic Central Mexico, was established in 1428 with the defeat of Azcapotzalco, the leading city in the Valley of Mexico at the time.3 Though ostensibly a confederation of three city-states—Tenochtitlan, home of the Mexica people; Texcoco, capital of the Acolhua domain; and Tlacopan, associated with the Tepanec people—the Aztec empire, or Triple Alliance, was clearly controlled by Tenochtitlan, and traditionally Texcoco is accepted as its principal ally and second in command.4 Over fifty smaller city-states, including Tepechpan, were then subject to one of the three ranking cities within the empire, which was consolidated through an elite interaction network (Hodge 1996; Smith and Berdan 1996:9). Upon a subject city’s incorporation into the empire, its local leader was typically kept in power, serving as a link between his subjects and the imperial administrative system. Membership in this imperial network had its privileges, such as gifts and access to land, which guaranteed the loyalty of the local leader and, accordingly, the promotion of his community’s membership in the network. The modern city of Tepexpan corresponds to the Late Post-Classic period site, east of Lake Texcoco (fig. 1.1). Tepechpan is best classified as a secondary altepetl within the Aztec empire. An altepetl was an organization of people associated with a given terri

tory and ruled by a hereditary leader called a tlatoani, or speaker.5 Subsumed within the larger altepetl were a number of constituent parts, which are often called calpulli or tlaxicalli; one or more calpulli may have been the civic/ceremonial center(s) of the altepetl, while others may have been outlying, more rural centers.6 The various calpulli were all bound by their shared obligations to the altepetl. Nevertheless, there is still quite a bit of ambiguity as to the exact structure of the altepetl, certainly because its makeup was not fixed. In Tepechpan’s case, Tepechpan proper was the political and religious center of the altepetl, the calpulli in which the tlatoani resided and where its main temple was located. The other calpulli within the Tepechpan altepetl were located far from the urban Tepechpan, which increased their separatist desires, especially after the Spanish conquest. As a secondary altepetl, Tepechpan itself was subsumed within an even larger citystate, or the huey (great) altepetl of Texcoco, which was associated ethnically with the Acolhua people.7 As such, Tepechpan and thirteen other Acolhua city-states were politically obligated to Texcoco, expected to provide supplies and men in the time of war, and labor and materials for public works. Nevertheless, the secondary altepetl was a more important marker of identity and typically trumped ethnic identity (Horn 1997:20); that is, the people of Tepechpan saw themselves more as Tepechpaneca than as Acolhua, which surely reflects their own separatist desires, much as some calpulli wished to be independent of their altepetl. A destabilizing force within the larger empire was the emergence of Tenochtitlan as the supreme power in the Triple Alliance in the years before the arrival of the Spaniards, with Texcoco taking a more secondary role within the empire (Carrasco 1999:30). This power shift may help to explain what appears to be


Figure 1.1. Map of the Valley of Mexico and principal altepetl in the sixteenth century.

a principal problem of the Tira, namely that the primary contributor to the manuscript made no direct references to Texcoco, despite the fact that Tepechpan was a key member of the Acolhua federation.8 The implication is that Tepechpan was not satisfied with its subordinate status and used its history to argue for a more advantageous position within the empire, effectively usurping Texcoco’s traditional role as principal ally of the Mexica. The altepetl continued to be fundamental to Nahua life after the conquest, as much of the structure of the Aztec empire at the subimperial level of the altepetl was maintained into the Colonial period. Fundamental to the economic and political organization of New Spain was the Spanish cabecera, which was essentially grafted onto the pre-conquest altepetl (Gibson 1964:33; Horn 1997:19). Typically, the Spaniards ranked the different calpulli within the altepetl, making the calpulli that appeared to be the civic and ceremonial center of the altepetl the head town or cabecera, with the remaining outlying calpulli designated as sujetos (Lockhart 1992:20). The sujetos were to provide tribute, labor, and other obligations to the cabecera, which in turn provided such obligations to the Spanish state. This was done first through the encomienda structure, in which a Spaniard, typically one of the early conquerors, maintained control over the cabecera and its tribute and labor obligations; later, these obligations were provided to the state directly through the corregimiento system, in which a number of cabeceras were grouped together under the control of a higher Spanish administrator, or corregidor.9 However, neither of these Spanish administrative systems nor their representatives—the encomendero and the corregidor—are mentioned in the Tira.10 Instead, what is given precedence throughout the Tira is the maintenance of the local ruling line, which further linked the new

cabecera designation with its previous altepetl structure. The presence of a pre-conquest tlatoani was one of the earliest criteria for establishing cabecera status (Gibson 1964:34). Though the Spaniards called the indigenous rulers by new names—at first they were called caciques, but later they were given the official title of gobernador, or governor—the indigenous ruler signified a direct link to the pre-conquest noble ruling line. Accordingly, the current tlatoani of Tepechpan remained its ruler after the conquest, and because of his presence, the city was ranked as a cabecera, with its thirteen outlying calpulli becoming its sujetos. On the surface, the cabecera system dovetailed neatly with the preHispanic altepetl structure; however, by relying on the presence of a tlatoani to determine cabecera status, the Spanish system did not take into account the Aztec imperial structure (Gibson 1964:34). That is, the Spaniards skipped over the primary cities of the Triple Alliance and instead named those secondary city-states ruled by tlatoque as colonial cabeceras. Although politically subordinate to Texcoco, Tepechpan was still ranked as a cabecera because it had a pre-Hispanic tlatoani tradition, which ultimately took precedence.11 In short, Spain’s control over Central Mexico was also maintained through an elite interaction network, but under the Spanish colonial system, the status of the secondary altepetl was elevated to that of the three member cities of the Triple Alliance.12 This Spanish reorganization created an unstable situation as the Triple Alliance cities, especially Texcoco and Tacuba, attempted to regain their pre-Hispanic subject altepetl, many of which had become cabeceras under the Spanish system. Furthermore, some calpulli that were relegated to sujeto status attempted to elevate their own positions by claiming independent ruling lines. Consequently, there was a lot of jockeying for posi-


tion in this new Spanish colonial order, and Tepechpan was in a particularly precarious place. For example, the sujetos of Tepechpan were located north of the city, far from the cabecera (Gibson 1964:45; Evans 2001:94). So distant from the calpulli seat of the tlatoani, these outlying communities often developed a strong sense of independence and powerfully argued for separation (Lockhart 1992:53; Horn 1997:21–22). This was the case in Tepechpan, when its sujeto Temascalapa claimed independence. Moreover, the religious division of the Tepechpan altepetl may have further promoted the separation of its northern sujetos. Spain imposed a doctrinal system on the provinces of New Spain for the conversion of the indigenous peoples, but Tepechpan never became an independent doctrina, or parish, perhaps due to its small size and importance. Tepechpan and just one of its sujetos were taught religious doctrine by the Augustinians of Acolman, while the clergy who lived in Tizoyuca administered to the remainder of Tepechpan’s subjects (Paso y Troncoso 1939–1942, 16:90–91). Further threatening the well-being of Tepechpan were the numerous epidemics of the Colonial period. According to Tepechpan’s response to the Relación geográfica questionnaire of the late sixteenth century, documentation from its lawsuits, and the Tira itself, Tepechpan experienced major population losses following the conquest, and by 1580 had only 950 tribute payers, as opposed to an estimated pre-Hispanic population of 8,000 to 12,000 people (Sanders 1965:74). Ultimately, wealth and power in ancient Mexico rested on a foundation of land and labor, and the Spanish conquest did not fundamentally change this formula (Hicks 1986:48–49). Accordingly, local communities fiercely protected their hold over their subject communities, which provided both land and labor through tribute and service

obligations. The loss of its subject populations could throw the already precarious economic situation of a town like Tepechpan into chaos, and this is just what threatened Tepechpan throughout the sixteenth century. Furthermore, because one of the earliest criteria for cabecera designation was a hereditary leader, or tlatoani, it was paramount for a relatively minor city such as Tepechpan to document the presence and high status of its ruling line. Thus, in the first century after the conquest the altepetl was far from stable, and many communities maintained traditional painted histories to document and argue for their rights and privileges in the new colonial system (Gibson 1964:50–57; Boone 1998b). The Tira was created in this politically charged context as an attempt by Tepechpan’s elite to preserve the community’s corporate integrity despite the divisions of the altepetl and threats to its autonomy. Such historical manuscripts functioned as key political tools in the years following the conquest and, based on their pre-conquest precedents, surely served this same role in the years preceding the Spanish invasion. The Nahua Conception of History Nahua records of the past contain multiple and often contradictory versions of historic events depending on local agendas, with many Nahua histories having large mythic and propagandistic components (Umberger 2002:88; Marcus 1992:3–16; Gillespie 1989: xxii–xxvii; Boone 2001:17–18). Though those seeking objective facts in these histories may find their truth-value suspect, it is often the historical manipulations themselves that carry more intriguing meanings, for these reveal the issues of key concern to Nahua communities and their historians. Indeed, the Nahua conception of history

Introduction

clearly differs from the European view that idealistically sees history as an objective, and therefore true, record of past events (Christensen 1996:441–442; Boone 2000:15). Consciously or not, European historians hid their biases, while Nahua historians more obviously constructed political arguments, reinterpreting and reconfiguring past events to fit contemporary circumstances—in short, for political expediency. For example, after the Mexica ruler Itzcoatl’s victory over Azcapotzalco, he famously burned the old histories and commissioned new ones, presumably to fit the new political landscape created by this victory (Sahagún 1959–1982, 10:191). In effect, this new, official Mexica history legitimized Tenochtitlan’s superior place in the empire (Wolf 1999:189). The Mexica did not have a monopoly on historical revisionism; it is clear that less prestigious Nahua communities also manipulated history. For example, Susan Schroeder (1991:201–202) has shown that the Nahua historian Chimalpahin’s copious records of the past served to glorify the prestige of his hometown, Amaquemecan Chalco. Also, analyses of Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl’s historical accounts reveal that he exalted the deeds of his Acolhua ancestors, especially former Texcocan tlatoque Nezahualcoyotl and Nezahualpilli (Velazco 1998; Lee 2003a, 2003b). The same is true of the pictorials associated with Texcoco, such as the Codex Xolotl (Spitler n.d.) and the Mapa Quinatzin (Douglas 2003), which visually promote Texcoco’s status, while the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992) and the Anales de Tlatelolco (1948)— both recorded alphabetically in the sixteenth century—also present glorified versions of their patron cities’ histories. Spanish chroniclers were clearly aware of this tendency. An account by Fray Diego Durán (1994:465) of the boasting typical in indigenous tales of the past, which could

have applied to Tepechpan or any number of other secondary city-states, exemplifies the tension between European and Nahua conceptions of history, the pull between objective and subjective accounts of past events. Durán lamented that the indigenous history he was following almost completely ignored Tacuba, ostensibly the third most important city in the Aztec empire. As he put it, “I am sure that if I went to Tacuba to ask about their glorious deeds the people there would tell me that they had been greater than Motecuhzoma’s.” He further noted that the problem was not just tied to the history he was following, but that “all of these towns claim that they were exempt from tribute, had royal insignia, and were the victors in war.” When asking residents of one particular town about their power and position in the past, he wrote, “they exaggerated to such an extent, raising their superiority to the skies, that before they reached the stars with their tales I was forced, with soft words, to get them to admit that they had been subjects of and had paid tribute to Nezahualpilli of Tezcoco.” Put simply, we cannot turn to an Acolhua source to counterbalance a Mexica source, as if this will reveal the truth, for both versions were colored by local agendas. Nevertheless, the manipulations found in these histories should not imply that these were complete fabrications; they had to have some relationship to a preexisting conceptual framework. Discussing the role of history after the conquest, Susan Gillespie (1998:256) writes, “the disruption of the conquest required a response, a re-argumentation with remodeled (not ‘invented’) history as people jockeyed for positions of status in the construction of a new society.” Within these new histories, Gillespie argues, it is still possible to discover the indigenous symbol system that structured Aztec ideology. To be sure, manipulations must have also characterized pre-


conquest histories. Long before the Spanish invasion, the Mexica had imposed their own form of rule over many Nahua communities, which surely then reconfigured their histories to jockey for position under Mexica imperial control. The local bias that characterizes Aztec histories should not diminish their value because it is the very contradictions or biases contained within these histories that reveal the issues of overriding importance in indigenous politics and ideologies under both Aztec and Spanish rule.13 The historical manipulations themselves highlight the issues important to the patron city. In Tepechpan’s case, its denial of its subjection to Texcoco, a major historical manipulation in the Tira, suggests that its subject status was considered a serious political liability, one that a reconstructed view of the past might change. Another important difference between Nahua and Western conceptions of history concerns the forms these histories take— pictorial for the Nahuas and alphabetic for Europeans. Indeed, some see the pictorials more as mnemonic devices that inspired oral recitations, making them less valuable than a writing system that recorded specific historical records.14 However, to see the pictorials simply as mnemonic devices ignores their interpretive strength. These manuscripts do not just call to mind a past event but guide its telling and interpretation; that is, the pictorials preserve histories and not simply memories (Douglas 2000:24). Furthermore, the brevity and lack of specificity in Aztec pictorial writings were not accidental. These pictorial histories were purposely ambiguous and sketchy for political reasons, allowing for varied readings based on audience and political objectives (Umberger 1981b:11). The Nahuas did not record their histories with the aim of fixing or standardizing historic traditions. Instead, the past had to remain flexible, amenable to modification, inter

pretation, and glorification (Gillespie 1989: xxiv), both permitted and enhanced by a pictorial writing system. The Nahua history is therefore a living system, and the upheavals caused by the impositions of Aztec and then Spanish control created ideal opportunities for political maneuvering through historical revisionism (Gillespie 1989:xxvi). The Tira de Tepechpan was created in this environment as a tool of persuasion commissioned by Tepechpan’s elites to support their ambitions. By presenting Tepechpan as a politically and religiously powerful city-state with allegiances to the dominant powers, the Tira’s patrons and contributors intended to preserve Tepechpan’s corporate integrity and community identity. The shifts we see in this history, which first established Tepechpan’s alliance with Tenochtitlan only to quickly establish a new alliance with the Spaniards, reveal how easily history was manipulated, especially in the pictorial realm, where slight visual cues carry much interpretive weight. Moreover, the contributors to the Tira were clearly aware of changing colonial policies, and they altered the focus of Tepechpan’s history to improve its standing in this evolving system. The strategies used by the Tira’s contributors are not unique to Tepechpan; the content of Nahua histories is often so standardized that it is possible to trace historical tropes and their manipulations in different histories, thereby highlighting issues important to the Tepechpaneca and other indigenous peoples subject to Aztec and Spanish imperial control. Theoretical Framework Over a span of perhaps 200 years, if not more, a number of painters, annotators, and even previous owners have left their marks

Introduction

on the Tira, and the resultant palimpsestual nature of the manuscript has made it difficult to easily categorize and understand. How do we approach a manuscript with no single moment of creation, with no single authorial intention? Moreover, what approach do we take with a manuscript that combines different systems of meaning with different intentions—the pictorial, which leaves strict interpretation open, versus the alphabetic, which seeks to fix meaning? I reconcile these issues by considering all of the contributions, both the pictorial and the alphabetic, as textual discourse. Walter Mignolo (1993:125– 126, 1995:7–8, 20) and Tom Cummins and Joanne Rappaport (1998:7–11) have called for an expansion of notions of discourse and literacy to include visual forms. The implication is that by considering the pictorial writings of the Nahuas as a visual communication system, as visual discourse, they can be theorized in much the same way as language or alphabetic writing. I therefore treat all contributions to the Tira as texts. I identify and isolate the work of the different contributors, based primarily on content and stylistic features, and I propose a basic chronology for the creation of the manuscript, which my reading of the Tira follows. I then take a thematic approach, providing an iconographic interpretation of the pictorial imagery, and translation and explanation of the alphabetic annotations. From this starting point, I find meaning in the various histories recorded in the Tira by tracing its historical tropes and intertextual threads inside and outside the manuscript, inside and outside Tepechpan. As poststructuralist theory acknowledges, language and discourse are inherently multivalent. Texts do not have a single, unitary meaning, but rather multiple and unstable meanings. Working from the writings of Mikhail Bakhtin, Julia Kristeva (1980) theo

rizes that no text exists alone, nor can its full meaning be approached by treating it in isolation; that is, texts cannot be separated from the larger cultural and social processes out of which they are created (Allen 2000:37). Moreover, to borrow Roland Barthes’s (1977:160) words, each text is “woven entirely with citations, references, echoes, cultural languages . . . antecedent or contemporary, which cut across it through and through in a vast stereophony.” All texts reference and borrow from other texts, and within all texts there exist multiple levels of meaning that depend upon the larger sociocultural context out of which they are created and through which they are interpreted. This sociocultural context, in turn, can only be reconstructed through traces it leaves in other texts. Therefore, to find these layers of meaning, we must consider not only the document itself—in the case of the Tira, its pictorial and alphabetic content—but also its relation to other texts. Applying these ideas to the Tira is especially useful because of its palimpsestual nature.15 With its multiple contributors and dual registers, both of which promote comparison, various levels of meaning exist within the manuscript. An image on the Tepechpan register may have one meaning when considered alone and an additional meaning when compared to the imagery on the Tenochca register. The imagery added by a later painter also takes on additional meaning when compared to the content of an earlier artist. The same is true of the annotations added later, which must speak to the pictorial imagery already on the manuscript. Additionally, more meaning can be found outside the Tira by considering its intertextual threads in their larger sociohistorical context as derived through comparisons with other indigenous histories. A comparative approach is especially im-


portant in Aztec studies because many indigenous records use the same historical tropes, making Aztec histories so standardized that slight deviations carry additional levels of meaning that are easily missed when considering a text in isolation. My approach situates the Tira in its sociohistorical context and follows its references and appropriations of other historical discourses and tropes, thereby bringing the Tira’s multiple levels of meaning to the surface. Of course, by tracing these intertextual threads inside and outside the Tira, the reader/interpreter/viewer, both today and in the past, is necessarily an active participant in this construction of meaning. The Tira as Colonial Discourse The key contextual site from which the Tira was created and through which it must be interpreted is Tepechpan’s subject position under imperial control. Created after the imposition of Spanish colonial rule, the Tira exemplifies colonial discourse; it is above all else a political document. However, though much post-colonial theory seeks to find patterns in the reactions and negotiations inherent in subjecthood, it is important to keep in mind that the colonialism of Spain over New Spain was atypical, for one reason because the unique agency of the Nahuas themselves.16 The Spaniards adapted many of their policies to preexisting conditions in Central Mexico. They did not simply transplant their culture, but instead they contended with and relied upon the preexisting cultural practices and patterns of the Aztec empire and its peoples (Gibson 1964; Lockhart 1991, 1992; Hassig 2006). An important factor that allowed them to do so was the fact that imperial rule was not a new concept to the native peoples of Central Mexico. Though scholars often treat the Aztec fed

eration as an empire, they do not typically see the Mexica as “colonial” rulers. Surely this distinction comes from the different political, religious, and cultural systems of the Spaniards and the Mexica. The Spaniards introduced to their subjects a new form of government, a new religious system, new language, new judicial system, and so on, whereas the Mexica imposition of control did not force subjected territories to fundamentally change their societal structures and beliefs. Nevertheless, those subjects under Aztec rule did have to perform services and pay tribute to the imperial leaders, just as they had to do for their Spanish overlords. Though the nature of their rules differed, both the Mexica and the Spaniards dominated and subjected other territories through militaristic, economic, and religious means. The people of Tepechpan had already lived under subjecthood before the arrival of the Spaniards, and despite the disruptive transition from Aztec to Spanish control, indigenous communities like Tepechpan could adapt pre-conquest strategies to negotiate their new positions as Spanish imperial subjects. One of these strategies was the traditional community history. The Tira, then, is essentially a hybrid product, a response to the Spanish colonial present and a renegotiation of the Aztec past. Accordingly, the Tira’s contributors borrowed signs from the dominant discourses—Mexica, Spanish, even Texcocan— in order to advance Tepechpan’s position within these controlling political systems. This hybrid context is heterogeneous; there is no simple dichotomy here between indigenous and Spanish, but instead a more complicated network of interactions, with the Tepechpaneca setting themselves within and apart from their “others.” Hybridity is not just a strategy of the colonized, who use it to cope with the domi-

Introduction

nant culture, but it is also a strategy of their overlords, who use it to incorporate subjects into their dominating systems (Dean and Leibsohn 2003:24). Hybridity is thus a two-way street, and Homi Bhabha (1994:85– 92) refers to this process as mimicry. In an effort to control their subjects, colonizers impose their culture on the colonized, who may readily take on the signs of the dominant power in the hopes of attaining some of that power for themselves. In the case of the Tira, its contributors utilized the Mexica annals format and then Spanish alphabetic writing, the dominant discourses, to create sites for survival within the symbolic systems of their controllers. Though there clearly was a dominant party in colonial transactions, the subordinated subject did not passively accept outside authority but, instead, negotiated its place within the hegemonic system, appropriating the signs and discourse of the dominant power and subverting them for the community’s agenda. Of course, there is an inherent ambivalence to this approach. The colonial subject is both the observed and the observer, an active participant in the construction of identity, even though this identity is structured largely under colonial rule (de Certeau 1986). In short, Tepechpan’s elites were caught in an ambivalent struggle, negotiating between assimilation and autonomy. By commissioning a community history like the Tira, they were able to articulate their desire for Tepechpan’s political stability and corporate survival on this contested ground, while at the same time promoting their own membership in the elite imperial network. As colonial discourse, then, the Tira represents a type of middle ground, a “Third Space,” where there is no purity of history or culture, no unity or fixity, a place where “even the same signs can be appropriated, translated, rehistoricized and read anew” (Bhabha 1994:37). 10

Ultimately, the vast span of time and history that the Tira encompasses defies simple categorization, as do the varied contributors and their methods and intentions. Hence, I take a diachronic approach with an interest in how history changed through the Colonial period and how interest in the past also changed. In the next chapter, I focus on the Tira itself. I discuss its manufacture, identify its various contributors, and trace its history. Next, I examine the pre-conquest portions of the Tira that were painted entirely by its principal artist, Tepechpan Painter A. In Chapter 3, I consider Tepechpan’s “Pre-Imperial” history. Here, Painter A documented Tepechpan’s status as an autonomous, ancient, and civilized city-state, the cultural superior to Tenochtitlan. Upon the Mexica victory in the Tepanec War and Tenochtitlan’s emergence as the supreme power in the Valley of Mexico, Painter A subtly changed the focus of his history; as I explicate in Chapter 4, he shifted the emphasis to Tepechpan’s alliance with the Mexica victors. With the Spanish defeat of Tenochtitlan and Spain’s emergence as the ruling power, Painter A again modified his approach by documenting Tepechpan’s allegiance to Spanish authority, as discussed in Chapter 5. The subsequent painters of the Tira, considered in Chapter 6, continued to show Tepechpan as an important member of the Spanish empire, but rather than presenting an elegantly patterned and glorified history, as Painter A did, the later painters instead highlighted potential threats to Tepechpan’s corporate integrity under Spanish rule, with the focus increasingly on Tepechpan’s hardships. The annotators, treated in Chapter 7, shared many of the same concerns as the later painters—they were interested in the past only insofar as it impacted the present. In conclusion, I bring these strands together, elucidating the strategies that the contributors to the Tira—and


other indigenous communities, as well— used to ensure the survival of the patron city. Ultimately, this study reveals that a community’s relationship to the ruling power took precedence over ethnicity and previous political affiliations, in both the preconquest and Colonial periods. The pictorial

history, then, was a tool of persuasion, a political argument created with the expectation of maintaining corporate integrity and even earning important privileges. By reconfiguring its past and selectively documenting its present, the community of Tepechpan hoped to secure its future.

Introduction

11


2. The Tira de Tepechpan Its Structure, Contributors, and History

C

learly a dynamic means of recording this community’s history and likely used in a variety of contexts, the Tira is a product of its previous contributors, interpreters, and even owners. Indeed, based on the manuscript’s pictorial and alphabetic content, it is likely that it was not created for any specific function but instead was a multipurpose document that, if and when necessary, could serve Tepechpan’s community interests in a variety of circumstances. This diversity of uses is reflected in the large number of artists and annotators contributing to the manuscript throughout the Colonial period.

the Colonial period, and because they were derived from oil or tempera, they appear heavier and are easily distinguished from the pigments indigenous to Mesoamerica (Vega Sosa 1991:134). The pre-conquest portion of the Tira was painted entirely with natural pigments, and the colonial section with a mix of European and native inks. Alphabetic annotations were also added directly to the manuscript, but the artists of the Tira left no space to accommodate these glosses, unlike the creators of some manuscripts intended for a European audience. For example, throughout much of the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (1995), the pictorial imagery was concentrated at the top of the manuscript, with space left for alphabetic explanations at the bottom. This suggests that the pictorial imagery was the primary means of communication in the Tira, with the alphabetic annotations added at a different time. The fact that the Tira’s annotations were written in Nahuatl also suggests that the manuscript was intended primarily for an indigenous audience; in contrast, the majority of annotations in the Codex TellerianoRemensis were written in Spanish. Extended, the Tira is 625 cm long and approximately 21 cm high (Boban 1891:245). However, between the year signs for 2 Reed (1559) and 3 Flint (1560), there is a noticeable attachment of paper (plate 18). The feet of a funerary bundle painted above this date are truncated, which suggests that the final strip covered a portion of the figure and, consequently, was added after the figure was painted. This paper must have been added sometime after the Tira’s original creation,

Physical Description of the Tira De Tepechpan The Tira de Tepechpan was painted on native amate (bark) paper, whose manufacture was a pre-conquest tradition that continued through the Colonial period (Noguez 1978, 1:14).1 Commonly, sheets of bark paper were glued together to create a long and relatively narrow strip, called a tira, which was usually rolled or folded in an accordion fashion. Because this paper was too rough and porous for the delicate writings of the ancient Aztecs, it was painted with a fine white gesso or plaster coating. Nahua artists would then paint on this coating, using natural pigments derived locally. These pigments were applied like a watercolor, giving the painting a delicate quality. The lightness of the colors and the uniformity of the colors’ tone make these native pigments recognizable. European inks and paints were introduced during 13

which implies that it was continuously updated over time. At yet another later point, a second coating of gesso was applied to the manuscript, perhaps in an effort to conserve the document (Boban 1891:269; Noguez 1978, 1:17). This was added after the pictorial imagery and many of the alphabetic glosses were written on the Tira. The Tira is now folded accordion-style into twenty sections, each spanning fifteen to sixteen years and measuring approximately 32 cm in length, but this folding pattern was surely not the intention of the original contributor. Often the creator of a tira would make allowances for the folds, and in fact, there are small gaps in the continuous line of year signs between each thirteen-year Aztec quarter-cycle. The Tira was never folded at these gaps. If it had been, one would expect to see creases or breaks in the gesso coating at these divisions, but none are visible. Thus, the Tira was never folded as originally intended, perhaps because the original painter was separated from the manuscript before his work was complete. The Format of the Tira De Tepechpan As an annals history, the Tira’s basic structure is provided by the Aztec calendar, which is based on a fifty-two-year cycle, often compared to our century. Aztec years are designated by one of four signs—Rabbit, Reed, Flint, and House—that cycle through coefficients from one to thirteen. Beginning with 1 Rabbit, the next year is 2 Reed, then 3 Flint, 4 House, 5 Rabbit, 6 Reed, . . . 12 House, 13 Rabbit, 1 Reed, and so on. This system results in four thirteen-year quartercycles (1 Rabbit–13 Rabbit, 1 Reed–13 Reed, etc.) and a fifty-two-year century/cycle, after which the years repeat. Noting that the Tira’s composition was based on the Aztec quarter14

cycle, José Antonio Pichardo (n.d.), a former owner of the manuscript, calculated that the Tira must have begun originally with the year 1 Rabbit (1298) and ended with 13 Flint (1596). However, as noted above, an additional piece of paper was added to the Tira between 2 Reed (1559) and 3 Flint (1560), and about this same time, a new hand painted the remaining year signs. Thus, I believe the original artist of the Tira intended his history to last from 1 Rabbit (1298) to 13 House (1558), which creates a history of 260 years and exactly five fifty-two-year cycles. Number symbolism was especially potent in Mesoamerica, and it is surely no coincidence that the original Tira recorded a history of 260 years, for this number calls to mind the 260 days in the Aztec ritual calendar. Moreover, a span of exactly five fifty-twoyear cycles is especially elegant as it mimics the Aztec creation story as pictured on the famous Calendar Stone. According to this legend, the four previous worlds created by the gods were all destroyed, and the Aztecs believed that they lived in the fifth age, called the Fifth Sun. In such a system, the Tira’s original creator correlated the present age with his own. Because the annals format is inherently connected to the calendar, discrepancies in dating among different sources become emphasized, and it has been suggested that these discrepancies may stem from the use of different calendars in Central Mexico. Some have argued that anywhere from nine to thirteen different year counts, each beginning with a different start date, were in use in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries (Kirchhoff 1950; Jiménez Moreno 1961; Davies 1973:193–210; Edmonson 1988:132–133). Unconvinced by these arguments, H. B. Nicholson (1971:70) allows for variation but maintains that one calendar must have been in effect after the Tepanec War and subsequent consolidation


of the Aztec empire. Ross Hassig (2001:80– 81) also permits that different calendars may have been in use in Central Mexico, but he argues that the Mexica imposed their calendar upon conquered territories for the simplification of tribute collection. Indeed, in her comparison of the reign dates of Mexica tlatoque, Elizabeth Boone (1992:50– 51; 2000:42) found no significant variation, which suggests that the same count must have been in use in these varied histories. Further support for the use of the Mexica year count throughout the Aztec empire is the fact that many communities, including Tepechpan, recorded the celebration of the New Fire Ceremony, which marked the shift from one fifty-two-year cycle to the next, in the year 2 Reed rather than the traditional 1 Rabbit. Hassig (2001:122) persuasively argues that the Mexica changed the celebration year of the New Fire Ceremony to reflect their political control. In fact, many histories, including the Tira, projected the change into the distant past, revealing an acceptance of Mexica hegemony. Thus, the calendar used by the creators of the Tira de Tepechpan is the same one used by the Mexica of Tenochtitlan. Furthermore, Boone (1996:201) argues that the year-count annals format itself is a diagnostic trait of Mexica control: “By creating the year-count annals to record their history, the Mexica located time within the mental conception of Tenochtitlan.” Indeed, as a diagnostic feature of the Aztec empire and Tenochca control, local rulers readily adopted the annals format, just as they did the calendar, to show their allegiance to the imperial capital. In effect, the subject community mimicked the capital city in the hopes of appropriating some of that power for itself. Thus, the artists of the Tira used the year-count annals and the Mexica calendar to communicate Tepechpan’s membership in the Aztec empire and

the associated privileges such membership conferred. Later, these contributors would appropriate Spanish concepts, such as Gregorian year correlations and alphabetic text, to show their place within the new empire. In short, according to the conception of history presented in the Tira, Tepechpan was a key and willing member of both empires. The Painters All of the painters of the Tira de Tepechpan recorded history using the Aztec pictorial writing system, albeit in varying degrees. During the Colonial period, indigenous artists added more Renaissance stylistic techniques to their work, yet all of the Tira’s painters continued to record most information through pictorial representations. At its simplest level, Aztec pictorial writing used pictures to convey meaning; that is, a drawing of a rabbit conveys the idea of a rabbit. Logograms or ideograms were used to convey words or abstract ideas; for example, a representation of a burning temple signifies conquest on a more symbolic level. To convey more specific information, such as personal and place names, Aztec artists turned to hieroglyphic writing, where graphemes or glyphs “spell” words pictorially or phonetically. The Aztec writing system is now sufficiently understood to allow a fairly straightforward iconographic reading of these signs. For artists trained in the Aztec style, the viewer’s ease of understanding an image was paramount. These artists accordingly preferred conceptual representations, resulting in a highly conventionalized painting/ writing system where information was conveyed in a clear and succinct manner. After the conquest, many indigenous artists—including the later painters of the Tira—were influenced by the more perceptual art style

Its Structure, Contributors, and History

15

introduced by the Spaniards, who favored the illusion of reality on a two-dimensional surface.2 Just as the indigenous historians incorporated Gregorian year correlations into their traditional histories to show their membership in the new Spanish empire—in effect, their acceptance of Spanish concepts of time—the later painters of the Tira incorporated European stylistic techniques into their paintings to show their acceptance of yet another facet of Spanish control. These later painters pictured the world more as a Spanish artist would. To identify the work of the different painters, it is helpful to determine the extent to which each worked in the native artistic style, the presence of Renaissance stylistic techniques, and distinct features of each painter’s hand. Based on this stylistic evidence, I identify four different pictorial contributors, whom I call Tepechpan Painters A, B, C, and D. As the Colonial period progressed, more Renaissance stylistic techniques were incorporated into traditional indigenous paintings, while the hieroglyphic component of Aztec writing faded. The relative amount of native and European stylistic techniques coupled with the chronological parts on which each painter worked enabled me to determine roughly when each must have contributed. These criteria suggest that Tepechpan Painter A must have worked on the Tira first, followed by Tepechpan Painters B, C, and D. Tepechpan Painter A Tepechpan Painter A (hereafter called Painter A) painted the entire pre-conquest portion of the Tira and much of its colonial imagery until 1553. He also drew the Aztec time line until the year disk for 13 House (1557). Painter A worked fully within the Aztec tradition. Indeed, his style is one of the most tradi16

tional of the known Nahua colonial artists, which suggests that he was a tlacuilo, or artist/scribe, trained in the Aztec pictorial system sometime before the conquest. Painter A’s representation of the Tepechpan leader Icxicuauhtli (plate 2, upper register) is exemplary of the four main features of the Aztec painting style (Robertson 1959:15– 23; see also Boone 1982). First, the human form is not visually unified; that is, component parts, depicted from different points of view, create a whole. Thus, Icxicuauhtli’s face, arms, and legs are shown in profile, while his eye and torso were drawn frontally. Second, in Aztec paintings, line was used simply to frame areas of color and was not expressive. Accordingly, Painter A used what Robertson (1959:15, 65–66) calls a uniform frame line, or a steady line of uniform consistency that encloses and qualifies areas of color. In this case, a black line of unvarying width encloses Icxicuauhtli’s garments and outlines his body parts. Because pre-Hispanic indigenous artists were not concerned with rendering the illusion of a three-dimensional figure, they made no attempts to show depth through modeling or shading. Painter A therefore used flat washes of color, as seen in the uniform hue of Icxicuauhtli’s skin. Moreover, Icxicuauhtli’s white cloak is shown in a flat manner with no drapery indicated. And finally, space is undefined; Icxicuauhtli was not placed in a naturalistic setting. Instead, his location was indicated with a hieroglyph of a curved hill. Although Aztec figures tend to appear flat, Aztec artists did sometimes seek naturalistic representations (Boone 1982:158). For example, Aztec painters often differentiated left and right feet, which was a pre-conquest convention. In the Tira, Icxicuauhtli’s left foot is shown flat and in profile, while his right foot is tilted to reveal the toes in the correct order. Furthermore, as this same ex-


ample reveals, Painter A drew hands accurately grasping items, which later artists did not so skillfully achieve. In fact, Painter A’s work is highly detailed; he often painted full hands with fingers and nails indicated, and he accurately painted the intricate hairstyle typical of indigenous women (plate 2, lower register). Moreover, Painter A’s figures are easily recognized for their compact forms, especially when compared to the oversized figures painted by the later contributors. Unfortunately, the exact date at which Painter A worked is unknown. Because his imagery is not seen after 1553, I believe he died that year or was otherwise separated from the manuscript. Thus, Painter A either created the Tira in 1553 or worked on it for an uncertain number of years prior to 1553, keeping it continuously updated. I favor the latter hypothesis for a few reasons. First, his time line extends until 1557, which suggests that he planned to update the Tira with current events after 1553. Also, the fact that Painter A never folded the Tira as intended implies that he was separated unexpectedly from the manuscript before completing his work. Tepechpan Painter B Tepechpan Painter B added events to the history already recorded by Painter A between 1522 and 1553, and he continued to add new events until 1559 (plates 15–18). Painter B continued to convey information pictorially, but his style changed to allow for more perceptual representations. He abandoned the indigenous tradition of identifying important historical figures with name glyphs, though he continued to use place glyphs. Also, Painter B tended to pose figures in the native conceptual style, but he added more perceptual details. For example, he used shading to create the illusion of threedimensionality: in a representation of an in

digenous warrior (plate 16, lower register), he painted the figure’s garment yellow but used green shading at the sides to indicate volume. In fact, Painter B’s most experimental work was reserved for new subject matter, such as Spanish bishops (plate 16, upper and lower registers), whom he depicted in a slight three-quarter view, which is never seen in pre-conquest Aztec works. Moreover, the line of Painter B is steady, in accordance with the Aztec painting style, yet it is more expressive. For example, he used a broken frame line to show folds and drapery, which was most skillfully executed in his representation of a kneeling indigenous figure shown under the year 4 Flint (1548; plate 17). A number of general features further distinguish the hand of Painter B, the most obvious being the large size of his figures, which tend to dwarf those by Painter A. Furthermore, figures by Painter B appear to float because they have tiny feet that are not firmly planted on the ground. Moreover, in contrast to Painter A, Painter B did not distinguish between left and right feet, his figures have oversized hands, and his seated figures do not comfortably occupy their relatively small chairs. The degeneration of the native painting style typical of Painter B’s work suggests that he worked after Painter A. Moreover, many of the events added by him are removed from the time line, which indicates that Painter A’s history was already in place when Painter B contributed. Most likely, he worked either in 1559 or began working in 1553 (after Painter A’s separation from the Tira) and continuously updated the manuscript until 1559. Tepechpan Painter C In 2 Reed (1559), a separate strip of native amate paper was glued to the original Tira


17

(plate 18). At this point a different hand drew the final year signs, suggesting that the new strip was added in or near this year. The appearance of new iconography also indicates that another contributor, Tepechpan Painter C, began working on the Tira at about this date and kept it updated until 1570 or, alternatively, worked in one sitting in 1570, after which we no longer see his work. The work of Painter C reveals the continuing development of Aztec pictorial writing into the sixteenth century. Painter C continued to record information pictorially, yet he abandoned Aztec hieroglyphic writing; he no longer used personal and place name glyphs to identify specific people and locations. Furthermore, Painter C added more European perceptual techniques to his work. This is best seen in his depictions of skulls (plate 18, upper register). These act as glyphs in the pre-Hispanic manner to indicate death, but they are shown according to European conventions, in a slight three-quarter view with shading to create the illusion of volume. Painter C also began to make use of European perspectival techniques, albeit in an inaccurate manner, as seen with the house above 10 Reed (plate 18). A few general features help us to further distinguish the work of Painter C. His figures are larger than those by Painter A and slightly smaller than those by Painter B. Like those of Painter B, his figures have oversized hands that do not accurately grasp items. Also, he used a thick, broken line in the European manner to convey folds and drapery, but his line is not as steady nor neat as those of Painters A and B. Tepechpan Painter D Although the final pages of the Tira are in poor condition today, the paintings from 1576 to 1590 (plates 19, 20) reveal enough similarities to lead me to believe that they 18

were painted by one hand, Painter D. The lull in events between 1570 and 1576 suggests that Painter D may have begun working on the Tira around 1576 and kept it updated until the end, or he painted his history later (at about 1590/1596) in one sitting. Typical of an artist working toward the end of the sixteenth century, Painter D failed to identify specific people and places with hieroglyphic writing, although he continued to convey information pictorially, even though by this time many Nahua historians had adopted alphabetic writing. For the most part, Painter D’s images reveal knowledge of European artistic conventions and greater naturalism, especially in his use of line. In the indigenous tradition, Painter D used a thick line to outline figures; however, his line is not of a uniform consistency, and it was used also to convey the illusion of folds and drapery. Furthermore, Painter D was the first artist in the Tira to attempt a naturalistic setting by showing foliage on the lower register at the very end of the manuscript (plate 20). Painter D, like Painter C, also attempted a perspectival representation of an indigenous house under 10 House (1581), but his, too, is imprecise (plate 19). The illusionistic inaccuracies of Painters C and D suggest that they were not formally trained in the European system but experimented with these techniques on their own. The Annotators Either during or after the figural imagery was painted, different annotators added alphabetic glosses and Christian year correlations to the Tira. Annotator 1 was the most prolific, and for the most part his annotations concern the pictorial record, though in places he added additional information not recorded by the Tira’s painters. His firm hand and neat writing style are distinctive, and the second


coat of gesso applied to the manuscript does not impinge on his glosses, which confirms that they were written before the gesso was applied and likely at an early date. Moreover, his annotations appear throughout the manuscript, further suggesting that he was its primary scribe. Based on the style of his writing, its consistency, and orthography, I suspect that Annotator 1 added his glosses in one sitting sometime between 1590 (when his final gloss appears) and 1650. His neat cursive writing is typical of the Early Colonial period, as is the European ink that he used, which has now faded to a distinctive brown. Also, he often used q’ as an abbreviation for qui, he did not use o- consistently as a preterit marker, and he used the word tlatoani for ruler; all of these features are typical in alphabetic writings of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries (Karttunen and Lockhart 1976:113, 117). The contributions of the next writer, Annotator 2, seem to have little relation to the pictorial imagery. He listed different lands over which Tepechpan may have once claimed control (plates 12, 13). Such information was not typically included in annals histories, which may explain the awkward and confusing presentation of this data in the Tira. This scribe’s writing is easily distinguished from the rest: the letters are rather messy and are printed in separate block letters rather than the linked, almost cursive script typical of the other scribes. Three more annotators added sparse information to the Tira and mostly followed the pictorial record, though not always correctly. The content and placement of the annotations suggest that they were added after the pictorial imagery was completed, anytime from the late sixteenth century and most likely into the seventeenth and possibly eighteenth centuries. Sometime later in its history, a second gesso coating was applied to the Tira,

and the glosses by Annotators 4 and 5 were written on top of it. These glosses appear on a copy of the manuscript commissioned by Pichardo and therefore must have been added before this copy was made at about 1800.3 A former owner of the Tira, Jean Waldeck, added some year correlations directly to the Tira, and he also stamped his name on the manuscript and folded it in twenty leaves, as it remains today.4 A stamp that reads “Collection E. Eug. Goupil à Paris. Ancienne Collection J. M. A. Aubin” was also added throughout the Tira and comments further on the Tira’s previous ownership. As it exists today, the Tira is not just a product of the community of Tepechpan. It has also become a product of its former owners and interpreters, who left their imprints in various ways on the manuscript itself. The Tira, then, has had a long history with no one moment of creation. It was a dynamic record of the community’s past and present and, as such, was continuously updated. In this regard, the Tira is a living document, similar to the primordial titles of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries— part alphabetic, part pictorial accounts of the past that never had a clear “end result” but were constantly modified to answer to Spanish demands and encroachments on indigenous communities (Wood 1998:203; see also Haskett 2005). This suggests that throughout its history, the Tira was never intended for one specific function, but instead a more general one: to serve the best interests of the Tepechpan altepetl and its leaders over time. History of the Tira De Tepechpan It is still unknown exactly how the Tira left the community of Tepechpan and entered the hands of European collectors. The first historical mention of the Tira places it with


19

the Italian collector Lorenzo Boturini (1702– 1755) by 1743.5 Boturini journeyed in 1736 to New Spain, where he became interested in the history of pre-conquest Mexico. An avid collector of Mexican antiquities, Boturini may have acquired the Tira directly from Tepechpan, as he commonly visited indigenous communities in the Valley of Mexico in search of ancient manuscripts (Noguez 1978, 1:24). Boturini’s collecting activities eventually aroused the suspicions of the viceregal court, which had him arrested and imprisoned in 1743. He was deported to Spain, and his collection was confiscated by order of the viceroy. The viceregal government carried out an inventory of Boturini’s collection in 1743, and the Tira appears in this inventory under the number 3–6. A copy of the Tira that Boturini had made appears here as well. Boturini’s collection was then shuffled among different governmental offices until the early nineteenth century, when the collection, in a depleted condition, was placed in the Museo Nacional and the Archivo General. The Tira does not appear in an inventory of the Museo’s collection published in 1804, though the Boturini copy is listed; however, by 1888, this copy too was missing from the Museo Nacional and still has not been found.6 Exactly how the Tira was disengaged from the Boturini collection is unclear, but the manuscript eventually ended up in the collection of Father José Antonio Pichardo (1748–1812), who compiled a large collection of ancient Mexican painted histories and alphabetic documents (Noguez 1978, 1:26–28). Father Pichardo also had a copy of the Tira made. While in Mexico in the 1830s, the French explorer, artist, and writer Jean Waldeck (1766–1875) bought the Tira and Pichardo’s copy. Waldeck took some early notes on the manuscript and also made a tracing of the Pichardo copy of the Tira (Diel 20

2002:16); these are now housed in the Newberry Library Ayer Collection in Chicago. In 1842, Waldeck sold the Tira and the Pichardo copy to the French collector Jean Aubin, who in 1889 sold his entire collection to French collector Eugene Goupil (Boban 1891:245, 274).7 Finally, in 1898, most of the Goupil collection—including the Tira de Tepechpan and the Pichardo copy—was acquired by the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, where it remains housed today (Fonds Mexicain 13– 14; Fonds Mexicain 88-6). Conclusions The fact that a number of people contributed to the Tira, and most at the behest of Tepechpan’s elite leaders, and that it did not leave the community until 1743 at the latest suggests that the Tira was not made for one specific function. Scholars often create clear-cut distinctions when considering the audiences and intentions of indigenous histories, seeing them intended for either an indigenous or Spanish audience (Karttunen 1998; Glass 1975a:13–19). However, such criteria are difficult to apply because a document might have been made for one use and then served another; manuscripts typically had lives beyond their original contexts of creation (Lienhard 1991:33). In her analysis of the maps created by indigenous artists in response to the questions from the Spanish Relaciones geográficas, Barbara Mundy (1996:71–72) argues that these maps were painted both for a powerful Spanish patron and for the local community. They are therefore colored by “doubleconsciousness.” That is, they reflect two competing agendas: how the local community saw itself, and how the local community thought the Spaniards wanted to see it. I believe the Tira is colored by this same sense of a dual audience. However, the impetus for the creation of the maps for the


Relaciones geográficas came from Spain, and the maps were ultimately destined for Spain. In contrast, the motivation for the painting of the Tira came from Tepechpan itself, and it was kept and maintained by the local community, as evidenced by the fact that the primary means of communication was pictorial, and when alphabetic annotations were added to the manuscript, they were written in Nahuatl, not Spanish. Moreover, the general content of the manuscript and its multiple contributors suggest that it was a more multipurpose document that could serve

Tepechpan’s community interests at different times and in a variety of circumstances. Indeed, the Tira surely had the potential to serve Tepechpan’s interests in a Spanish legal context as well, but since there is no record of its ever being entered as evidence in a Spanish court of law, it is my sense that the people of Tepechpan actively sought to maintain control over the document. It is likely they were able to do so until its economic value outweighed its historical value, at which point it was sold to a European collector.


21


The Tira de Tepechpan, Fonds Mexicain 13–14, Bibliothèque National de France

plate 1

plates 2 and 3

plate 4

plate 5

plate 6

plate 7

plates 8 and 9

plate 10

plate 11

plates 12 and 13

plate 14

plate 15

plate 16

plates 17 and 18

plate 19

plate 20

3. Pre-Imperial History

A

ccording to Central Mexican his‑ torical tradition, after the fall of the esteemed urban center of Tula in the northern Valley of Mexico in the twelfth century, its noble Toltec descendants dispersed. Many of them settled in different communities around Lake Texcoco, with the greatest concentration said to have been at Culhuacan, which accordingly became known as the seat of Toltec nobility in the Late Post-Classic period. At about this same time, nomadic peoples called Chichimecs migrated from farther north and also founded communities around Lake Texcoco. To elevate their positions, the Chichimec leaders often married noblewomen from Culhuacan because of their Toltec heritage. With this infusion of noble blood into the Chichimec ruling family, its legitimacy and future dynastic succession could be established. Many Aztec histories begin by recalling this migration of nomadic Chichimecs into the Valley of Mexico and their subsequent intermarriage with Toltec nobility and establishment of a noble dynasty; the Tira de Tepechpan is no different. The pre-imperial section of the Tira, painted entirely by Painter A, focuses on the migrations, foundations, and dynastic successions of Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, respectively. By presenting these histories on parallel tracks, Painter A forces a comparison of the two polities. These same themes were commonly recorded in other Aztec histories, both pictorial and alphabetic, from a variety of communities. These themes thus function as historical tropes, and as such, they must have

significance beyond the Tepechpan community. Through a reading of Painter A’s pictorial history for its primary meaning and then tracing these themes outward from Tepechpan to Tenochtitlan, and again to the larger Aztec empire, Painter A’s agenda becomes clear: his message is that Tepechpan was an ancient, autonomous, and noble city center whose pedigree was a step above that of Tenochtitlan. Migration For the Aztecs, history typically begins with migration. For example, in the Codex Mexicanus (fig. 3.1), the early migrants literally step from their homeland of Aztlan onto the time line, thus initiating both time and history (Boone 1994:67). The Codex Boturini (fig. 3.2) also begins with an image of Aztlan immediately followed by the initiation of the migration. The implication is that history, and time for that matter, begins once a group decides to move forward. It was clearly important for each altepetl to trace its own migration. In the Codex Boturini (1964:2), various tribes migrate into Central Mexico and slowly drift apart. These separate migrations establish the autonomy of each future altepetl. In the Tira, Painter A distinguished the migration of the future Tepechpaneca from the Tenochca, but by presenting these migrations on parallel tracks and manipulating potent visual cues, he showed that Tepechpan was the more advanced—politically, culturally, even cosmically—of the two.

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Figure 3.1. Departure from Aztlan in 1 Flint (1168). Codex Mexicanus, 18. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

Figure 3.2. Journey from Aztlan to Teoculhuacan in 1 Flint. Codex Boturini, 1. CONACULTA.-INAH.MEX; reproduced with permission of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

Mexica Migrants The beginning of the Mexica migration appears in the Tira on the lower register under the years 4 House/5 Rabbit (1301/1302), where Painter A depicted two similar figures placed one above the other (plate 1). This section is in poor condition, so I include a drawing in figure 3.3. The men are unnamed, but a number of features distinguish them as Chichimecs, who were known as nomadic hunters: they wear only loincloths, and they carry bows and arrows and have fiber quivers tied around their torsos. Their elaborate headdresses are also typical of Chichimecs (Noguez 1978, 1:34). Called a cozoyahualolli, this headdress consists of a ring, painted half red and half blue, through which two tufts of yellow feathers are held. Because the beginning of the Tira is damaged, it is difficult to tell if these Chichimec hunters once faced something, though there seems to be a lack of space on the original manuscript for an additional representation. Painter A thus represented these early Mexica as generic Chichimec hunters.

Thus the name of this city translated literally is “The Place of the Curved Hill,” but more metaphorically, it reads “The Place of the Ancestors.” Icxicuauhtli’s placement in front of this place sign presumably indicates his departure from there. Icxicuauhtli’s clothing and accoutrements also convey meaning. He wears a white cotton tilma bordered in red and a turquoise diadem, or xihuitzolli. Shown in profile, the crown is colored blue to show its turquoise medium and is knotted at the back with a red leather strap with its ends finished in gold. As man-made items of fine media, the tilma and crown are associated with a more civilized society. However, Icxicuauhtli also carries a bow and arrows, which are typically associated with the nomadic Chichimec peoples in Aztec pictorials. Taken together, Painter A’s record informs the reader that in the year 1 Flint (1324), the noble Chichimec

Tepechpan Migrants On the upper Tepechpan register, the first historical notice occurs in the year 1 Flint (1324; plate 2). Here, Painter A drew a male figure identified by a name glyph of a foot (icxi-tl) and an eagle head (cuauh-tli), reading “Icxicuauhtli” (Foot Eagle). In this year, the color of the year disks changes from blue to red, signaling a shift in Tepechpan history. Shown standing and therefore in motion, Icxicuauhtli is in the act of migration. He is in front of a curved-hill place glyph, which must refer to a city known as Teoculhuacan. The curved hill calls forth the Nahuatl word col-li, which is a homophone meaning both “something twisted” and “grandfather.”

Figure 3.3. Drawing of Chichimec migrants. Tira de Tepechpan, page 1 (after Aubin 1849–1851).

Pre-Imperial History

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Icxicuauhtli departed from Teoculhuacan, presumably in search of a new homeland. Cosmic Implications Setting the Tepechpan migrant apart from the Mexica are his calendric associations. First, the colors of the year disks change with the appearance of the Tepechpan leader, and they continue to do so throughout the Tira with shifts in Tepechpan’s leadership. By correlating the colors of the year disks with these changes in rulership, Painter A communicated the close connection between the rulers of Tepechpan and the Aztec calendar. Enrique Florescano (1994:44) describes the Nahua conception of time and space: Each hour, day, month, year, or chronological era was governed by one of these forces or divine powers, so that its dominion encompassed simultaneously a precise space and temporal lapse, until with the advent of another temporal moment that force was displaced by the new one, which from that instant ruled its corresponding space and time. The Tepechpan ruler, here in the form of Icxicuauhtli, is this divine force that governed the years until his death, when a new divine force, in the human form of a new tlatoani, took control. An important facet of political power in Central Mexico was control of time and the calendar, which communicated control of the past and future (Umberger 1981a:214). By changing the colors of the year disks in relation to events associated with rule in Tepechpan, the Tira’s painters communicated that Tepechpan’s leaders controlled this aspect of political power. The connection of Icxicuauhtli with the Aztec calendar is further enhanced by the fact that his migration begins in 1 Flint, a highly

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important date in the Aztec calendric system. Falling at the exact midpoint in the fifty-twoyear calendric cycle, 1 Flint is given sacred significance in several Nahua histories. For example, the Codex Xolotl (1996), which is associated with the Acolhua domain, shows the division of lands and the establishment of new dynasties in this same year (Dibble 1996, 1:34–35; Boone 2000:185–86). However, the date takes on even greater significance when we trace its appearance in Mexica history. A number of events important to the Mexica happened in 1 Flint years: according to Chimalpahin’s (1998, 1:183–185) Third Relation, as well as the Codices Mexicanus (see fig. 3.1), Boturini (see fig. 3.2), and Azcatitlan (1995:2), Mexica migrants left Aztlan and began their migration; according to the Codex Mendoza (1992:2v, 5v), two important Mexica tlatoque (Acamapichtli and Itzcoatl) acceded to the throne; and finally the Mexica defeated the Tepaneca and established their own imperial rule. The year 1 Flint is also the calendric name and ritual day of the Mexica patron deity Huitzilopochtli. In short, 1 Flint symbolizes the birth of the Mexica empire, if not the empire itself.1 As such, the date is also found on two of the main sculptural monuments associated with Tenochtitlan: the Calendar Stone and the Temple Stone. Richard Townsend (1979:55, 69) associates the 1 Flint glyphs on these two monuments with the Mexica patron deity Huitzilopochtli and also with Mexica rule. By associating the Mexica state with this cosmologically significant date, the Mexica communicated the legitimacy and sacred nature of their rule (Townsend 1979:70). Though 1 Flint may have had symbolic associations for the Nahuas in general, the Mexica appropriated the metaphoric implications of this date to an extraordinary degree. They did so to


show their rule as divinely sanctioned, a preordained part of the cosmic progression. Tepechpan Painter A attempted the same thing. By associating this cosmically charged date with the Tepechpan ancestor, founder, and initiator of Tepechpan history, he showed the sacred legitimacy of the Tepechpan state, just as the Mexica historians did for Tenochtitlan. As Townsend (1979:71) writes, these events and offices could only be meaningful when legitimized by portraying them symbolically in cosmological settings; the state and the social order were only valid and therefore understandable in the measure that they were equated with the sacred world. Thus, Icxicuauhtli’s migratory journey was given sacred significance and legitimization because it began on a key date in the Nahua cosmological system. In contrast, the calendric association of the early Mexica migrants with the years 4 House/5 Rabbit (1301/1302) carries much less weight. Other histories associate the Mexica migration with the year 1 Rabbit, a significant date because it is the first year in the Aztec calendric cycle and the year in which the present age, the Fifth Sun, began. For example, the Codex Mexicanus (1952:22) shows the Mexica migrants at Chicomoztoc, an important stop along their migration, on this date. Moreover, Chimalpahin (1998, 1:65) mentions that in the distant past the Mexica arrived at Aztlan in 1 Rabbit (AD 50). Important historic events for the Mexica were said to have happened in cosmically charged years, associating these events with prophecy and divine sanctification. Accordingly, Painter A’s dating may be seen as a subversive device meant to subtly disassociate the Mexica with the cosmic implications of

certain dates and thereby deny these events a sacred significance. Sacred Space Just as Painter A associated the future Tepechpan founder with the sacred year 1 Flint, he also associated him with a sacred space, Teoculhuacan, which is often conflated with Chicomoztoc, or “Seven Caves Place,” known as a place of sacred emergence. The curved-hill place glyph of Teoculhuacan is similar to the one used for Culhuacan, a city-state on the southern shores of Lake Texcoco where Toltec descendants had settled. According to the Relación de la genealógia (1991:106), Teoculhuacan was the original and highly esteemed homeland of the Culhua people; by implication, Teoculhuacan must also have been associated with Toltec nobility (Davies 1980:23–25). The Teo- prefix added to Culhuacan indicates the sacred nature of Teoculhuacan, for teo-tl means “god” or “divine.” The placement of Icxicuauhtli immediately in front of the place glyph, then, suggests that Icxicuauhtli left Teoculhuacan on this date to begin or resume his migration, just as the Culhua did. Because Teoculhuacan had both sacred and Toltec significance, the implication is that Icxicuauhtli also had such associations. Other peoples also claimed a past association with Teoculhuacan. Chimalpahin (1998, 1:189) says that the Amaquemeca, of whom he was a descendant, went from Aztlan to Teoculhuacan. Furthermore, according to a number of sources associated with the Mexica, they too stopped at Teoculhuacan along their migration; in the Codices Azcatitlan (1995:3), Boturini (see fig. 3.2), and Mexicanus (see fig. 3.1), Teoculhuacan was the first stop for the Mexica after having left their homeland of Aztlan. In these sources, Aztlan is shown as an island city, with Teo-


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culhuacan on the opposite shore, suggesting the two are linked symbolically (Boone 2000:214). The Mapa Sigüenza (in Boone 2000:167) shows the Teoculhuacan glyph immediately next to Aztlan as the starting point in the Mexica migration, and a number of prose sources also associate Teoculhuacan with Aztlan.2 The ideological significance of the migration in Mexica history suggests that Mexica nobility manipulated this historical tradition to legitimize their position.3 By conflating Aztlan with Teoculhuacan, the Mexica may have been attempting to appropriate the sacred significance of this place from the Culhua. Interestingly, another key group who arrived in the Valley of Mexico, the Acolhua, did not mention Teoculhuacan in accounts of their own migration. Thus, those groups that claimed an association with Teoculhuacan, such as the Tepechpan‑ eca, may have borrowed this trope from the Mexica, who themselves appropriated it from the Culhua. Nevertheless, Painter A did not show the Mexica migrants at Teoculhuacan. Furthermore, he did not include two other places that are typically seen in the Mexica migration tradition and that are often conflated with Teoculhuacan: Chicomoztoc and Aztlan. Just as Painter A failed to associate the Mexica migrants with a ritually charged date, he also failed to show them at a ritually charged place, thereby denying them their sacred sanctification, while at the same time stressing such sanctification for Tepechpan. Social and Political Transformation Both the Tepechpaneca and Mexica migrants are associated with nomadic, or Chichimec, society, as indicated by the bows and arrows that they carry. In Aztec pictorial histories, the bows and arrows associated with Chichimecs symbolize their status as nomadic hunters who had not yet settled in permanent 28

communities and thus were not yet civilized (Boone 2000:47). However, the contrast between the two sets of migrants subtly communicates that the Mexica migrants were fully Chichimec, whereas Icxicuauhtli was in transition towards a more civilized status. For example, the Mexica migrants also carry fiber quivers and are in the act of hunting; their bows are actively drawn, whereas Icxicuauhtli merely holds his. Icxicuauhtli’s bow and arrows therefore are not ready for use, but instead serve as a sign of his earlier status. Moreover, the Mexica migrants wear simple loincloths as opposed to Icxicuauhtli’s fulllength woven cotton mantle. As an item of woven clothing and one that more fully covers his body, Icxicuauhtli’s tilma clearly communicates a more civilized status. Icxicuauhtli also wears the turquoise xihuitzolli, whereas the Mexica migrants wear the cozoyahualolli. The appearance of these headdresses in other sources clarifies their significance; the xihuitzolli is associated with imperial rule, while the cozoyahualolli implies tribal rule.4 For example, early rulers of Tepetlaoztoc wear the cozoyahualolli in the Codex Kingsborough (1993:210v–211r), and early Mexica migrants wear this same headpiece in illustrations in Diego Durán’s (1994: pl. 1) history. Early Mexica, Texcocan, and Huexotla rulers likewise wear the cozoyahualolli in Sahagún’s Primeros memoriales (1993), and he referred to all of these early leaders as Chichimecs (figs. 3.4, 3.5). To mark the first imperial ruler of each group, Sahagún’s artists replaced the cozoyahualolli with a turquoise diadem. The Mexica headgear changed with Itzcoatl, and the Texcocan with Nezahualcoyotl, who earned their new signs of rulership because of their conquest of Azcapotzalco and subsequent political independence. Thus, the xihuitzolli communicates a politically elevated position, a shift from tribal to imperial rule; as Nicholson (1967:73) puts it, this shift


Figure 3.4. Ruler list of Tenochtitlan. Primeros memoriales, 51r. Courtesy of the Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid.

Figure 3.5. Ruler list of Texcoco. Primeros memoriales, 52r. Courtesy of the Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid.

represents the political and cultural “coming of age” of these communities. The implication for Tepechpan is that this coming of age happened at an early date for its noble ancestor. Because its origin extends back to Toltec times, the xihuitzolli is a fitting sign of noble

rule, and it is commonly associated with the rulers of the Triple Alliance, as shown by Sahagún’s artists (Nicholson 1967:72). Carmen Aguilera (1997:18) calls it the “ultimate visual sign of lordship.” However, Acolhua rulers do not wear the xihuitzolli in the manuscripts associated with Texcoco, which leads me to


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Figure 3.6. Presentation of Huitzilihuitl and his daughter to Coxcox of Culhuacan. Codex Boturini, page 20. CONACULTA.-INAH.-MEX; reproduced with permission of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

suspect that the xihuitzolli was specifically associated with the Mexica, who appropriated this sign of nobility from the Toltecs, perhaps via the Culhua. Turquoise was conceptually linked to the Toltec past because the Toltecs were said to have discovered the medium (Aguilera 1997:17). In the Codex Boturini, the only person to wear this headdress is Coxcoxtli, ruler of Culhuacan (figs. 3.6, 3.7). Painter A, then, may have borrowed this sign from the Mexica and applied it to Tepechpan’s own rulers just as the Mexica borrowed it from the Culhua/ Toltecs. In so doing, he communicated Tepechpan’s equality with the past and future imperial leaders. Taken together, the accoutrements of the Mexica migrants—their cozoyahualolli, loincloths, bows, arrows, and quivers—commu30

nicate their still prevalent Chichimec status, whereas Icxicuauhtli’s insignia—his xihuitzolli, cotton tilma, bow, and arrows—show this migrant in transition from Chichimec to noble. Painter A’s reference to the Chichimec past of the future Tepechpan founder is a typical device in Aztec histories. For example, in the Codex Xolotl (1996), the Mapa Quinatzin (2004), and Mapa Tlotzin (fig. 3.8), Acolhua ancestors are also shown as Chichimec migrants, and in pictorials related to the Mexica, such as the Codices Mexicanus (see fig. 3.1) and Ríos (1964:66v), their ancestors, too, are depicted as Chichimecs. A Chichimec past was important because it served to emphasize the metamorphosis of these early migrants into Toltec leaders. Nigel Davies (1980:85–86) sees this tale of transfor-


Figure 3.7. Mexica as mercenaries for Coxcox of Culhuacan. Codex Boturini, page 21. CONACULTA.INAH.-MEX; reproduced with permission of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

mation as a status symbol conferring political legitimacy. As Paul Kirchhoff (1966:277) and Elizabeth Boone (1991) have argued, there was a sense of pride at the accomplishments of these ancestors as they overcame adversity and gained power, making them fit to assume imperial rule. By using these same signs, Painter A implied that the Tepechpan ruler was also fit to take on imperial power. Mexica Settlement at Chapultepec Directly below Icxicuauhtli on the Tenochca register, Painter A depicted the settlement of Mexica migrants in Chapultepec (Grasshopper Hill). Although a line does not connect a specific year to the scene below, the placement of the Chapultepec place glyph directly below the year 13 Reed (1323) and the

symmetrical placement of the figures around the place glyph likely associate the scene with that date. Painter A pictured two Mexica couples at Chapultepec. The representations of men and women in the Tira are contrasted in a number of ways. First, their poses differ according to gender; the men sit with their knees drawn up in front, whereas the women are shown in a kneeling posture. Furthermore, the men have blunt haircuts, while the women have elaborately wrapped and braided coiffures, indicating married status.5 Painter A also colored the men and women differently: the men’s skin tone was painted with red undertones and appears darker than the women’s skin, which has yellow undertones. A black line connecting the man and woman on the left suggests they are husband


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Figure 3.8. Acolhua migration (left) and Texcoco’s dynastic sequence and foundation (right). Mapa Tlotzin, sections 1 and 2. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

and wife. Hieroglyphic compounds identify the husband as Cuauhtlix (Eagle Foot) and his wife as Xicomoyahual (Busy Bee). A red line connects them to the man on the right, signifying that he is their son; his name is Coatzontli (Snake Hair). Presumably, the woman above Coatzontli is his wife, although no line connects the two figures to each other (Noguez 1978, 1:40). Cosmic Implications Though Painter A failed to associate the Mexica settlers with a specific year, we may infer an association with the year 13 Reed, which is the twenty-sixth year in the calendric cycle and the year in which the sun was said to have been created. As a symbol of the sun’s creation, this date was included on the top of the Calendar Stone, whose essential purpose was to set Mexica imperial rule into a cosmic context (Townsend 1979:70). Indeed, some sources (though not the Tira) recorded the future Tenochca ruler Itzcoatl’s accession to power in this year and his defeat of Azcapotzalco in the next year, 1 Flint, another cosmically significant date. By conjoining these dates with both cosmic and national 32

significance, the Tenochca rulers sanctified their authority. Though Painter A may have associated the Mexica settlement at Chapultepec with this date, and consequently the birth of the sun, we cannot help but notice that the Teoculhuacan place glyph associated with Icxicuauhtli above also floats over this significant date. We might apply this sacred significance, then, to both Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan. Social and Political Transformation After settling at Chapultepec, the Mexica migrants are shown with signs of higher status. For example, they no longer wear the cozoyahualolli, nor carry their bows, arrows, and quivers. Furthermore, the men wear fulllength cotton tilmas, and the women wear skirts and huipiles, also of cotton. These garments are more modest than the earlier loincloths and are woven, which indicates that the Mexica were no longer nomadic hunters but living in a settled community. Nevertheless, Painter A still communicated that Icxicuauhtli was more politically advanced; he wears the turquoise diadem associated with noble rule, whereas the heads of the Mexica


migrants are bare. Furthermore, Painter A depicted the Mexica men on bundled grass seats, which also communicate nonautonomous rule. In the list of rulers in Sahagún’s Primeros memoriales (see figs. 3.4, 3.5), the early tribal leaders also sit on bundled grass seats, whereas the later imperial rulers sit on full-sized woven reed thrones, called tepotz‑ icpalli. Like the cozoyahualolli, the bundled seats are associated with early, tribal rule. The implication is that these Mexica were just settlers and not yet autonomous leaders. Painter A did identify these Mexica with name glyphs that convey their historic importance. This family appears in other sources, and their saga communicates an ultimately failed attempt to add Toltec blood to the Mexica dynasty. In a genealogy in the Codex Mexicanus (fig. 3.9), a man named Copil is pictured at the top left above his daughter Xicomoyahual (Mengin 1952:411). Copil is identified with a name glyph of a white and red conical cap typical of the god Xipe Totec, and Xicomoyahual carries her familiar “Busy Bee” name glyph. When she reappears toward the right, Xicomoyahual is shown with her husband, Cuauhtlix (Eagle Foot). The identity of these figures is further clarified in the annals portion of this same codex (fig. 3.10). Above the year 1 House (1285), a figure grabs Copil by the hair, indicating his defeat, and below the time line, Xicomoyahual and Cuauhtlix appear once again, united by a line in a marriage statement. The saga of Copil must have been a popular legend from the Mexica migration, as it was recorded in several alphabetic chronicles.6 According to these sources, Copil’s mother was Malinalxochitl, a sister of the Mexica patron deity Huitzilopochtli.7 Troubled by her evil nature, the Mexica abandoned her along their migration. Later, seeking to avenge his mother’s abandonment, Copil and his daughter Xicomoyahual went to

Chapultepec, where the Mexica had settled. They planned to ally themselves with other tribes and wage war against the Mexica, but having been warned by Huitzilopochtli of Copil’s impending attack, the Mexica were prepared for the assault. A priest (named Cuauhtlequetzqui in alphabetic sources) was in charge of the cult of Huitzilopochtli and followed the deity’s orders to kill Copil. Led by Huitzilopochtli, Cuauhtlequetzqui threw Copil’s heart into a mass of reeds; this would be the very site from which the nopal cactus that marked the future city of Tenochtitlan would grow. Cuauhtlequetzqui (an alternative name for Cuauhtlix) then married Copil’s daughter Xicomoyahual, and they had a son named Coatzontli, as is pictured in the Tira. According to Chimalpahin (1997, 1:93), Coatzontli married a woman named Nazohuatl, the daughter of the Culhuacan ruler Acxoquautli.8 In the Aztec historical tradition, royal wives were often solicited from Toltec Culhuacan to provide noble blood for the ruling Chichimec dynasty. These figures thus represent an attempt by the Mexica migrants to add Toltec blood, and therefore legitimacy, to their bloodline. The story of Copil and his descendants is particularly associated with the Mexica; with the exception of the Tira, it does not appear in histories from the Acolhua tradition. Painter A’s inclusion of this story reveals the significant influence of and adherence to Mexica historic traditions, and suggests the intent of his imperial history, showing Tepechpan as a key member of the Aztec empire and principal ally of the Mexica. Ultimately, this section can be read both as a reference to the story of Copil and also as an indication of the infusion of Toltec blood into the Mexica bloodline through Nazohuatl, the Culhua princess. However, as Susan Gillespie (1989:77–78) points out, such infu-


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Figure 3.9. Genealogy from the Codex Mexicanus, 16. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

sions failed in the early years of the Mexica state either through the death of the woman or her children. With each failure, the Mexica tried anew to add Toltec blood to legitimize their rule. Presumably, this bloodline ended shortly after subsequent events at Chapultepec; therefore, by including this story and its aftermath (see below), Painter A also recorded the Mexica failure to acquire Toltec blood for its dynasty. The Mexica Expulsion from Chapultepec The Mexica settlement at Chapultepec was short-lived; within one generation, war broke out and the Mexica were expelled (plates 3 and 4).9 In the Tira, a warrior is attached to the year disk of 1 Rabbit (1350) by a red dotted line. His face paint and the eagle-down balls in his hair identify him as a Mexica warrior; Mexica mercenaries in the Codex Boturini (see fig. 3.7) have these same features (Noguez 1978, 1:53). Below this warrior is an effaced representation of the Chapultepec place glyph. Thus, the battle 34

took place at Chapultepec, where the Mexica had settled twenty-seven years earlier. Below and partially overlapping this warrior is a remnant of another Mexica warrior, but he too is partially effaced. The upper figure fights another warrior without the identifying features of the Mexica soldiers. The Mexica warrior holds an indigenous spearthrower, called an atlatl, and a white shield outlined in blue, whereas his adversary holds a club and a white shield. The two warriors flank a representation of a burning temple, an ideogram for conquest that signifies the defeat of the Mexica at Chapultepec. Reading to the lower left, a warrior holding a shield and club leads a female captive to Azcapotzalco (Ant Hill). She has the standard woman’s coiffure and is fully dressed although her lower half now is effaced. Continuing to read to the left, another combatant leads an unarmed Mexica warrior—identified by his face paint and the eagle-down balls in his hair—to Xaltocan (Sand Spider). The Mexica warrior wears only a loincloth, which further communicates his defeat. In


Figure 3.10. Defeat of Copil (top register) and marriage of Xicomoyahual and Cuauhtlix (bottom register). Codex Mexicanus, 38. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

contrast, his captor wears white cotton armor and still carries his shield and obsidian club. Thus, armed forces from Azcapotzalco and Xaltocan, two important Tepanec citystates were able to take a Mexica warrior and a noblewoman captive. Footprints guide the narrative sequence of events back to the right. Remnants of the footprints from the Azcapotzalco and Xaltocan place glyphs end at the burning temple, and from there, two sets of footprints lead in different directions. One set ends at a man and a woman placed just below the time line and seated in the traditional gender-specific poses. Name glyphs identify the man as Huitz ilihuitl (Hummingbird Feather) and the woman as Tozpanxochitl (Banner Flower), and a number of pictorial conventions communicate their impending sacrifice (Noguez 1978, 1:55). For example, they both wear black bands on their eyes and heron feathers and balls of eagle down in their hair, all symbolic of sacrifice in Aztec art. Also, Huitzilihuitl’s body, excluding his feet, was painted white to indicate the application of chalk used to

prepare sacrificial victims. Finally, Huitzil‑ ihuitl’s mouth and hands were painted red, perhaps indicating bloodletting. However, both have their eyes open, revealing that they have not yet been killed. Huitzilihuitl wears a turquoise diadem indicating his position as a noble leader, and the woman beside him must be a female relation; in other sources, she is most often identified as his daughter, but also variously as his wife, sister, or niece. In the Tira, she wears only a skirt and is bare-breasted with her arms bound. The exposure of her breasts is an obvious attempt to humiliate this noblewoman, and many accounts of this event stress her nudity.10 Below them is the place glyph for Culhuacan, indicating that they were taken there to be sacrificed. A red dotted line touches the feet of Huitzilihuitl and ends at the year disk for 2 Reed (1351), suggesting a date for the sacrifice. A stylized knot on the year disk shows 2 Reed was the year of a New Fire Ceremony as well. The second set of footprints leads from the burning temple past a place glyph of


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reeds and water, which reads “Acocolco” (Twisted Water). A man’s head among the reeds indicates that the Mexica hid there after their defeat. The footprints then lead to a small, standing figure handing a bundle to a larger, seated man. The smaller figure is named Tenoch (Nopal), and the larger figure is Coxcoxtli (Pheasant), whose cotton clothing, turquoise diadem, and placement on the woven reed throne communicate that he was the ruler of Culhuacan, whose curved-hill place glyph appears behind him. The footprints from the burning temple finally end at a representation of a house shown in profile with three human heads inside. In the Codex Boturini (see fig. 3.6), a similar hieroglyphic compound is marked with a jar (com-itl) glyph, and Chimalpahin (1998, 1:213) relates that the Mexica fled to a city called Contitlan, which was under Culhua control. Surely this is the same city to which the painters of the Codex Boturini and the Tira referred (Noguez 1978, 1:59–60). The representation is connected by a red dotted line to the year 2 Reed, which implies that the Mexica fled to Contitlan the same year that Huitzilihuitl and his daughter were sacrificed. In short, Painter A’s account communicates that combined forces from Xaltocan, Azcapotzalco, and Culhuacan defeated the Mexica in 1350, and the next year the tribal leader of the Mexica and his daughter were sacrificed. After the defeat, the Mexica were made to serve Coxcoxtli of Culhuacan and settled for a time in Contitlan, a city under Culhua control. Mexica Settlement in Tepechpan

cording to Painter A, some settled in Tepechpan. Four couples are shown walking towards a temple on the upper, Tepechpan register (plate 4). The facial stripes on the men and eagle-down balls in their hair link them to the Mexica warriors on the lower register (Noguez 1978, 1:63–64). Furthermore, the four male settlers are named (though the women are not), indicating they must be important figures in Tepechpan history.11 The events shown on this register took place in Tepechpan (which had been founded almost twenty years earlier [plate 3]), so the four couples must have arrived in this city. Although the women are fully dressed, the men wear only loincloths; however, the man at the bottom carries a bundle, most likely containing cult objects. This bundle is marked with a representation of a matted textile, which reappears at the steps of the pyramid in front of the couples, perhaps representing an offering from the Mexica to the Tepechpan temple. The woven mat marking on the bundle and temple may further refer to the Tepechpan place name, which contains the sound pech-tli, or “mat,” and perhaps refers to a deity specifically associated with Tepechpan (Noguez 1978, 1:62). Thus, this scene communicates that the Mexica offered cult objects to Tepechpan, thereby revealing their allegiance. Furthermore, a group of decapitated animals—a snake, butterfly, and bird—float above the temple. This sacrifice seems to be associated with foundations, as it is also seen at the foundation of Tepechpan (plate 3). Apparently, when these Mexica migrants arrived in Tepechpan, they performed rituals associated with settlement.

After their expulsion from Chapultepec, many Mexica fled to other more established cities, presumably so as not to be subject to the Culhua (Anales de Tlatelolco 1948:37). Ac-

Cosmic Implications Most sources agree that the Mexica expulsion from Chapultepec and sacrifice of the tribal leader and his daughter happened

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in 1 Rabbit and/or 2 Reed, though there is some disagreement as to the exact fifty-twoyear century in which the expulsion took place.12 Nevertheless, the ritual significance of these dates is still clear. As the first year in the calendric cycle, 1 Rabbit was the traditional year of the New Fire Ceremony, also called the Binding of the Years, until it was changed to 2 Reed. According to an annotation in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (1995:41v), Motecuhzoma II decided to postpone the New Fire Ceremony to the more propitious 2 Reed because of the bad associations of the year 1 Rabbit, which previously had been years of famine. However, Ross Hassig (2001:122) has argued that the Mexica more likely changed the traditional celebration year of the New Fire Ceremony from 1 Rabbit to 2 Reed and imposed this change throughout the empire to reflect their political control. Indeed, extant Aztec histories, the Tira included, projected the change into the distant past, communicating an acceptance of Mexica hegemony. The New Fire Ceremony marked the completion of the calendric cycle through a number of rituals, one of which was to bundle together fiftytwo reeds symbolizing the fifty-two years in the cycle and ritually burn them. The knot sign under each 2 Reed year disk in the Tira symbolizes these bundles and marks these as New Fire years. As the year of the New Fire Ceremony, then, 2 Reed was clearly a significant date, and one that seems to have been specifically set by the Mexica state. Accordingly, the fact that the sacrifice of Huitzilihuitl and his daughter was said to have taken place in this year could not be coincidental. Huitzilihuitl’s sacrifice may have symbolically initiated the ceremony, associating it with the future Mexica state. Moreover, since Mexica migrants arrived in Tepechpan the

same year, their arrival was also given sacred significance. Social and Political Transformation The Mexica men are marked as warriors, and their superior military powers, which will only become clear later, are suggested by their use of a fine-quality weapon associated with the Toltecs: the spear-thrower, or atlatl (Boone 2000:193). The Mexica warriors also wear woven cotton armor, a sign of settled society. However, after their defeat, their accoutrements were confiscated. Painter A’s representation contrasts the still fully dressed and armed Xaltocan warrior from his captive, a Mexica warrior who has been stripped of his cotton armor and atlatl; thus, Painter A’s composition symbolically communicates the failure of the Mexica to maintain their association with the Toltec past. Painter A’s representation of Huitzilihuitl also signifies another failed connection with the Toltecs. According to the Franciscan historian Juan de Torquemada (1986, 1:97), Huitzilihuitl was the son of Coatzontli and Nazohuatl, the Culhua-Toltec noblewoman seen earlier in the Tira. Thus, it was he who had the right pedigree to assume rule and establish a noble dynasty with a Toltec bloodline for the Mexica. In the Tira, his turquoise diadem serves as a visible symbol of this political advancement. However, this royal line soon ends with his death and the death of his daughter (van Zantwijk 1985:182; Gillespie 1989:80). Painter A’s inclusion of this event emphasizes a rupture in Mexica rule: a failed attempt by the Mexica to add Toltec blood to their ruling line. Indeed, upon Huitzilihuitl’s sacrifice, his successor, Tenoch, tellingly does not wear the turquoise diadem. The contrast between Tenoch and Coxcoxtli, tlatoani of Culhuacan, is especially illuminating. Coxcoxtli’s xihuitzolli, tepotzic-


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palli, and full-length cotton tilma all communicate his role as noble leader. In contrast, Tenoch is shown smaller, without headgear, and dressed in a simple loincloth. Painter A depicted Tenoch handing a bundle to Coxcoxtli, an act that further confirmed Tenoch’s subordination. Although the contents of the bundle are difficult to determine, multiple interpretations are possible. First, Tenoch may have presented the relics of the bundle of Huitzilopochtli, tribal deity of the Mexica, to Coxcoxtli (Noguez 1978, 1:58). He carries a similar bundle later in the Tira, and he is identified as a priest in the famous foundation page of the Codex Mendoza (fig. 3.11), which suggests his control of the cult bundle. Alternatively, Painter A’s representation may refer to an event recounted in the Codices Boturini (see figs. 3.6, 3.7) and Aubin (1981:22r) and the history of Diego Durán (1994:114). After becoming mercenaries for Culhuacan, the Mexica were ordered to battle Xochimilco. Apparently, they were so successful that rather than bring all of the prisoners back to present to Coxcoxtli, they instead cut off an ear from each prisoner and presented these to the tlatoani. The representation of Tenoch presenting a bundle to Coxcoxtli could also refer to this event (Waldeck n.d.:131), which established the military superiority of the Mexica. Finally, the bundle may represent a simple tribute payment of a white mantle from the Mexica to the Culhua. Based on the multivalency inherent in Aztec pictorial writing, any or all of these interpretations are possible. Indeed, when these readings of the terse image are considered together, they effectively communicate the religious, military, and economic subordination of the Mexica to the Culhua. The less politically and culturally advanced state of the Mexica migrants who arrived in Tepechpan is also marked. The men are shown as warriors by their distinctive 38

face paint and the balls of eagle down in their hair, and they wear only loincloths and no headgear. Clearly, they are of a lower status than the Tepechpan migrant seen earlier. By showing them presenting an offering to the Tepechpan temple—and by implication, the Tepechpan state—Painter A suggested that these Mexica migrants had become subjects of Tepechpan. Sacrificial Rituals The juxtaposition of the sacrifice of Huitzil ihuitl and Tozpanxochitl on the lower register and the animal sacrifice ritual in Tepechpan at the exact same time as shown on the register above cannot be coincidental. This composition establishes a contrast between animal and human sacrifice on one hand, and between the Tepechpaneca and the Mexica on the other. Colonial sources date the distinction between human and animal sacrifice to the pre-conquest past, specifically to the downfall of the Toltecs. According to colonial tradition, the great Toltec leader and civilizer Quetzalcoatl discouraged his people from practicing human sacrifice until a usurper named Tezcatlipoca again promoted the practice and forced Quetzalcoatl’s exile (Relación de la genealogía 1991:108–109; Anales de Cuauhtitlan 1992:31).13 The association of Quetzalcoatl, who abhorred human sacrifice, with civilization implies that these new settlers in Tepechpan were more civilized than the Mexica they left behind. Indeed, it may even suggest that they were more civilized than the Culhua, Toltec descendants, for they were the ones who carried out the sacrifice of Huitzilihuitl and his daughter. This association of human sacrifice with the Mexica is also seen in some of the responses in the Relaciones geográficas. Some of the respondents, including Tepechpan’s, claimed that they only practiced human sacrifice because it was introduced by the Mexica


Figure 3.11. Foundation of Tenochtitlan. Codex Mendoza, 2r. Courtesy of the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.

(Paso y Troncoso 1905–1906, 6:54, 83, 206; Barlow 1949b:31, 36; Nuttall 1926:64). These same respondents claimed that the only form of sacrifice they traditionally practiced was their daily offering to the sun, to which they presented a decapitated snake, eagle, and butterfly, the same animals shown in the Tira. Jongsoo Lee (2003a, 2003b) argues that the alphabetic chroniclers associated with Texcoco, Juan de Pomar and Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl, emphasized that its most famous ruler, Nezahualcoyotl, also abhorred human sacrifice, contrasting his noble status to that of the “barbaric” Mexica. Surely owing to Spanish sentiments and cultural impositions, the issue of sacrifice became important in the Colonial period as a new historical trope distinguishing civilization from barbarity. According to Painter A’s account, Mexica society was built upon a foundation of human sacrifice, whereas the people of Tepechpan sacrificed only animals. To a Spanish audience and a recently converted indigenous audience, this dichotomy would imply again that the people of Tepechpan were more civilized than their Mexica counterparts. Foundation Like the migration, a town’s independent foundation was an important event establishing the autonomy and antiquity of an altepetl. In a lawsuit between Tepechpan and its subject Temascalapa (see Chapter 5), Temascalapa argued that it was an independent community because it had been founded before Tepechpan. Tepechpan disagreed, claiming that it had been founded first and that Temascalapa was actually founded by Tepechpaneca. The implication is that ancient and independent ties to land were a necessity for continued corporate integrity, which is just the message Painter A sent by contrasting the foundations of Tepechpan 40

and Tenochtitlan. He portrayed Tepechpan as the older community, founded by a noble ancestor with divine sanctification; in contrast, the foundation of Tenochtitlan had no noble actors nor cosmic implications. Tepechpan Red year signs continue from the first appearance of Icxicuauhtli in 1 Flint (1324) to his second appearance in 11 Rabbit (1339; plate 3). A red line links Icxicuauhtli to this year disk, which is painted half red and half green, and the subsequent change in color of the year disks alerts the reader to a transition in Tepechpan leadership: the simultaneous accession of Icxicuauhtli and foundation of Tepechpan. Throughout the pre-conquest portion of the Tira, ruler accessions are shown in a codified manner. The new ruler is seated with his knees drawn up in front on a fullsize woven mat throne, or tepotzicpalli. He wears a white tilma bordered in red and tied at his right shoulder, shown with a stylized knot. As a final indication of his elite position, the newly seated tlatoani wears a turquoise diadem, and Painter A indicated the shoulder-length hair underneath. Because ruler accessions are so codified, the only distinguishing feature is usually the name glyph that identifies the actor; in this case, we see the familiar “Eagle Foot” name glyph linked to his throne. Another distinguishing feature of this accession statement is the inclusion of speech scrolls that issue from Icxicuauhtli’s mouth, presumably representing his establishment of the tlatoani position at Tepechpan; tlatoani means “speaker” and is the term for a hereditary leader. Painter A also included several other details in this particular accession statement to show that this was not simply the seating in power of Icxicuauhtli but also the foundation


of the Tepechpan altepetl. Painter A recorded the place of action by showing Icxicuauhtli’s throne resting on a bed of stone. This symbol serves as a place glyph for Tepechpan, a name derived from the root tepehxitl, a large rock or cliff, and the locative suffix -pan, meaning “on.” This derivation is repeated by the respondents quoted in Tepechpan’s Re lación geográfica, who reported that Tepechpan means “a town set on a large rock” and was so named because it was founded near a rocky hill (Nuttall 1926:61).14 Icxicuauhtli quite literally sits on the stone foundation, and from this point forward, the upper register is linked conceptually with Tepechpan. Moreover, the Tepechpan place glyph partially overlaps a conventionalized representation of a cave, shown metaphorically as an open mouth marked with eyes, fangs, and a pug nose. A maguey plant and reeds grow from the icon, and various cacti are included to the left, further associating the open maw with the earth. Also included, just above her husband, is Icxicuauhtli’s wife. She is identified by a name glyph and an alphabetic annotation as Tozquentzin (Yellow Feather Garment), and she faces a representation of a decapitated bird and snake next to a three-stepped pyramid.15 A faint trace of red paint on the original Tira indicates blood from the decapitation, revealing that an animal sacrifice ritual was associated with the act of foundation (Noguez 1978, 1:50). Painter A also included the place glyph for Culhuacan behind the pyramid. The curved hill of Culhuacan points toward the left, directing our attention to Tozquentzin. Because it is on the same level as Tozquentzin, the glyph must refer to her homeland, marking her as a Toltec noblewoman (Noguez 1978, 1:51). Another distinguishing feature of this accession statement is the inclusion of five couples seated before Icxicuauhtli. Painter A

clearly showed that the five men who face Icxicuauhtli are of a lower political rank; they are smaller than Icxicuauhtli, and they do not wear turquoise diadems or sit on woven reed thrones. However, these men must have been historically important to Tepechpan because each is named and shown communicating with the new ruler.16 One speech scroll comes from each man’s mouth, whereas two speech scrolls come from the mouth of Icxicuauhtli: as leader, he must communicate more. The man on the bottom carries a bundle, which most likely contains the relics of the patron deity of Tepechpan. The men’s wives are also shown, though they are unnamed. These five couples, plus Icxicuauhtli and his wife, must represent the founding families of Tepechpan and the controllers of its patron deity. In short, in the year 11 Rabbit (1334), Icxicuauhtli—assisted by his Culhua-Toltec wife and five elite couples—founded Tepechpan. To sanctify the occasion, they performed an animal sacrifice ritual. In this same year, Icxicuauhtli was officially seated as tlatoani of the newly founded altepetl. Tenochtitlan The depiction of the foundation of Tenochtitlan is rather plain compared with that of the same event in Tepechpan (plate 5). Tenochtitlan (Place of the Nopal Cactus) is indicated by a glyph for “stone” (te-tl) topped by a nopal cactus (noch-tli). The eagle at the top does not form a phonetic part of the place name but instead references the Mexica migrants’ vision that marked this as their prophesied homeland. Painter A placed this hieroglyphic compound under the 4 Rabbit (1366) year disk but did not link it specifically to this year. Painter A also included five founding couples at Tenochtitlan. As in the representation of the Tepechpan foundation, the men are named but the women are not.


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The five couples overlap and are stacked one on top of the other except at the bottom, where two men are shown with complete bodies. These two men sit on the same bundled grass seats seen at the Mexica settlement in Chapultepec. Tenoch is seated second from the bottom on a grass mat, and he carries a bundle wrapped around his shoulder, surely a reference to the cult bundle of Huitzilopochtli, patron deity of Tenochtitlan (Noguez 1978, 1:70). Cosmic Implications As in the Mexica settlement at Chapultepec, Painter A failed to associate the foundation of Tenochtitlan with a specific year, whereas the Tepechpan foundation was clearly linked to the year 11 Rabbit, which also changes color to signal a new temporal cycle. This device reveals the close connection between Tepechpan and the calendar, while at the same time emphasizing a disjunction between Mexica history and the same calendar. Though the cosmic significance of the year 11 Rabbit remains unclear, Tepechpan’s independent founding, preceding that of Tenochtitlan, supports Tepechpan’s long history and autonomous status. According to Painter A, the foundation of Tenochtitlan took place sometime between 4 Rabbit (1366) and 7 House (1369), though the official date of the Tenochca foundation, as it appears on the Temple Stone and the Codex Mendoza foundation page (see fig. 3.11), was 2 House (1325). That the Mexica manipulated history to present their rise to imperial power in the best possible light is clear, and a foundation in 2 House (1325) is likely a fabrication meant to do just that. Such an early foundation date establishes the antiquity of Tenochtitlan and would place this foundation earlier than that of Tepechpan. As one of Painter A’s goals was to establish the antiquity of the ruling lineage of Tepech42

pan, clearly it would not do to show Tenochtitlan’s foundation on this early, though official, date (Boone 1998b:190). Furthermore, the Mexica surely selected 2 House for its cosmic implications. The dates of important events in Mexica history were chosen because of their significant positions in the fifty-two-year cycle (Umberger 1981a:209– 210, 1981b). In 13 Reed, or the twenty-sixth year of the cycle and half-century marker, the sun was created. The twenty-seventh year, 1 Flint, was the year the Mexica left Aztlan, and in the next year in the cycle, 2 House, the Mexica founded Tenochtitlan. Thus, the foundation of Tenochtitlan at 2 House was an integral part of the cosmic progression; by providing a different date, Painter A disavowed this cosmic association. Divine Sanctification A religious undertone is also evident in the foundations of both cities. For example, one founder of each city carries a bundle that must contain relics associated with the patron deities of the respective communities. This is a subtle statement about the religious underpinnings of a newly founded altepetl. Painter A’s inclusion of the cave and eagle at the respective foundations further associates the two cities with the divine. Evidence of Painter A’s Acolhua influence may be his placement of the Tepechpan founder in the cave icon. In Acolhua sources, such as the Mapa Tlotzin (see fig. 3.8) and Mapa Quinatzin, the sign for the foundation of an altepetl is the seating of the founding couple in a cave. Because caves do not characterize Texcoco, this must serve as a metaphoric rather than a literal representation (Boone 2000:187). Furthermore, the cave icon clearly has associations beyond Texcoco and is probably one of the most ancient, recurring symbols in Mesoamerican art.17 In ancient Mesoamerican thought, caves were


considered to be entrances to the underworld, a place to commune with the gods, and the place of sacred ancestors (Heyden 1981). By personifying the cave as an open mouth, or the so-called Earth Monster, Painter A was referencing its association with the divine. By placing the community founder in the cave, the implication is that he too had such associations. In short, Icxicuauhtli is shown as the conduit between his people and the underworld, and the inclusion of the cave in the Tira reveals that the foundation of Tepechpan and the rule of Icxicuauhtli had been divinely sanctioned. The association of the monster maw with the earth is solidified by the representation of vegetation nearby. Reeds and a maguey plant grow from the Earth Monster mouth, and to the left, Painter A included different cacti, specifically the nopal, which also figures prominently in the foundation of Tenochtitlan, Place of the Nopal Cactus. By appropriating a sign important in the Mexica foundation, Painter A may have wished to elicit the same associations: that the Tepechpaneca took an inhospitable land and made it fertile and valuable, a statement on the power of the Tepechpaneca, just as it comments on the Mexica. The reeds also may refer to the word Tollan, or Place of Reeds, a generic place name referring to great cities throughout Mesoamerica, the implication being that Tepechpan was such a city. Painter A’s inclusion of the eagle on top of the Tenochtitlan place glyph also communicates the divine sanctification of this place. The eagle alludes to a mythical event that determined where the Mexica would settle. According to Durán (1994:42–43), after Cuauhtlequetzqui, the priest of Huitzilopochtli, killed Copil, he threw his heart into a mass of reeds, where it landed on a rock. Huitzilopochtli revealed to the priest that a prickly pear cactus had grown from this heart and

was so full and strong that an eagle had made it his home. Huitzilopochlti then prophesied that when the Mexica migrants found this eagle, they would find their homeland. The eagle surely calls forth this tale of the ultimate outcome of the Mexica triumph over Copil’s attempted revenge. The stone and nopal cactus reference the event and additionally act phonetically to provide the name Tenochtitlan. The inclusion of the eagle, then, indicated the divine sanctification of this place to the Mexica, just as the Earth Monster cave maw divinely marked Tepechpan. Though it is not included in all representations of the foundation of Tenochtitlan (the Codex Azcatitlan, Codex Mexicanus, and Mapa Sigüenza do not include the eagle), it is shown on the back of the Temple Stone and on the foundation page of the Codex Mendoza, both official statements of Tenochca supremacy. Political Advancement Though the foundations of both cities may have been divinely sanctioned, Painter A es‑ tablished a clear contrast between the two cities; Tepechpan had a tlatoani, a noble hereditary leader, whereas Tenochtitlan did not. Icxicuauhtli sits on a full-size woven reed throne, while two of the Mexica founders sit on seats of bundled grass, a sign of lingering tribalism in this newly founded city. In further contrast to Icxicuauhtli, none of the Mexica founders wears the turquoise diadem of royalty. Instead, they wear the face paint and balls of eagle down associated with warriors, which may reference the fact that they continued to work as mercenaries for Culhuacan; the Codex Boturini (see fig. 3.7) shows that the Mexica served Culhuacan in this capacity before their town foundation. Thus, the signs that Painter A chose to mark the Tenochca founders communicate that even though the Mexica may have founded


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their own city, they were not yet its autonomous rulers. The lingering tribalism of the Mexica may be explained by the fact that they had not successfully added Toltec blood to their lineage. Typically a Chichimec tribal leader would take a Culhua noblewoman as a wife to bring Toltec blood to the ruling dynasty and thereby establish the polity’s legitimacy. Painter A recorded such an ennobling process for Icxicuauhtli, who legitimized his right to rule through his marriage to Tozquentzin. Tozquentzin also ensured that their descendants, the future leaders of Tepechpan, would have noble blood. Because none of the female founders of Tenochtitlan are named, we are not aware of a similar ennobling process for Tenochtitlan at the time of its foundation. Indeed, based on the earlier assassination of Huitzilihuitl and his daughter, Toltec descendants, such an ennobling still would have been necessary for Tenochtitlan to name an official leader; hence, none of the Tenochca founders was a legitimate tlatoani. Founders Painter A suggests yet another, though far more subtle, distinction between the two foundations through the style of his work. His depiction of the Mexica migrants is rather sloppy and not typical of the attention to detail he lavished on the Tepechpan register. For example, he failed to include face paint on all of the male Tenochca founders, and he failed to include arms on the women. Clearly, in his mind, Tepechpan history took precedence. The very inclusion of women at the foundation of Tenochtitlan in the Tira is unique; Mexica sources show only men at the foundation (Boone 2000:194–195; Diel 2005a:96).18 This inclusion of women may reflect Acolhua influence in Painter A’s history, as founding

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couples are recorded in the Texcocan sources such as the Mapa Tlotzin (see fig. 3.8). In contrast, pictorials associated with Tenochtitlan largely ignore the role of women in Mexica imperial history, presumably because they posed potential threats to the purity of the ruling bloodline, whereas secondary communities such as Tepechpan emphasized the role of women in their histories, often because they helped to enhance the patron community’s prestige (Diel 2005a). Clearly, Tepechpan’s Tozquentzin did just that. Nevertheless, Painter A’s naming of the male founders does show further adherence to Mexica historic tradition. Though there is much variation in the names of the Tenochca founders in the different sources, some of the men recorded in the Tira are also named in other documents. Reading from bottom to top, the founders are named Xiuhcac (Turquoise Sandal), Tenoch (Stone Nopal), Tetentetl (Stone Lip Plug), Acacitl (Rabbit Reed), and Atl (Water) (Noguez 1978, 1:70). Chimalpahin’s (1998, 1:361) list of Tenochca founders in his Fifth Relation is by far the closest match to the Tira; he named the same five men plus five more. Also, the foundation page from the Codex Mendoza (see fig. 3.11) includes three of the same founders (Tenoch, Xiuhcac, and Acacitl), and the Mapa Sigüenza shows Tenoch, Acacitl, and Atl. Moreover, Painter A distinguished two of the same founders who are marked in other sources. Both Xiuhcac and Tenoch are shown in full-body representations and sit on seats of bundled grass. Chimalpahin (1998, 1:361) distinguished Xiuhcac by calling him a teomama, or god carrier. Tenoch is singled out in the Codex Mendoza as a priest because his ear is painted red and his body is gray, signifying the bloodletting and application of ash that is typical of Aztec priests. He is also distinguished from the other founders because


he does not wear his hair in the warrior’s topknot as the others do. Painter A made a similar reference, though more subtly, by showing Tenoch with a bundle wrapped around his shoulder, surely a reference to the cult bundle of Huitzilopochtli. These references again show Painter A’s familiarity with Mexica historic tradition. Sacrificial Rituals Painter A depicted an animal sacrifice ritual for Tepechpan that must be associated with the act of foundation. This establishes at an early date the idea that the Tepechpan community practiced only animal, not human, sacrifice. In contrast, the inclusion on the Mexica register of the eagle on the nopal cactus that grew from Copil’s heart is a reference, albeit subtle, to human sacrifice and suggests that Tenochtitlan was literally founded on top of a human victim. Such an interpretation would reinforce the idea of civilization over barbarity in a Spanish colonial context and to a Christian audience. Dynastic Succession Once the founding of an altepetl was recorded, a community’s dynastic succession became the most important structural component of Aztec histories. For example, the history section of the Codex Mendoza is structured completely around the succession of Tenochca tlatoque and their conquests. The uninterrupted nature of the ruling line and its noble blood were important statements to make about an altepetl ’s leaders, as were their important conquests, political alliances, and ties to land. Furthermore, because the tlatoque were the representatives of the gods on earth, their connection to the gods and the cosmos was important to communicate. This was often done through a structural

framework that tied them to the natural progression of the calendar. Tepechpan After recording the foundations of the respective cities, Painter A focused on their ruling dynasties. In both Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, three different tlatoque ruled from town foundation to the outbreak of the Tepanec War. A metaphor for rulership in Nahuatl is the expression in petlatl, in icpalli (the mat, the throne), and ruler accession statements in the Tira are a visualization of this linguistic trope. New rulers are shown seated on a full-sized tepotzicpalli, and they wear a fulllength tilma and xihuitzolli. As the first ruler of Tepechpan, and because his inauguration coincided with the foundation of the altepetl, Icxicuauhtli’s accession statement is one of the most complex in the Tira, as discussed above. Icxicuauhtli’s reign is associated with the color green, and he ruled during the Mexica expulsion from Chapultepec and the arrival of Mexica settlers in Tepechpan. The implication is clear: Tepechpan was already an autonomous city, whereas the Mexica were still living in a subject state. He also oversaw the ritual bundling of the years in 2 Reed (1351). The New Fire Ceremony was probably the most important ceremony in the Aztec calendar, indicating the link between his subjects and the cosmos, and the successful beginning of a new fifty-two-year cycle reflected highly on the ruling tlatoani. Icxicuauhtli’s reign ended with his death in the year 13 Rabbit (1362; plate 5). Ruler deaths are also shown in a consistent manner throughout the Tira. Painter A drew a funerary bundle placed in the seated pose of a living ruler, with knees folded up in front. A rope secures the bundle: it is tied


45

once around the neck, and then crossed twice around the body and once more around the feet. A turquoise diadem is superimposed on the funerary bundle to communicate the royal status of the deceased, and his name glyph identifies this as the bundle of Icxicuauhtli. A green line connects this funerary bundle to the green half of the year 13 Rabbit (1362). Icxicuauhtli’s successor, Caltzin (House), was seated in rule in this same year (plate 5). According to testimony in a colonial lawsuit, Caltzin was the son of Icxicuauhtli, suggesting that rule in Tepechpan passed from father to son, as it did in Acolhua Texcoco (AGI Justicia legajo 164:7r; Carrasco 1971:371). Caltzin is shown in the typical guise of a new tlatoani; he sits on the tepotzicpalli and wears the white tilma and turquoise diadem. However, Painter A included a slight deviation in his representation of Caltzin by painting his hair in a warrior’s topknot above his diadem. Called a temillotl, the topknot symbolizes courageous achievements in battle (Berdan and Anawalt 1992, 2:8) and presumably communicates that Caltzin was an accomplished warrior. The important events that coincided with Caltzin’s rule were the foundation of Tenochtitlan and the seating of the first official Mexica tlatoani, Acamapichtli, but he did not oversee any events in Tepechpan. Attached by a yellow line to the yellow half of his inaugural year disk, Caltzin’s reign is associated with this color, and he ruled until 6 Rabbit (1394), which is linked by another yellow line to Caltzin’s funerary bundle, indicating his death (plate 7). The other half of this year disk is painted blue and is connected by a blue line to the newly inaugurated Tencoyotzin (Coyote Lips), who wears the typical accoutrements of a tlatoani. As did Icxicuauhtli fifty-two years previous, Tencoyotzin oversaw the New Fire 46

Ceremony of 2 Reed (1403), which suggests the importance of his rule. Painter A’s detailed account of the manner of Tencoyotzin’s death, discussed more fully in Chapter 4, further marks this ruler’s significance (plate 9). Painter A first drew a typical funerary bundle to record the death of Tencoyotzin, but sometime after, he white-washed over this and instead painted a detailed representation of Tencoyotzin’s assassination (Boone 2000:202–203). Linked to the blue year disk of 12 Rabbit (1426) by a blue line, Tencoyotzin’s closed eyes and unnatural pose indicate death, while his simple loincloth further symbolizes his humiliation at the hands of the Tepaneca, one of whom is shown actively clubbing the Tepechpan ruler. Even in defeat, he wears the turquoise diadem of nobility. Tenochtitlan Painter A depicted the seating of the first official Mexica tlatoani, Acamapichtli (Handful of Reeds), in the year 1 Flint (1376); he is attached to this year by a red dotted line (plate 6). Painter A followed the typical pattern in showing Acamapichtli’s inauguration; he wears the full regalia of a tlatoani and is seated on the tepotzicpalli. Acamapichtli ruled until his death in the year 8 Flint (1396; plate 7). His funerary bundle, topped with a turquoise diadem, is attached to this year by a red dotted line, and Huitzilihuitl acceded to the throne in this same year. Identified by his Hummingbird Feather name glyph, the newly seated tlatoani is linked to this same year disk by another red dotted line. Painter A added genealogical detailing to the seating of Huitzilihuitl, which rarely is seen in Aztec annals (Boone 2000:198). Identifying them as his sons, a solid red line leads from Huitzilihuitl to the future tlatoani Chimalpopoca (Smoking Shield) and his brother


Temictzin (Dream), shown below (plate 8). Temictzin sits on a small petate mat and wears a white tilma. His hair is worn long, with a warrior’s topknot, and is arranged with his ear exposed.19 A red dotted line links Temictzin to a future queen of Tepechpan (plate 10), which identifies her as the granddaughter and niece of Mexica tlatoque. The death of Huitzilihuitl is shown in the year 3 House (1417); his funerary bundle, topped with a turquoise diadem, is attached by a red dotted line to this year disk (plate 8). Painter A recorded the seating of Chimalpopoca immediately after Huitzilihuitl’s death. The newly installed Chimalpopoca is linked to the time line by a red dotted line, and he is identified by his name glyph, which is standardized in the pictorials (Boornazian 1996:65). The name Chimalpopoca, or Smoking Shield, is recorded with a drawing of a shield (chimal-li) from the top of which come scrolls, an Aztec logogram for smoke (popoca, to smoke). In the Tira and other extant examples of this name glyph, the shield is decorated with eagle-down balls, which are often associated with conquest and sacrifice, and may be a poetic reference to Chimalpopoca’s bravery or prowess in war (Boornazian 1996:65). Chimalpopoca’s funerary bundle is connected to the year 12 Rabbit (1426) by a red dotted line (plate 9). In death, his name glyph is no longer decorated with eagle-down balls, perhaps a metaphoric device revealing that his bravery has been extinguished. Cosmic Implications Painter A’s color choices suggest that the Tepechpan leaders were more closely tied to the calendar than their Mexica counterparts. Each Tepechpan ruler is associated with a specific year disk color, and to further enhance this connection, Painter A matched the colors of the lines that link the Tepech

pan rulers with their associated year disks. In contrast, red dotted lines connect the Mexica rulers to the year disks, and not always consistently. Symbolically, this color usage harmoniously links the Tepechpan rulers with the time line and, at the same time, creates a disjunction between the Mexica rulers and the calendar. Nevertheless, Painter A did show Acamapichtli’s accession, and consequently the initiation of the tlatoani tradition in Tenochtitlan, in the significant 1 Flint (1376), and in this he agrees with a number of other sources. That the Mexica began their tlatoani tradition in the same year that their ancestors began their migration could not be a coincidence (Umberger 1981a:201–202). Therefore, Painter A followed Mexica historic tradition here, though the parallel composition of the Tira underscores the fact that Tenochtitlan’s first tlatoani was seated more than forty years later than the first tlatoani of Tepechpan. Following the official version of Mexica history as recorded in the Codex Mendoza, the temporal cycle begun with Acamapichtli’s accession in 1 Flint (1376) ended exactly one fifty-two-year cycle later with the death of Chimalpopoca in 13 Reed (1427). The seating of his successor Itzcoatl in another 1 Flint year (1428) began a new temporal cycle that coincided with his defeat of Azcapotzalco and the subsequent growth of imperial rule. Even so, the elegant chronology provided in the Codex Mendoza does not match many other histories. Many sources, including the Tira, place Chimalpopoca’s death in 12 Rabbit; these same sources, with the exception of the Tira, have the accession of Itzcoatl in 13 Reed and his defeat of Azcapotzalco in 1 Flint. Though there is variation in the sources, Painter A is unique in placing a full one-year interregnum between the death of Chimalpopoca and the seating of Itzcoatl. Chimal-


47

pahin (1997, 1:129) is the only other source to mention an interim in rule. According to him, a son of Chimalpopoca, named Xihuitl Temoc, was installed as ruler after his father’s death and ruled for only sixty days, until his own death; nevertheless, he is not included in other Tenochca king lists (Carrasco 1984:60). Chimalpahin’s account may explain Painter A’s record of an interregnum, and it may provide an additional interpretation of the Tira representation: that the interim ruler was not Chimalpopoca’s son, but instead his brother, Temictzin, as he was the last living person to be recorded in the Tira on the Tenochca register previous to Chimalpopoca’s death. The multivalency and interpretive richness of the pictorial tradition make this a possible interpretation of Painter A’s composition, one that would have further bolstered Tepechpan’s prestige, as the daughter of Temictzin would later marry a future king of Tepechpan. Also serving to link Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan is the fact that Tencoyotzin’s death occurred the same year as Chimalpopoca’s. By showing the deaths and accessions of Tepechpan and Tenochca leaders on the same dates, I believe Painter A symbolically equated the two; thus, just as Chimalpopoca’s assassination would instigate aggressions between the Mexica and the Tepaneca of Azcapotzalco, so too would Tencoyotzin’s death. Political Advancement With the accession of Acamapichtli, the Mexica rulers finally gained the signs of royalty seen so much earlier in Tepechpan. Indeed, because Painter A’s accession statements are identical on both registers, deviations particularly stand out. One deviation is the hair of Caltzin. Worn in a warrior’s topknot under his turquoise diadem, Cal-

48

tzin’s hair may signal an elite warrior’s title. The topknot not only implies his military prowess but also may serve as a mnemonic device to elicit stories of his conquests from a knowledgeable orator. Military prowess is a theme typically seen in Aztec histories; for example, the history section of the Codex Mendoza is filled with conquest statements. Painter A’s representation of Caltzin may indicate Tepechpan’s conquest of other territories, a necessary step in the buildup to power. In addition, Temictzin, the father of a future Tepechpan queen, also wears his hair in a warrior’s topknot, which signifies that he too must have had military conquests, a good indication of the clout of the future Tepechpan queen. Another necessity for power in Central Mexico was a royal bloodline, which the birth and subsequent accession of Caltzin established for Tepechpan. As the son of a Chichimec migrant and a Culhua-Toltec queen, Caltzin represents Tepechpan’s noble lineage brought to fruition. In contrast, Painter A made no such statement for Tenochtitlan. Though many alphabetic histories stress the ennobling of Acamapichtli, and hence the Tenochca ruling line, through either his Culhua-Toltec wife or mother, the pictorials rarely included such statements.20 As the Tira shows, the previous noble dynasty established by Coatzontli and Nazohuatl ended with the sacrifice of Huitzilihuitl and his daughter; thus Acamapichtli’s association with a Culhua princess was necessary to establish a new noble lineage with Toltec precedents for Tenochtitlan. However, Painter A failed to include this information in his history. Instead he showed that the Tepechpan ruling dynasty was so ennobled. The implication may be that Tepechpan had a legitimate ruling dynasty while Tenochtitlan did not.


Conclusions Painter A’s pre-imperial history concerns the buildup of power for both the Tepechpaneca and the Mexica by using stock themes of Aztec history: migration, foundation of the altepetl, and dynastic succession. However, through the composition of the Tira, with its parallel registers, and his manipulation of an economy of signs (such as the tepotzicpalli and turquoise diadem) and cosmic associations, Painter A varied the histories of Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan to such a degree that the knowledgeable and perhaps biased reader would recognize Tepechpan as being culturally superior to and politically more advanced than Tenochtitlan. Painter A’s preimperial history records a long, autonomous history for Tepechpan and a noble ruling lineage. In contrast, the Mexica are shown as subjects of the Culhua for much of their early history, and the antiquity of Tenochtitlan is not as great as Tepechpan. Nevertheless, many aspects of Painter A’s history reveal his acceptance of and adherence to Mexica historic tradition. For example, the large amount of space devoted to the Mexica expulsion from Chapultepec in the Tira and the similarities between his representation and the representations in Mexica sources— such as the Mapa Sigüenza and the Codices Azcatitlan, Boturini, and Mexicanus—suggest Painter A’s familiarity with Mexica historic tradition. Indeed, Acolhua sources, with the exception of the Tira, do not relate this story. Painter A also depicted the initiation of the Tenochca tlatoani tradition on the significant date of 1 Flint, and recorded the divine sanctification of Tenochtitlan itself by painting the eagle vision that marked the site. I believe Painter A’s references to Tenochtitlan work on multiple levels. As Boone

(1996) has argued, provincial centers often adopted imperial forms to show their membership in the Aztec empire. Painter A seems to have done just that, borrowing forms and icons typical of Mexica histories, such as the annals format and the xihuitzolli, to show Tepechpan’s place in the empire. Moreover, his inclusion of key episodes in Tenochca history reveals his acceptance of Tenochtitlan as the ruling power in the empire and foreshadows Tepechpan’s upcoming alliance with the capital. At the same time, Painter A’s manipulation of these signs may also work on a more subversive level. Tenochtitlan was clearly the most powerful altepetl in Central Mexico before the arrival of the Spaniards, and Tepechpan was a subject state, forced to pay tribute to and serve Texcoco. Therefore, Painter A borrowed and manipulated Mexica history and icons to confer their communicative meaning on Tepechpan and to effectively deny this city’s subjection to Texcoco. Because many of the historical tropes used by Painter A were borrowed from Mexica historic tradition and, accordingly, are associated with power, Painter A’s appropriations were a symbolic attempt to apply this power to Tepechpan and thereby negate its subjection to Texcoco. Indeed, the Mexica themselves may have first perfected this historical device by appropriating signs of nobility, such as the xihuitzolli, from the Toltecs via the Culhua. Also, by manipulating their history to align with the calendar, the Mexica presented their imperial growth as a natural part of the cosmic progression. That such manipulations could be successful is implied by the fact that the Mexica would eventually inherit the power of the Toltecs. If the Mexica could be so successful, perhaps Tepechpan could do the same after the conquest. Thus, Painter A


49

borrowed Mexica signs of nobility and applied them to Tepechpan while at the same time using Spanish standards of civility, such as the abhorrence of human sacrifice, to contrast Tepechpan with Tenochtitlan. With Tepechpan’s prestige established, Painter A shifted the focus of his history. This change coincided with the Tepanec War and the emergence of the Mexica as imperial

50

leaders. Aware of the benefits of membership in the empire, Painter A focused next on Tepechpan’s relationship to Tenochtitlan, the new imperial power. In effect, he presented Tepechpan as its principal ally, yet based on the message he established in his pre-imperial history, Tepechpan must still have been its cultural superior.


4. Imperial History

I

n the early fifteenth century, war broke out between the Tepaneca, the reigning power in Central Mexico, whose capital was at Azcapotzalco, and many of their subject cities. Clearly, this was a major event in Valley of Mexico politics for it receives a great deal of attention in many Aztec histories, in which the Tenochca stand out as the major combatants in the ensuing Tepanec War. However, it is unclear whether or not they had help, and if so, who their principal allies were; accounts vary depending on the local bias of the source. It is no surprise, then, that the account of the Tepanec War in the Tira emphasizes Tepechpan’s role in the battle, which is not mentioned in any other sources. Azcapotzalco was eventually conquered, after which Tenochtitlan emerged as the leading imperial power in much of Central Mexico and beyond. At this point in his history, Painter A’s agenda appears to have shifted somewhat to emphasize Tepechpan’s relationship to Tenochtitlan. I suspect this shift was an attempt to place Tepechpan in the role of principal ally of the Mexica. In this regard, Painter A’s history is similar to that of other Central Mexican cities, especially Texcoco, which is traditionally accepted as Tenochtitlan’s principal ally. The remainder of Painter A’s imperial history focuses on the dynastic successions of Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, respectively. His dynastic account continues to communicate the sacred nature of rule for the Tepechpan tlatoque, especially through their association with the calendar. Moreover, he adds only a few historic events concerning Tepechpan, and none

dealing with Tenochtitlan. Though minimal, these added details emphasize the continued autonomy and political power of Tepechpan while also communicating its acceptance of Mexica hegemony. The Tepanec War The representation of the Tepanec War is one of the most complicated sections in the Tira (plate 9). Under the year 4 Reed (1431), Painter A painted the place glyph of Azcapotzalco (Ant Heap), and below this, he drew a shield over an obsidian club, an ideogram that signifies war. This glyph is attached to a speech scroll issuing from the mouth of the Mexica ruler Itzcoatl (Obsidian Snake), who had just been seated in power in 1 Flint (1428). In short, Itzcoatl declared war on Azcapotzalco in 4 Reed. Under the shield is a representation of Maxtla (Loincloth), who is marked as the ruler of Azcapotzalco by his turquoise diadem, white mantle, and woven reed throne. Footprints from Maxtla lead to the left, back in time, and carry the action to the upper Tepechpan register, where they end at a representation of four figures, all named hieroglyphically and marked as Tepaneca.1 Because the footprints originate with Maxtla, the interlopers must have been sent on his orders. They also wear distinctive headdresses, which in the Primeros memoriales (Sahagún 1993:262r) are worn by the god Otontecuhtli, who is specifically associated with the Tepaneca (Noguez 1978, 1:79). Furthermore, these men carry tobacco gourds marked with stone glyphs (te-tl) that 51

may act as phonetic indicators again identifying these men as Tepaneca. Although their ethnicity is clear, the men are not so obviously marked as warriors, for they wear only loincloths, and the tobacco gourds they carry are more commonly associated with priests (Boone 2000:202). Perhaps Painter A wished to communicate that these soldiers came in disguise. Nonetheless, their mission is clear: three of the men carry clubs, and one actively beats Tencoyotzin, who lies prone with blood coming from his face. Tencoyotzin wears only a loincloth, indicating his defeated status, as does his awkward pose. The fourth invader carries a rope, presumably to bind Tencoyotzin for capture and sacrifice, though his closed eyes already indicate his death, as does the associated year disk, which changes from blue to red. Quaquauhtzin (Wooden Staff), next in line to the throne of Tepechpan, stands beside the dead Tencoyotzin. His bare head reveals that he was not yet an official ruler, presumably because he was forced to flee after his predecessor’s death. Indeed, footprints lead from him to a place glyph of a hill with superimposed flint knives over the sign for “preciousness,” or chalchihuitl, perhaps reading “Tecpatepec Chalco.”2 Quaquauhtzin is shown again, seated, next to this place glyph, which indicates that he fled to this town and settled for a time.3 Quaquauhtzin still does not wear the xihuitzolli, and he is seated only on a small petate mat, which further emphasizes his exiled status, surely due to the conflict with Azcapotzalco. Footprints lead again from the seated Quaquauhtzin into the time line at 4 Reed, the same year that Itzcoatl declared war on Azcapotzalco. Painter A’s representation may show that Quaquauhtzin went even deeper into hiding once war was declared. Additionally, the descent of Quaquauhtzin’s footprints into the time line, and hence symbolically into the Tenochtitlan reg52

ister, may indicate that Quaquauhtzin’s journey took him to Tenochtitlan to help in the upcoming war. Thus, Painter A’s composition implies a causal relationship; Itzcoatl declared war on Azcapotzalco because of its assassination of Tepechpan’s leader several years before. The next in line to the Tepechpan throne then joined the Mexica upon the start of the battle. According to Painter A, the final defeat of Azcapotzalco happened several years later, in 12 Reed (1439). The defeat is shown on the lower register; a representation of the Azcapotzalco place glyph appears above a burning temple with an overturned summit, an Aztec ideogram for conquest (plate 10). In the very next year, both Quaquauhtzin and Motecuhzoma acceded to their respective thrones. The respondents to Tepechpan’s Relación geográfica summarize these events well and most likely referred to the Tira in compiling their answer: “A lord of Atzcapotzalco near Mexico, named Maxtlaton, with despotism killed Tencoyotzin, lord of Tepechpan, in order to increase his dominion, for which reason they waged war against Atzcapotzalco and joined the Mexicans” (Nuttall 1926:71). The Tepanec War in Other Sources Originally, Painter A used a simple funerary bundle to record the death of Tencoyotzin; traces of that original bundle are visible under the representation of the assassinated ruler (Boone 2000:202–203). By modifying his work, Painter A more explicitly called attention to the connection between the assassination of the Tepechpan ruler and the ensuing battle. However, Tencoyotzin was not the only ruler to be assassinated by Tepanec forces. Based on the accounts of the war in other sources, the Tepaneca must have carried out a mass regicide. The Mexica


ruler Chimalpopoca was one of their most important victims, also killed by Tepanec forces sent by Maxtla.4 Though Painter A’s use of a simple funerary bundle to indicate Chimalpopoca’s death fails to acknowledge the exact cause, this information surely could have been provided by a knowledgeable orator. It would then be abundantly clear that the two tlatoque were symbolically linked, both killed in the same year at the hands of Tepanec assassins. The implication is that the Tepanec War avenged the death of Tencoyotzin as much as that of Chimalpopoca, which implies the important position of Tepechpan in the future empire. That the registers join here further suggests a link between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan; in short, the political importance of Tepechpan became elevated by its connection with Tenochtitlan. A similar message is typical of other altepetl. For example, according to the Codex Xolotl (fig. 4.1) and Alva Ixtlilxochitl’s (1997, 1:326–327) account—both recorded from the Acolhua perspective—Maxtla’s predecessor, Tezozomoc, ordered the killing of the Texcocan ruler Ixtlilxochitl, which led to an outbreak of fighting between Acolhua and Tepanec forces. As a subject of Azcapotzalco, Ixtlilxochitl was expected to marry a daughter of Tezozomoc, but instead he took a Tenochca noblewoman as his principal wife. By doing so, the Texcocan ruler both snubbed Azcapotzalco and established a new alliance with Tenochtitlan, as solidified through the marriage and their union and victory in the upcoming war.5 Ixtlilxochitl’s son and heir to the throne, Nezahualcoyotl, went into hiding after his father’s assassination and eventually joined Mexica forces to overthrow Azcapotzalco, after which he restored the rulers of his subject cities, including Tepechpan, to their rightful thrones. These events are surprisingly similar to those recorded in the Tira for Tepechpan, except for Quaquauht

zin’s restoration to the throne through the help of Nezahualcoyotl, which Painter A’s account effectively denies. In short, the Tepaneca killed the fathers of both Quaquauhtzin and Nezahualcoyotl, upon which they both fled, joined the Mexica in battle, and defeated Azcapotzalco. Later, both Quaquauhtzin and Nezahualcoyotl would establish a marriage alliance with Tenochtitlan; in fact, as explained below, they did so by marrying the same woman!6 By patterning his history after that of Texcoco while at the same time writing Texcoco out of Tepechpan’s history, Painter A appropriated for Tepechpan what has traditionally been accepted as Texcoco’s primary role in the empire: the principal ally of Tenochtitlan. Nevertheless, this biased approach to the Tepanec War seems to have been a popular historical trope, and the role of principal ally of the Tenochca in the Tepanec War was very much up for grabs. According to the Anales de Tlatelolco (1948:4–55), its leader Tlacateotl was also assassinated by order of the Tepanec ruler, after which the Tlatelolca allied with the Mexica in the war against Azcapotzalco. This same source credits the final victory and killing of the Tepanec ruler Maxtla to Tlacateotl’s successor, Cuauhtlatoa. The Tlatelolca even diminished the role of Texcoco in the war by maintaining that Cuauhtlatoa and Itzcoatl installed Nezahualcoyotl as ruler of Texcoco after their victory, in clear contradiction to Alva Ixtlilxochitl’s account. Further denying the pivotal role of Nezahualcoyotl in the victory, the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (fig. 4.2) and its cognate, the Codex Ríos (1964:107), include Tlacateotl but not Nezahualcoyotl in the terse mention of the war. The painters of these manuscripts depicted Itzcoatl’s accession to rule immediately after the death of Chimalpopoca. Next to this transfer of power, Maxtla and Tlacateotl (the latter stands on the Tlatelolco place

Imperial History

53

Figure 4.1. Map 7 of the Codex Xolotl, featuring the assassination of Ixtlilxochitl (top left) and battles between Tepanec and Acolhua forces (center). Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

glyph) are shown armed and approaching a temple. This representation is rather confusing because the two seem to be presented as allies rather than as enemies, and Eloise Quiñones Keber (1995:215–216) suggests that the scene may have been copied erroneously from another manuscript. A battle between the two rulers would make more sense and would support Quiñones Keber’s (1995:128) suspicion that the original manuscript has a Tlatelolcan provenance. If so, it would not be surprising to see Tlatelolco as a key participant in the war, as was claimed by Texcoco and Tepechpan as well. Tellingly, the Codices Telleriano-Remensis and Ríos fail to even mention Nezahualcoyotl until well after the final victory. Of course, even Cuauhtitlan figured 54

prominently in the Tepanec War according to the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:80– 101). As recorded in this sixteenth-century alphabetic history, the Tepanec tlatoani also killed the ruler of Cuauhtitlan, after which Cuauhtitlan allied with the Mexica. When the people of Cuauhtitlan installed a new ruler, they sought approval from the Mexica rather than the Tepaneca, to whom they had previously been subject. Therefore, they ignored ethnic affiliation to take the side of the conquerors, as many indigenous peoples would subsequently do upon the arrival of the Spaniards. Not surprisingly, the sources that fail to mention an ally’s help in the battle are those associated with Tenochtitlan. For example, in the Codex Mendoza (fig. 4.3), the defeat of


Figure 4.2. The death of Chimalpopoca, the accession of Itzcoatl, and the outbreak of the Tepanec War in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, 31r. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

Azcapotzalco is the first in the list of twentyfour conquests carried out by Itzcoatl, and three of the supposed allies of the Mexica in the war—Texcoco/Acolhuacan, Tlatelolco, and Cuauhtitlan—are noted as conquests of Itzcoatl on these same pages. Certainly, there was no denying that the Mexica were the key force in the Tepanec War, and with their victory, they became the new imperial leaders in Central Mexico. Therefore, unable to ignore the supremacy of Tenochtitlan, Painter A emphasized Tepechpan’s role in the battle, just as the other sources did for Texcoco, Tlatelolco, and Cuauhtitlan, respectively. The similarity of these non-Tenochca accounts, which emphasize an alliance between the patron city and Tenochtitlan, suggests that Painter A followed a common historical trope. As Frederick Hicks (1994:237) has argued, alliance with the victors, regardless of ethnic affiliation, was paramount for political prestige in Mesoamerica. By emphasizing their connections with the Mexica, these polities were effectively arguing for their own privileged position in the future empire. The new empire that was founded after the conquest of Azcapotzalco is often referred to as the Triple Alliance, a confederation that consisted of Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, and Tlacopan. However, Susan Gillespie (1998) questions if the Triple Alliance truly existed as such, or if it was a colonial tradition meant to bolster the prestige of Texcoco and Tlacopan, the lesser members of the presumed confederation (see also Gibson 1971:389). Indeed, Painter A made no mention of any such alliance, and his unique record of the Tepanec War supports Gillespie’s thesis that shifting alliances more likely characterized the Aztec empire, rather than a static Triple Alliance. Based solely on Painter A’s history, one could easily presume that the main cities in the Aztec empire were Tenochtitlan and 56

Tepechpan. The Tepanec War obviously provided an opportunity for political restructuring in Central Mexico, with new alliances formed to throw off the yoke of Tepanec dominance. Clearly, Tepechpan took advantage of this restructuring by ignoring its subjection to Texcoco and promoting its ties to Tenochtitlan, which, as explicated below, would become further reinforced through a marriage alliance. Cosmic Implications The traditional date for the conquest of Azcapotzalco is 1 Flint (1428), a date that was surely selected because of its cosmic significance for the Mexica state.7 However, Painter A recorded the Tepanec War as lasting much longer, from the declaration of war in 4 Reed (1431) to the final defeat in 12 Reed (1439), an anomalous and late date for the final victory. By showing the conquest in 1 Flint, historians communicated a cosmic validation of the conquest of Azcapotzalco and its link to the supremacy of the Mexica state. Accordingly, by providing a different date, Painter A subtly disassociated the final victory from the Mexica. I suspect that Painter A provided this particularly late date for the victory to more fully link the final conquest with the seating in rule of Quaquauhtzin, which happened the very next year. The implication is that Quaquauhtzin could finally be named officially as tlatoani because of the victory, a statement that underscores the role of Tepechpan in the war. Dynastic Succession With the defeat of the Tepaneca, the Mexica entered the imperial phase of their history and, by implication, so did Tepechpan. The representations of the remaining preconquest Mexica and Tepechpan tlatoque are


Figure 4.3. Folio 5v of the Codex Mendoza, showing Itzcoatl’s reign and conquests. Courtesy of the Bodleian Library, University of Oxford.

for the most part identical, distinguished only by name glyphs. Thus, the respective imperial rulers are shown as equals. Though Painter A recorded no more historic events for Tenochtitlan, he did add a few telling details to Tepechpan’s history: a marriage alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, and the distribution of land and dedication of a temple in Tepechpan. These events communicate the political, economic, and religious importance of Tepechpan, while also communicating its allegiance to the imperial capital. Tepechpan The unofficial ruler during the Tepanec War, Quaquauhtzin became the official tlatoani in 13 Flint (1440; plate 10). His accession statement is typical in that he wears the turquoise diadem of rule and is seated on a full-size woven reed throne; however, there are some distinguishing details. For one, he wears his hair in a warrior’s topknot, which likely communicates his valiant efforts in the Tepanec War and perhaps his receipt of an elite warrior’s title. Furthermore, Painter A included Quaquauhtzin’s wife in his accession statement. Identified with a flower (xoch-itl) name glyph that I read as Xochtzin, she is seated above her husband and linked to him by a red dotted line in a traditional marriage statement. Her braided and wrapped hairstyle also communicates her marital status. Another red dotted line leads from her to the lower register and links her to the warrior Temictzin, marking him as her father. Another line from Temictzin joins one from the Mexica tlatoani Chimalpopoca and ends at his predecessor, Huitzilihuitl. These details communicate Quaquauhtzin’s wife’s high status, for she was the grand-daughter and niece of Mexica tlatoque.

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Quaquauhtzin died just three years after his accession (plate 10). The 3 Reed (1443) year disk is painted half blue and half yellow, and a blue line connects his funerary bundle, topped with a turquoise diadem, to the blue portion of the year disk. An arrow pierces Quaquauhtzin’s funerary bundle, and blood comes from the wound. Clearly he did not die of natural causes, and the associated hill glyph topped with reeds must record the place where he was killed. After the death of Quaquauhtzin, the year disks revert to yellow, and there was an eight-year interregnum at Tepechpan. We may speculate that during this time, Xochtzin was regent, presumably because her son, the legitimate heir to the throne, was too young to assume rule upon his father’s untimely death. Finally, in 11 Reed (1431), Tencoyotzin II was seated as Tepechpan’s tlatoani; a year disk, which turns from yellow to blue, reveals the transition in power (plate 11). Shown seated on the woven reed throne and wearing the typical regalia of a new ruler, Tencoyotzin II also holds a staff in his left hand and points to a line of eight rectangular brown patches, indicating land. Symbols of pre-Hispanic agricultural measures, a rope (mecatl) and a hand (maitl) superimposed on a rod (quahuitl), appear to the left (Noguez 1978, 1:94).8 This hieroglyphic construction communicates that the new Tepechpan tlatoani measured and distributed land. Tencoyotzin II had an extremely long reign of seventy-six years. He oversaw one New Fire Ceremony in 2 Reed (1455) and possibly a second in the year of his death. A faint green line links his funerary bundle to the year 2 Reed (1507), which is painted half green and half yellow (plate 14). Painter A included the wife of the deceased Tepechpan tlatoani above the funerary bundle of her husband. She is identified by a name glyph


of two dots and a rabbit’s head, Ome Tochtzin (Two Rabbit). She is seated in the Aztec kneeling woman’s pose and wears her hair braided and wrapped in the distinctive Aztec female hairstyle. She also wears an elaborate huipil finished in red and marked at the front and back with a red patch and scroll pattern. A red line from Ome Tochtzin joins a line from her deceased husband and ends at the seating three years later of Quaquauhtzin II, surely identifying him as their son. Upon Tencoyotzin II’s death, the year disks turn to yellow, and no one was officially seated as ruler until Quaquauhtzin II’s inauguration in 5 Rabbit (1510). During this time, Ome Tochtzin must have served as regent, or ruler stand-in, which is suggested at her death (Boone 2000:231, 264–265). Above the year 1520, Painter A included the funerary bundle of Ome Tochtzin, the only female death recorded in the Tira (plate 15). The attached Two Rabbit name glyph identifies this as her death statement, but Painter A added some distinguishing features that mark this as the death of a female ruler. First, superimposed on the funerary bundle is a turquoise diadem, seen previously in the Tira associated with rulers. Here it shows that Ome Tochtzin acted as regent after the death of her husband. Second, the shape of the bundle is not the typical one of a seated male but instead is that of a kneeling female; the bundle is wrapped with a rope once at the neck, crossed twice at the torso, and finally wrapped around the feet, which are in the back. A final, unique element is included under the turquoise diadem. Although highly damaged, when examined in the original, it is clear that Painter A included a representation of the typical Aztec female hairstyle under the diadem. After the death of her husband and before the installation of her son, Ome Tochtzin

must have acted as regent.9 By drawing a red dotted line from the kneeling Ome Tochtzin to her funerary bundle, Painter A not only communicated that the bundle was certainly hers, but also symbolically drew her presence over these intervening years. The years associated with her rule are painted yellow, as were the years of Xochtzin’s presumed regency. Moreover, Ome Tochtzin was not just a figurehead at Tepechpan, for she oversaw a temple dedication. To indicate this important event, Painter A depicted a temple resting on a stone foundation and connected to the year 3 Flint (1508) by a red dotted line. Just two years later, Ome Tochtzin acceded rule to her son, Quaquauhtzin II, who was seated in the year 5 Rabbit (1510); a blue line attaches the representation of his inauguration to the blue portion of this year disk (plate 14). He died in 9 Rabbit (1514) after just five years of rule (plate 15). At this time the year disks revert to yellow, which suggests that Ome Tochtzin again assumed the role of regent, for the years previously associated with her reign were also yellow. The next Tepechpan ruler, Tenyahualohuatzin (Lips Procession), was inaugurated in 12 House (1517), at which time the year disks change from yellow to blue. He would rule through the Spanish invasion. Tenochtitlan Painter A’s record of Tenochtitlan’s dynastic succession follows the traditional sequence, with Itzcoatl acceding to the throne in 1 Flint (1428) and dying in either 12 Reed (1439) or 13 Flint (1440); the exact date is unclear because his funerary bundle is not linked to the time line (plate 12). The seating of Motecuhzoma I (Angry Lord), Itzcoatl’s successor, was placed immediately under the year 13 Reed (1440), and his death in 2 Flint

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(1468); his funerary bundle is connected to this year disk by a red dotted line.10 Axayacatl (Water Face) acceded to the throne in this same year, ruling until his death in 2 House (1481; plate 13).11 Axayacatl’s successor, Tizoc (Chalk Leg), was seated in the year 2 House (1481); he is connected to this year by a red dotted line (plate 13).12 After just four years in power, Tizoc died in 6 House (1485), as indicated by the red dotted line that links his funerary bundle to this year. Ahuitzotl (Water Rat) gained the throne in 6 House (1485); a typical representation of a seated tlatoani identified by his name glyph of a rat covered with water is connected to this year by a red dotted line (plate 13). Another dotted line links his funerary bundle to the year 10 Rabbit (1502), indicating his death (plate 14). Motecuhzoma Xocoyotzin’s accession is shown in this same year. He is identified with the same abbreviated name glyph as Motecuhzoma Ilhuicamina: a turquoise diadem, for tecuhtli, or Lord. As did his namesake fifty-two years earlier, Motecuhzoma II died in the year 2 Flint (1520). Marriage Alliance Because Painter A did not consistently include wives in ruler accession statements, those who were included must have played important political roles for Tepechpan (Diel 2005a:83–92). This is certainly true of Quaquauhtzin’s wife, Xochtzin. Underscoring her political role is the fact that Painter A recorded her lineage, a rare inclusion in an Aztec annals history. By tracing her bloodline onto the lower Tenochtitlan register and showing her relation to former Mexica tlatoque, Painter A highlighted the alliance between the two cities, perhaps a result of their partnership in the Tepanec War. Furthermore, she appears at an important juncture in Tepechpan’s history, after a rupture in rule

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following the assassination of Tencoyotzin I. As Gillespie (1989:17–18, 22) argues, women often appeared in Aztec histories after such ruptures, when they materialized to reestablish the ruling bloodline that was symbolically impaired by the break. As a Mexica noblewoman, Quaquauhtzin’s wife restored the Tepechpan lineage with her established nobility while at the same time creating a marital alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan. Marriage clearly served a political function in the Aztec empire, with superordinate tlatoque typically giving daughters in marriage to subordinate rulers (Carrasco 1984; Townsend 2006; Diel 2007). As a subject of Texcoco, Quaquauhtzin must have been expected to marry a daughter of the Texcocan tlatoani Nezahualcoyotl. By selecting a Mexica noblewoman as his principal wife instead, Quaquauhtzin sent a clear political statement communicating a new alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan and in effect denying Tepechpan’s subjection to Texcoco. The arrow piercing Quaquauh tzin’s funerary bundle just three years later points to the consequences of Tepechpan’s political machinations. This saga must have been a popular cautionary tale, for the story was recorded in a number of alphabetic histories from the Colonial period.13 According to these rather romanticized accounts, after hearing that the woman promised to him in marriage had married another man, Nezahualcoyotl took a journey in an effort to sort out his feelings, as it were. He soon arrived in Tepechpan, where Quaquauhtzin graciously received him while Xochtzin served the two leaders refreshments. Upon first sight, Nezahualcoyotl fell in love with the young woman and, determined to have her, arranged the death of Quaquauh tzin. Nezahualcoyotl ordered Quaquauhtzin


into battle against Tlaxcala, while surreptitiously arranging for some Tlaxcalan warriors to seek out the Tepechpan ruler and kill him. Above Quaquauhtzin’s funerary bundle in the Tira, a glyph of reeds over a hill sign must indicate the place of his final battle. After Quaquauhtzin’s death, Nezahualcoyotl quickly married his widow. According to Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 1:544), the Codex Xolotl (1996:6), and the Mapa Tlotzin (see fig. 3.8), she became his principal wife and the mother of his son, the future Texcocan tlatoani Nezahualpilli.14 At a banquet before the battle, Quaquauhtzin performed a poem that came to be recorded alphabetically early in the Colonial period.15 Though Xochtzin is not directly mentioned, Quaquauhtzin’s declaration, “You have hated me / You have marked me for death,” shows that he was aware of Nezahualcoyotl’s treachery. The poem further reveals that Quaquauhtzin, aware of his fate, would dutifully go to war, which was his obligation as the servant of Nezahualcoyotl. As the poem says, “Now I go to his house / I will perish.” Recorded alphabetically on at least two separate occasions in the sixteenth century, this must have been a popular legend, one that may have been ritually reenacted when performing or giving voice to Tepechpan’s history. Although the terse representation in the Tira summons the tale, the story told by a Tepechpaneca would surely have differed from that told by Alva Ixtlilxochitl, with his decidedly Texcocan bias. For example, Alva Ixtlilxochitl specifically said that Xochtzin was too young for marriage and was therefore only Quaquauhtzin’s fiancée, not his wife, perhaps making Nezahualcoyotl’s actions less treacherous. Nevertheless, Painter A clearly presented the two as husband and wife; the dotted line that links them marks

them as a married couple, and the braided and wrapped hairstyle of Xochtzin identifies her as a married woman. A later interpreter also saw her as Quaquauhtzin’s wife, for an alphabetic annotation beside Xochtzin identifies her as yncihuah, or “his [Quaquauhtzin’s] wife.” Moreover, Tepechpan’s next ruler, Tencoyotzin II, is named after Quaquauhtzin’s father, which implies that he was the grandson of Tencoyotzin I and thus the son of Quaquauhtzin and his Mexica wife. A likely explanation for the romantic tale of Nezahualcoyotl’s duplicity is that it was a reaction to political maneuverings on the part of Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan (Diel 2005a:90). Quaquauhtzin’s decision to take a Mexica noblewoman as his principal wife clearly communicated a break in ties with Texcoco and the establishment of new ties with Tenochtitlan. Nezahualcoyotl’s actions were retribution against Tepechpan for its political machinations. In yet another similarity between the histories of Tepechpan and Texcoco, an identical situation ignited the Tepanec War. Rather than marry the daughter of Tezozomoc, leader of Azcapotzalco, the Texcocan leader Ixtlilxochitl took a Mexica noblewoman as his wife. To punish Ixtlilxochitl for his disloyalty, Tezozomoc ordered his assassination (Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997, 1:326–327; Codex Xolotl 1996:6, 7). Some scholars have noted that this tale is reminiscent of the biblical story of David, Uriah, and Bathsheba, with Nezahualcoyotl in the role of David, who fell in love with Uriah’s wife, Bathsheba. Determined to have her, David ordered Uriah into a battle in which his death was arranged.16 As Salvador Velazco (1998:34, 40–46) has argued, Alva Ixtlilxochitl may have enhanced the similarities between David and Nezahualcoyotl in an attempt to make Texcoco appear to be a true place of the Christian faith. However,

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a Tepechpan-centric reading of these events might stress Nezahualcoyotl’s treachery. One would presume that the ordered killing of the Tepechpan leader by the Texcocan tlatoani would break any alliance there once was between Tepechpan and Texcoco. This is just what happened between Texcoco and Azcapotzalco upon Tezozomoc’s assassination of Ixtlilxochitl, which effectively severed ties between the two cities. Ultimately, Xochtzin played an important political role for Tepechpan: she restored its ruling bloodline, which had been ruptured by the assassination of Tencoyotzin I; she established a marriage alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, the new imperial power in Central Mexico; she bore a son who became the next Tepechpan ruler, cementing ties to the Mexica state; and she caused a break in the alliance between Tepechpan and Texcoco. Also, some sources relate that upon Chimalpopoca’s death, it was decided that neither his descendants nor those of Huitzilihuitl would rule; chosen instead was Itzcoatl, the son of Acamapichtli and a slave woman (Carrasco 1984:59–60). As a descendant of the Huitzilihuitl and Chimalpopoca dynasty, Tepechpan’s queen Xochtzin may represent the preservation of the legitimate dynasty of Tenochtitlan, which according to the Tira continued in Tepechpan. Ultimately, Texcoco’s reassertion of control over Tepechpan must have been successful, for Tencoyozin II’s wife is included in the Tira, and a later alphabetic annotation identifies her as a daughter of Nezahualcoyotl. Nevertheless, though this fact would have been added by a knowledgeable interpreter, Painter A’s record makes no direct mention of Ome Tochtzin’s Acolhua lineage, in contrast to the clear lineage statement he included for Xochtzin. A strict reading of Painter A’s selective history, then, only establishes the connections between Tepechpan 62

and Tenochtitlan, despite assertions to the contrary in sources associated with Texcoco. Distribution of Land The inauguration of Tencoyotzin II, presumably Xochtzin’s son, stands out in the Tira because it is combined with his distribution of land, which would have been connected to an imposition of tribute obligations. Perhaps using the Tira as a source, the respondents to Tepechpan’s Relación geográfica communicated the same information: “Later on, fifty years previous to the reign of Montezuma [around 1450], lord of Mexico, the lordship of Tepechpan was held by Tencuyotzin, to whom the natives of said town began to yield tribute” (Nuttall 1926:63). Because the right to distribute lands was only available to an autonomous ruler (Wolf 1999:141), Tencoyotzin’s establishment of calpulli lands and tribute payments signifies Tepechpan’s status as an imperial city with its own subjects. A similar assertion is found in the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:100), which recorded the distribution of lands to the people of Cuauhtitlan after they sided with the victors in the Tepanec War: “Then he apportioned lands, handing them out, giving them as grants. Then the Cuauhtitlan nation was provided with lands. It was on account of the war that the grants came to be made.” For Tepechpan, this land distribution occurred quite a few years after the Tepanec War, with Quaquauhtzin’s successor. As the son of a former Tepechpan ruler and a Mexica noblewoman, Tencoyotzin II may have represented the physical embodiment of the new alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan created by his parents. The imposition of tribute by Tencoyotzin II then may have resulted from these newly established ties. In the pictorials, references to land are more commonly found in maps and cadastres rather than in the annals histories. Perhaps


this event was added to Tepechpan’s history because ties to land became an important statement to make under Spanish rule, when the rightful patrimony of many cities came under increasing scrutiny. Painter A’s record, then, asserted that Tepechpan’s right to its landholdings dated to the ancient past. Temple Dedication As evidence that she was not just a figurehead but an active leader, Ome Tochtzin is shown overseeing the renovation and dedication of a temple at Tepechpan (plate 14). The Tepechpan temple shown earlier in the Tira (plate 4), above the year 4 House (1353), was clearly an early construction as it has only four tiers and no summit. The new Tepechpan temple is more complex; it has five tiers, a central walkway, a summit sanctuary shown in a T-elevation, and an elaborately decorated roof. Painter A placed the temple on top of a stone foundation, the place glyph for Tepechpan, which emphasizes that this temple was built there. Archaeological surveys revealed remnants of an Aztec period temple in present-day Tepechpan (Sanders 1965:81). A Christian church was built on top of this during the Colonial period. Temple dedications are standard fare in Aztec histories, which reveals their political importance in the Late Post-Classic and Colonial periods. For example, the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:74, 76) mentions temple dedications for Tenochtitlan, Texcoco, Chalco, and, of course, Cuauhtitlan. The Codex en Cruz (figs. 4.4, 4.5) records temple dedications for Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, and Texcoco, and also for the relatively minor city of Chiauhtla, a subject of Texcoco. The inclusion of Chiauhtla bolsters Charles Dibble’s (1981, 1:59) suspicion that this manuscript was painted there, as it would make sense for Chiauhtla to have promoted its own temple and hence its religious importance.17

For a pre-conquest altepetl, a temple was symbolic of the community’s power and identity; the implication is that the presence of a temple communicated a city’s sovereignty, and the more elaborate the temple, the more powerful the altepetl (Lockhart 1992:206; van Zantwijk 1985:200). The dedication of a temple of such magnitude in Tepechpan would have clearly communicated its religious prestige, just as the temples at Cuauhtitlan and Chiauhtla did for these cities. In fact, witnesses for Tepechpan, in its lawsuit with its subject Temascalapa, mentioned the presence of the ancient temple in Tepechpan as further proof of the city’s later cabecera status (AGI Justicia 164). Surely the most important temple dedication in the Valley of Mexico was that of the Templo Mayor by Ahuitzotl, who completed the renovations begun by his predecessor, Tizoc. Numerous pictorial histories depict the dedication ceremonies, with some placing particular emphasis on the sacrificial ceremonies that sanctified the event. For instance, the complex record in the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (fig. 4.6) emphasizes the large number of victims sacrificed for the dedicatory ceremony. In this example, the three white figures represent sacrificial vic‑ tims, and the associated incense bags and branches function as numbers, indicating a total of 20,000 victims (Quiñones Keber 1995:225). The Codex en Cruz (see fig. 4.5) also shows the human victims; in the 8 Reed (1487) year column, the artist of this manuscript painted the Tenochca temple with three disembodied heads with associated place glyphs, referencing the sacrificial victims and their homelands. By emphasizing the human toll of the Templo Mayor expansion, these particular sources may have attempted to communicate the barbarity of the Mexica, especially when we take into account the colonial and Christian context

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Figure 4.4. Temples dedicated to Huitzilopochtli in Texcoco (bottom) and Tlatelolco (top) in 1 Reed (1467). Codex en Cruz. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

of these works.18 Other temple dedications shown in the Codex en Cruz do not include sacrificial victims, which suggests a contrast between the people of Chiauhtla and the Tenochca. Accordingly, by failing to picture the ceremonies that would have attended the temple dedication in Tepechpan, Painter A may have been emphasizing the civility of the Tepechpaneca. Despite the numerous references to the Templo Mayor dedication in other sources, Painter A did not include this event in the Tira. In fact, after the defeat of Azcapotzalco, 64

he recorded no historic events for Tenochtitlan beyond simple ruler accession statements; from then until the conquest, his attention was focused squarely on Tepechpan. Nevertheless, Tepechpan’s temple dedication does reiterate Tepechpan’s ties to Tenochtitlan. Perhaps not coincidentally, Ome Tochtzin’s temple dedication happened in 3 Flint (1508), the third anniversary of the arrival of Mexica migrants in Tepechpan. Though not associated with a specific year, the early Mexica migrants shown presenting offerings to the Tepechpan temple and performing


Figure 4.5. Temples dedicated to Huitzilopochtli in Chiauhtla in 4 Reed (1483) (bottom) and in Tenochtitlan in 8 Reed (1487). Codex en Cruz. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

an animal sacrifice ritual associated with the act of foundation appear exactly three fiftytwo-year cycles earlier, above 3 Flint (1352). By showing that the temple dedication was timed to coincide with this anniversary, Painter A may have been indicating how important these Mexica migrants were to the future Tepechpan community. Further connecting the Tepechpaneca to the Mexica is the god to whom the Tepechpan temple was dedicated. The grid-like pattern and shell motifs adorning the summit of the

temple appear in other pictorials associated with the Mexica patron deity, Huitzilopochtli (see figs. 4.4, 4.5, and 4.6). Therefore, the Tepechpan temple was also dedicated to this god, further communicating Tepechpan’s acceptance of Mexica sovereignty. Other cities also dedicated their temples to the Mexica patron deity. For example, in the Codex en Cruz column for the year 1 Reed (1467; see fig. 4.4), a temple decorated with the same Huitzilopochtli design characteristics and marked with the name glyph for Nezahual-

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Figure 4.6. Dedication of Tenochtitlan’s Templo Mayor in 8 Reed (1487). Codex TellerianoRemensis, 39r. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

coyotl communicates that in this year Nezahualcoyotl dedicated a temple to Huitzilopochtli in Texcoco (Dibble 1981, 1:20). This must have been an important event, for the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:110) also mentions this temple dedication, and the artist of the Codex Azcatitlan (fig. 4.7) recorded the same event, showing the Texcocan temple with its Huitzilopochtli attributes. The representation of Texcoco’s main temple in the Codex Ixtlilxochitl also shows its double summit dedicated to Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc. According to the Codex en Cruz (see fig. 4.5), Texcoco’s subject, Chiauhtla, also dedicated a temple to Huitzilopochtli in the year 4 Reed (1483); this temple is decorated in the same manner, again suggesting that the people of Chiauhtla also pledged alle66

giance to the Mexica patron deity, despite their Acolhua ethnicity. On the surface, the dedication of a temple to the Mexica patron deity in these Acolhua cities is unusual. According to the Texcocan historian Juan de Pomar (1991:30, 34– 35) the three gods worshipped at Texcoco, in order of importance, were Tezcatlipoca (Texcoco’s “ídolo principal ”), Huitzilopochtli, and Tlaloc. Therefore, we would expect its main temple to be devoted to Tezcatlipoca, but according to this same source, Tezcatliopoca’s temple was not located in Texcoco proper but was built in the barrio of Huiznahuac and was much smaller than the double-summit temple devoted to Huitzilopochtli and Tlaloc, which was placed in the middle of the city. Pomar also suggests that


Figure 4.7. Dedication of the Templo Mayor of Texcoco. Codex Azcatitlan, 35. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

the Huitzilopochtli side took precedence over the ancient Tlaloc, as evidenced by its summit being the taller of the two. Though the colonial Texcocan sources often stress the autonomy and power of Texcoco in the Aztec empire, the fact that this city and its subjects devoted their main temples to the Mexica patron deity suggests the degree of religious control exerted by the Mexica. The acceptance of the ruling power’s god, then, was a political device used to curry favor with the imperial leaders. In this regard, Texcoco’s devotion to Huitzilopochtli was no different than the less powerful Tepechpan’s. Indeed, this device would reassert itself after the conquest, when the acceptance of the Christian god and foundation of a Christian church would act in much the same manner,

conferring spiritual power on the patron city and offering a sign of their acquiescence to foreign rule. Cosmic Implications It is typical to see some variation in the accession dates for Mexica rulers in the various chronicles. Considering this variation, Painter A’s dates are for the most part consistent with other sources. However, he did not always associate Mexica rulers with specific dates. When he did, he continued to use a red dotted line to distinguish these rulers from their Tepechpan counterparts, who are connected to the time line with lines matching the colors of their year disks. In this way, Painter A visually emphasized the harmony of the Tepechpan rulers with the calendar,

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while creating a subtle disjunction between the Mexica rulers and the progression of time. Although history in the Tira is presented in a linear fashion, it also has a cyclical core determined by the structure of the calendar. The same year names repeat every fifty-two years, and dates of the same name are believed to share particular associations. For example, because famine ravaged Central Mexico in the year 1 Reed, it was believed that famines would continue to occur in this same year in the future. Nicholson (1975:491) calls this repeating, cyclical aspect of Aztec chronicles “pattern history.” Because Mexica histories were based on the annals format, rulers were conceptually linked to the time line, and royal dynasties can be seen also as repeating cycles. Thus, according to official Mexica history, both Acamapichtli and Itzcoatl were seated as rulers in 1 Flint years, which symbolically links them. Both achieved great advances for the Mexica state: Acamapichtli began its royal bloodline, and fifty-two years later Itzcoatl earned its independence. An underlying cyclical pattern is also evident in the reigns of Motecuhzoma I and Motecuhzoma II, whom Susan Gillespie (1989:123–125) sees as structural equivalents. Not only did they share a name and die in the same year (2 Flint), but each was the sole ruler from his generation. Furthermore, each of their deaths was followed by a shift in the dynastic sequence, with their daughters (Atotoztli and Tecuichpo/ Doña Isabel, respectively) playing key roles in the selection of the succeeding tlatoque. Clearly, the Mexica imposed order on history; presumably, the more elegant one’s history, the stronger its political argument. Itzcoatl’s burning of the old histories and commissioning of new ones following his defeat of the Tepaneca is well cited in the litera-

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ture (Sahagún 1950–1982 10:191). This new, official history was an idealized one in which dates were chosen because of their symbolic associations (Umberger 1988:353). Therefore, the similarities of the reigns of Motecuhzoma I and II, and of Acamapichtli and Itzcoatl, respectively, are not coincidental. Instead they reflect an imposed, cyclical patterning typical of Aztec history, which Gillespie argues reflects underlying principles related to kingship in the Aztec world. This symbolic connection between the calendar and the royal dynasty, then, expressed a relationship between the cosmos and the state; the rulers, their histories, and destinies were tied to the cosmos. As Gillespie (1989:17) puts it, The patterned repetition of the genealogy, seen in terms of biological relationships and succession, events in the reigns of the kings, and in one case their names is not unique to the Tenochtitlan dynasty but is a function of certain concepts of rulership in which the nature of the king is tied to the functioning of the cosmos; thus kingship, like the cosmos, is cyclical. Indeed, we need look no further than Tepechpan to see another example of such patterning. The Tepechpan dynastic sequence—with rule passing from father to son through a sequence of six rulers from its founder to Quaquauhtzin II (Tepechpan’s last tlatoani to have a complete reign previous to the Spanish invasion)—also reveals cyclical patterning. The Tepechpan dynasty is structured around two sets of tlatoque that alternate rule from father to son between each set (fig. 4.8). That is, each ruler in a particular set is separated by one generation each. The first set consists of the Tepechpan founder, Icxicuauhtli,


Set 1: Icxicuauhtli Tencoyotzin I Tencoyotzin II

Set 2: Caltzin Quaquauhtzin I Quaquauhtzin II

Figure 4.8. Structural patterning of the Tepechpan dynastic sequence.

his grandson Tencoyotzin I, and his greatgreat-grandson Tencoyotzin II. Tepechpan’s second tlatoani, Caltzin, his grandson Quaquauhtzin I, and his great-great-grandson Quaquauhtzin II are members of the second set. Through its correlation with approximately two generations, the fifty-two-year cycle promoted a special relationship between grandfathers and grandsons, who tended to live during the same named years. That the final two rulers in each set took the names of their grandfathers underscores the cyclical patterning at work, as do the reign dates of the rulers. For example, each ruler in Set 1 ruled during the year 2 Reed, which happened to be the year of the New Fire Ceremony. The structural patterning is further enhanced by similarities among the rulers in each set. For example, important events for Tepechpan tended to happen during the reigns of each of the rulers in the first set. Icxicuauhtli founded the city and established its ruling dynasty; Tencoyotzin I was a victim of the aggression between Tepechpan and Azcapotzalco, and as such instigated the Tepanec War and Tepechpan’s alliance with the Mexica; and Tencoyotzin II was the first to distribute calpulli lands and establish tribute obligations. The rulers of the second set also exhibit similarities. Both Caltzin and

Quaquauhtzin I are depicted wearing their hair with warrior’s topknots, which implies that they were strong military commanders and perhaps shared a warrior’s title. Both Quaquauhtzin I and II had relatively short reigns followed by interregnums in rule, and after each of their deaths, it is likely that a woman took over rule or acted as regent before the next ruler could be installed, as was alleged for Motecuhzoma I and II in Tenochtitlan. The patterning seen here works much as it did in Tenochtitlan, communicating the sacred nature of rule. Hence, the Tepechpan historians likely manipulated history to make it fit this elegant cosmic pattern, just as the Mexica historians did. For instance, the extremely long reign of Tencoyotzin II, which lasted seventy-six years according to the Tira, may have been exaggerated to fit a preconceived symbolic structure. The implication is that the Tepechpan tlatoque must have been divine and legitimate because their destinies were so harmoniously tied to the calendar. The last ruler to be seated before the Spanish invasion, Tenyahualohuatzin, occupies an ambiguous position in this schema. The interregnum preceding his accession implies some sort of breakdown following the untimely death of Quaquauhtzin II. If the pattern had continued, Tenyahualohuatzin would have been the fourth ruler of the first set, and his reign would have been an important one. In fact, it was, for he ruled through the Spanish invasion. However, his unique name and the changes that came to Tepechpan’s dynasty with the imposition of Spanish rule suggest that his reign ushered in a new era for Tepechpan, one tied to Spanish rather than Mexica imperialism. The implication is that the Spanish invasion was a preordained part of the cosmic progression, bringing about a new conception of time and a new imperial order, a time of transition through

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which Tenyahualohuatzin was destined to rule. Continuity of the Ruling Line According to testimony in its lawsuit with Temascalapa (see Chapter 5), rule passed from father to son in Tepechpan; therefore, a genealogy is implied in its dynastic sequence, and the genealogical ties among the Tepechpan rulers are emphasized by their shared names. Separated by one generation each, Tencoyotzin I and II must have been grandfather and grandson, and the same must be true of Quaquauhtzin I and II. These repeating names come at important junctures in Tepechpan’s history, immediately after the successive killings of Tencoyotzin I and Quaquauhtzin I. The death of a tlatoani was a difficult and inherently dangerous time for any polity, and this danger was compounded when the tlatoani died of unnatural causes. The fact that each assassination at Tepechpan was followed by an interregnum suggests ruptures in Tepechpan’s dynastic sequence, which the pictorial annals typically took pains to ignore or explain (Boone 2000:240). I believe this is what Tepechpan attempted through the repetition of rulers’ names, which implies a continuous tlatoani succession. In other words, because Tencoyotzin II shares the name of a former Tepechpan ruler, we assume that they are of the same bloodline and, based on their places in the dynastic sequence, that they must be grandfather and grandson. The same is true of Quaquauhtzin I and II. The interregnum preceding the reign of Tencoyotzin II could be explained by the fact that he was too young to assume rule upon the death of his father, Quaquauhtzin I. Meanwhile, upon Tencoyotzin II’s own death, his son Quaquauhtzin II also could have been too young to rule, hence the regency of Ome Tochtzin. Nevertheless, the legitimacy of Qua70

quauhtzin I’s rule and the continuous bloodline of Tepechpan are brought into question by two non-Tepechpan sources: the first, a genealogy of the rulers of Azcapotzalco found in the Anales de Tlatelolco (1948:22), and the second, a letter written in Latin and addressed to the king of Spain (AGI México 1842, published in Pérez-Rocha and Tena 2000:213–225). Both state that Quaquauhtzin I was the son of the Tepanec leader Tezozomoc, who placed him in rule over Tepechpan, presumably after the assassination of Tencoyotzin I (Noguez 1978, 1:83–84). If Quaquauhtzin I was in fact a Tepaneca sent to rule in Tepechpan, it should not be surprising that Tepechpan’s community history makes no reference to this association, as it would have delegitimized the Tepechpan ruling line. Painter A did record a rupture in Tepechpan’s dynastic succession with Tencoyotzin I’s assassination, but presumably all was resolved once Quaquauhtzin I, whom Painter A visually implies is the rightful heir to the throne, was officially seated as ruler and took a Mexica noblewoman as a wife. That Quaquauhtzin I was a full Tepechpaneca is also indicated by the fact that his presumed son, the next in line to the throne, was named Tencoyotzin II, which suggests that Tencoyotzin I must have been his grandfather and the father of Quaquauhtzin I, despite Tepanec assertions to the contrary. Such a statement has added significance when we reconsider the story of Quaquauh tzin I’s death. According to Alva Ixtlilxochitl, the woman that Nezahualcoyotl stole from Quaquauhtzin I was not yet his principal wife but simply his fiancée. This implies that they did not yet have children and that Tepechpan was left without a legitimate heir to the throne. The Tira denies this assertion: Painter A depicted Quaquauhtzin I and Xochtzin in a traditional marriage statement. Furthermore, the heir to the throne is named


Tencoyotzin II, which again implies that he was in fact the grandson of the previous Tencoyotzin and the son of Quaquauhtzin I and Xochtzin. Tencoyotzin II’s own death was followed by yet another interregnum at Tepechpan. The fact that the next official tlatoani was named after Quaquauhtzin suggests again that his namesake was his grandfather as well. This implies that the interregnum did not result from a rupture in rule but instead because the new tlatoani was too young to assume rule upon his father’s death. Thus, the second Quaquauhtzin must again have been of the Tepechpan royal bloodline. In short, the naming pattern of the Tepechpan rulers served to effectively deny any possible ruptures in Tepechpan’s ruling line, which would have symbolically diminished its power. In political systems in which rule is hereditary, the continuity of the dynastic sequence is imperative, and it continued to be so under Spanish control because continuous tlatoani succession was key to cabecera status. Conclusions In his imperial history, Painter A followed some common historical tropes. First, he established an alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan that was solidified through the Tepanec War, a marriage union, and the acceptance of the Mexica patron deity. By following these tropes in other indigenous histories, it is clear that the establishment of favorable relations with powerful polities was a typical way for lesser communities to gain, at least symbolically, some of the political and economic power and privileges of their superiors. Second, Painter A emphasized Tepechpan’s autonomy within the alliance by denying its subject status to Texcoco and by showing the distribution of calpulli

lands and the building of a temple in Tepechpan. Most important, he showed the dynastic succession in Tepechpan as an uninterrupted sequence—one that was elegantly tied to the calendar and the cosmos, much like the dynasty of Tenochtitlan. Thus, the details of Tepechpan’s imperial history clearly communicate the high political and spiritual rank of this relatively minor city. In contrast, Painter A did not include any pivotal historic events in Tenochtitlan after the conquest of Azcapotzalco, presumably because they had little impact on Tepechpan; the most glaring omissions from the Tira are the Tenochca conquest of Tlatelolco and the dedication of the Templo Mayor, which are mentioned in many other Nahua histories.19 In fact, the few details that Painter A did add to imperial Tenochca history—the Tepanec War and the lineage of Temictzin— ultimately relate back to Tepechpan.20 Since Painter A’s thematic program in the imperial section was to show Tepechpan’s relations to the great Tenochtitlan, he had to include the imperial capital in Tepechpan’s history because this supposed alliance symbolically elevated the rather minor altepetl of Tepechpan to a higher political status. Ultimately, by showing Tepechpan’s allegiance with Tenochtitlan, Painter A attempted to appropriate Mexica prestige and power for Tepechpan through association. This implied acceptance of Mexica authority would serve as a model for Painter A’s colonial history, where he shifted the focus of his history to emphasize Tepechpan’s acceptance of Spanish power. Just as the Mexica replaced the Tepaneca, the Spaniards would soon replace the Mexica as the new imperial leaders. In the pre-Hispanic fashion, Painter A linked Tepechpan with the Spanish victors regardless of the town’s ethnic affiliation and the ties that may have once bound it to the Aztec capital.

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5. Colonial History of Painter A

I

n 1519, Spaniards arrived in the Valley of Mexico and began the conquest of the Aztec empire. In the Tira, the conquest barely touches Tepechpan; instead the military conquest is localized at Tenochtitlan, while a more peaceful, “spiritual” conquest unfolds in Tepechpan. Painter A’s record of the subsequent imposition of Spanish political and religious rule emphasizes Tepechpan’s acceptance of Spanish hegemony, and the pattern followed by Painter A in his preconquest history served him also through the arrival of the Spaniards. Just as the Tepechpan eca were shown with Mexica signs of power, they now take on Spanish signs of authority; just as they accepted the Mexica patron deity, they now accept the Christian God; and just as Tepechpan was shown as a key constituent in the Aztec empire, it is now shown as a key member of the Spanish empire. By expanding his history to include the Spaniards and their political and religious institutions, Painter A effectively contrasted Tepechpan’s acceptance of Spanish authority with Tenochtitlan’s perceived rejection of it. Nevertheless, Painter A did not deny Tepechpan’s increasing hardships under Spanish colonial rule; thus, he also documented epidemics and a lawsuit between Tepechpan and its subject, Temascalapa. Ultimately, though Tepechpan accepted Spanish authority, its self-interest and integrity as a corporate community remained its paramount concern.

tion revealing the new entanglement of indigenous and European art forms. Above the year 1 Reed (1519), Painter A drew a cross and dove floating towards the time line (plate 15). As European conventions for Christianity, the cross and dove easily transferred to Aztec pictorial writings as a hieroglyphic construction signifying Catholicism and the Holy Spirit (Noguez 1978, 1:106; Boban 1891:260; Boone 2000:235). The message is that Christianity arrived quickly and peacefully in Tepechpan. Meanwhile, a brutal military conquest was unfolding in Tenochtitlan and would last much longer. On the lower register immediately below the dove, the Spanish conqueror Hernán Cortés is shown with a steel-tipped lance in hand, signaling his arrival in Central Mexico. His uncolored skin and beard distinguish him as a Spaniard, as do his European clothes. Cortés’s pointing hand calls attention to a representation of a smoking temple under the year 2 Flint (1520), which refers to events in Tenochtitlan related to the Toxcatl festival (Noguez 1978, 1:108).1 In May of 1520, after the Spanish entrance into Tenochtitlan, Cortés learned that Spanish forces led by his enemy Pánfilo de Narváez had arrived on the coast to arrest him. Leaving Pedro de Alvarado in charge at Tenochtitlan, Cortés journeyed to meet Narváez. This was the time of the festival for the Aztec god Toxcatl, and Alvarado allowed the Mexica to hold their celebration in the sacred precinct in front of the Templo Mayor. However, claiming to have heard of a native conspiracy, Alvarado planned an attack on the Mexica participants. The Spaniards blocked the gates

The Spanish Invasion The entrance of the Spaniards into Tepechpan is depicted with a symbolic representa73

of the sacred precinct, slaughtered the unarmed Mexica worshippers, and stormed the Templo Mayor. The startled Mexica fought back and blockaded the Spaniards in the palace of Axayacatl. The representation of the smoking temple refers to this event. The summit of the temple is not shown toppled, as seen earlier with the conquest of Azcapotzalco in 1439, which implies that the defeat of Tenochtitlan was not yet complete. After this attack, the city of Tenochtitlan devolved into a state of chaos, and Cortés returned from the coast to find his Spanish troops trapped in the Mexica palace. Hoping to quell the unrest, Cortés sent the imprisoned Motecuhzoma II to the balcony of the palace to reassure his people. Apparently the crowds could not be calmed, and in the ensuing melee, Motecuhzoma was somehow killed.2 Signifying Motecuhzoma’s death is a funerary bundle with his identifying name glyph under the smoking temple, and immediately below is a depiction of the seating of his successor, Cuitlahuac (Dung), whose reign was brief. His death is shown just below his accession. To the upper left of the funerary bundle is a representation of four turquoise disks, each with a hole in the middle, acting as an ideogram for “day.” Attached to each disk is a banner, which signifies the number twenty in the Aztec pictorial system. Thus, this hieroglyphic construction records a span of eighty days, the length of Cuitlahuac’s reign (Noguez 1978, 1:109–110). He died of smallpox during the epidemic of 1520. Cuauhtemoc (Descending Eagle) gained the throne in 3 House (1521) and died in 6 Flint (1524). To communicate the unnatural manner of Cuauhtemoc’s death, a moredetailed representation was added below his funerary bundle (plate 15). In this year, Cortés led an expedition, which included Cuauh-

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temoc and other tlatoque, to Honduras in an effort to stop his enemy Cristóbal de Olid’s campaign to conquer this territory.3 During the expedition, Cortés claimed that Cuauhtemoc and the other tlatoque were plotting to overthrow the Spaniards. Finding the indigenous nobles guilty of treason, Cortés ordered their execution by hanging. Accordingly, in the Tira, we see Cuauhtemoc hanged by his feet from the branch of a tree.4 We may presume that with his death, the military conquest of Tenochtitlan was complete. The representation of Cuauhtemoc’s death is in particularly poor condition, which makes the identification of its painter problematic. The detailed depiction of leaves is more common in European art, but the representation of tree roots is a pre-conquest convention. This mixed style is not typical of Painter A’s work, nor is the use of European paint, which we also see here. However, the skilled rendering of the scene, the use of a uniform frame line, and the compact nature of the representation do suggest the hand of Painter A, who I suspect added this detail at a later date. The addition of the exact manner of Cuauhtemoc’s death would further stress the fact that he died at the hands of Spaniards because of his resistance to their rule. Furthermore, this additional death statement is reminiscent of the earlier assassination of Tencoyotzin I, which was also a modification of an earlier representation. Tencoyotzin’s death, along with Chimalpopoca’s, resulted in a political restructuring in the aftermath of the Tepanec War and cemented Tepechpan’s alliance with Tenochtitlan. The death of Cuauhtemoc brought about another political restructuring, with the Spaniards replacing the Mexica in rule much as the Mexica had supplanted the Tepaneca. In ancient Mexico, ethnic and state loyalties were often disregarded in war, and the situation in colo-


nial Mexico was no different. The death of Cuauhtemoc therefore indicates the final defeat of the Mexica and a shift in the balance of power over Central Mexico, with Tepechpan again taking the side of the victors. The Spanish Invasion in Other Sources As James Lockhart (1993:6) has noted, in many indigenous accounts of the conquest, the Spanish invasion receives minimal comment insofar as the local altepetl is concerned. The conquest was not one of local communities but of the Mexica capital; hence, histories associated with Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco provide fuller accounts. For example, the Codices Aubin (fig. 5.1), Moctezuma (in Boone 2000: fig. 156), and Ríos (1964:133) communicate the conquest by depicting a battle at the Templo Mayor, and all devote a great deal of space and attention to the event. Nevertheless, by using simple funerary bundles to signify Cuauhtemoc’s death a few years later, the authors of the Codices Aubin (1981:45r) and Mexicanus (fig. 5.2) fail to acknowledge the exact cause of this death, perhaps to avoid mentioning Cuauhtemoc’s alleged rebellion. In contrast, the painter of the Codex Ríos (1964:135)—whose original prototype likely had a Tlatelolcan provenance—exhibits no qualms in showing Cuauhtemoc’s rebellion; he is shown hanged by his neck from a tree along with the Texcocan ruler Coanacochtzin. The Codex en Cruz (fig. 5.3), associated with the secondary altepetl of Chiauhtla, shows the arrival of the Spaniards in Tenochtitlan and Texcoco in 1 Reed (1519) and 2 Flint (1520), respectively, but the painter of this manuscript devoted much more attention to the succession of indigenous rulers through the early years of the Spanish arrival. Due to a tear, it is difficult to tell if the painter

of this history included the burning of the Templo Mayor above the Tenochtitlan place glyph in the 3 House (1521) year column, but he did paint the burning of Texcoco’s main temple in 6 Flint (1524). Further emphasizing the Spanish conquest of Texcoco, the death of Coanacochtzin is recorded in the 6 Flint (1524) year column (Dibble 1981, 1:48). Like Tepechpan, Chiauhtla associated the conquest with the imperial capitals— both Tenochtitlan and Texcoco—and not the local community. This painter also made sure to communicate the arrival of Christianity, and presumably its acceptance by the local community, in the form of a friar in 4 Rabbit (1522). As Lockhart (1993:6) surmises, “Tenoch‑ titlan/ Tlatelolco as the great loser cared much more intensely about the conquest than other Nahua groups, wrote more about it, and doubtless harbored certain attitudes that were not representative of the broader cultural group.” With Tenochtitlan as the great loser in the conquest, other polities tried to align themselves with the Spaniards, the great winners. Accordingly, historians from both Tlaxcala, Tenochtitlan’s principal enemy, and Texcoco, Tenochtitlan’s principal ally, emphasized the aide they provided the Spaniards in the conquest.5 For example, in the Lienzo de Tlaxcala (fig. 5.4), a Tlaxcalan leader confers with Cortés in Tenochtitlan as if the two were partners in the conquest, while Motecuhzoma is shown at the top of a palace in chains (Kranz 2001:211; Diel 2005b:311). Painter A may have attempted a similar feat but using different means. He effectively created a contrast between the militaristic Tenochca and the religious Tepechpaneca. Ultimately, Painter A’s composition—with the dove/Christianity on the Tepechpan register immediately above Cortés, the sign of

Colonial History of Painter A

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Figure 5.1. Arrival of the Spaniards and the battle at the Templo Mayor. Codex Aubin, 41v–42r. Courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum, London.

Spanish military power, on the Tenochca register—eloquently sums up the goal of the colonial portion of his history: to show that the Tepechpaneca accepted the Spaniards and their religion, while the Tenochca rejected them and had to be forcibly subdued. The conquest of Tenochtitlan lasted a number of years, through a dizzying succession of rulers, the burning of its temple, and the execution of its final tlatoani. In contrast, the military conquest did not even touch Tepechpan, whose acceptance of Christianity is shown as an unproblematic affair.

conquest tlatoque. By comparing the representations of these colonial leaders, it becomes clear that through the composition of his work and his manipulation of icons associated with Spanish rule, Painter A was communicating that the Tepechpaneca accepted Spanish political authority long before the Tenochca. Likewise, Painter A contrasted the continuity of Tepechpan’s ruling line with the ruptures that Tenochtitlan’s own noble line underwent.

Political Leadership

The colonial dynastic succession of Tepechpan proceeded in an uninterrupted fashion through the conquest, but the iconography associated with rule in Tepechpan quickly changed. The death of the Tepechpan ruler Tenyahualohuatzin, seated in rule before the arrival of the Spaniards, is shown in 12 Rab-

A central focus in Painter A’s history continued to be the ruling hierarchy of Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, but to this he added the Spanish viceroys; the implication is that they are the structural equivalents of the pre76

Tepechpan


bit (1530) in the pre-Hispanic manner (plate 16); he is bundled in a seated fashion, and his bundle is topped with a turquoise diadem, the sign of Aztec rule. Following the preconquest pattern, the installation of the next indigenous ruler, Don Diego Yolloxochitl, is shown immediately beside this death. However, the Tepechpan ruler is shown sitting on a European-style folding chair, also referred to as an X-chair or hip-joint chair. Furthermore, although the Tira here is severely damaged, Pichardo’s copy shows that Don Diego wore a European crown at his installation. Thus, Don Diego did not rule as a tlatoani in the pre-conquest tradition, but instead as a Spanish-style gobernador. Don Diego Yolloxochitl died in 1539 (plate 16). A hieroglyphic construction of a heart ( yollo-tl) and a flower (xoch-itl) identifies him by his indigenous name, but his funerary bundle is placed horizontally in the Christian fashion, revealing that he died a Christian. Here we clearly see the Spanish crown that

has been superimposed on his bundle as an indicator of rule, replacing the turquoise diadems that marked earlier funerary bundles. The message is that Spanish Christian authority had fully superceded Aztec authority in Tepechpan. The next Tepechpan leader, installed in 1540, wears the Spanish crown and sits on the European folding chair (plate 16). He even has a fully Spanish name, Don Cristóbal Maldonado, which Painter A wrote hieroglyphically with a hand (ma-itl) and its shadow (tonalceuhyo), reading ma-tonalceuhyo, an approximation of the Spanish name “Maldonado.”6 In contrast to his representations of earlier Tepechpan rulers, Painter A left the skin of Don Cristóbal and the future leaders of Tepechpan uncolored, further associating these leaders with the Spaniards, who also have uncolored skin. However, Painter A did depict Don Cristóbal as a Nahua, for he is unbearded and wears a white tilma. Don Cristóbal Maldonado died in 1545;

Figure 5.2. The death of Cuauhtemoc and the installation of Motelchiuhtzin in 8 Rabbit (1526), the arrival of Bishop Zumárraga in 10 Flint (1528), and the defeat of Culiacan and departure of Bishop Zumárraga in 12 Rabbit (1530). Codex Mexicanus, 78. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.


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Figure 5.3. Events from 1 Reed (1519) through 13 Reed (1531). Codex en Cruz. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

he is shown bundled, topped with a European crown, and laid horizontally in the Christian fashion (plate 17). Though the use of a different name glyph here (a drop of water [a-tl] and what may be a stone [te-tl]) is confusing, this bundle must record his death because another ruler was inaugurated in Tepechpan the very next year. This ruler is identified with an Aztec hieroglyphic construction (a house glyph topped with three flowers), which must somehow communicate Don Bartolomé de Santiago, who succeeded Don Cristóbal.7 Don Bartolomé was the final Tepechpan ruler drawn by Painter A, and his representation follows the pattern established with his immediate predecessors: 78

his skin is uncolored, he wears a European crown, and he is seated on the European folding chair. His white tilma and unbearded face show that he was a Nahua, yet he ruled within the Spanish colonial system. In short, Tepechpan’s ruling line underwent no ruptures through the conquest, and its leaders progressed from ruling in the Aztec sphere to ruling in the Spanish one. Tenochtitlan The dynastic succession at Tenochtitlan after Cuauhtemoc’s death was not nearly as smooth as Tepechpan’s. A series of men were installed as rulers of Tenochtitlan after


the death of Cuauhtemoc, but because they were not nobles and did not go through normal investiture procedures, they were called cuauhtlatoque (Eagle Rulers), a pre-conquest title used when a noble ruler could not be named and an interim, non-dynastic ruler was needed.8 Under the 12 Rabbit/13 Reed (1530/1531) year disks (plate 16), a representation of an eagle (cuauh-tli) with a blue speech scroll (tlatoa, to speak) emerging from its mouth must be a reference to this series of cuauhtlatoque (Noguez 1978, 1:124–125).9 The first cuauhtlatoani of Tenochtitlan was Juan Velázquez Tlacotzin. Cortés appointed him after the death of Cuauhtemoc, but he died before the Cortés expedition returned from Honduras and is not mentioned in many sources. The second, Andrés de Tapia Motelchiuhtzin, was appointed after the death of Tlacotzin in 1526. He ruled for five

years, until he was killed on a military expedition to the north led by Nuño de Guzmán. The Spaniards then named Pablo Xochiquentzin as the third cuauhtlatoani, and he ruled for five years. Based on the ambiguous placement of Painter A’s cuauhtlatoani representation, it may communicate in general that Tenochtitlan was ruled by a series of cuauhtlatoque in the years following Cuauhtemoc’s death, a point that delegitimizes the Tenochca ruling line by emphasizing the break in its dynastic sequence. According to Painter A, Tenochtitlan’s noble ruling line did not resume until 5 Flint (1536), when Don Diego de Alvarado Panitzin was installed (plate 16). A grandson of the former Mexica tlatoani Axayacatl and brother of Motecuhzoma II, Don Diego Panitzin was clearly a noble, and therefore legitimate, ruler (Gibson 1964:169). Further-

Figure 5.4. The meeting of Cortés and a Tlaxcalan leader in Tenochtitlan. Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1892:11).


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more, Panitzin was the first local ruler of Tenochtitlan to be given the official title of gobernador under the newly established viceregal government (Chimalpahin 1998, 2:225; Gibson 1964:169). However, the depiction in the Tira de Tepechpan shows Panitzin ruling within the native sphere; at his inauguration, he sits on the Aztec woven reed throne and wears the turquoise diadem (plate 16). Additionally, his skin is painted a darker brown, in contrast to the uncolored skin of his Tepechpan counterpart. In the depiction of his death in 1541, the funerary bundle of Panitzin still carries the turquoise diadem, although his bundle is laid flat in the Christian fashion (plate 16). The next indigenous ruler, Diego Tehuetzquititzin, a grandson of Tizoc, is finally seated on the European folding chair and wears a Spanish crown at his accession in 10 House (1541). New Spain Ignoring the various Audiencia leaders, Painter A waited until 4 Reed (1535) to show the imposition of Spanish power in Central Mexico with the arrival of its first viceroy, Antonio de Mendoza (plate 16). Shown on the upper register, the viceroy is marked as a Spaniard by his clothing and beard, and he is seated on the European chair.10 Originally, the viceroy wore a brimmed hat, but at a later date, a yellow crown colored with a thick pigment and outlined with a now faint red was superimposed.11 Painter A did not identify Mendoza by name, perhaps because his accoutrements marked him as the viceroy. In fact, these accoutrements designate him as both a political and religious leader. His European chair marks his political authority, and he wears a cross on his chest, which conveys spiritual rule. A cross with a banner attached is before him and acts as an addi-

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tional symbol of political and religious sovereignty (Quiñones Keber 1995:233; Boone 2000:235). Painter A therefore associated the highest ruler of New Spain with both forms of rule, as was the pre-conquest tradition. Above the year 1550 (plate 17), Painter A shows Viceroy Mendoza again, this time with a name glyph of a bird’s head (toto-tl, an approximation of Antonio) with maguey leaves (me-tl) plus a gopher (tozan) to approximate “Mendoza.” A figure with dark skin stands in front of Mendoza and points at the viceroy, indicating communication. They must not be enemies because his sword points away from Mendoza, and footprints from the viceroy lead in the general direction of the sword. In this year, Mendoza received orders to assume the position of viceroy of Peru; Painter A must have been recording this transfer of power (Noguez 1978, 1:146; Boban 1891:265). Immediately above, Painter A depicted the arrival of Mendoza’s replacement, Viceroy Luis de Velasco. The representation of Velasco is similar to that of Mendoza; bearded and dressed in Spanish clothing, Velasco sits on the European X-chair and wears a cross at his chest, again signifying his role as political and spiritual leader of New Spain. To distinguish the two viceroys, they were both named hieroglyphically, though it is impossible to read Velasco’s today. A blue speech scroll from Velasco’s mouth suggests his role as viceroy and further distinguishes him from Mendoza. Rupture versus Continuity of the Local Ruling Line In contrast to the continuity of Tepechpan’s own ruling line, Painter A’s representation on the lower, Mexica register communicates in general that Tenochtitlan was ruled by a series of cuauhtlatoque in the years following Cuauhtemoc’s death, a rupture that effec-


Figure 5.5. Events from 1 Flint (1531) through 13 Flint (1543), with cabildo houses built in Texcoco and Chiauhtla in 3 Rabbit (1534) and 4 Reed (1535), respectively. Codex en Cruz. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

tively delegitimized the Tenochca dynastic sequence. Indigenous historians recorded Tenochtitlan’s interim rulers in a variety of ways that alternatively stressed the rupture versus continuity of the Mexica ruling line, depending on the historian’s viewpoint. For example, the Codex en Cruz (see figs. 5.3 and 5.5) no longer included Mexica rulers after the death of Motecuhzoma, whereas the ruling lines of Texcoco and Chiauhtla, presumably the patron city of the manuscript, continue. Thus, the Tira and the Codex en Cruz, both associated with relatively minor altepetl, emphasized the ruptures that Tenochtitlan’s ruling line underwent, while they made sure to show that their own noble lines emerged through the conquest unscathed.

In contrast, pictorials associated with Tenochtitlan tend to downplay the rupture in rule. For example, the Codex Aubin (fig. 5.6) shows the inaugurations of the cuauhtlatoque and gobernadores in a similar manner. Both Motelchiuhtzin and Xochiquentzin— shown at 9 Reed (1528) and 13 Reed (1532), respectively—are shown as legitimate rulers: they sit on woven reed thrones and wear turquoise diadems, just as Panitzin (fig. 5.7), a noble (and therefore legitimate) ruler, does in 5 Flint (1536). Only the color of their mantles is distinguished. The same is true in the Tenochca ruler list from the Primeros memoriales (fig. 5.8). Motelchiuhtzin and Xochiquentzin are included and are shown in the exact manner


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Figure 5.6. Accessions of the Tenochca rulers Motelchiuhtzin and Xochiquentzin in 9 Reed (1527) and 13 Reed (1531), respectively, and expeditions to Culiacan in 10 Flint (1528) and 13 Reed (1531). Codex Aubin, 45v, 46r. Courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum, London.

as the legitimate ruler, Panitzin. Each sits on the woven reed throne, though all are distinguished from their pre-conquest counterparts.12 A painter of the Codex Mexicanus (1952:79, 80) also included Motelchiuhtzin (see fig. 5.2), Xochiquentzin, and Panitzin, and all wear turquoise diadems, signifying legitimate rulership. Thus, the non-noble rulers were included in these Tenochca histories and equated with their noble counterparts, thereby deemphasizing the rupture in Tenochtitlan’s ruling line. Clearly, continuity of the local ruling line remained an important marker of legitimacy after the conquest and continued to be a key historical trope in Nahua pictorials. Accordingly, Mexica historians downplayed the ruptures in Tenochtitlan’s dynastic sequence, whereas non-Tenocha sources such

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as the Tira emphasized these same ruptures in contrast to the continuity, and therefore legitimacy, of their own local ruling line. Political Transformation Painter A further distinguished Tepechpan from Tenochtitlan by manipulating signs of Aztec and Spanish authority. For example, the European folding chair appears in numerous indigenous pictorial writings of the Early Colonial period. As with its prototype, the ancient Roman curule chair, this seat could be occupied only by someone with high status and associated privileges. In Nahua pictorials it is most often associated with Spanish rulers or elites (Diel 2005b). The Codex Osuna (fig. 5.9) serves as a typical example, with the Spanish viceroy Luis Velasco seated on the right on a European folding chair, and


Figure 5.7. The accessions of Tenochca leader Panitzin in 5 Flint (1536) and Tehuetzquititzin in 9 Flint (1540), the expedition to New Mexico in 8 Reed (1539), the Mixton War in 10 House (1541), and an epidemic in 1 House (1545). Codex Aubin, 46v, 47r. Courtesy of the Trustees of the British Museum, London.

the Mexica governor across from him seated on the tepotzicpalli. Thus, just as the tepotzicpalli signified Aztec authority, the European chair became an icon of Spanish power in the painted writings of colonial Mexico. By far the majority of representations of the European chair in Nahua pictorials show Spanish elites seated in the chair; therefore, the Tira’s paintings of indigenous elites seated in the European chair particularly stand out. Don Diego Yolloxochitl (Heart Flower) was the first Tepechpan ruler to be seated in power during the Colonial period. He is depicted sitting on the Spanish chair and thus endowed with Spanish authority. Also, the Tepechpan ruler wears a crown, a sign of European royalty, instead of the diadem, a sign of Aztec nobility. In short, Don Diego

Yolloxochitl is not a tlatoani in the preconquest tradition, but rather a Spanish-style gobernador. This same visualization of political transformation is also seen in the Lienzo de Tlaxcala. The painting of the Tlaxcalteca learning of the arrival of the Spaniards shows them seated on small stools (fig. 5.10). Later, after they have joined the Spaniards in the conquest, the Tlaxcalan leader is shown sitting on the European folding chair as Cortés’s equal (see fig. 5.4). The implication is that the Tlaxcalteca, too, have been transformed into Spanish political leaders, thereby communicating their acceptance of Spanish hegemony and their integral role in the conquest (Diel 2005b:310–312). Painter A also made sure to communicate how quickly the Tepechpan leaders trans-


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formed into Spanish ones, in contrast to the Mexica. Though an official gobernador, the Mexica ruler Don Diego Panitzin continued to rule in the Aztec fashion; at his inauguration in 1536, he is shown with dark skin, sitting on the Aztec tepotzicaplli, and wearing the turquoise diadem. It is not until 1541 that a Mexica ruler, Panitzin’s successor, Diego Tehuetzquititzin, finally sits on the European folding chair and wears a European crown. These two rulers of Tenochtitlan were both born of the royal line and were considered governors; thus, nothing should distinguish their rule. A logical explanation for these disparate representations can be found in the agenda of Painter A (Diel 2005b). By appropriating and manipulating Spanish icons of power—the chair, the European crown, and skin color—Painter A promoted the political stature of Tepechpan. Its rulers took on Spanish signs of power before the Mexica leaders did, which implies that the Tenochca leader Panitzin was associated with Aztec authority, while Tepechpan’s Yolloxochitl (seated in power six years earlier) was associated with Spanish rule. Consequently, according to Painter A, the Mexica of Te‑ nochtitlan did not officially accept Spanish power, nor were they granted that power, until 1541, more than ten years after Tepechpan declared allegiance to Spain. The parallel composition of the Tira makes it clear who accepted Spanish rule first. Tepechpan as the Seat of Spanish Authority By placing the seated viceroys on the upper, Tepechpan register, Painter A further associated Spanish viceregal rule with Tepechpan Figure 5.8. Tenochca ruler list continued from Tizoc to Panitzin. Primeros memoriales, 51v. Courtesy of the Real Academia de la Historia, Madrid. 84


Figure 5.9. Juxtaposition of Aztec and Spanish rule. Codex Osuna, 38r. Courtesy of the Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid.

Figure 5.10. Tlaxcalan rulers learning of the arrival of the Spaniards. Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1892:3).

rather than Tenochtitlan, the actual political capital of New Spain; the implication is that the Spaniards and their authority resided in Tepechpan. A similar message is seen in the Lienzo de Tlaxcala, which shows Cortés returning to Tlaxcala to find a Spanish folding chair inside a royal house (fig. 5.11); thus, Tlaxcala quite literally held the seat of Spanish power (Diel 2005b). At least symbolically, then, the historians of both Tlaxcala and Tepechpan placed Spanish imperial authority in the local community, thereby emphasizing their acceptance of Spanish hegemony and denying Tenochtitlan’s status as the seat of Spanish rule in New Spain. Life Under Spanish Rule Two new themes that appear in Painter A’s colonial section are his references to epidemics and a lawsuit, both of which threatened to damage Tepechpan economically. 86

These additions reveal a new preoccupation typical of the Colonial era: the ability to fulfill tribute obligations and to maintain corporate integrity. Despite Tepechpan’s increasing difficulties, Painter A stressed Tepechpan’s high political and religious standing and its acceptance of Spanish authority by also including references to new building campaigns in Tepechpan. Epidemics With the arrival of the Spaniards in Mexico, epidemics began to ravage the indigenous populations. The first, a smallpox epidemic, struck Tepechpan in 2 Flint (1520). Painter A’s representation on the upper register (plate 15) of a seated figure covered in pockmarks and attached to this year signifies the epidemic, and the placement of this figure relates both that Tepechpan’s former regent, Ome Tochtzin, died of smallpox and that an


epidemic broke out in Tepechpan in this year (Noguez 1978, 1:108). Although Painter A did not highlight a relationship, the Mexica tlatoani Cuitlahuac also died of smallpox in this same year; surely a knowledgeable orator would have noted the connection. A different epidemic struck in the year 1 House (1545). On the lower register of the Tira (plate 17), a prone figure lies upside down with his arms crossed at his chest and blood spurting from his nose and mouth; his closed eyes indicate death. In this year, a deadly disease, perhaps typhus, struck the Valley of Mexico, and its main symptom was bleeding from the nose, as pictured in the Tira (Gibson 1964:448–449). By showing the disease on the lower register, Painter A may have been associating the epidemic with greater Central Mexico. The Tepechpan ruler Don Cristóbal Maldonado died in the very same year, possibly from this same disease.

Clearly, the outbreak of these deadly diseases had a major impact on the indigenous peoples; notices of the epidemics and their casualties were recorded in a number of other pictorial histories. For example, the Codices Mexicanus (fig. 5.12) and en Cruz (see fig. 5.3) also show pockmark-covered smallpox victims at 1520. Furthermore, the creators of the Codex Aubin (see fig. 5.7) and en Cruz (fig. 5.13) painted epidemic victims bleeding from the nose in notices of the cocoliztli, or sickness, of 1545, whereas the painter of the Codex Telleriano-Remensis (1995:46v) depicted only the funerary bundles of the dead.13 In addition to the psychological impact and historical importance of these devastations, it must have been important for town leaders to keep track of such calamities because these would have affected their ability to meet tribute obligations, which were of increasing concern in the Colonial period. In fact, in

Figure 5.11. Cortés returns to Tlaxcala, seat of Spanish authority. Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1892:29).


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Figure 5.12. Events from 1 Reed (1519) through 6 Flint (1524). Codex Mexicanus 77. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.

1551, the people of Tepechpan petitioned the crown for a reduction of their tribute, complaining of a great epidemic, presumably the sickness of 1545, that led to a massive population loss in Tepechpan and poverty for its remaining inhabitants (AGI Justicia 164:78r– 84v). Although not mentioned specifically in the suit, the Tira would have substantiated the epidemic’s effects on Tepechpan. The Lawsuit with Temascalapa Above the year 10 House (1541), Painter A drew a footprint followed by a black dotted line that ends at the place glyph for Temascalapa (Place of the Sweat Bath) and references a lawsuit between Temascalapa and Tepechpan (plate 16). Denying that it was a subject of Tepechpan, Temascalapa refused to satisfy its tribute obligations. The case was taken to court and lasted several years.14 Speaking in 1552, official witnesses stated that Temascalapa had stopped paying tribute to Tepechpan about ten years earlier, as was reported in the Tira with the symbolic representation of 88

the town leaving the time line, or leaving the fold as it were, in 1541 (AGI Justicia 164:26v– 30v). Because town leaders were responsible for shortfalls in tribute (Haskett 1991:62), Tepechpan’s failure to collect the proper amount of tribute from its subject surely would have hurt the town’s leaders financially and politically. It was important, then, to document this event. It is unclear if the depiction of a coat of arms just above the year 10 House (1541) refers to this lawsuit (plate 16). Coats of arms were often included in the títulos primordiales of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Often these are unique crests suited to the patron town and included to symbolically communicate the legitimacy of the corporate indigenous community (Haskett 1996). The crest in the Tira is different in that it is a much earlier example. In addition, it is not unique to Tepechpan but instead features the lions and castles of the court of Castilla y León superimposed on a double-headed eagle with wings extended, and topped with a European crown. This is the Hapsburg coat of arms and


as such stands for the Spanish government or the king himself (Haskett 1996:109). Noguez (1978, 1:138) speculates that this representation may refer to the Audiencia Real, which decided in favor of Tepechpan in their case with Temascalapa; however, this explanation is not entirely convincing, as the case was not officially sent to the Audiencia until 1552. Instead, as a sign of the Spanish king and royal government, the crest here may have functioned in the Early Colonial period much as it did on the later primordial titles, as a sign or guarantee of the corporate landholdings

and, by extension, the legitimacy and cabecera status of Tepechpan, which Painter A implies were conferred by the king. This is an especially potent symbol, coming as it does immediately before Temascalapa’s denial of its subject status. From the Temascalapa glyph come more footprints and a black dotted line that ends at another Temascalapa place glyph (plate 17), now shown with a staff of justice and attached to the year 8 Flint (1552). Much of the suit was heard in this year, and the Audiencia decided in favor of Tepechpan; this

Figure 5.13. Events from 1 House (1545) to 6 Rabbit (1550) in the Codex en Cruz. Courtesy of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France.


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representation must refer to this decision. However, this was not the end of the matter, as the people of Temascalapa continued to appeal the Audiencia’s decision. For this reason, Painter A may have drawn the cabildo house in the next year (see below). With Temascalapa’s continued appeals, the cabildo acts as further proof of the cabecera status of Tepechpan. The inclusion of a reference to this lawsuit in the Tira reveals its importance for the Tepechpan community, and it has been suggested that the Tira may have been created specifically for the case (Boone 1998b:190). However, the Tira could not have been submitted as evidence because it recorded history until at least 1590, after the bulk of the suit was completed. Furthermore, arguments presented in the lawsuit are not mentioned in the Tira. For example, Tepechpan claimed that Temascalapa was its rightful subject because, among other reasons, colonizers from Tepechpan had founded Temascalapa, but no such information is contained in the Tira. The only references to Temascalapa throughout the Tira are the two references to the lawsuit, and none of the alphabetic annotators of the Tira identified either Temascalapa place glyph, suggesting that this lawsuit was not a concern in their readings of the manuscript. Also, throughout the suit, Tepechpan readily admitted its subject status to Texcoco and even argued for its own antiquity by claiming that it was founded before Texcoco, yet Painter A took pains to ignore this relationship, relating Tepechpan to Tenochtitlan instead. In sum, the majority of events recorded in the Tira added little to the case, except to establish Tepechpan as a principal ally first of Tenochtitlan and then of Spain, and to establish its cabecera status through its ancient, unbroken ruling line, which may have indirectly strengthened Tepechpan’s case be90

cause it showed the high status of the altepetl. Nevertheless, neither argument was made during the lawsuit. Though the impetus for the Tira’s creation may have been threats to Tepechpan’s integrity, such as that posed by its subject Temascalapa, it more likely served as an all-purpose document, made primarily for the community itself as a record of its autonomy and identity, but with the potential to justify Tepechpan’s position in a Spanish context, if necessary. In fact, it was likely consulted during the case, as numerous witnesses mentioned ancient paintings that confirmed their arguments. Also, some witnesses recited the names of Tepechpan’s previous rulers and even their reign dates, which they likely read in the Tira prior to testifying. Though Painter A did not create the Tira specifically for this suit, the potential loss of a subject city obviously posed enough of a threat to Tepechpan to warrant mention in its history. According to a tribute painting included in the suit, Temascalapa had more tribute payers than Tepechpan; therefore, it is easy to imagine the difficulties that losing such a subject would pose for the cabecera. Without the help of Temascalapa in fulfilling its obligations, the rulers of Tepechpan would have been forced to make up for inevitable shortfalls in tribute, and often one of the easiest ways to do this was through the sale of land. Temascalapa’s denial of its subject status to Tepechpan, then, posed a clear threat to Tepechpan’s corporate integrity and landholdings, and the Tira’s reference to Tepechpan’s victory in the suit could have potentially served as evidence of the legal relationship between the two polities in case of future transgressions by Temascalapa. New Buildings In light of these difficulties, Tepechpan still managed to build two new important colo-


nial buildings. The first was the church of Tepechpan (plate 17), which was drawn in a rudimentary perspective above the year 5 House (1549). Painter A drew a platform base on top of which is the main church building and its attached bell tower. The entrance to the church is shown with a pointed round arch, which was introduced by the Spaniards. Nahua communities took Christian churches as analogs of pre-conquest temples; both were considered symbols of the sovereignty and status of the altepetl (Haskett 1991:70; Lockhart 1992:206). Also, as Dana Leibsohn (1995:273) argues, drawings of churches on indigenous maps mark communities as Christianized, and we can assume the same is true of the church in the Tira. Hence, Painter A’s record of this church communicates Tepechpan’s high religious status and its acceptance of Christianity and, accordingly, Spanish authority, just as the earlier temple to Huitzilopochtli showed its recognition of Mexica hegemony. Additionally, because the building of a church was a huge economic burden for indigenous communities, the inclusion of a church in a community’s history also communicates the economic resources of the patron town (Leibsohn 1993:56). For Tepechpan, the building of this church was a particularly difficult task because of its problems with Temascalapa. In a petition to the Audiencia Real in 1548, the people of Tepechpan complained that Temascalapa had neglected to help build the church, despite its being obligated to do so as Tepechpan’s sujeto. Viceroy Mendoza agreed and, in 1549, ordered that Temascalapa comply with its obligations (AGI Justicia 164:14v– 15r). The building shown surely refers to this church, and perhaps Viceroy Mendoza’s placement directly in front of it refers to his decision as well. The fact that Temascalapa was ordered to work on the church re

inforces Tepechpan’s control over its sujeto. Moreover, although officially the existence of a church in a town did not guarantee cabecera status, many indigenous communities believed this to be the case and referred to the establishment of a church when arguing for autonomy (Gibson 1964:54). Thus, the church communicated Tepechpan’s cabecera status on multiple levels, while also communicating Tepechpan’s economic and religious prestige. Also confirming a community’s cabecera status was the presence of a cabildo house. In what may be his final drawing in the Tira, Painter A depicted a distinctive building complex (plate 17), this time above the year 9 House (1553) and attached to that year by a black dotted line. This drawing shows three buildings together in a primitive perspective. They sit on a raised platform with steps at the front. The two side buildings are drawn in the pre-Hispanic fashion with post-andlintel doorways and window jambs, representing indigenous buildings, which join neatly with their European neighbor, marked by its round arch. Because the formation of the buildings reflects a city square, this must represent the dedication of the local cabildo. In a map of Tepechpan from 1578, its church and cabildo are prominently featured (AGN Tierras 1871, exp. 17). By the second half of the sixteenth century, one of the most important criteria for cabecera status came to be the existence of a local cabildo (Gibson 1964:167). Therefore, like churches, cabildos became a common presence in indigenous pictorials, a new historical trope. For example, the artist of the Codex en Cruz (see fig. 5.5) also included the establishment of cabildos, first at Texcoco in 3 Rabbit (1534) and then in Chiauhtla in the very next year. The cabildos drawn for the two towns are identical, and the fact that the relatively minor city of Chiauhtla had a cabildo


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identical to Texcoco’s and built just one year later suggests the prestige of this upstart city. Furthermore, in its lawsuit with its subject Temascalapa, Tepechpan asserted that it was a true cabecera and pueblo por sí (independent town) because it had a cabildo; as Temascalapa did not have one, it could not be a true cabecera (AGI Justicia 164:116r). Ultimately, by showing that the town of Tepechpan had a Christian church and a cabildo, Painter A provided evidence for Tepechpan’s cabecera status, economic resources, and general prestige, while also documenting Tepechpan’s acceptance of Spanish religious and political authority. In contrast, he showed no such buildings at Tenochtitlan, which presumably had not declared allegiance to Spain in this way and could not boast of equal prestige. Conclusions Working fully within the native tradition, Painter A continued to record the dynastic successions of both Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, but he emphasized the ruptures that Tenochtitlan’s ruling line underwent in contrast to the continuity of Tepechpan’s own dynastic succession. Painter A manipulated pictorial iconography to further contrast Tepechpan’s new alliance with the Spaniards with Tenochtitlan’s perceived rejection of Spanish authority. Whereas Cuauhtemoc rebelled against the Spaniards, Tepechpan’s rulers took on signs of Spanish authority before their Tenochca counterparts. Furthermore, Painter A tellingly placed Spanish

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viceregal authority on the upper register, thereby associating Spanish rule more closely with Tepechpan. Also, the two most important buildings for the establishment of cabecera status and hence colonial prestige—the church and cabildo—appear in Tepechpan and not Tenochtitlan. Ultimately, Painter A’s history of Tepechpan in the early years of Spanish colonial rule establishes Tepechpan’s acceptance of this rule, yet his continued focus on Mexica history reveals that the former Aztec capital continued to exert an influence on his perception of the colonial world. Painter A’s references to epidemics and a lawsuit with a subject community do reveal new and clearly difficult features of life under Spanish rule. However, by following historical tropes—such as records of conquests and building campaigns—typical of Tepechpan’s earlier, pre-conquest history, Painter A emphasized continuity with past traditions. On the surface, Painter A presented the Spanish replacement of the Mexica ruling apparatus as an unproblematic affair (at least for Tepechpan), and the colonial present is ordered as political argument, just as was done in the past. The Spanish conquest itself is structurally equivalent to the earlier Tepanec War, both leading to a political reorganization of Central Mexico. Through both political upheavals, Tepechpan took the side of the victors, presenting itself as a key ally of the new dominant power. The increasingly chaotic and difficult realities of life under Spanish colonial rule only come into greater clarity with the contributions of the later artists.


6. Colonial Histories of Painters B, C, and D

A

fter Painter A ceased working on the Tira, a succession of three different painters updated the manuscript until its end. Because each of these painters worked at a different time, the form and content of their histories had to change to effectively argue for Tepechpan’s rights and corporate integrity in the constantly evolving Spanish colonial system. Also, since they were working closer in time to the events they were recording, the later painters focused more on life under Spanish rule, especially events that affected the ability, or lack thereof, to fulfill increasingly burdensome tribute obligations. Though these additions to the Tira seem more evocative of newspaper accounts, providing updates on events important to the local community rather than historical revisionism, these particular events were still chosen by the later painters because of their political import. Lost is Painter A’s elegant ordering of past events for its symbolic impact; however, the later painters continued to present a selective history, recording events that show Tepechpan in the best, and sometimes worst, light. Indeed, the breakdown of order in the colonial section of the Tira, where we see an explosion of information compared to the relatively sparse pre-conquest section, may reflect a general breakdown affecting Tepechpan itself; more emphasis was placed on Tepechpan’s devastations than its glories. Nonetheless, despite these changes, one theme remained constant: the continued record of Tepechpan’s rulers. The painters’ focus was still on the local community and the lasting integrity of its uninterrupted ruling line, perhaps a final

link to the past over which the Tepechpaneca could maintain control. Tepechpan Painter B From 1522 to 1553, Painter B added events to the history already recorded by Painter A and then continued his own history until 1559. Interestingly, the historical notices that Painter B added to the history of Painter A concern only the Colonial period. He made no additions to the pre-conquest portion of the Tira, presumably because, as Charles Gibson (1964:188) has noted, by the middle of the sixteenth century, pre-conquest history was not as significant in establishing cabecera status as it had once been. More important were the acceptance of Christianity and the establishment of Spanish-style government in the indigenous community. Nevertheless, Painter B’s additions do imply deficiencies in Painter A’s record. For example, he paid particular attention to the comings and goings of Spain’s ruling elite, both political and religious, and to indigenous uprisings, topics largely ignored by Painter A. The Meeting of Cortés and an Indigenous Warrior Painter B’s earliest modification to the history of Painter A appears on the upper Tepechpan register above the year 4 Reed (1522; plate 15). Here he painted Hernán Cortés seated in a European chair and engaged in conversation with an indigenous figure standing before him. Cortés is attached to the 4 Rabbit year disk by a thick red line, and he wears a 93

red jacket, blue pants, and brown shoes and is bearded, all of which mark him as a Spaniard. Additional features communicate his rank and importance. First, he wears a hat with a feather attached at the brim, perhaps a reference to his title, Marqués del Valle.1 Furthermore, he holds a steel-tipped lance; in all depictions of Cortés in the Tira, he holds a similar lance, which serves as his attribute and marks him as the military leader of New Spain. Finally, Cortés is seated in a European chair, the icon of Spanish rule. The placement of Cortés seated in rule on the upper register suggests that the people of Tepechpan had accepted the power of Cortés in their land. This representation of Cortés particularly stands out because of his black skin coloring. Many figures in the Tira exhibit this same trait. They appear only in the colonial section, and none are by Painter A. In Aztec pictorial writings, priests sometimes are shown with black or gray skin, a reference to the application of ash to their bodies (see fig. 3.11). This convention has led some to propose that the black figures in the Tira are also priests or have religious associations (Waldeck n.d.:132; Boban 1891:265; Noguez 1978, 1:173; Boone 2000:232). However, this explanation is problematic because many secular figures, such as Cortés, also are painted black in the Tira. Noguez (1978, 1:173) proposes that the black skin coloring may mark these figures as members of the religious and/or civil hierarchy of New Spain. Again, a lack of consistency negates this hypothesis; a later depiction of Cortés under the year 1530 (plate 16) and by the same painter shows him with unpainted skin. An alternative explanation, also proposed by Noguez (1978, 1:173) and the one I find most likely, is that the figures were not painted black intentionally but that the paint used to color their skin turned black over time. The fact that so many disparate 94

figures exhibit this black skin coloring supports this idea. Also, a figure with black skin is often shown communicating with a figure with light or no skin color, as does Cortés in Painter B’s representation, so the now-black paint may have served to differentiate the two figures. A red speech scroll coming from Cortés’s mouth indicates that he is communicating with the figure before him. Also attached to the year 4 Rabbit (1522), but now by a red dotted line, this figure, wearing a turquoisecolored mantle and sandals, holds a spear with the point submissively turned towards the ground. Feathers decorate the end of the spear, and two eagle-down balls are painted on the staff; these embellishments mark the weapon as indigenous, in contrast to Cortés’s European lance. Furthermore, the figure wears some type of headgear, perhaps an eagle helmet (Boone 2000:232). Hence, his clothing and accoutrements show that he is an indigenous warrior who appeared in peace before Cortés. The exact significance of this composition, beyond the idea of a meeting between Cortés and an indigenous soldier, is difficult to determine, though the alphabetic annotations may provide some clues. The gloss by the indigenous warrior reads “yxtlil,” which likely identifies him as Ixtlilxochitl, a son of the Texcocan ruler Nezahualpilli. The Acolhua empire had undergone a schism shortly before the Spaniards arrived in Mexico (see Hicks 1994). After the death of his father, Ixtlilxochitl fought with his brother for succession to the Texcocan throne. He eventually gained control of the northern half of the Acolhua empire and refused to recognize Tenochca authority. Ixtlilxochitl then established an alliance with the Spanish invaders, and in 1522, Cortés officially named Ixtlilxochitl as ruler of Texcoco, which is also recorded in the Codex Mexicanus (see fig.


5.12). The Tira may record this same news as well. Ixtlilxochitl contributed a large number of indigenous forces to the Spanish campaign against Tenochtitlan, and in acknowledgement of this support, Cortés granted Ixtlilxochitl and his allies lands (Alvarado Tezozomoc 1987:147; Hicks 1992:8). In the Tira, another alphabetic annotation associated with the scene references a distribution of land (see appendix). Accordingly, a possible reading of this representation is that it also recorded Cortés’s grant of land to Ixtlilxochitl and his Acolhua allies, one of which we may presume was Tepechpan (Boban 1891:261; Noguez 1978, 1:111–112; Boone 2000:232). If this is the case, then Painter B made a turnaround with his history, acknowledging Tepechpan’s relationship with Texcoco, surely because of the political advantages it conferred at the time. Such statements are typical in indigenous histories of the later sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, when indigenous historians were aware of potential privileges extended to those who aided the Spaniards. The Tlaxcalteca are an excellent example; they petitioned the Spanish government for privileges using documents such as the Lienzo de Tlaxcala as evidence. The Lienzo presents the conquest as a joint undertaking of the Tlaxcalteca and the Spaniards (see fig. 5.4), and through such self-promotion, the city of Tlaxcala received privileges such as tribute reductions, though certainly minor, from the Spanish government (Gibson 1952; Kranz 2001). The Texcocans attempted the same thing, petitioning for their own privileges from the crown based on the aid that Texcoco, specifically through Ixtlilxochitl’s alliance, provided the Spaniards during the conquest (in Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997, 1:12). Surely the best examples of this are found in the writings of Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997,

2:221–224), who exalted the heroism of his ancestor Ixtlilxochitl and his alliance with Cortés (Adorno 1989:215). Related to these privileges would have been the granting of lands to indigenous communities, and there was clearly an emerging tradition about Cortés conferring lands to indigenous rulers at about this time. For example, Chimalpahin (1998, 2:159) recorded a meeting in the year 3 House (1522) between Cortés, a group of imprisoned Mexica noblemen including Cuauhtemoc, and a group of indigenous rulers who were formerly subjects of the Mexica. According to Chimalpahin, Cortés demanded that the Mexica nobles return the lands they had taken from the subjugated indigenous communities. Of course, one of these communities was Chalco, Chimalpahin’s hometown; therefore, this event would have served as a reconferral of Chalco’s former landholdings by the new imperial ruler, Cortés. Ernst Mengin (1952:470) suspected that this same meeting was also shown in the Codex Mexicanus (see fig. 5.12), where we see Cortés, seated on the Spanish folding chair, communicating with three indigenous leaders before him. These men are identified as Cuauhtemoc, Motelchiuhtzin, and Tlacotzin; the last two would serve as stand-in rulers after Cuauhtemoc’s death. However, although the nature of their discussion is unclear, I suspect that this does not show these men returning lands to others but instead paying their respect and obedience to Cortés, as they are clearly shown receiving orders from him. In the next year, the artist painted a representation of a royal house with the Tenochtitlan place glyph above and footprints indicating arrival. I suspect that these two depictions are linked, communicating that these Mexica nobles were reestablished in rule over Tenochtitlan, a fitting message for a manuscript associated with Tenochtitlan.

Colonial Histories of Painters B, C, and D

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These sources, then, communicate a new historical trope: their patron city’s obedience to Cortés and his granting of privileges and/ or landholdings to the indigenous community. This same message was typically stated in the later primordial titles, which tend to focus on indigenous landholdings and corporate integrity. In these indigenous titles, Cortés is presented as the imperial leader, and his inclusion would have supported the validity of these grants and, subsequently, of the indigenous community’s acceptance of Spanish rule. In short, Cortés functioned in these documents as a symbol of legitimacy (Lockhart 1991:59; Wood 2003:33). In this light, Painter B’s representation also communicates Tepechpan’s acceptance of and service to Spanish military authority, presumably through its relationship with Texcoco. This point is lacking in Painter A’s representation of the conquest but is typical of other indigenous histories. Ultimately, this depiction would have served to bolster Tepechpan’s claims of ownership of particular landholdings, which presumably were granted by Cortés. Indigenous Uprisings Under the year 1529 (plate 16), Painter B drew a representation of a curved-hill place glyph, a usual reference to Culhuacan and seen earlier in the Tira, albeit in a different style. This glyph does not refer to the Culhuacan of the southern shores of Lake Texcoco, but instead to a town known as Culiacán. Located near the Pacific coast, Culiacán was conquered in 1530 by Nuño de Guzmán, who had set out from Mexico City on an expedition to the northwest in 1529. Guzmán took 500 Spaniards with him and 10,000 indigenous people, mostly Mexica and Tlaxcalteca, but also natives from other Central Mexican towns.2 The people of Culiacán ini96

tially submitted to the Spaniards, but in 1531 they rebelled, complaining of overwork and unfair enslavement. More Spanish and indigenous forces arrived to defend the town as a crown possession and defeated the people of Culiacán in that same year. The curvedhill glyph under 1529 must refer to the initial expedition to the north. Obviously this conquest was an important historic event for the indigenous peoples as it is mentioned in a number of alphabetic and pictorial histories, most of which emphasize the participation of indigenous forces in the expedition.3 For example, in their accounts of the battle, Chimalpahin (1998, 2:173, 183) and the painters of the Codices Aubin (see fig. 5.6) and en Cruz (see fig. 5.3, 11 House year column) paid particular attention to the participation of indigenous forces, while the painter of the Codex Mexicanus (see fig. 5.2) emphasized combined Spanish and indigenous troops by showing a shield with a crossed Spanish sword and indigenous club under the Culiacán place glyph to signify the battle. Conquests were typical fodder in pre-conquest histories, usually told from the viewpoint of the victors and their allies; therefore, these indigenous historians followed a thematic tradition that predated the conquest. Their references to this indigenous uprising and its defeat suggest that these historians viewed their communities as allies of the Spaniards in these battles, and the historical records document the alliance. Though it is unclear from the terse reference in the Tira if forces from Tepechpan also participated, this would be a valid interpretation, for why else include the defeat in Tepechpan’s history? Moreover, by showing the rebellious territory on the lower register, Artist B created an effective contrast between the peaceful Tepechpaneca who accepted Spanish authority and the rebellious communities that did not.


Painter B continued to include other rebellious territories on the lower register with more detailed records emphasizing the role of indigenous forces in these subsequent battles. Attached to the year 1540 on the lower register (plate 16), an indigenous warrior holds a shield decorated with a steppedfret design, and he wears a yellow tlahuiztli, a warrior costume in the form of a body suit (Anawalt 1981:55). The associated gloss mentions a war in New Mexico. Therefore, the text and the picture must refer to the expedition lead by Francisco Vásquez de Coronado to New Mexico in search of the legendary city of Cíbola (Noguez 1978, 1:131).4 Spanish shipwreck victims from Florida had reported that the indigenous peoples there spoke highly of a great kingdom to the north consisting of seven cities and immense wealth, and Viceroy Mendoza sent Coronado, the governor of Nueva Galicia, on an expedition in search of this kingdom. He set out in 1540 with hundreds of Spaniards and even more indigenous soldiers, but the city did not live up to the tales of fabulous wealth they had so eagerly believed. The representation by Painter B, then, emphasized the military aspect of the expedition by focusing on an indigenous participant. The author of the Codex Aubin (see fig. 5.7) also recorded this expedition, focusing on the Nahua forces that participated.5 Again, these references served to strengthen these indigenous alliances with the Spanish victors and show the indigenous peoples as key warriors for the new empire. When Coronado went in search of Cíbola, he left his military commander, Cristóbal de Oñate, in charge of Nueva Galicia, which was in a state of unrest due to former governor Nuño de Guzmán’s mistreatment of the indigenous peoples.6 Beginning in 1538, there were more and increasingly violent indigenous uprisings in this region, and soon the entire province was in a state of rebellion.

Painter B recorded the subsequent battle under the year 1541 with a hill glyph topped with a bust of an indigenous man and three flowers. This hieroglyphic construction reads Xochipilli (xochi-tl, flower; pil-li, nobleman), a town where much of the fighting occurred. The hill also is decorated with a shield (chimalli) for Chimalhuacan, another name for the province of Nueva Galicia (López-Portillo y Weber 1939:24; Noguez 1978, 1:134). The rebels had a stronghold in a place near Xochipilli referred to as the “Mixton,” and the subsequent battle is known as the Mixton War. Easily defended, the Mixton is in an elevated position and is covered with rocks and crags; in fact, Painter B’s detailed hill glyph with its addition of foliage and crags must refer to the physical landscape of this area, as does a depiction by the painter of the Codex Aubin (see fig. 5.7). To the right of the place glyph in the Tira is a representation of another warrior, who wears cotton armor, painted blue, and holds an obsidian club and a decorated shield. Shields with a similar stepped-fret design and feather ornamentation are associated with Aztec warriors; they appear throughout the Codex Mendoza as tribute payments made to Tenochtitlan. The accoutrements therefore identify the warrior as a native of Central Mexico sent to quell the disturbance. Having taken the best forces, both indigenous and Spanish, with him on his expedition to New Mexico, Coronado left Nueva Galicia virtually undefended, and Viceroy Mendoza was forced to send more troops from New Spain to secure the crown’s northern possessions. As Chimalpahin (1998, 2:199) writes, “from all of the towns they called people so that they could conquer those of Xochipillan.” It is estimated that as many as 40,000 indigenous warriors fought for Spain, and as inducement they were exempted from tribute (Liss 1975:125, 195). The northern Chichi-


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mecs defended their land well, and Viceroy Mendoza himself was forced to join the combined Spanish and indigenous forces in this battle and eventual defeat of the rebellious territories. Peggy Liss (1975:107) has argued that the numerous Spanish forces that were willing to participate in defense of the crown in the Mixton War reveals an increasing Spanish and Creole pride in viceregal New Spain. This pride must also have extended to the Nahuas, given that indigenous forces so clearly outnumbered the Spaniards, and these battles were consistently recorded in indigenous histories. In fact, the painter of the Codex Mexicanus (1952:80) superimposed an indigenous club and Spanish sword over a shield to signify this conquest as a joint indigenous/Spanish undertaking, just as he did with the conquest of Culiacán (see fig. 5.2). Furthermore, the painter of the Códice de Tlatelolco (fig. 6.1) included both Spanish and indigenous forces but clearly gave prominence to the indigenous soldiers, who tower over their Spanish counterparts on horseback. The painter of the Codex Aubin (see fig. 5.7) depicted one indigenous warrior fighting another at the top of a craggy hill to represent the battle.7 Like Painter B, the compiler of the Codex Aubin ignored the role of the Spanish forces altogether. The inclusion of these uprisings in so many indigenous histories reveals that war continued to be an important facet of life, just as it had been in the Late Post-Classic period. Since conquests were a common feature of indigenous pictorial histories, Painter B must have found Painter A’s failure to record these battles problematic and accordingly added these events to Tepechpan’s history. References to these battles in local histories also suggest a military alliance between local communities and the Spanish victors. By placing these battles on the lower 98

register, far from Tepechpan, Painter B emphasized that other territories were still rebellious, whereas Tepechpan peacefully accepted Spanish control. Ruling Hierarchy Many of Painter B’s additions to Painter A’s history concern the ruling hierarchy imposed by Spain below the level of viceroy. He added only one reference to a ruler of Tenochtitlan, instead focusing on the civil and religious leaders sent to New Spain. These notices may further communicate Tepechpan’s place within the new Spanish imperial structure. Tenochtitlan Painter A may have become separated from the Tira before the death of the Tenochca governor Tehuetzquititzin, which happened in 9 House (1553) as recorded by Painter B (plate 17). Shown on the lower register and attached to this year disk by a thick red line, the funerary bundle lies horizontally and was originally topped with a European crown. As funerary bundles with European crowns had previously recorded the deaths of indigenous leaders, the original funerary bundle must have related the death of the Tenochca governor. However, as discussed below, this funerary bundle was later modified to reference the death of Bishop Zumárraga instead. Painter B did not depict the seating of the next Tenochca leader, Don Esteban de Guzmán, who was named in the following year, perhaps because he was a juez de residencia and not an official governor (Gibson 1964:169; Lockhart 1992:34). Nevertheless, Painter B also failed to include Guzmán’s successor, presumably because Tenochca history had diminishing importance for Tepechpan into the Colonial period, which is further supported by the modification made later to Tehuetzquititzin’s funerary bundle.


Figure 6.1. The Mixton War as depicted in the Códice de Tlatelolco. CONACULTA.-INAH.-MEX; reproduced with permission of the Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia.

Therefore, Painter B’s record of Tehuetzquititzin’s death effectively signaled the end of Tenochtitlan’s ruling line as far as Tepechpan was concerned. New Spain’s Political Leaders Painter B also added notices about key Spanish secular personnel to Painter A’s history. The figure that Painter B included under the

year 9 Reed (1527) is identified as a Spaniard by his attire of a blue jacket, leather boots, and brimmed hat, and more specifically as Hernán Cortés by his steel-tipped lance (plate 16). Two profile heads, marked as Nahuas by their distinctive hairstyles and lack of facial hair, are attached to Cortés’s feet. In 1528, Cortés returned to Spain with a group of indigenous tlatoque. Although placed one year


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early and the men lack the typical headgear of tlatoque, this composition likely refers to this journey (Noguez 1978, 1:120–121). Perhaps this event was included to show the continued importance of indigenous rulership; the fact that indigenous leaders were taken to Spain suggests their key role in the new empire. Cortés returned from Spain three years later, which Painter B shows on the lower register. Attached to the year 12 Rabbit (1530), Cortés again wears a brimmed hat with a blue jacket and red boots, and he carries his characteristic lance.8 Though mentioned in some alphabetic annals, such as Chimalpahin’s (1998, 2:171) Seventh Relation, the comings and goings of Cortés do not receive mention in other pictorials except for the Codex Mexicanus, perhaps because a new system of rule, the Audiencia, was imposed over Central Mexico at this time. To the right of Cortés is the president of the Second Audiencia, Sebastián Ramírez de Fuenleal, who arrived in New Spain in 1531 (Noguez 1978, 1:125). Wearing a red cloak with blue clothing underneath, Fuenleal’s attire distinguishes him from Cortés. Furthermore, Fuenleal carries a cross, signifying his additional position as bishop of Santo Domingo. Typical of Painter B’s work and indicative of the degeneration of the native writing style, no name glyphs identify these men, but what they wear and the items they carry act as identifying attributes. It is not entirely clear why the comings and goings of civil personnel received such notice in the indigenous pictorials and alphabetic chronicles. Indeed, Painter A failed to note these events, focusing instead on the viceroys. By having added these notices, Painter B suggests that the previous history was somehow incomplete; perhaps the presence of these people conferred some type of legitimacy on the people of New Spain. Also, 100

a concern with news related to these officials may have more directly placed Tepechpan within the Spanish colonial sphere, consequently reinforcing the theme of Tepechpan’s allegiance to Spain. Of course, an interest in Spain would have extended to its highest ruler. Accordingly, I suspect that the inclusion of a funerary bundle (plate 18) topped by a European crown and linked by a line to another lone European crown above the year 2 Reed (1559) acted as a hieroglyphic device marking the funerary bundle above as that of the Spanish emperor Charles V, who died in 1558.9 News of his death may not have reached Tepechpan immediately. With the emperor’s death, the color of the year disks change from yellow to red; thus, Painter B changed the compositional pattern set by Painter A by changing the year color to refer to the death of the ruler of the Spanish empire, thereby equating the Spanish emperor with the Tepechpan governors.10 Clearly the death of Charles V was a key event in the colony. In fact, a royal tomb was built in Mexico City in 1559 to honor the former emperor, which must have been an important event for New Spain, as it is recorded in the Codices Aubin (1981:51v), en Cruz (1981:3), and Mexicanus (1952:83). The emperor’s death must have been as important as the deaths of pre-conquest Mexica tlatoque, which were also consistently noted in these indigenous histories. New Spain’s Religious Leaders In contrast to Painter A’s history, Painter B focused a great deal of attention on the religious hierarchy imposed by Spain. Though in poor condition today, and with features that are now a heavy black, a figure placed on the upper register and attached to the year 6 Flint (1524) can be identified as a friar by his tonsure, robe, roped belt, and


cross (plate 15). It was in 1524 that twelve Franciscan friars arrived in the New World, and Painter B’s representation must refer to this event (Noguez 1978, 1:114). Clearly important, this event was noted by many indigenous historians, including Chimalpahin (1998, 2:167) and the painters of the Codex Aubin (1981:45r) and Codex en Cruz (see fig. 5.3, 4 Rabbit year column).11 The friars’ arrival initiated the conversion of indigenous communities to Christianity, an important point to make in the Colonial period. Earlier, Painter A communicated the arrival of Christianity through his symbolic representation of a dove and cross. Painter B’s representation functions more literally, focusing on the human agents of Christianity, perhaps to more effectively communicate Tepechpan’s acceptance of the new religion. That it is the human agents of Christianity who took precedence is also suggested by the Historia Tolteca-Chichimeca, which does not record the introduction of Christianity in Cuauhtinchan until 12 Rabbit (1530), the year a friar arrived in a nearby town (Leibsohn 1993:47– 48). By comparing the two registers of the Tira, we see that the Mexica in 1524 were still rebellious, as evidenced by the hanging of Cuauhtemoc, while on the upper register, the people of Tepechpan were again shown welcoming Christianity. Even more important than the arrival of the first friars must have been the arrival of New Spain’s first bishop. Painter B depicted the arrival of Bishop Juan de Zumárraga on the Tepechpan register (plate 15) above the year 8 Rabbit (1526).12 Although not identified by a name glyph, his elaborately decorated crosier and miter, both of which are colored a bright yellow and outlined in black, act glyphically to mark him as a bishop, as does his clothing. Also, the bishop towers above the friar of 1524; in a scale of hierarchy, the bishop is clearly more important. Here,

his face is painted black, but when he reappears four years later, his skin is no longer colored. Bishop Zumárraga’s second appearance was noted on the lower register (plate 16), where he is linked to the year 12 Rabbit (1530). His face is shown in a slight threequarter view, and he is wearing the traditional bishop’s garments. In this case he holds a rather plain crosier, again painted yellow and outlined in black, in his right hand. The gloss informs us that the bishop returned in this year to Spain, although he actually returned in 1532.13 The next year he was officially consecrated in Valladolid as the Bishop of Mexico, and in 1534 he returned to New Spain, which Painter B drew on the lower register (plate 16), attached to the year 3 Rabbit (1534) by a red line. He is shown with the typical bishop’s clothing and accoutrements, and his face and hands are again black. The various comings and goings of Bishop Zumárraga are standard fare in other indigenous histories; for example, the Codices Aubin (1981), Azcatitlan (1995), en Cruz (see fig. 5.13), Mexicanus (see fig. 5.2), and TellerianoRemensis (1995), as well as the assorted chronicles by Chimalpahin, detail various events associated with the bishop. He was clearly considered an important historical figure, so much so that Painter B must have seen Painter A’s failure to note his presence in New Spain as a glaring omission. Indeed, this omission makes one wonder just how much the bishop’s presence was felt in a small community such as Tepechpan in the years just following the conquest. Perhaps only in retrospect did these indigenous historians learn of his important religious role and its significations. Bishop Zumárraga effectively sanctified New Spain as a place worthy of such a high Christian official, and I suspect that his inclusion in indigenous histories


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served to sanctify the patron communities in much the same way and further communicate their acceptance of Christianity. Bishop Zumárraga’s next appearance in the Tira stresses his conversion of the indigenous peoples. Painter B drew the bishop, with his same identifying features, on the lower register (plate 17) attached to the year 4 Flint (1548) by a faint red line. He sits on the European hip-joint chair, while a man kneels and prays before him. The worshipper must be indigenous because he wears a tilma, but he also wears a long-sleeved shirt and a white headband, revealing the native adoption of items of European dress. Zumárraga was in Tepetlaoztoc in 1548, and perhaps the people of Tepechpan traveled there to be baptized and confirmed (Noguez 1978, 1:143; Boban 1891:266). Following Torquemada’s (1986, 3:454) account, Zumárraga baptized more than 14,000 indigenous people during this visit. This representation may on one level refer to Zumárraga’s mass baptism, and, on a more specific level, it may relate that the people of Tepechpan participated and were baptized, thereby making them legitimate Christians. Bishop Zumárraga died soon after the mass baptism in 1548, and Painter B recorded the arrival of Bishop Zumárraga’s successor above 11 Reed (1555; plate 17). Alonso de Montúfar was named bishop in 1551 but did not enter Mexico City until 1554. No characteristics distinguish the representation of Bishop Montúfar from his predecessor, nor does a name glyph specifically identify him. Thus, this is not a portrait but merely a glyph recording the arrival of a bishop, which other indigenous histories such as the Codices Aubin (1981:49r) and Mexicanus (1952:83) also recorded. Indeed, the painter of the Mexicanus used a simple bishop’s miter as a sign or glyph for the various bishops (see fig. 5.2). Beyond showing the arrival of Chris102

tianity in Tepechpan, Painter A made few other references to Spanish religion; he included none of the religious personnel who figure so prominently in other indigenous histories. The fact that events concerning the religious hierarchy were included so consistently in indigenous histories suggests that such statements became expected fare, providing evidence of a community’s acceptance of Christianity. Painter B and/or the Tira’s patrons must have realized that this new historical trope was missing from Painter A’s history, perhaps because he misunderstood the dual nature of rule in New Spain, where viceroys acted as political leaders and bishops as religious leaders. Hence, Painter A’s viceroys are shown as composite political and religious leaders, much like the pre-conquest Aztec tlatoque. The addition of the Catholic religious hierarchy to Painter A’s history, then, completes the Spanish replacement of the Mexica in rule. Because the justification for the conquest was the religious conversion of the indigenous populations, it was important that the people of Tepechpan show that they had accepted not only Spanish political rulership, but spiritual authority as well. Painter B’s additions make this point clear. Tepechpan Painter C Working closer in time to the events he recorded, Painter C’s contribution lacks historical perspective, reading more like a selective news report than an idealized and conventionalized history. Because the Spaniards had by then fully replaced the Mexica in power, Painter C did not include any events associated with the indigenous citizens of the former Tenochtitlan. Instead, he chose to focus on the Tepechpan and Spanish ruling spheres, both political and religious, and both placed on equal footing. In a departure from the histories of


Painters A and B, and perhaps because he and the Tira’s patrons were increasingly aware of the futility of arguing for a prestigious position for Tepechpan in the Spanish colonial system, Painter C paid more attention to Tepechpan’s increasing difficulties in meeting its tribute obligations, hence his records of epidemics, labor obligations, and census counts. The history that Painter C constructed communicated Tepechpan’s current hardships rather than its past glories. This shift is not surprising because expressions of poverty were a typical legal device in colonial New Spain. For example, inserted in the documentation of the lawsuit be‑ tween Tepechpan and Temascalapa is a petition by Tepechpan’s encomendera. She argued that Tepechpan had paid so little tribute to her that she had been left in poverty, and Tepechpan was ordered to increase its tribute. Of course, Tepechpan appealed based on its own destitution, which must have been a successful argument as Tepechpan’s tribute obligation was revised once again, this time in its favor. Ruling Hierarchy Absent from Painter C’s record of New Spain’s ruling hierarchy is any interest in the indigenous rulers of the former Tenochtitlan, as was typical of the work of Painter A and, to a lesser extent, Painter B. In fact, Painter C may have gone so far as to replace the notice of a Tenochca governor’s death with news of Bishop Zumárraga’s death instead. The funerary bundle under 1553 (plate 17) was originally topped with a European crown, but later a bishop’s miter of yellow outlined in red was superimposed, and a yellow crosier, also outlined in red, was placed above. These items distinguish the funerary bundle as that of a bishop, presumably Bishop Zumárraga, though he actually died

soon after the mass baptism in 1548. I suspect that either Painter C or D made this change because both used red outlines. Perhaps the artist was trying to erase references to the Tenochca ruling line, or maybe he was simply confused that Zumárraga’s death was shown in this manner. Nevertheless, the message is clear: the Mexica tlatoque had been thoroughly replaced by the Spanish, who at this point also appear on the lower register that had previously been associated with Tenochtitlan. New Spain’s Viceroys The consistent inclusion of New Spain’s viceroys mimics Painter A’s continuous record of Tenochca ruler accession statements. Accordingly, Painter C pictured the arrival of Viceroy Gastón de Peralta on the lower register, attached by a faint red line to the year 1568 (plate 18).14 He is seated on a European chair, and his beard and clothing—blue jacket, red boots, and brimmed hat—mark him as a Spaniard. On top of the hat, either Painter C or a later artist added a European crown, indicated with thick yellow pigment and outlined in red, as was done to Painter A’s representation of Viceroy Mendoza above 1535. The viceroy also holds a cross with a blue banner attached, a symbol of political and religious authority. After having ruled for only one year, the viceroy was ordered to return to Spain. He was replaced by Don Martín Enríquez, whose arrival is shown on the upper register (plate 18). A line leads from his chair to the year 12 House (1569), although he actually arrived the previous year. Seated on the European folding chair, Viceroy Enríquez wears a yellow crown and carries a yellow cross with a red banner attached, but his clothing—a red jacket, blue boots, and a crown—distinguishes him from his predecessor.


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Tepechpan’s Governors The seatings of new Tepechpan governors were recorded in an uninterrupted fashion and in tandem with the arrival of viceroys. Painter C drew Tepechpan’s newest governor above the year 13 Rabbit (1570) but neglected to include a funerary bundle for his predecessor (plate 18). By this time, governors were elected officials and were not meant to serve life tenures in office. In fact, they were only supposed to serve one or two years and were ineligible for reelection; however, the prohibition against governors serving lengthy terms was constantly flouted, as we see here in Tepechpan, where the previous governor must have served for almost twenty-five years.15 Nevertheless, the discontinuance of a death glyph preceding the next ruler’s accession indicates that the election of a new ruler no longer depended upon the death of the previous one. Painter C did not provide a name glyph to identify the new Tepechpan governor, but an alphabetic gloss informs us that this is Don Antonio de Esteban, who was promoted to governor after previously serving as the alcalde of Tepechpan (AGI Justicia 164:85r, 112r). Except for the fact that the governor’s skin is now black, Painter C followed the pattern for depicting indigenous rulers that was established earlier by Painter A. Accordingly, Painter C changed the color of the year disks to yellow, and the governor wears a white tilma and is barefoot and unbearded. Nonetheless, he is shown as ruling in the European fashion, for he is seated on the folding chair and wears a yellow crown. Though Painter C continued to show both the viceroys and Tepechpan’s governors on the European chair, which implies that they were endowed with the same type of authority, he did distinguish the European leaders from their indigenous counterparts. Many indigenous elites had adopted items of 104

Spanish clothing by this time, but Painter C shows Tepechpan’s governors still wearing the white tilma, in contrast to the European clothing of the viceroys. I suspect this is because Painter C wanted to stress that these rulers of Tepechpan were natives of the city. At this time, Europeans and mestizos were making increasing inroads into indigenous communities, sometimes trying to usurp rule there. Therefore, the continuance of the ruling line in indigenous hands became a point of pride for the local community. Life under Spanish Rule Most of the important events in Tepechpan that Painter C recorded relate to the issue of its tribute and labor obligations to the Spanish state. Therefore, we see continued references to epidemics as well as records of census counts taken in their aftermath. Even a depiction of the Mexico City cathedral focuses on its foundation, thereby emphasizing its construction over its religious significance. San Francisco Church Under the year 5 Rabbit (1562), Painter C painted the wooden structure of a church, referring to the foundations of the Mexico City cathedral laid in this year (plate 18). The building of the cathedral surely rivaled the dedications of pre-Hispanic temples. This was such an important event for New Spain that it was celebrated with processions whose participants included Viceroy Velasco, Bishop Montúfar, and the governors of Tenochtitlan, Tlatelolco, Tacuba, and Texcoco (Chimalpahin 1998, 2:215; Sarabia Viejo 1978:142). Nevertheless, Painter C’s record ignores the religious prestige offered by the church for larger New Spain. In this regard, his representation makes an interesting contrast to the earlier temple and


church dedications recorded by Painter A. In the former case, the icon of a finished temple showed Tepechpan’s acceptance of the Mexica patron deity and its prestige as an independent altepetl. In the latter case, the icon of a Christian church signified the acceptance of Christianity by Tepechpan and its prestige as an independent cabecera. In contrast, by showing just the foundation of San Francisco rather than the complete church, Painter C focused attention not on the church itself as a symbol of Christianity and religious allegiance, but on the labor that went into its construction. Many indigenous communities, including Tepechpan, were expected to help in the erection of the cathedral; therefore, Painter C’s representation likely recorded Tepechpan’s fulfillment of its labor obligations to the Spanish state. In general, indigenous communities were expected to perform service in the form of public works, and in the first decades after the conquest, such demands were burdensome and largely unregulated (Horn 1997:91). Clearly by the second half of the sixteenth century, indigenous communities realized the need to document their services, and this is just what Painter C’s record did. Put simply, what concerned him was not the religious prestige of such a building, but the indigenous sweat that went into its foundation. Epidemics Also of concern to Painter C were the epidemics that continued to decimate Tepechpan’s population. A succession of skulls above the years 5 Rabbit (1562), 7 Flint (1564), and 9 Rabbit (1566) signify death, much as skulls marked the day sign of death in the pre-Hispanic divinatory codices (plate 18).16 Given that these were the years of serious epidemics in Central Mexico, the skulls must signify the deaths that occurred in

Tepechpan. In this case, Painter C does not comment on the specific nature of the diseases but simply on the deaths they caused. Epidemics ravaged indigenous communities throughout the sixteenth century, and their notices are a consistent feature of many indigenous histories.17 Estimates place the total loss of indigenous life in Central Mexico at 90 percent by the end of the sixteenth century (Gibson 1964:138, 449). Such losses certainly had a psychological impact on communities, but their leaders also had to deal with the economic impact, having to make up for shortfalls in their town’s tribute and labor obligations—hence the need to document the reasons for such shortfalls. As tribute was based on a head count, population losses were especially important and potentially devastating. Often when communities could not meet their obligations, they were forced to sell off parcels of land, which obviously hurt the corporate community. In fact, according to the Tira, a census count was immediately called for Tepechpan to reassess its obligations after these losses. Census Count Above the year 9 Rabbit (1566), Painter C drew a bearded figure in Spanish clothing and carrying a vara, a sign of authority in New Spain (plate 18). He is communicating with an indigenous figure who wears a white tilma over European trousers. The Spanish figure is painted black in contrast to the indigenous figure, who is uncolored and stands in front of a house shown frontal with an indigenous post-and-lintel doorway. The associated alphabetic gloss informs us that this composition shows a census count, a new event in the Tira, and one also added to the Codex en Cruz (see fig. 5.13). Beginning in the 1540s and continuing through the 1560s, common tribute was replaced by a head tax, and each tributary was


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expected to pay the same amount (Gibson 1964:199; Hassig 1985:226). The change to a head tax is documented in the Codices Aubin (1981:47v), en Cruz (Dibble 1981, 1:53), and Osuna (1947) and clearly was of some concern to indigenous communities. The reference in the Tira likely refers to a new count that had to be taken in light of the population losses the community had suffered from the epidemics of the previous years. In the aftermath of a reduction in population, a new census count would have surely resulted in a reduction in tribute, a key point that the elite of Tepechpan would have wanted to document. Reinforcing this idea of population loss, Painter C placed the skull of the 9 Rabbit epidemic immediately on top of the census taker’s leg. The Dávila Brothers’ Rebellion Painter C included two heads above the years 10 Reed (1567) and 11 Flint (1568). Their closed eyes and the blood coming from their necks indicate death by decapitation, and they are marked as Spaniards by their uncolored skin, beards, and brimmed hats. This terse representation calls forth the story of a conspiracy lead by the Dávila brothers that clearly fascinated viceregal New Spain. Members of a prominent Creole family, Alonso and Gil Gonzalez Dávila were accused of conspiring with others to overthrow the viceroyalty. Their alleged coconspirators were also from illustrious families and most notably included the sons of Hernán Cortés.18 Their plot discovered, the Dávila brothers were tried and found guilty, and in August of 1566, they were publicly decapitated in the city square. Following Torquemada’s (1986, 1:632) account, practically the entire city gathered in the streets to witness the parade of the bodies. Meanwhile, the Cortés brothers received a much lighter

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sentence; they were expelled from Mexico and sent to live in Spain.19 Thematically, this Creole rebellion is a departure for the Tira, which had previously focused on the local community and the Mexica/Spanish ruling structure. Nevertheless, this Creole conspiracy received quite a bit of attention in Nahua historical accounts. For example, the Codices Aubin (1981:55r) and Mexicanus (1952:85) picture the decapitated heads, and Chimalpahin (1997, 2:233–235), Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco, 1519–1633 (1989:240), and the Anales de Juan Miguel (1989:256) all mention this event. Clearly the fact that these Spaniards were so publicly executed intrigued the indigenous people. These Nahua historians may have been struck by the irony of the Spaniards, who so vehemently deplored Aztec sacrificial practices, carrying out such a public execution themselves. Moreover, this happened in Aztec sacred space, as the city square was in the precincts of the former Aztec sacred center. Also, the heads were displayed in a manner strikingly similar to the pre-conquest Aztec skull rack; perhaps these indigenous historians saw this spectacle as a return or a legitimization of past indigenous practices. tepechpan Painter D Painter D’s contributions to the Tira are most similar to those by Painter C; both historians recorded events concerning the local community and its tribute obligations. Furthermore, Painter D continued to focus on the local and imperial ruling spheres. Nevertheless, though more factual on the surface, his history is still largely a construction, and like Painter C’s, one that emphasizes Tepechpan’s recent difficulties rather than its past prestige.


Ruling Hierarchy Painter D made no mention of Tenochca rulers in his history. Instead he focused only on New Spain’s political and religious leaders, and Tepechpan’s local governors, showing all on equal footing. New Spain In 1580, viceroy Don Martín Enríquez was ordered to assume the position of Viceroy of Peru, and in that same year, his successor arrived. Painter D drew the new viceroy, Don Lorenzo Suárez de Mendoza, Count of Coruña, above the year 10 Flint (1580; plate 19). His skin colored black, Viceroy Suárez de Mendoza wears a blue cloak, leather boots, and a yellow crown outlined in red. He also carries a yellow cross with a red banner, which must act as an identifying attribute of viceroys in general, for one reappears under the time line and above a funerary bundle marking the viceroy’s death in 13 Reed (1583). The newly appointed bishop, Don Pedro Moya de Contreras, arrived in New Spain in 1584 (plate 19). Due to the previous viceroy’s untimely death, the bishop was also named president of the Audiencia and was considered a provisional viceroy. In his representation of the bishop’s arrival above the year 1584, Painter D conveyed the dual nature of his position. The bishop is marked by his traditional clothing, but he also sits on a European folding chair, an icon of Spanish political authority; hence, the bishop is shown as a religious and secular leader. Painter D recorded the arrival of the new viceroy, Alvaro Manrique de Zúñiga, under the year 2 House (1585; plate 20). Painted with a skin color that has now turned black, he is seated in the European folding chair, wears a blue jacket and red boots, and holds

a cross outlined in black and with a faint remnant of a red banner barely visible.20 Only four years after his arrival, the viceroy was ordered to transfer power to Luis de Velasco, son of the former Viceroy Velasco. The pictorial system of the Tira is so conventionalized that we need no alphabetic gloss to tell us that the remnant of a European folding chair under the year 7 Rabbit (1590) must communicate the arrival of the newest viceroy (plate 20). Tepechpan The final indigenous ruler to be painted in the Tira appears on the upper, Tepechpan register, and a faint blue line links him to the year disk of 1 Flint (1584; plate 20). Although the strict upper and lower register divisions set up by Painter A no longer remained, throughout the Tira all Tepechpan governors are shown on the upper register, suggesting that it continued to be associated predominantly with Tepechpan. In further obeisance to Painter A’s model, Painter D changed the color of the year disks from yellow to blue with this accession statement. This final portion of the Tira is partially destroyed, but from the remaining representation, the new governor appears similar to his predecessors. He is seated in a European folding chair and wears a white tilma, even though indigenous elites had eagerly adopted European dress by this time (Haskett 1991:161). The white mantles may stress that rule in Tepechpan remained in indigenous hands at a time when other indigenous communities were having trouble with non-natives assuming positions of authority. Typically, Painter D did not provide a name glyph for this figure, and I have been unable to locate his name in archival sources. With the upper and lower divisions no longer strictly recognized, the Tepechpan


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governors often were drawn on the same register, and arguably on equal footing, as the Spanish viceroys and even bishops. Though the elite religious and political leaders of New Spain likely had little notice of a city like Tepechpan, their presence in the Tira signified Tepechpan’s membership in and allegiance to the Spanish empire. Just as the preconquest Tepechpan tlatoque were set on par with the Mexica tlatoque, at this point they were equated with the Spanish viceroys and bishops. However, Tepechpan’s rulers were still marked as Nahuas by their clothing, again indicating that rule over Tepechpan remained in local hands. Life under Spanish Rule Painter D added one event to his history that may reference a Christian miracle, but beyond this unique addition, he focused on events that would ultimately affect Tepechpan’s ability to meet its tribute obligations: continued epidemics, associated census counts, and finally a plague of grasshoppers that destroyed Tepechpan’s crops. A Religious Procession Painter D drew a friar (plate 19) above the years 12 Rabbit/13 Reed (1582/1583). Holding a large cross, the friar appears to be in some type of religious procession. Most likely, this image references an event recorded by Chimalpahin (2006:29, 141), who writes that in 13 Reed (1583), a crucifix miraculously appeared in San Guillermo Totolapan (a town in Morelos) and was brought to Mexico City. Clearly this was an important event as “all the Augustinian, Franciscan, and Dominican friars, the secular priests, and Theatines went to meet it.” A Christian miracle such as this can be read in much the same light as earlier signs of the divine. Huitzilopoch-

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tli prophesied that Mexica migrants would see a vision of an eagle nesting in a cactus that would mark their destined homeland. This prophecy legitimized the divinity and power of Huitzilopochtli and communicated the divine sanctification of Tenochtitlan. Accordingly, the miraculous appearance of a crucifix in Mexico communicated the legitimacy of the Christian religion and its sanctification of Mexico. By noting this event in the Tira, Tepechpan identified itself as a Christian community. Epidemics Painter D drew a small, partially effaced funerary bundle (plate 19) above 6 Flint (1576), but it is unclear whose death this represents. Perhaps associated with the funerary bundle, two skulls are shown over the years 6 Flint (1576) and 7 House (1577), again signifying death, as is further reiterated by the representation on the register below. Here, a naked man lies prone, with blood issuing from his nose and mouth, and a similar depiction is shown under 5 Flint (1588; plate 20). Grave epidemics struck the indigenous populations in these years, and the most common symptom reported was nosebleed, as recorded by Painter D (Gibson 1964:449). Because of their devastating effects on indigenous communities, these epidemics were recorded in numerous colonial sources.21 A petition for a reduction of tribute filed by Tepechpan in 1578 contended that the community was unable to cultivate its lands due to the massive population loss suffered in the previous years (AGN Tierras 1871, exp. 17, cuaderno 1). The record of the epidemics in the Tira may have served to document such losses. In fact, the epidemics of 1576 and 1577 were so severe that the viceroy soon ordered yet another census count for Tepechpan.


Census Counts Under the year 1578, Painter D depicted a Spanish official speaking to an indigenous man by a house (plate 19); though shown on the lower register, this must reference a census count in Tepechpan (Noguez 1978, 1:160). Spanish officials were sent to various towns throughout Mexico in this year to count the number of natives who had died in the previous years’ epidemics. Another Spaniard also visited Tepechpan in this year; Tepechpan went to court to petition against the granting of two caballerías de tierra in its boundaries to a Spaniard (AGN Tierras 1871, exp. 17, cuaderno 1). The governor of Tepechpan, Don Antonio Esteban de Guzmán, argued against the grant because he believed it would harm his community. A vista de tierras was ordered, and the corregidor Francisco de Castañeda went to Tepechpan to settle the case. The main argument against Tepechpan was that the land in question was not under cultivation. The people of Tepechpan retorted that they could not cultivate the land due to population losses from a cocoliztli (sickness) the year before. Concluding that the Tepechpaneca did not cultivate the land because they had so much other land, Castañeda granted the merced to the Spaniard. Thus, this representation may also refer to this visit and lawsuit. At a tear in the Tira under the year 1583 (plate 19) is a remnant of a representation of a roof similar to the one seen in the composition of 1578. The people of Tepechpan petitioned for their own grant of land in this year (AGN Tierras 1871 exp. 17:382r, 383r). Presumably a vista de tierras would have been undertaken, and this may have been shown in the Tira representation. The merced was granted the next year. The additions in the Tira would thus refer to these grants and

petitions for land, clearly a new subject matter for this indigenous history, but one of increasing importance in later histories such as the primordial titles. Furthermore, a call for a new tribute count was issued in 1581 in answer to a petition by Felipe de Baeza, half brother of the encomendero Gerónimo de Baeza, for half of the tribute from the encomienda of Tepechpan and Temascalapa (AGN Tierras 1649, exp. 2:156r–207v). Perhaps the remnant of the house under 1583 refers to this count, although the actual count in the archival records dates to the eighteenth century.22 Crop Damages Perhaps it is fitting that one of the last representations in the Tira focuses on Tepechpan’s continued economic difficulties. Below the years from 1586 to 1589 (plate 20), a representation of corn plants with an alphabetic gloss reading tapachichi, the Nahuatl word for grasshopper, suggests that a plague of grasshoppers destroyed the crops in these years (Noguez 1978, 1:165). A similar incident is shown in the pre-Hispanic portion of the Codex Mexicanus (1952:72), which pictures a grasshopper eating a corn plant. Damage to its harvests would certainly have affected the economic stability of Tepechpan, and Painter D’s record of this incident would again have served to explain any resulting shortfalls in tribute. As it turned out, local survival and the precarious balance maintained by dependence on the earth had not changed much over time. However, the stakes may have become higher. With few social mechanisms in place to protect indigenous communities from natural disasters, many were forced to sell lands for basic survival. Consequently, every shortfall threatened the corporate integrity of the community, whose main re-


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course was to petition the Spanish crown for further reductions in tribute. A document like the Tira could certainly have served as evidence as to why such reductions were needed. The record of the hardships that Tepechpan had had to endure became the best strategy for the community’s survival and suggests that Tepechpan’s leaders were becoming increasingly savvy about Spanish laws and procedures. Conclusions Though the later painters continued to follow the format set by Painter A, their contributions to the Tira reveal a change in historical conception. Painter A presented an idealized and elegant history that functioned more as political argument and symbolic construct. The later artists, while continuing to negotiate Tepechpan’s place in the Spanish colonial system, increasingly focused on Tepechpan’s troubles under this new form of rule. Epidemics, escalating tribute obligations, and failed crops clearly had a detrimental effect on the altepetl. Therefore, the later painters—surely at the behest of Tepechpan’s governing elite, who would have been responsible for making up for any tributary shortfalls—documented these hardships for the once prestigious Tepechpan. The Tira remained a tool of persuasion, but its later sections record Tepechpan’s difficulties rather than its glories. An awareness of changing Spanish colonial policies is reflected in the later histories. For example, in the 1560s, Spain imposed a uniform head tax on indigenous communities, and the responsibility for making up shortfalls in tribute fell to the indigenous government (Gibson 1964:199, 233; Haskett 1991:62). At this same time, Spain established the repartimiento, or labor draft system. The job of supplying indigenous laborers for 110

public works projects also fell to the indigenous government. Therefore, town finances and labor became a principal concern of indigenous governments in the second half of the sixteenth century, and the increasing pressure created strained political conditions for the ruling elite. Of course, the epidemics suffered by the indigenous peoples further exacerbated the situation. All of these concerns are reflected in the histories of the later painters. For instance, Painters C and D recorded census counts in Tepechpan, surely because of the importance of the head tax imposed by the Spaniards. Painter C also documented the laying of the foundations of the Mexico City cathedral, which effectively recorded Tepechpan’s fulfillment of its repartimiento obligations. Furthermore, the epidemics that resulted in the loss of indigenous life and subsequently hampered tribute collection are pictured throughout the colonial portion of the Tira. Finally, at the very end of the Tira, Painter D depicted an invasion of grasshoppers that destroyed the crops of Tepechpan and created shortfalls in tribute. Gibson’s (1964:211) assertion that problems of town finance came to be the principal concern of indigenous governments is reflected in the changed focus of the Tira in the second half of the sixteenth century. Commissioned by Tepechpan’s elites, the additions made to the Tira after 1550 reflect the rising pressures they must have felt under Spanish rule. Despite these changes, a constant feature of the pre-conquest and colonial sections is the focus on Tepechpan’s leaders. Under Spanish rule, an innovation in governance was the frequent election of new cabildo officials, with indigenous governors supposed to serve for one or two years before a new election. In the Tira, we see that the indigenous rulers assumed much longer tenures. Although the Tira emphasizes Tepechpan’s ac-


ceptance of the Spanish ruling system (both political and religious), its governors ruled locally much as they did before the conquest. For this reason, the local rulers continued to be shown wearing the pre-conquest white

cotton tilma, which underscored their indigenous roots and links to the pre-conquest ruling line, the thread that unites the Tira and Tepechpan’s histories.


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7. The Alphabetic Annotations

I

ntroduced by the Spaniards, alphabetic writing took on an almost fetishized role in New Spain, symbolizing the authority of the Spanish empire because of its overwhelming use in the political, religious, and judicial spheres (Lienhard 1991:5–10). Because colonial power rested largely on legal titles, or mercedes, which were written alphabetically on paper, the indigenous peoples could not ignore the administrative and judicial power of the written word. An alphabetic annotation, then, added a sense of authority to a pictorial text, fixing it with a unitary and, in the new colonial order, legitimate meaning that the imagery presumably lacked. Perhaps with this goal in mind, a number of scribes added alphabetic annotations, or glosses, to portions of the Tira. Written in Nahuatl, these glosses were added to the manuscript at different times and in a selective manner. That is, portions of the Tira were not annotated, which suggests that the additions of each scribe reflect a conscious choice about what each wanted to communicate.1 The content and placement of the annotations suggest that they were added after the pictorial imagery was completed, any time from the late sixteenth century and most likely into the seventeenth and possibly eighteenth centuries. In terms of content and intentions, the alphabetic annotations are similar to the pictorial imagery of the later painters; due in part to their late date, they are overwhelmingly concerned with events impacting Tepechpan and its status as an independent cabecera under Spanish colonial rule. Like Painters C and D, the annotators

mostly ignored Tenochtitlan, which reveals its diminishing importance for the identity and history of later colonial Tepechpan. Annotator 1 Annotator 1 was by far the most prolific annotator of the Tira, and I suspect that he added his glosses to the manuscript some time between 1590 and 1650 (see Chapter 2). (Transcriptions and translations of Annotator 1’s glosses are included in the appendix.) The clarity and neat style of Annotator 1’s writing also suggest that he was a skilled scribe, and it is likely that he worked as a notary, or escribano, for the Tepechpan cabildo. By the end of the sixteenth century, even the smallest indigenous communities had notaries, and they sometimes also held government positions within the cabildo (Lockhart 1992:330; Horn 1997:63–64). As a notary, then, Annotator 1 would have been an important member of Tepechpan’s ruling elite, and the content of his annotations reveals a concern with Tepechpan’s pre- and post-conquest political and religious status and also with its fulfillment of colonial obligations. For the most part, his annotations are fairly accurate identifications of the Tira’s pictorial imagery. Following the terse pictorial style, most of his annotations are succinct and to the point, simply identifying people and places, and rarely providing more detailed, narrative information. Nevertheless, his annotations reveal the key issues of concern to Tepechpan at the close of the sixteenth century.

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Pre-Conquest Annotations As did Painter A before him, Annotator 1 focused much of his attention on the ruling line of Tepechpan; he identified each of the rulers by name and also annotated their death statements. His glosses reveal a general understanding of Painter A’s pictorial imagery. For example, at the first appearance of Icxicuauhtli, he correctly identified him as a Chichimec, as conveyed by the bow and arrows he carries, but upon his next representation, now seated on a woven reed throne at Tepechpan’s foundation, Annotator 1 noted the elevation in his political rank, calling him a tlatoani. Nevertheless, Annotator 1’s variation in titles for the subsequent rulers does not clearly match the pictorial imagery. For instance, he called Caltzin a tlatoani, but his successor, Tencoyotzin, is labeled as both a Chichimec and a tlatoani. Why this distinction was made is unclear. Painter A did distinguish Caltzin by his warrior’s topknot, but if and how this relates to Chichimec status, or lack thereof, is uncertain. At his first appearance following Tencoyotzin’s death, Quaquauhtzin is also identified as a Chichimec, perhaps to communicate his exiled and therefore nomadic status, but upon his official inauguration, he is only named and no title is provided. Although this may be a simple omission, it also may support Tepanec claims that Quaquauhtzin was actually placed in power by the leaders of Azcapotzalco (AGI México 1842; Anales de Tlatelolco 1948:22). If true, Annotator 1 may have withheld the tlatoani title from Quaquauhtzin to communicate that he was not a legitimate leader, though Painter A’s representation does show him as one. The tlatoani title returns to Tepechpan’s ruling line upon the inauguration of Tencoyotzin II; this elevation in rank may reflect

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his distribution of calpulli lands, which would imply that he was an autonomous leader. His successor, Quaquauhtzin II, is also called a tlatoani, but Don Hernando Tenyahualohuatzin—the final ruler to be seated in power before the Spanish invasion—does not carry this title, nor do the subsequent Tepechpan rulers, presumably because they no longer rule as tlatoque in the pre-conquest tradition but as Spanish-style gobernadores. When Annotator 1 included dynastic information beyond basic accession and death notices, he mostly followed Painter A’s pictorial imagery. For example, at Tepechpan’s foundation, he noted that Icxicuauhtli was the ruler of the Tepechpan altepetl, which reflects the political status of the newly founded city-state. Also, clearly aware of the important political role of Tozquentzin as a Toltec ennobler, he identified her by name and also informs us that she was indeed a cihuapilli, or a noblewoman. Thus, the ancient foundation of Tepechpan and the establishment of its noble ruling line were clearly of interest in his reading of the Tira. Also of concern was the Tepanec War, which received numerous glosses. For example, Annotator 1 identified the assassins sent to kill Tencoyotzin as Tepaneca, and he identified one in particular as a man named Caltzin, which must refer to his “house” (cal-li) name glyph. However, his gloss for the image of Quaquauhtzin fleeing Tepechpan and resting for a time at a place that may be identified, based on the associated place name glyph, as Tectepec Chalco, Annotator 1’s usually reliable explanation does not fit the pictorial record; instead it references an irrigation project that he credited to Quaquauhtzin, though this project has no clear relation to Quaquauhtzin’s actions during the Tepanec War. In this case, Annotator 1 may have incor-


rectly read the place glyph behind Quaquauh tzin as Teotihuacan, which then brought forth the story of the hydraulic project. Some time in the early fifteenth century, water from the San Juan River of Teotihuacan was diverted to irrigate the lands of Acolman, Tepechpan, Tequisistlan, and Texcoco, which improved the economic prosperity and living conditions of these towns (Sanders et al. 1979:153; Noguez 1978, 1:87). The Relaciones geográficas for both Tepechpan and Teotihuacan mention that the San Juan River passed through these towns, but neither source recorded the leader responsible for the project (Nuttall 1926:52, 54, 76). However, this information is provided in Texcoco’s Relación geográfica, which was written by Juan Bautista de Pomar (1991:86). Not surprisingly, he credited his great-grandfather Nezahualcoyotl, the former tlatoani of Texcoco best known for his creativity and intellect, with the hydraulic project.2 By instead crediting Quaquauhtzin with the engineering feat, Annotator 1 added intellectual prestige to the Tepechpan community. Also, as noted earlier, much of Quaquauhtzin’s life mimicked that of Nezahualcoyotl; Annotator 1’s gloss further relates the two. Perhaps also reflecting his interest in establishing Tepechpan’s political prestige, in his gloss of Quaquauhtzin finally gaining the throne, Annotator 1 paid more attention to his noble wife than he did the new Tepechpan tlatoani. Though he did not identify her by name, he does inform us that she was a daughter of Temictzin of Mexico and that she was Quaquauhtzin’s wife. Thus, his emphasis was on the marriage alliance between Tepechpan and Tenochtitlan, and the important political role of this noblewoman. An oral reading surely would have provided the tragic story of Quaquauhtzin’s death at 3 Reed (1443) and the associated poem, but

this is much too complicated for a short annotation. Annotator 1 only tells us the place of Quaquauhtzin’s final battle; though now damaged, the gloss may mention Chietla.3 As did Painter A, Annotator 1 also distinguished the inauguration of Tencoyotzin II by detailing his creation and distribution of calpulli lands, which surely reflects an interest in preserving Tepechpan’s landholdings into the Colonial period. Furthermore, Annotator 1 did not identify Tencoyotzin, nor the future leaders of Tepechpan, as Chichimecs, which also may signify an elevation in Tepechpan’s status, perhaps in relation to this distribution of land; as a town with its own subjects, Tepechpan had become an imperial center. Annotator 1 also identified Tencoyotzin II’s wife, who Painter A pictured above her husband’s death statement. However, Annotator 1 provided additional information not communicated pictorially. Contrary to the pains Painter A took to ignore Tepechpan’s subjection to Texcoco, Annotator 1 informs us that Ome Tochtzin was a noble daughter of Nezahualcoyotl of Texcoco. By marrying the daughter of a superordinate ruler, Tencoyotzin II publicly communicated Tepechpan’s subject status to Texcoco. Presumably, by the time at which Annotator 1 worked, this preconquest subjection could no longer affect Tepechpan’s place in the colonial world. That Annotator 1’s intentions do not entirely match those of Painter A is also suggested by what he failed to annotate in the pre-conquest section. For example, on the upper Tepechpan register, there are only two events that he failed to gloss: the arrival and settlement of Mexica migrants in Tepechpan at about 3 Flint (plate 4) and the dedication 104 years later of a temple devoted to the Mexica patron deity (plate 14). By the time of Annotator 1’s reading of the Tira, Christian

The Alphabetic Annotations

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churches and related ceremonies clearly took precedence over pre-conquest temples and pagan rituals. Moreover, both of these events ultimately relate Tepechpan to Tenochtitlan, which obviously had little import for Tepechpan after the mid-sixteenth century. Indeed, Annotator 1 glossed no events on the Mexica register before the Spanish arrival, in complete disregard of the connections between Tenochtitlan and Tepechpan that had so clearly interested Painter A years earlier. Colonial Annotations Given the increasingly abbreviated representations by later artists and their departure from traditional iconography, Annotator 1’s alphabetic glosses in the colonial section carry more interpretive weight. Also, his glosses expand onto the lower register, though he continued to ignore historic events associated specifically with the Mexica. The ubiquity of glosses in the post-conquest section reveals the importance of Tepechpan’s colonial history for Annotator 1. Also, he correlated the Aztec years after 1 Reed (1519) with their Spanish equivalents; the ink, style, and size of the year correlations match his handwriting. Thus, for Annotator 1, the arrival of the Spaniards introduced a new conception of time. Just as Painter A tied his history to the continuous Aztec timeline, which effectively communicated Tepechpan’s membership in the Aztec empire, Annotator 1 used Christian years to show Tepechpan’s membership in the new Spanish empire and the arrival of a new Christian era at Tepechpan, beginning in 1519. Annotator 1’s references to the conquest are relatively vague. At Cortés’s first appearance on the lower register below 1 Reed (1519), he simply informs us, “It was when the Marqués arrived.” Making no mention

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of how the more militaristic aspects of the conquest impacted Tenochtitlan, his focus instead was on Tepechpan. For example, he did not explain the smoking temple on the lower register nor the quick deaths and successions of Mexica tlatoque through the invasion. In contrast, he added a relatively lengthy gloss to Artist B’s rather enigmatic representation of a meeting between Cortés and an indigenous soldier on the Tepechpan register. In fact, it is Annotator 1 who informs us that the indigenous soldier may have been the Texcocan dissident Ixtlilxochitl, who fought with his brother for succession to the Texcocan throne and eventually gained control of the northern half of the Acolhua empire. In acknowledgement of the support that Ixtlilxochitl and his allies offered the Spanish conquerors, Cortés granted them lands (Alvarado Tezozomoc 1987:147; Hicks 1992:8). Though slightly damaged and difficult to read in its entirety, Annotator 1’s gloss may reference this event. It may also note that Cortés granted lands to Ixtlilxochitl’s allies, which included Tepechpan. This gloss, then, may have established Tepechpan’s claims to land, an increasingly important issue in the colonial era.4 Associated with the gloss identifying Ixtlilxochitl is a reference to a “do martin yx.” I suspect this name is related to the next representation, which communicates the arrival in 1524 of twelve Franciscan friars led by Fray Martín de Valencia. In this same year, Fray Martín baptized Ixtlilxochitl and other indigenous elites (Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997, 1:491). Perhaps Annotator 1 conflated the baptism with the representation of Ixtlilxochitl. Ultimately, though Painter A avoided direct references to Texcoco, Annotator 1 had no such disinclination. Indeed, in light of Ixtlilxochitl’s connections with the Spanish conquerors, especially as promoted by his


descendant Alva Ixtlilxochitl, it would have been in Tepechpan’s best interests to show its allegiance to a main ally of the Spaniards. In this regard, Annotator 1’s glosses of indigenous rebellions also call attention to Tepechpan’s peaceful acceptance of Spanish rule. For example, his only reference to a Mexica tlatoani occurs at the representation of Cuauhtemoc’s death in 6 Flint (1524), but he did not mention the ruler by name. Instead, he wrote, “They went to Honduras where the tlatoque died,” which references plural tlatoque despite Painter A’s record of the hanging of only one tlatoani, presumably Cuauhtemoc. Annotator 1, then, did not read this as an event concerning only Tenochtitlan. Furthermore, unlike his description of Tencoyotzin’s death at the hands of Tepaneca, Annotator 1 did not assign blame for the deaths in Honduras. Indeed, he simply wrote that they died, not that they were killed, and this is one of the few times that he did not use the honorific construction; presumably, he did not see these deaths as honorable. Annotator 1 also glossed the other indigenous rebellions recorded pictorially by Painter B. Clearly these battles continued to interest the indigenous peoples, perhaps because they created a contrast with the peaceful Tepechpan and suggested the military power of the new empire. Throughout the colonial portion of the Tira, Annotator 1 noted the various comings and goings of Spanish officials, including Cortés’s trip to Spain with indigenous tlatoque. Moreover, he noted the arrivals of the new president of the Audiencia, Don Sebastián Ramírez de Fuenleal, and each of the new viceroys, identifying these officials by name and appropriate title, even when this information was not provided glyphically. He consistently used the Spanish title of nobility, “don,” when identifying these Span-

ish rulers as well. In this regard, these Spanish officials were equated with their Tepechpan counterparts, who carry this same title. By calling Tepechpan’s colonial rulers “don” instead of “tlatoani,” Annotator 1 linguistically distinguished these rulers from their pre-conquest counterparts, further signifying their incorporation into the Spanish sphere of government. Maintaining his focus on Tepechpan’s elites, Annotator 1 also glossed Ome Tochtzin’s death in 1520, and he wrote her death statement with the same honorific construction used for the deaths of Tepechpan tlatoque. Though he did not identify her as a ruler, Ome Tochtzin clearly exerted an important role over Tepechpan politics, as suggested by her pictorial and alphabetic mentions in the Tira. Another noblewoman, this one European, also seems to have garnered interest in Tepechpan. At the representation of a skull above the year 7 Flint (1564), Annotator 1 enigmatically noted the death of the queen of Spain (plate 18). This likely refers to the death of Elizabeth of Valois, King Philip II’s wife, though she actually died in 1568. Presumably Annotator 1 wrote this gloss some years after the imagery was painted, and perhaps he saw the skull and crown beside it as compositionally linked. Elizabeth’s death must have been a significant event in New Spain. A royal tomb was built for her in Mexico, and this tomb and one devoted to her husband are recorded also in the Codex en Cruz (Dibble 1981, 1:58). The inclusion of her death in these local histories reveals the perceived integration of Spanish and indigenous rulership.5 Though Annotator 1 failed to note the arrival of the dove and cross, or Christianity, in Tepechpan in 1519, he did give consistent attention to the arrivals, departures, and ac-


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tivities of Spanish religious officials. For example, at the representation of a friar above 5 Flint (1524), only a partial gloss (Y fra . . . . . . . . . exic . . .) remains, but it must refer to the Franciscan friars who arrived in Mexico in this year (plate 15). In many indigenous histories this event is equated with the arrival of Christianity in New Spain. Annotator 1 must have seen their arrival in the same light, and in this regard, Painter A’s symbolic representation of the dove for Christianity may have made little sense to Annotator 1, for how could Christianity have come to Tepechpan without the friars, its human agents? Certainly the most powerful Christian agent in New Spain was the bishop, so it is not surprising that New Spain’s first one, Bishop Zumárraga, would merit special attention. Annotator 1’s glosses range from mentions of his mundane arrivals and departures to a mass baptism and confirmation he carried out in the year of his death (plate 17). This last event is one of Annotator 1’s lengthiest glosses, which suggests its importance to Tepechpan at that time. He also identified the modified funerary bundle under the year 9 House (1553) as representing the death of Bishop Zumárraga. This reveals that he added his notation after the funerary bundle had been modified and, based on the inaccurate dating, probably some years after the bishop’s actual death. Annotator 1 also noted the arrival of Zumárraga’s successor, Bishop Montúfar. By identifying the actions of religious personnel in New Spain, Annotator 1 showed the perceived integration of Tepechpan’s history with the Christian religious hierarchy. Though Annotator 1’s contributions reveal an interest in the ruling elite of Tepechpan and New Spain, he was also concerned with events affecting the larger Tepechpan community. For example, he annotated 118

each of the epidemics that devastated the indigenous populations and that were recorded by the various artists. His attention to these events reveals his and, by extension, Tepechpan’s concern with the condition of the indigenous community and with documenting reasons for any shortfalls in tribute resulting from such epidemics. Related to the resultant population losses were the census counts taken soon after the epidemics to recalculate Tepechpan’s tribute obligations, which Annotator 1 also glossed. Though the writing at the first census count in 1566 (plate 18) has been effaced, we can make out the gloss of the second one (plate 19) under the year 8 Rabbit (1578), which reads, “Felipe de Valdés counted us by house.” His identification of the census taker by name and use of the first person plural pronoun suggest that Annotator 1 may have been a participant and witness to the count. To the right of this representation is a now-damaged drawing of a house. Although also effaced, Annotator 1’s associated gloss, where we can just barely make out the word “tecalpo,” references yet another census count. Along with tribute obligations, labor obligations were another concern for indigenous communities in the Colonial period, and so important was his record of Tepechpan’s fulfillment of these obligations that Annotator 1 recorded an event without a pictorial counterpart. Linked to 6 Rabbit (1550) by a brown dotted line (plate 17), Annotator 1’s gloss informs us of a drainage project at Citlaltepec, which is also mentioned in the Codex Aubin (1981:47v) and the Anales de San Gregorio Acapulco (1994:283). Clearly Annotator 1 felt that this was an important event that merited inclusion in the community’s history. He also added two glosses that reference the laying of the foundations of the Mexico City cathedral at 5 Rabbit (1562; plate 18). Annotator 1’s references to these projects


suggest that the people of Tepechpan participated as part of a labor draft. As was true of the later artists, Annotator 1 must have felt it necessary to document Tepechpan’s fulfillment of its repartimiento obligations. In a final gloss that indirectly refers to Tepechpan’s tribute obligations and directly references the precarious survival of indigenous communities, Annotator 1 added an almost illegible alphabetic notation (Y tapachich, “There were grasshoppers”) to the representations of corn plants below the years 1586 to 1589 (plate 20). This gloss must refer to an infestation of grasshoppers that damaged crops in these years, thereby explaining any shortfalls in tribute resulting from such damages. Finally, Annotator 1 could not help but mention the scandal that so clearly consumed the interest of the people of New Spain. Though their names were not provided, the decapitated heads must have been identification enough; above the years 10 Reed/11 Flint (1567/1568), he wrote, “Dávila was decapitated” (plate 18). Annotator 1’s alphabetic glosses in the colonial section of the Tira are so ubiquitous that it is informative to point out what he did not identify. He did not annotate the cuauhtlatoani representation under 1530 nor any of the Mexica governors; clearly the Mexica sphere was of little interest to him. Also, he did not annotate the dove and cross above 1519, the Hapsburg coat of arms above 1541, or the cabildo representation above 1553. All of these images are Painter A’s pictorial representations, which suggests that Annotator 1 worked on the Tira sometime after Painter A was separated from it, and that he may not have understood the meaning or importance of these images. Most significant, he did not identify either Temascalapa place glyph, which reveals that his interpretations of the Tira were not carried out in associa

tion with the lawsuit between Temascalapa and Tepechpan.6 Annotator 2 Annotator 2 added a number of place names to the Tira between the years 13 Reed (1479) and 12 Rabbit (1490); these are transcribed in figure 7.1. This scribe’s writing is easily distinguished from the rest: the letters are rather messy and were printed using separate block letters rather than the neat, linked script typical of the other scribes, which may suggest that he was not a trained notary. Most of the place names are contained within rectangular divisions outlined in red. Associated with these glosses and under the year 13 Reed (1479) is a series of brown rectangular patches, similar to those seen earlier at 13 House (1433), which refer to a distribution of calpulli lands. Unfortunately, it is unclear who painted the brown patches of land, though Painter A may be the best bet, since this representation is identical to the patches of land associated with Tencoyotzin’s distribution of calpulli lands. In fact, it is even possible that Painter A himself added these annotations, as the messy script suggests someone new to alphabetic writing. Because the majority of Annotator 2’s glosses are place names, it is likely that the brown patches and rectangular divisions refer also to land. Nevertheless, the exact meaning of this section is problematic. The glosses associated with the Mexica tlatoque here—amaxaltzin, tlachiamilpa, atzacuautzin in yao . . . chipilan—are difficult to translate and to relate to these rulers.7 Moreover, some of the places named in this section—such as Tecpitlalpa and Petlacalco—remain unidentified.8 Despite these gaps, many other towns have been identified, and a common bond emerges, which supports Noguez’s (1978, 1:97) suggestion that these may be the pre-


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Figure 7.1. Transcription of place names from pages 12 and 13 of the Tira de Tepechpan (after Aubin 1849–1851).

Hispanic land possessions of Tepechpan’s elite. Many of the places listed were associated at one time with Tlatelolco, and the cabecera/sujeto status of most of the listed cities was under dispute in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.9 Ecatepec is probably the most prominent town listed in this section of the Tira, and five of its colonial subjects are included here also: Tocayocan, Cohuacalco, Cohuatitlan, Huitzilan, and Astacalco.10 After the conquest, Ecatepec was granted cabecera status and given in perpetuity to Leonor Moctezuma, daughter of the former Mexica tlatoani (AGI Justicia 124:4v; Gibson 1964:418– 420). However, Tlatelolco fought this grant, claiming that many of the estancias included in the grant were its subjects, including three of the towns listed here: Tocayocan, Cohuacalco, and Cohuatitlan.11 Three more towns

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included in this list also shared ties with Tlatelolco: Zacualtitlan (alternatively spelled Çagualtitlan) and Tepetlacalco were sujetos of Tlatelolco, and Axolohuapan was a former subject of Tecama, which seems also to have been a subject of Tlatelolco (Gibson 1964:41, 48–49). Figure 7.2 charts these cities’ relations to Tlatelolco. Tenochtitlan and Tlatelolco shared an island location and were founded by the same people, but at some point, a splinter group of Mexica founded Tlatelolco with its own ruling line. The exact political relationship between Tlatelolco and Tenochtitlan following their separation is poorly understood, but in 1473, Mexica forces led by Axayacatl defeated Tlatelolco, and its landholdings were distributed among Mexica elites (Berdan and Anawalt 1992, 2:33). The list of place names in the Tira comes less than a decade later,


and the placement of this list predominantly on the lower register may communicate that this was a Mexica appropriation of Tlatelolco’s lands or subject communities after the defeat. Two of the place names do appear on the upper register, which may imply that some lands were given to Tepechpan, perhaps to acknowledge Tepechpan’s help in the defeat of Tlatelolco. Typically, rulers of one polity might give income-producing lands to a ruler of another polity. For example, Texcocan rulers were given such lands in areas under the control of Tlatelolco and Tenochtitlan (Hodge 1996:21), and according to Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 1:446), Nezahualcoyotl also collected tribute from Ecatepec, as well as from Tepotzotlan, Toltitlan, and Cuauhtitlan (see below). After the conquest, it was clearly difficult to sort out these varied landholdings, and Tlatelolco contested the usurpation of its possessions, particularly those that were included in encomienda with Ecatepec. The cabecera status of two other cities listed here—Toltitlan and Tepotzotlan—was also contested during the Colonial period (Gibson 1964:66). Both cities were former subjects of Cuauhtitlan but had become independent towns with their own tlatoani traditions years before the Spanish arrived (Hodge 1996:20–21). Nevertheless, Cuauhtitlan must have still had pretensions over

these cities; as the author of the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:63) put it, “upon the arrival of the Castillians, when the Marqués del Valle came, the Cuauhtitlan nation was destroyed” because Tepotzotlan and Toltilan, among others, were detached from the city. Based on the statement in the Anales, Cuauhtitlan must have been trying to reclaim these territories as subjects; therefore, the cabecera status of these towns was also under dispute. Tepechpan was also concerned about the loss of its own lands. In a description written in 1545, Diego de Aguilar noted that the people of Tepechpan complained that one of its subjects was made to serve MexicoTlatelolco (AGI Justicia 208:14r–15v). Additionally, in its lawsuit with Temascalapa, Tepechpan claimed to previously have held many more landholdings than it did in the Colonial period. Witnesses specifically mentioned that Tepechpan held lands in Toltitlan, a town contained in this list (AGI Justicia 208:228v–229r, 231r–232v). Perhaps inspired by such litigation, Annotator 2 added this series of place names to the Tira to show Tepechpan’s pre-conquest possession of land in these areas, an issue clearly under dispute from multiple quarters. Beginning in the sixteenth century, private properties of indigenous nobles were considered legal if they could be shown to be inheritances in

Tlatelolco Tepetlacalco

Tecama Axolohuapan

Tizoyuca

Tocayocan

Ecatepec Cohuacalco

Zacualtitlan Cohuatitlan

Astacalco

Huitzilan Figure 7.2. Communities subject, or once subject, to Tlatelolco. Place names from the Tira de Tepechpan are in italics.


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private possession from pre-conquest times (Gibson 1964:265). Thus, this section may record the past landholdings of Tepechpan in a colonial effort to regain these lands. To the right, Annotator 2 added more alphabetic glosses, here written vertically. These annotations also seem to reference land, but their poor condition makes a full translation difficult. Nevertheless, two place names stand out. On the lower register, “atlanmaxac san miguel ” must refer to San Miguel Atlanmaxac, a subject of Tepechpan that today is in the municipio of Temascalapa. On the upper register, “santana” likely refers to Santa Ana Tlachyahualco, another subject of Tepechpan (Nuttall 1926:48; Noguez 1978, 2:13). In a petition of 1638, these two communities (along with Santiago Tzacuala) complained that their subjection to Tepechpan was a hardship because Tepechpan was so far away and did not pay them for their labor (AGN Indios v. 11 exp. 34, 26r–v). Only a few months later, Tepechpan was ordered to stop demanding personal services of its sujetos and to pay them accordingly (AGN Indios v. 11 exp. 59, 44v). Annotator 2’s additions, then, may have outlined the landholdings of the altepetl in relation to the unrest of its subjects. Though the exact meaning of this section remains problematic, Annotator 2 must have been commenting on landholdings that ultimately relate back to Tepechpan, most likely lands over which Tepechpan and other competing centers claimed some control. Indeed, the confusing aspect of this section may stem from the fact that references to land were not typically included in annals histories; instead, such information would have been better communicated in a map or cadastre. However, after the conquest, the presence of this information on the pictorial annals history and its placement in the pre-conquest section

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may have served to legitimize the historical basis of this information. Annotator 3 Annotator 3’s distinctive script is found in just one gloss to the Tira (plate 11). At the representation of Tencoyotzin II’s distribution of calpulli lands at 1 Rabbit (1454), Annotator 3’s partially damaged gloss, written vertically, reads, “. . . emin cuaxochtli tezcatzonco.” The Nahuatl word cuaxochtli means “boundary,” and Tezcatzonco is a town to the west of Tepechpan. The gloss must refer to the distribution of calpulli lands, upon which Annotator 1 presumably commented earlier. Annotator 3, then, seems to have added that the boundaries were established specifically at Tezcatzonco (Boban 1891:257; Noguez 1978, 1:94). The content of this annotation reveals a continued interest in land boundaries, and the fact that this detail was added in an alphabetic annotation bolsters the idea that the traditional function of the pictorial annals history had to expand in the Colonial period to communicate issues about land. Annotator 4 The writing of Annotator 4 is distinguishable because his letters were written in a loose script and are large and generously spaced. Annotator 4 added only two alphabetic glosses to the manuscript; however, they are two of the most intriguing because both are erroneous. Appearing on top of the second gesso coating, these glosses must have been added to the Tira at a relatively late date. At the foundation of Tenochtitlan (plate 5), this scribe wrote “tlotzin xaltocan.” Tlotzin is the name of the founder of Texcoco, and Xaltocan is a city associated with the Tepanec people, the dominant power in the Valley of


Mexico in the fourteenth century. However, it is unclear how anyone could interpret the Tenochtitlan place glyph, surely the most recognizable of Aztec place signs, as Xaltocan. Nevertheless, according to Annotator 4, this pictorial representation shows either the foundation of Texcoco by Tlotzin, presumably while still under the yoke of Xaltocan, or Tlotzin founding Xaltocan. Annotator 4 also misidentified the first Mexica tlatoani, Acamapichtli, whom he labeled “Quinatzin” (plate 6). As the son of Tlotzin, Quinatzin became tlatoani of Texcoco after his father’s death. These glosses suggest that Annotator 4 expected the lower register to refer to Texcoco, presumably because of Tepechpan’s membership in the huey altepetl. Indeed, it is ironic, since Painter A made such an effort to ignore Tepechpan’s subjection to Texcoco, that some of his images would be given Texcocan interpretations. Clearly, the intent of the artist was not always understood or accepted by the annotator.12 Annotator 5 Also working at a later date (his glosses appear on top of the second gesso coating) was Annotator 5, whose handwriting is easily distinguished because of its compact nature. Annotator 5 identified only Chimalpopoca and his brother Temictzin on the lower Tenochtitlan register. These two Mexica elites are the only ones (correctly) identified in the Tira, surely because of their relationship with Tepechpan. Temictzin’s daughter, Chimalpopoca’s niece, married a future tlatoani of Tepechpan, thus connecting the two polities. Annotator 5’s gloss, then, called further attention to this alliance, and although the annotation concerns Mexica history, the fact that these men were ultimately associated

with Tepechpan suggests that Tepechpan was still the focus for this late interpreter. Conclusions By isolating and examining the work of the different annotators, the issues important to later readers of the Tira become clear. Annotator 1’s contributions reveal a concern with the Tepechpan people and its ruling sphere, and also with the new colonial apparatus— political, religious, and economic—established by the Spaniards. In this regard, his history most closely follows that of the later artists of the Tira. Indeed, he completely ignored Painter A’s historical notices about Tenochtitlan, and the ubiquity of annotations associated with the colonial section reveals that by the time Annotator 1 interpreted the Tira, the Spanish colonial present had taken precedence over the Aztec past. Annotators 2 and 3 focused on land boundaries and possessions, a topic not sufficiently covered by the artists of the Tira, but one of increasing importance in the later Colonial period, during which the landed properties of indigenous elites were progressively alienated (Gibson 1964:265). For example, the painter of the Codex en Cruz (see fig. 5.13) also began to add references to lands associated with Chiauhtla towards the end of the manuscript. Beginning in the late sixteenth century, the Spanish colonial government began imposing what were called congregaciones; that is, they began congregating smaller indigenous communities together to ease administration. Then in the late seventeenth to early eighteenth centuries, indigenous communities were forced to verify their landholdings during the composiciones, a legal push that forced indigenous communities to show official title of their landholdings or risk losing their lands. This law inspired


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the creation of the títulos primordiales—part alphabetic, part pictorial accounts of the past that often recorded indigenous landholdings and boundary recognition (see Lockhart 1991:39–64; Wood 1998; Haskett 2005). I suspect that Annotators 2 and 3 added their glosses directly to the Tira for the same reasons that some communities created these primordial titles, as a means of defending corporate integrity. By adding these glosses to the pre-conquest section of the Tira, they further implied the antiquity of Tepechpan’s claims. These annotations, then, reveal new concerns for Tepechpan, perhaps because it had begun feeling pressure of encroachment from Spanish forces. Clearly, by the time the Tira was interpreted, Mexica history was no longer an important component of Tepechpan’s identity. This is in stark contrast to Painter A’s focus,

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but more in line with the emphases of the later artists. By the second half of the sixteenth century and beyond, Mexica imperial history could no longer impact Tepechpan. What did matter were Tepechpan’s continuous tlatoani succession, its landholdings, and its acceptance of Spanish political, religious, and economic authority. Moreover, the alphabetic annotations themselves added a sense of legitimacy to the pictorial content of the manuscript. By using alphabetic writing, the discourse of the Spanish colonizers, the annotators brought Tepechpan’s history closer to a Spanish historical conception. Nonetheless, the annotations were still written in Nahuatl and subordinated to the pictorial content. The Tira’s contributors may have used the signs and discourse of their Spanish colonizers, but they did so entirely as Nahuas.


8. Indigenous Histories as Strategies for Survival

T

he Tira de Tepechpan certainly supports the notion that all politics is local. Though the Tira comments on the Aztec and Spanish empires and promotes Tepechpan as a key member of these empires, the point of view and bias always favors the local community. Created from the subject position, then, the Tira allows us to consider imperial strategy from the bottom up; it not only speaks to the imposition of Aztec and Spanish control over Tepechpan, but more important, it reveals how Tepechpan negotiated its position as a subject city under this control. Because of the similar underlying structures of the Aztec and Spanish empires, the patrons of and contributors to the Tira could rely on pre-conquest strategic precedents to ensure Tepechpan’s survival as it transitioned from being an Aztec subject to a Spanish one. Though interrelated, these strategies all communicate allegiance—political, military, cultural, and religious—with the dominant power. At the same time, the contributors to the Tira made sure to promote the continuity and nobility of the local ruling line; indeed, the record of Tepechpan’s ruler accession statements is the most consistent feature of the Tira, seamlessly spanning the Aztec and Spanish empires and conferring high political status on the city-state. Many of the same strategies used by the Tira’s contributors appear as new historical tropes in other indigenous histories. For example, the Códice de Tlatelolco (1989), which focuses only on Tlatelolco’s colonial history, records Tlatelolco’s participation in wars, its contributions to

public works, the maintenance of the local ruling line, and its relations with the Spanish political and religious hierarchies (Valle 1994:37), topics that are also covered by the contributors to the Tira. In short, numerous historians came up with similar solutions to the negotiation of place under colonialism, surely because such negotiations were common before the Spanish invasion. Tepechpan certainly experienced increasing hardships under Spanish rule. Though the community had faced difficulties before the conquest—two of its rulers were assassinated—the troubles it encountered after the conquest were more universal, affecting the entire population: epidemics, the disobedience of a subject community, and crop damages brought by a plague of grasshoppers. Moreover, these events were recorded without the same sense of historical perspective and revisionism. Therefore, new strategies had to be utilized, focusing not on Tepechpan’s past glories but on its present, devastated condition. In the end, when Tepechpan’s past accomplishments and political maneuvering were no longer enough to save the community, its very desolation became its best defense for survival. Allegiance to the Dominant Power Though each indigenous community maintained a unique historical tradition, the same survival mechanisms used by the Tira’s contributors are also seen in other indigenous histories, most likely because the Aztec

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and Spanish empires were both consolidated through an elite interaction network (Hodge 1996). Upon incorporating a subject into the empire, Aztec and Spanish rulers typically kept the local leader in power. This leader served as a link between his subjects and the imperial administrative system, and his loyalty was ensured by his membership in this elite network and through the granting of privileges. Thus, the local ruler clearly stood to gain from his admission into this network. Accordingly, he promoted his membership—and, by extension, that of his altepetl/cabecera—in these empires through community histories such as the Tira. As elites of Tepechpan, then, the patrons of and contributors to the Tira were co-opted into these oppressive regimes, and their acceptance of Mexica and Spanish hegemony, in all its forms, was a political decision made to ensure their continued status, which in the end could not exist without the survival of the corporate community. Political Allegiance For elite allies, membership in the Aztec empire had its privileges, but the best relations were typically with the most powerful, regardless of ethnic affiliation. Accordingly, Painter A did not document Tepechpan’s political allegiance with Texcoco but instead with Tenochtitlan, the supreme power of the empire. Thus, Tepechpan rulers are shown with Mexica icons of rule, such as the turquoise diadem, and Tepechpan’s history is presented in the annals format so closely tied to Tenochtitlan. The Tepechpan and Tenochca histories conceptually link the two cities and suggest that they were key allies, as is further supported by the marriage that united the two polities in 1440. Tepechpan was not alone in promoting

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its relation to the Aztec capital; as Elizabeth Boone (1996) has argued, other provincial centers within the empire used this same strategy. For example, the Codex Azoyú from the Tlalpan province and the Codex of Hueychiapan from Xilotepec also use the annals format and include a substantial amount of Tenochca history with that of the patron community (Boone 1996:185–188). Like the Tira, the message from these more provincial outposts is that they, too, were key members of the Aztec empire. It should be no surprise, then, that indigenous historians reverted to this same strategy after the conquest to communicate their close political allegiance with the new Spanish imperial leaders. Accordingly, in the Tira, Tepechpan’s colonial rulers are shown with Spanish signs of authority; they swap the Mexica turquoise diadem for a Spanish crown and the woven reed throne for a European folding chair. Moreover, by including alphabetic text, Christian year correlations, references to the Spanish ruling hierarchy, and even a more illusionistic art style, the contributors to the Tira showed Tepechpan as a key member of the Spanish kingdom. Indeed, the earliest viceroys, Mendoza and Velasco, the personifications of Spanish political authority, appear on the register associated with Tepechpan, not Tenochtitlan, the true seat of Spanish government in New Spain. Again, this strategy is also prevalent in histories associated with other secondary city-states. For example, Susan Schroeder (1991:24) notes that Chimalpahin, too, juxtaposed his history of the royal kings of Amaquemecan with the history of the Hapsburgs of Spain, “as though he considered the two comparable.” By linking the local with the imperial, these indigenous historians sought to establish equality between the two. The underlying expectation must have been that


political allegiance, regardless of ethnic affiliation or past alliances, would continue to confer privileges upon the subject community as it joined the Spanish empire. Military Allegiance Because military force was a primary means of political consolidation for both the Spaniards and the Mexica, military allegiance also was required of their subjects. Thus, as was explicated in chapter 4, Tepechpan and many other indigenous communities presented themselves as the key allies of the Mexica in the Tepanec War, presumably with the expectation of receiving privileges. For instance, Painter A recorded the distribution of calpulli lands soon after this military alliance and victory was recorded in the Tira, and the author of the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:100) explicitly linked the distribution of land to their participation in this same war. Of course, this same strategy came into play upon the Spanish invasion, with many indigenous communities joining the Spaniards to defeat the Mexica, or at least claiming that they had. For example, Alva Ixtlilxochitl promoted the close alliance between Cortés and his Texcocan ancestors, who according to the author played a key role in helping the Spaniards to defeat Tenochtitlan, despite Texcoco’s previously close relationship with the Aztec capital. It is likely for this reason that the Acolhua ruler Ixtlilxochitl is shown in collaboration with Cortés on the upper register of the Tira; the implication is that Tepechpan was a part of their alliance. Certainly the best promoters of their military partnership with Spain were the Tlaxcalteca, enemies of the Mexica and one of the few independent kingdoms to escape Aztec domination within Central Mexico. The Tlaxcalteca presented persuasive arguments about

the aid they provided the Spaniards in documents such as the Lienzo de Tlaxcala, which presents Tlaxcala and Spain as partners in the conquest. Indeed, other indigenous groups also aided the Spaniards, but none were able to translate this support into privileges to the extent that Tlaxcala did, presumably because the Tlaxcalteca knew how to work the system, petitioning the crown for privileges and using histories like the Lienzo de Tlaxcala as evidence. Cultural Allegiance Another key feature of indigenous histories is the promotion of the cultural accomplishments and civilized status of the local community and its rulers. Certainly, the most successful promoters of their civilized rank were the Texcocan historians. As Eduardo Douglas (2000:7) has noted, just as Tenochtitlan billed itself as the military capital of the empire, Texcoco presented itself as the cultural capital. This is especially evident in the pictorials associated with this city-state, including the Mapas Quinatzin and Tlotzin, and the Codex Xolotl. Moreover, the Texcocan chroniclers Juan de Pomar and Alva Ixtlilxochitl represented their ancestor, the former Texcocan tlatoani Nezahualcoyotl, as a peaceful poet, intellect, and aesthete in order to contrast the more civilized Texcoco with the “bloodthirsty” Tenochtitlan (Lee 2003a:246, 2003b:19). So persuasive were their arguments that modern scholars tend to uncritically accept this view of Nezahualcoyotl in order to highlight the civility of the pre-conquest Nahua peoples, as opposed to the cruel Mexica. In the Tira, Tepechpan and its leaders are presented in much the same way. Indeed, Painter A may have depicted Tepechpan’s civilized status and accomplishments after

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Texcoco’s model. For example, Tepechpan’s leader Quaquauhtzin I was credited with many of the same achievements as Nezahualcoyotl; he was known also as a fine poet and engineer. Additionally, Painter A showed Tepechpan as being culturally superior to Tenochtitlan; the founder of Tepechpan took on signs of civilized society, such as the turquoise diadem and residence in a permanent community, before his Mexica counterparts, and the Toltec blood of Tepechpan’s ruling line was recorded in the Tira, but no such Toltec ennobling was shown for the Mexica. The civility and cultural accomplishments of the patron city were therefore yet another historical trope common in Aztec histories. Nevertheless, some of the signs of civility so important in the Late Post-Classic period had little import to the Spaniards, who found many of the practices of the Aztecs barbaric. Therefore, many indigenous historians made sure to disassociate themselves from these practices, especially the human sacrifices to which the Spaniards were so vehemently opposed. Accordingly, Painter A juxtaposed the sacrifice of animals on the upper Tepechpan register with human sacrifice on the lower register, which is conceptually linked to the Mexica (plate 4). Other indigenous groups also made sure to distinguish themselves from the Mexica in this way; many respondents to the Relaciones geográficas blamed the Mexica for the introduction of human sacrifice and claimed that, like the Tepechpaneca, they only practiced animal sacrifice. Of course, the Texcocan chroniclers also maintained that the civilized Nezahualcoyotl rejected human sacrifice. These non-Mexica peoples, then, claimed a civility—now based on Christian criteria—that the Mexica presumably lacked.

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Religious Allegiance For both the Mexica and the Spaniards, the imposition of control extended from the political and cultural to the spiritual. Within the Aztec empire, religious allegiance was communicated through the worship of Huitzilopochtli, the Mexica patron deity. In the Tira, we see this worship visualized through the dedication of a temple devoted to the god in 3 Flint (1508). Even Texcoco, ostensibly the second most powerful city in the empire, dedicated its main temple to Huitz ilopochtli and Tlaloc, though its own patron deity was Tezcatlipoca, which casts the relation between Texcoco and Tenochtitlan in a new light; surely Texcoco was not as autonomous as its historians would have us believe. That the relatively minor Tepechpan and the huey altepetl of Texcoco both capitulated to the Mexica patron deity suggests that they did so because of the political advantages this worship conferred. Upon the victory of the Spaniards over the Mexica, then, it was logical for these same indigenous communities to accept the new Christian God. Thus, indigenous histories discuss the arrival of Christianity, its human agents (the friars and bishops), and the building of churches—all signs that the local community had accepted the religion of the new dominant power. Some historians even projected this acceptance into the past. According to Painter A, the Holy Spirit, as symbolized by a dove and cross, almost miraculously arrived in Tepechpan before any of the friars did. Moreover, the Codex Mexicanus (1952:52–54) references the passion of Christ in its annals history between 9 Reed (1371) and 7 Rabbit (1382), more than a century before the arrival of Christianity in the New World (Mengin 1952:442). The message here might be that the seeds of Christianity


were planted in Central Mexico long before the Spanish arrival. Indeed, the Texcocan historian Alva Ixtlilxochitl makes a similar assertion by symbolically modeling Texcoco’s rulers, especially Nezahualcoyotl, after Old Testament kings, thereby promoting Texcoco as the city chosen by God to receive the true faith (Velazco 1998; Lee 2003b). In Central Mexico before and after the conquest, politics and religion were intertwined, and in order to convey membership in the reigning empire, the local community also had to communicate its acceptance of the dominant power’s religious hegemony. This apparent “spiritual conquest,” however, should not be seen as total capitulation to the Spanish colonial project, but instead as a negotiation with this new form of imperial rule that followed pre-conquest precedents. As Nicholas Thomas (1994:15) argues, In many cases what may appear as the exercise of colonial hegemony—the imposition of Christianity, for example—is in fact better understood as the appropriation of introduced institutions, material objects or discourses to strategic effect on the part of colonized peoples. What then appears to be accommodation to the dominant power’s supreme deities—in effect, the exchange of Huitzilopochtli for Christ—is better interpreted as political maneuvering typical of a subject city-state. Continuous Ruling Line The strategies explicated above communicate Tepechpan’s allegiance to the ruling power, but at the same time, the Tira was promoting Tepechpan’s own prestigious identity and glorified history. Indeed, the most consistent feature of the Tira is its record of Tepechpan’s

continuous ruling line, which conveyed a sense of legitimacy upon the local citystate and its present leaders. To further enhance this legitimacy, Painter A implied that Tepechpan’s dynastic rulership was divinely sanctioned. For example, the Tepechpan dynastic succession was presented as being in harmony with the calendar, and its rulers show cyclical patterning, with rulers of alternating cycles sharing particular traits, such as the same names. In the Nahua worldview, this historical construction implied that their reigns were a natural part of the cosmic progression; Tepechpan’s tlatoque, those of the past and presumably their descendants in the present, were endowed with a divine right to rule, a message typically sent by the Mexica in their imperial art. Presumably, the more elegant a community’s history, the more legitimate its assertions. Inevitably perhaps, the Spanish imperial structure also relied on the local ruling line, and because cabecera status was conferred on those city-states with a hereditary leader, it was important to emphasize the presence of such a ruling line in local histories created after the conquest. Furthermore, Tepechpan’s colonial rulers continued to serve long tenures in office, though under the Spanish political structure they were supposed to rule for only one or two years before a reelection. These long terms are evidence that the local ruling line continued to function after the conquest much as it did before, as a semiautonomous link between the people of the community and the imperial leaders. Tepechpan’s elites—and those from other communities such as Chiauhtla, Tlaxcala, Tlatelolco, and Cuauhtitlan, among numerous others— surely wished to maintain autonomy under Spanish control, a goal that would have been supported by the community history with its emphasis on the local ruling line.


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New Strategies Alas, indigenous historians quickly learned that privileges and exemptions did not rest solely on past alliances and glories. Certainly the Tlaxcalteca were some of the most adept at promoting their alliance with the Spaniards, but by the end of the sixteenth century even their campaign for tribute exemptions was largely a failure, and the city was forced to sell off lands to meet its obligations (Gibson 1952:181). Surely similar scenarios threatened Tepechpan. In court cases concerning Tepechpan it is more typical to see them assert the wretched condition of the cabecera, especially the poverty and sicknesses that ravaged the community, as is also communicated with greater frequency in the later sections of the Tira. Paradoxically, whereas allegiance and membership within the empire could help the elites of an indigenous community, it became increasingly clear that these symbolic gestures had little import for basic survival as a corporate community, especially as the sixteenth century progressed. Indigenous communities may have sworn their allegiance to the Spaniards and helped them in the conquest, but in the face of population losses from epidemics, increasingly burdensome tribute demands, and encroachment from Spaniards on their lands, not to mention the constant threat of crop damages, the indigenous elites were clearly torn. Thus, the community history had to change, from presenting a political argument about the prestige of the altepetl to emphasizing the hardships the community had been forced to endure. Indeed, indigenous cities often successfully petitioned for reduced tribute and labor obligations based on such devastations. To be sure, devastations had also threatened these same communities before the conquest; the Codices Mexicanus and Telleriano-Remensis 130

document crop damages, droughts, and famines that plagued Central Mexico long before the Spanish arrival. However, Painter A made no such statements in his history. He presented an idealized view of the past, a façade Tepechpan’s later historians could no longer maintain in their present circumstances, presumably because it was no longer politically expedient to do so. Perhaps for modern viewers, the most jarring aspect of the Tira de Tepechpan is the fact that Tepechpan so unapologetically hitched its success to the dominant power while at the same time exalting its past glories and its present devastations. The Tira presents a picture of Tepechpan that is both selfaggrandizing and deferential. In the end, Tepechpan’s elites were locked in an ambivalent struggle, asserting their prestige and autonomy within a political system that effectively denied such things of its subjects, and at a time when their city was undergoing clear threats to its economic well-being and corporate integrity. Consequently, when we see instances of indigenous borrowings of Spanish material culture, in its artistic, textual, and material forms, we should not bemoan the negative influence, for this was a strategy long before the Spanish arrived. Indeed, Mexica and even Texcocan historic traditions were appropriated for much the same purposes. These appropriations reveal that subject communities were active participants in the construction of their reality; they did not take wholesale the identity of their oppressors, but instead used the signs and discourses of the dominant power when and where necessary to enhance and maintain their identities (Wood 2003). Though it may be disquieting to see a subject community so eagerly take on the signs of its oppressors, we must recognize that these were traditional tactics of those living under


subjecthood. By falling back on strategies that predated the Spanish invasion, the contributors to the Tira made sense of Spanish phenomena through traditional means; just as the people of Tepechpan allied with the Mexica regardless of ethnic affiliation, they shrewdly allied with and accepted Spanish hegemony, or at least this is the message sent by the Tira’s contributors. The inherent ambivalence in this subject city’s histories brings up a final question: how effective a tool of persuasion was the Tira de Tepechpan? As an all-purpose document, the Tira had the potential to serve Tepechpan’s interests in multiple contexts. However, though indigenous elites may have maintained access to records of the past, they were still constrained by myriad factors: culture, race, class, and power—in short, their subject status (Van Young 1999:243–244; Boone 1998a:7). Indeed, their diminished well-being after the conquest is reflected in the changing content of the later portions of the Tira, which purposely detailed the mounting difficulties of life under Spanish rule. Ultimately, then, the answer to the question above depends upon one’s definition of efficacy. On one hand, the fact that Tepechpan had constant problems with its sujetos, was continuously battling encroachers on its

lands, suffered major population losses and harsh tributary demands, and was eventually placed within the municipio of Acolman while its sujeto Temascalapa became an independent municipality reveals that the Tira itself, in the end, could not help the city. The very fact that the Tira was eventually separated from the city—most likely sold to a European collector by financially strapped elites of Tepechpan—reveals that for the people of Tepechpan, the only remaining function this manuscript could serve in the eighteenth century was economic. On the other hand, the Tira survives today, in nearcomplete form and exceptional condition, though admittedly far from Tepechpan. For few other secondary Aztec altepetl do we have such full records of the past that continue to speak to us today and in their original voices: visual, alphabetic, Nahuatl. In this regard, the patrons of and contributors to the Tira were ultimately successful, for their proclamations of Tepechpan’s historical importance still resonate today because of the creation of this manuscript. Indeed, the very existence of the Tira de Tepechpan and all it tells us of the Aztec and Spanish empires makes Tepechpan, and its histories and historians, a key source for our understanding of these worlds.


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Appendix Transcription and Translation of Annotator 1’s Glosses

The transcription presented here follows as closely as possible what remains on the Tira. Ellipses are used to indicate letters or words that are unreadable today. Otherwise, I have retained the spelling, diacritic marks, and abbreviations used by Annotator 1. A common diacritic mark is the overbar to indicate syllable final “n”; here that is written with a “~” marker over the preceding vowel. A common abbreviation used here is “q’” for “qui.” Sometimes Annotator 1 used single periods, which I include in the transcriptions, though their exact significance is unclear.

Date & Plate Number

Nahuatl Transcription

English Translation

1 Flint (1324) Plate 2

Y chichimecatl ycxiquahtli

This is the Chichimec Icxicuauhtli.

11 Rabbit (1334) Plate 3

Y tepechpan altepetl tlatohuanin ycxiquauhtli ycihuauh tozquetzin cihuapilin1

This is the tlatoani of the altepetl of Tepechpan, Icxicuauhtli, and his wife, the noblewoman Tozquentzin.


Y momiquilli ycxiquauhtli

Icxicuauhtli died.


Y tlantohuan caltzin

This is Tlatoani Caltzin.


Y oca momiq’llin. caltzi

Caltzin died there.


Y chichimecatl tecoyotzin tlatohuani

This is the Chichimec Tlatoani Tencoyotzin.


Y tepechpa tlatouani tecoyotzi quimictico tepaneca

The Tepaneca killed Tencoyotzin, tlatoani of Tepechpan.


Y chichimecatl quaquauhtzin

This is the Chichimec Quaquauhtzin.

4 Reed (1431) Plate 9

Y quaquautzin quimaxilli yn atl teootihuacan ynic hualcalaqui. atl. tepechpa

Quaquauhtzin channeled the Teotihuacan River so that it came to Tepechpan.


Y temictzin ychpoch mexico ynçihuauh quaquatzin

This is Quaquauhtzin’s wife, the daughter of Temictzin of Mexico.

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Y quaquauhtzin

This is Quaquauhtzin.


Y qua . . . tzin yanompa . . . ci chiyetlan

Quaquauhtzin went there . . . Chietla (?).

11 Reed (1451) Plate 11

Y tlatohuani tecoyotzin motlacalpolallili yhuã motetlamaquillin

Tlatoani Tencoyotzin established calpulli and gave land to people.


Y y’quac momiquili tecoyotzin

It was when Tencoyotzin died.


Y onmeto . . . tzin cihuapillin netzahualcoyotzin ychpoch tezcocon

This is Ome Tochtzin, a noblewoman and the daughter of Nezahualcoyotl of Texcoco.


Y quaquauhtzin tl . . . tohan

This is Tlatoani Quaquauhtzin.


Y yquac momiq’ilin quaquauhtzin

It was when Quaquauhtzin died.

12 House (1517) Plate 15

Y do . . . r . . . ado teyahualohuatzin

This is Don Hernando Tenyahualohuatzin.


Y ynquac hualan marques

It was when the marqués arrived.


Y momiq’lin ometo . . . tzin

Ome Tochtzin died.


Y çahua micohuaco

There was death from smallpox.


Y marques quimaltepemaca . . . coquisita . . . colme

The marqués gave altepetl to the conquerors.


Y Ixtlilxoch . . .

This is Ixtlilxochitl . . .


do martin yx . . .

This is Don Martín Yx . . .


Y fra . . . exic . . .

Friars . . . Mexico


Y hueymola huilovac ompa micq y tlatoque

They went to Honduras where the tlatoque died.


. . . castila yan marques quihuica tlatoque

The marqués took the tlatoque to Spain.


Y nquac momiq’li do ner . . . abo teya . . . louatzin

It was when Don Hernando Tenyahualohuatzin died.

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Y don . . . ie . . . yoloxochi . . .

This is Don Diego Yolloxochitl.


colhuacan uiauac

They went to Culiacán.


Y oya castila opispo

The bishop went to Spain.


Y ohualmohuica castila marques

The marqués arrived from Spain.


Y . . . ualmohui . . . presi . . . sabasti . . . rami . . .

President Don Sebastián Ramírez arrived.


Y ohualmohuicac castila opispõ omohuicayan

The bishop arrived from Spain. He was going to . . .


Y ohualohuica castilan dõ antonio de m...a

Don Antonio de Mendoza arrived from Spain.


omomiqli don diego yoloxochitl

Don Diego Yolloxochitl died.


Y don xpoval Maldonado

This is Don Cristóbal Maldonado.


yaoq’xoualo yacuic tlalpan

They went to war in New Mexico.

10 House (1541) Plate 16/17

Y xochipila yaoquixoanco

They went to war in Xochipillan.


Y omic dõ xpoval

Don Cristóbal died.


Y coco . . . tztica on . . .

. . . sickness . . . bleeding . . .


Y huia cuicã q temaca coutlmaçio nohuiya don fra Ju˚ çomaracan

Don Fray Juan de Zumárraga traveled about, confirming people everywhere.


Y atatacoc citlaltepec

They excavated at Citlaltepec.


Y do antonio de medoça visorai

This is Viceroy Don Antonio de Mendoza.


dõ fra Juã çomaraca momiquilini

Don Fray Juan de Zumárraga died.

11 Reed (1555) Plate 17

Y castila hual . . . dõ fra alo . . . obispo

Bishop Don Fray Alonso [de Montúfar] arrived from Spain.

Transcription and Translation of Annotator 1’s Glosses

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Y yquac motlalin quauhteocallin

It was when the foundation for the wood church was laid.


Y quauhteocalli mexico. s. fco . . . anquica mochiuh

The wooden church of San Francisco in Mexico City was built.


Y reyna castila momiqlli

The queen of Spain died.

10 Reed (1567) Plate 18

Y davila quechcotonaloc

Dávila was decapitated.


dõ casto de virata vi . . . ey marques

This is Viceroy Don Gastón de Peralta, marqués.


Y . . . martin . . . riquez visorey.

This is Viceroy Don Martín Enríquez.


Y dõ tonio de . . . teva

This is Don Antonio de Esteban.


. . . quili . . . nochola corona

. . . died . . . crown


Y . . . yetztica micohuac

There was death from bleeding.


otechcalpouh filiphe de valdes

Felipe de Valdés counted us by house.

13 Reed (1583) Plate 19

Y omomiquillin do lureco visorey

Viceroy Don Lorenzo died.


Y tapachich . . .

There were grasshoppers.


Y yetztica mi . . . oac.

There was death from bleeding.

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Notes

Chapter One 1. The Nahuatl word tlacuilo means both “one who writes” and “one who paints” and therefore refers to a dual role as artist/ scribe. For clarity, I refer to the pictorial contributors to the Tira as “painters” and the alphabetic contributors as “annotators.” 2. Donald Robertson’s (1959) analysis of Mexican manuscript painting was one of the first to treat these manuscripts systematically, while Joyce Marcus (1992) and Elizabeth Boone (2000) took a more comparative approach in their overviews of the Aztec writing system. For more-detailed explications of the Aztec pictorial system as a system of writing, see Dibble 1971; Nicholson 1973; Galarza 1980; and Prem 1970, 1992. 3. Despite its common usage, the term Aztec is problematic because the members of this empire did not refer to themselves in this way, nor did they see themselves as a unified whole, which the term implies (Barlow 1945). Nevertheless, it is generally used in scholarly discourse to refer to those polities subsumed within the empire and the associated cultural traditions typical of these peoples (Smith and Berdan 1996:4). I use it in the same way, and to distinguish the different polities, I use an ethnic qualifier or the name of the altepetl. The term Nahua refers generally to Nahuatl-speaking communities that may or may not have been members of the empire. 4. Hodge (1984, 1996), Carrasco (1991, 1999), Hicks (1992), and the essays compiled in Berdan et al.

1996 provide detailed analyses of the structure of the Aztec empire. 5. For more-thorough discussions of the structure of the altepetl, see Harvey 1984:84–85; Horn 1997:19–21; Lockhart 1992:14–58; Schroeder 1991:119–139, 209; and Smith and Berdan 1996:2–3. 6. Lockhart (1992:16) finds the word calpulli problematic because it does not appear often in Nahuatl documents, especially compared to the term altepetl; nevertheless, it is a convenient word often used to describe the constituent parts of the altepetl. 7. Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 1:7–8, 2:88, 94, 114), the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:131–132), the Motolinía Insert (in Offner 1983:289–290), and Torquemada (1986, 1:167–169) elucidate Tepechpan’s status and obligations as a secondary member of the Acolhua domain. Also, Tepechpan is pictured as a subject of Texcoco in the Codex Xolotl and the Mapa Quinatzin. Gibson (1956) and Hodge (1996:23–25) summarize much of this information. 8. Both Robertson (1959:63) and Nicholson (1971:47) have noted this intriguing aspect of the Tira, and Noguez (1978, 1:170–171) considered this a lingering problem impeding a clear understanding of the manuscript. 9. In the first decade after the conquest, the Tepechpan cabecera and its associated sujetos were given in encomienda to a quick succession of different Spaniards until ending up with Gerónimo de Medina, who held the territories until 1538, when he gave the Tepechpan encomienda in dowry to his daughter Ynes de Vargas upon her marriage

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to Juan Baeza de Herrera (Relación de las encomiendas 1955:41; AGI Justicia 208). Juan was survived by his widow and their son Gerónimo Baeza de Herrera, who held Tepechpan in encomienda until 1597. Although by this time the encomienda system had been officially disbanded, a document dated to 1617 states that the encomienda then passed to Don Fernando Baeza y de la Maresa, presumably the son of Don Gerónimo (AGN Tierras v. 1871 exp. 17:369v). 10. In an examination of wills from colonial Culhuacan, S. L. Cline (1986:36–37) also notes that the town’s encomenderos make few appearances, which suggests that the encomendero was a distant presence to some indigenous communities. 11. Although Tepechpan was of cabecera status, it was still subject to Texcoco in the Spanish labor draft system, suggesting that knowledge of its former Acolhua affiliation was maintained in the first century after the conquest (Gibson 1956:17). 12. To combat this inequity, the Spaniards did promote the Triple Alliance cities (along with Cholula and Xochimilco) to ciudad rank, but this designation seems to have had little meaning for either Spaniards or Nahuas (Gibson 1964:32–33). 13. Recent trends in Aztec studies acknowledge this issue by emphasizing symbolic meaning over historical validity; for examples, see Gillespie 1989; Leibsohn 1993; Wood 1998; 2003; Umberger 2002:87; and Haskett 2005. 14. Elizabeth Boone (2000:6)

provides a thorough summary of this debate. 15. Cynthia Stone (2004) uses the metaphor of place to deal with this same problem of multiple authorship and manuscript as palimpsest in her study of the Relación de Michoacán. Stone (2004:3–4) sees the manuscript as a common surface on which multiple contributors and interpreters intersected, inscribing their own interests onto the manuscript. A similar process occurred with the Tira. 16. The Latin American Research Review published a series of articles on the issues at play in Spanish colonialism and its associated colonial and post-colonial discourse. Particularly helpful for formulating my ideas on colonial discourse in New Spain were the works in this journal by Patricia Seed (1991, 1993), Rolena Adorno (1993), and Walter Mignolo (1993), as well as essays in Barker et al. 1994. Chapter Two 1. For more on amate paper manufacturing, see von Hagen 1944:35–38 and Albro and Albro 1995:66. 2. Robertson (1959), Baird (1993:21–27), and Peterson (1993:34–40) provide helpful comparisons of Aztec and European painting styles. 3. Pichardo’s handwriting does not match the glosses in the Tira, which suggests that he was not one of the annotators. Also, this dating refutes Boban’s (1891:269) assertion that Waldeck applied the second gesso coating to the Tira. 4. In his notes, Waldeck (n.d.:131) described the Tira as “roulé tres long” or “a very long roll,” indicating that it was originally presented to him as a roll. However, a later footnote that Waldeck added to this statement says that the Tira “now” consists of twenty pages, which reveals that the Tira must have been folded

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while in his possession. Also, some of the year correlations in the Tira match Waldeck’s hand. 5. The discussion of Boturini and his collection of Mexican antiquities is derived from Moreno 1971 and Glass 1975b. In 1746, Boturini also published his own account and catalog of his collection. 6. On his own copy of the Tira, Jean Aubin noted that he saw the original copy in the Museo Nacional sometime in the midnineteenth century. In his description of it, he wrote that none of the alphabetic glosses were included, nor were the final five plates (presumably from 1532 on). Chavero (1887:xiii) noted that it was missing by 1888. 7. A colored copy of the Tira commissioned by Aubin and now housed at the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (Fonds Mexicain 13– 14bis) is also a copy of the Pichardo copy (Diel 2002:16). A manuscript in the Bibliothèque Nationale de France (Fonds Mexicain 356) labeled “Mappe de Tepechpan” is only a collection of notes written by Aubin about his collection and contains just a few drawings of the Tira. Chapter Three 1. For more on the significance of this date and the symbolic implications of the Aztec calendar in general, see Umberger 1981a, 1981b; Townsend 1979; and Florescano 1994. 2. These sources are Alvarado Tezozomoc 1997:21–22; Durán 1994:10; Chimalpahin 1998, 1:65, 183–185; Anales de Tlatelolco 1948:31); and the Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas (1965:39). Graulich (1997:210) and Boone (2000:214) see Teoculhuacan, Aztlan, and even Chicomoztoc, which also plays an important role in Nahua migrations, as interchangeable. 3. For more-thorough analyses

Notes to pages 8–33

of the Mexica migration in terms of the distinction between myth and history, see Beekman and Christensen 2003; Boone 1991; and Smith 1984. 4. The Acolhua historian Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 2:26) specifically associated the cozoyahualolli with the coronation of Chichimec rulers in the Acolhua domain, which has led some scholars to associate the cozoyahualolli specifically with the Chichimec ancestors of the Acolhua (Nicholson 1967:73; Noguez 1978, 1:37). However, this association is problematic because three Acolhua manuscripts—the Mapa Quinatzin, Mapa Tlotzin, and Codex Xolotl—contain many depictions of Acolhua Chichimecs wearing animal skins and carrying bows and arrows, but none wearing the cozoyahualolli (see fig. 3.8). The cozoyahualolli does appear in the Codex Xolotl (see fig. 4.1), but it is attached to the name glyph of Nezahualcoyotl, identifying him as a hereditary prince (Dibble 1996, 1:92). In this case, it may also distinguish Nezahualcoyotl as the first autonomous Chichimeca Tecuhtli (Chichimec Lord), the Acolhua title for Texcocan leaders. The early Texcocan rulers in Sahagún’s Primeros memoriales (see fig. 3.5) also carry bows and arrows, while the Mexica do not, perhaps further alluding to the idea of the Acolhua rulers as Chichimeca Tecuhtli. 5. In the Códice de Santa María Asunción (1997) married women are distinguished from single women by their wrapped and braided hairstyles. 6. Doris Heyden (1989) pro‑ vides a full analysis of the importance of this myth for the Mexica state. 7. The account here is synthesized from the following sources: Durán 1994:31–33, 42–43; Chimalpahin 1997, 1:85–89, 103, and 1998, 1:159–163; Alvarado Tezozomoc 1987:26–27; and Anales de Tlatelolco (1948:35).

8. In the Tira, Coatzontli’s wife’s name glyph consists of leaves or corn (?)—jar (com-itl)—water (a-tl). 9. Gillespie (1989:68–78) and Davies (1980:182–190) synthesize the various accounts of the expulsion. My own summary follows these sources as well as the Codices Aubin (translated in Dibble 1963:31–37), Azcatitlan (1995:10), and Boturini (1964); the Anales de Tlatelolco (1948:36–41); Chimalpahin 1997 1:205–207, 2:29, 69–77, and 1998, 1:159–171; Alvarado Tezozomoc 1987:25–27; and the Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas (1965:49–51). 10. Though many sources mention the noblewoman’s nudity, only the Tira and the Codex Ríos actually reveal her bare breasts. Other artists may have obscured her breasts because of an increasing disinclination to show female nudity after the conquest, stemming from the imposition of Spanish religious and cultural values on some indigenous artists (Diel 2006). 11. Following Noguez (1978, 1:70), the possible readings of the name glyphs, from bottom to top, are Water Hand (a-tl + ma-itl, or Amaitl), Foot Jar (icxi-tl + comi-tl, or Icxicomitl), Rabbit (Tochtli), and Lips + ? (ten-tli + ?, Ten. . .). 12. The Codex Boturini shows the expulsion in 2 Reed, though the exact year correlation is unclear. Like Painter A, the author of the Codex Aubin placed the expulsion in 1 Rabbit/2 Reed (1350/1351). In the Codex Azcatitlan (1995:9–11), a range of years is shown for the expulsion, and among these years are 1 Rabbit (1350) and 2 Reed (1351). By placing the expulsion in this fifty-two-year cycle, these historians denied the official date of 2 House (1325) for the foundation of Tenochtitlan; according to these historians, the Mexica were still living in Chapultepec at this early date. In contrast, the Codices Mexicanus (1952:40) and Ríos

(1964:98, 99) place the expulsion in the preceding fifty-two-year cycle, in 1298 (1 Rabbit) and 1299 (2 Reed), as did the alphabetic chronicler Chimalpahin (1998, 1:203) in his Third Relation. These sources also recorded the foundation of Tenochtitlan on its official date. 13. For a full treatment of the various sources on Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl, see Nicholson 2001; for more-specific analyses of his aversion to human sacrifice, see Nicholson 2001:250–251, 260; van Zantwijk 1985:95; and Gillespie 1989:148. 14. The lack of consistency in the writing of Tepechpan’s place name glyph in the few sources in which it appears underscores the fact that other Aztec tlacuiloque were likely unfamiliar with this place. In a tribute painting created for a lawsuit between Tepechpan and its subject Temascalapa (AGI Mapas y Planos, México, 664), the Tepechpan place glyph consists of a representation of stones (te-tl) with a flag ( pantli) on top to phonetically elicit the -pan suffix (Noguez 1978, 1:48). The glyph for Tepechpan in the Codex Mendoza (1992:22r) shows a foot over a rectangular piece of stone (te-tl), which conveys the meaning of “on the stone foundation.” In the Mapa Quinatzin, the place glyph of Tepechpan is a petate mat ( pech-tli) surrounded by stones (te-tl) above and below. The stone, therefore, was a key element in the Tepechpan place glyph, but the varied additions indicate the necessity of a phonetic indicator for those unfamiliar with this place name. 15. This portion of the page is damaged and difficult to read; however, Pichardo’s copy, created over 100 years ago, indicates the presence of a decapitated bird, snake, and butterfly. 16. From bottom to top, the men are identified as One Serpent (Ce Coatl), Lip Hair (ten-tli + tzon-tli,


or Tentzontli), Rain (Quiyahuitl), Water Lip Flag (a-tl + ten-tli + pantli, or Atenpantli), and Water Bird (a-tl + toto-tli, or Atototli) (Noguez 1978, 1:49). 17. One of the earliest representations of this concept comes from Chalcatzingo. Created approximately 2,000 years earlier than the Tira de Tepechpan, Monument 1 also shows a figure seated within the Earth Monster cave mouth, which is remarkably similar to the representation in the Tira. David Grove (1973:134) argues that Aztec myths of migrations from caves may be deeply rooted in the past and may date from the Olmec period. Furthermore, thrones from the Olmec sites of San Lorenzo and La Venta show rulers seated within niches, most likely to also associate the ruler with the divine (Grove 1973:134). 18. These Mexica sources are the Codices Aubin (1981:26v), Azcatitlan (1995:12), Mendoza (1992:2r), and Mexicanus (1952:44), and the Mapa Sigüenza (in Boone 2000:167). 19. Because his hair is worn back, Temictzin’s eyebrow is exposed, which is not typically seen in pre-Hispanic Aztec art (Baird 1993:127). In this case, Painter A may have painted the eyebrow simply to emphasize Temictzin’s hairstyle and, consequently, his prowess in warfare. 20. The Codices TellerianoRemensis (1995:29v–30r), Ríos (1964:104), Xolotl (1996:3), and Ixhuatepec (in Gillespie 1989:36) picture Acamapichtli and his wife. Gillespie (1989:25–56) summarizes the various alphabetic accounts of this union. Chapter Four 1. One of these men carries a “house” (cal-li) name glyph, as does one of the Tepanec warriors who kills the Texcocan leader Ixtlilxochitl in the Codex Xolotl

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(see fig. 4.1); perhaps both sources show a famous Tepanec assassin. 2. The place glyph consists of a hill (tepe-tl) topped with two flint knives (tecpa-tl) and below this the sign for preciousness (chalchihu-itl). In the Codex Mendoza (1992:13r), a similar glyph identifies a town named Tecpatepec; therefore, this hieroglyphic construction may read Tecpatepec Chalco. 3. The associated alphabetic gloss references an apparently unrelated irrigation project (see chapter 7). 4. Durán (1994:69), Chimalpahin (1997, 1:129; 1998, 2:69), and the author of the Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:82) provide varied accounts of Chimalpopoca’s death. 5. The Codex Mexicanus (1952:61–62) also records the assassination of Ixtlilxochitl and exile of Nezahualcoyotl, but when war was finally declared in 1 Flint, Itzcoatl appears to have acted alone. 6. The similarities do not end here: both Quaquauhtzin and Nezahualcoyotl were also considered fine poets, and Annotator 1 credited Quaquauhtzin with a hydraulic project elsewhere credited to Nezahualcoyotl (see chapter 7). 7. In the Codex Azcatitlan, Codex Mendoza, and Legend of the Suns (1992:160), the exact year of the conquest is not given; however, each of these sources lists the defeat as Itzcoatl’s first, which implies a date of 1 Flint. Chimalpahin (1997, 1:131, 213; 1998, 1:247, 389; 1998, 2:71) consistently dated the defeat to 1 Flint, as does the Codex en Cruz (1981). The date of the battle in the Codex TellerianoRemensis is not clearly marked, though a hand sign beside the year 1 Flint likely associates the battle with that year. 8. Rebecca Horn (1997:130–131) notes that in documents from Coyoacan, you rarely see the hand and rod measurements mentioned together, which suggests they were roughly analogous, as may

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be communicated here by their superimposition. 9. Female rulers were not unheard of in ancient Central Mexico, and some sources claim that a daughter of Motecuhzoma I actually inherited the throne from her father (Carrasco 1984:44; Gillespie 1989:101; cf. Diel 2005a:95–99). 10. A rectangular shape appears to the right of Motecuzhoma’s funerary bundle; this may either be a reference to a plot of land or an unfinished house glyph. A portion of another rectangle is attached to the year 3 House (1469). These drawings do not appear in the earlier copies of the Tira, perhaps indicating that they had once been covered or were later additions (Noguez 1978, 1:95). 11. The series of place names that surround Axayacatl and the subsequent Mexica leaders are treated in chapter 7. Axayacatl’s funerary bundle carries an additional detail that appears to be a hand pointing to his leg, but it is unclear if Painter A or a later contributor drew this. The hand may refer to a battle injury Axayacatl sustained on his thigh while still a young ruler and may have been a distinguishing feature of his (see Durán 1994:268–269). 12. Tizoc’s name glyph appears on two pre-Hispanic stone sculptures, the Tizoc Stone and the Dedication Stone, and on each it consists of a leg similar to the one used by Tepechpan Painter A. In contrast, Tizoc’s name glyph is highly varied in other colonial codices, perhaps because the exact meaning of the name was unclear and confused colonial scribes not trained in Aztec writing (Boornazian 1996:68–70; Nicholson 1973:7). The similarity of Painter A’s glyph with the preconquest sources further suggests his training as a tlacuilo. 13. The summary is compiled from the following sources: Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997, 1:544; 2:118–


120; Chimalpahin 1997, 2:97; and Torquemada 1986, 1:154–155. For full treatments of this event, see Garibay 1965; León-Portilla 1992:99–111; Martínez 1972:60–61; Offner 1983:228–230; and Diel 2005a:86–90 and 2007. 14. Though this story appears in numerous sources, there is a great amount of variation as to the exact identity of this femme fatale. Chimalpahin (1998, 2:97) calls her Huitzilxochtzin, and Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 1:544; 2:118) alternatively calls her Tenanacihuatzin and Matlacihuatzin. Torquemada (1986, 1:154–155) also calls her Matlacihuatzin, but he says that she was the fiancée of a Temictzin of Tlatelolco, whose death Nezahualcoyotl arranged. 15. See Miguel León-Portilla 1992:109–111 for a transcription and translation of this poem. The poem was recorded twice in the Cantares mexicanos, a sixteenthcentury manuscript held by the Mexican National Library, and once in a manuscript now called the Romances de los señores de Nueva España. 16. For examples, see Alva Ixtlil xochitl 1997, 1:217; Martínez 1972; León-Portilla 1992:103; and Velazco 1998. 17. Though in poor condition, the temple dedication above 4 Reed (1483) seems to be associated with the Chiauhtla place glyph (Dibble 1981, 1:27). 18. For more examples, see the Codices Aubin (1981:38v) and Mexicanus (1952:71). The Codex Azcatitlan (1995:21), however, does not show any human victims. 19. The pictorials that mention the defeat of Tlatelolco are the Codices Aubin (1981:37r), Azcatitlan (1995:19), en Cruz (1981:2), Mendoza (1992:10r), Mexicanus (1952:70), and Telleriano-Remensis (1995:36v). 20. Even Painter A’s record of the Mexica migration and the large amount of space he devoted

to their expulsion from Chapultepec relate to Tepechpan, for ultimately these events explain why some Mexica came to settle in Tepechpan. Chapter Five 1. The following synthesis is derived from Sahagún 1950–1982, 12:49–54; Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997, 2:228–229; Alvarado Tezozomoc 1987:143; Durán 1994:536–538; and Díaz 1963:283–286. 2. Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997, 2:229), Durán (1994:540–541), Cortés (1986:132), and Díaz (1963:294) provide conflicting accounts of the death of Motecuhzoma II. Francis Brooks (1995) sees the story of Motecuhzoma’s imprisonment as a historical construct set forth by Cortés in his letters to Charles V to legitimize the conquest through the submission of Motecuhzoma and, by extension, his people. If so, it is interesting that so many historians, both Spanish and Nahua, relate the event. 3. The following account is condensed from Cortés 1986:366– 367; Durán 1994:562; Chimalpahin 1997, 1:167–169; Torquemada 1986, 1:574–576; and the Anales de Tlatelolco (1948:9–10). 4. The artist of the Codex Azoyú I (1991:34) also shows men hanged by their feet. 5. For Tlaxcala, see the Lienzo de Tlaxcala (1892), and for Texcoco, see conquest accounts in Alva Ixtlilxochitl 1997. 6. Because the Nahuatl language does not have the sound of “d,” Painter A approximated this sound with a “t”; such substitutions are commonly seen in hieroglyphic transcriptions of Spanish names (Boornazian 1996). 7. The names of Tepechpan’s early colonial governors are recorded in the lawsuit between Tepechpan and Temascalapa (AGI Justicia 164:5r–13v). 8. For more on this position and

the colonial Mexica cuauhtlatoque, see Chimalpahin 1998, 2:171, 186, 223–225; Gibson 1964:168–169; and Lockhart 1992:33–34. 9. The identification of this hieroglyphic compound as the work of Painter A remains provisional. The eagle is larger than Painter A’s previous eagle at Tenochtitlan’s foundation, but based on its style, I suspect that it was added by Painter A at a later date, perhaps at the same time he added the representation of Cuauhtemoc’s death. 10. Painter A also distinguished the European chairs of the various rulers. Tepechpan’s governors sit on chairs with an upward notch on the foot, the chairs of Tenochca governors have downward notches, and the chairs of Spanish viceroys are flat. 11. A similar modification was made to the viceroy seated below 1568. 12. The Plano en papel de maguey, which Robertson (1959:78) associates with Mexico City, also includes the cuauhtlatoque, but it is difficult to determine the exact intentions here because it appears multiple artists contributed. Nevertheless, Tlacotzin and Motelchiuhtzin are simply referenced with speaking eagle glyphs. In contrast, Xochiquentzin is shown in a fullbody view, but he does not wear a turquoise diadem, nor does he sit on a woven reed throne. William Barnes (2005:334) believes these omissions show his lack of a royal pedigree, especially compared to the subsequent rulers, who are of noble blood and therefore shown with turquoise diadems and woven reed thrones. 13. Alphabetic accounts also detail the epidemics: Anales de San Gregorio Acapulco (1994:282); Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco (1989:234); Anales de Juan Miguel (1989:256); Chimalpahin 1997, 2:201–203; Motolinía 1985:116; and Torquemada 1986, 1:512, 615). Also,


Gibson (1964:448–451) details the various epidemics that struck the indigenous populations throughout the Colonial period. 14. Documents pertaining to this suit are now housed at the Archivo General de Indias in Seville (Justicia 164, 208) and the Archivo General de la Nación in México (Mercedes vol. 7:18r–18v, 147r, vol. 84:120r–120v; Indios vol. 4:73r, vol. 20:53r; General de parte vol. 1:192rff, vol. 2:128rff). For fuller treatments of the arguments presented in the suit, see Diel 2002:309–318; Gibson 1964:53–54, 189–190; Hicks 1984, 1992; and Offner 1983:92–93, 110. Chapter Six 1. In the Codex Osuna (1947), hats with feathers mark certain figures as marqueses. 2. For more on this indigenous rebellion, see Mota Padilla 1870:23, 87; and Gerhard 1982:244, 257. 3. Focusing only on the Spanish forces, the Codex TellerianoRemensis (1995:44r) is anomalous. This artist painted Nuño de Guzmán on horseback, and an annotator informs us that he left in 1529 for Jalisco. 4. The expedition to Cíbola is discussed by Torquemada (1986, 1:609) and Mota Padilla (1870:111–114). 5. Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco (1989:232) and the Anales de Juan Miguel (1989:256) also mention this expedition. 6. For more-thorough discussions of the wars in the northern provinces, see Mota Padilla 1870; Galaviz de Capdevielle 1967; López-Portillo y Weber 1939; and Gerhard 1982. 7. The Codex TellerianoRemensis (1995:43r) again is a notable exception with its focus on the Spanish forces; it specifically shows the death of Alvarado and the arrival of Viceroy Mendoza. The battle is also mentioned in

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alphabetic chronicles, such as Chimalpahin 1997, 2:199; Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco (1989:234); and Anales de San Gregorio Acapulco (1994:282). 8. The representation of Bishop Zumárraga’s departure is also attached to Cortés’s line. Based on this composition, Mariano Cuevas (in Noguez 1985:78–82) argued that the placement of the two together was meant to represent a procession to the hill of Tepeyac, place of the apparition of the Virgin of Guadalupe. Though Cuevas’s argument has gained some popularity—for example, the positio for the beatification of Juan Diego cites the Tira as evidence (in Poole 1995:57)—it is far more likely that these representations simply reference the comings and goings of these figures as mentioned in other sources. 9. The interpretation of this section is problematic and not definitive because the two crowns appear to be in different styles, suggesting either a lack of consistency in Painter B’s work or that one of the crowns was added by a different artist. 10. Based on the change in the color of the year disk at 1559, Noguez (1978, 1:150) suggests that the funerary bundle represents the death of the Tepechpan governor Don Bartolomé de Santiago. However, records from the lawsuit between Tepechpan and Temascalapa show that Don Bartolomé was still alive and acting as governor in late 1560 (AGI Justicia 164:141v–145r). Also, if this composition recorded the death of a Tepechpan governor, we would expect to see his successor pictured. 11. Motolinía (1985:222, 237, 246), Torquemada (3:146), and Alva Ixtlilxochitl (1997 1:491) discuss the activities of these friars. 12. The bishop did not actually arrive until 1528. Painter B’s dates are not always correct, probably because he added these representa-

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tions approximately twenty years after the fact. 13. The arrival and departure dates of Spain’s various religious leaders that follow in this chapter are compiled from Torquemada 1986 and Poole 1992. 14. The arrival dates for the various Spanish viceroys are compiled from Torquemada 1986 and Rubio Mañé 1983. 15. The same was true in postconquest Coyoacan; see Horn 1997:228 and also Gibson 1964:175. 16. Painter C also included a crown linked to the year 7 Flint (1564), but the exact meaning is unclear. Some have suggested that the crown and skull together refer to the death of Viceroy Velasco, who did in fact die in this year (Boban 1891:266; Noguez 1978, 1:154). 17. These epidemics are mentioned in the Codex Aubin (1981:53v); Codex Mexicanus (1952:84); Chimalpahin 1997, 2:215; and the Anales de San Gregorio Acapulco (1994:286). 18. Anna Lanyon (2004) reconstructs the role (or lack thereof) of Cortés’s sons in the alleged rebellion. 19. The sentencing also caused a scandal, and a judge was sent to investigate the uprising and Viceroy Peralta’s handling of the affair. The judge decided that the viceroy had been too lenient and sentenced three more of the participants to death; they were executed in that same year, and Viceroy Peralta was ordered back to Spain (Rubio Mañé 1983:124–125; Chimalpahin 1998 2:233–235). 20. My identification of this figure as the work of Painter D is tentative. The crown and cross are not typical of Painter D’s work, and the figure is thinner than Painter D’s other figures. 21. These epidemics are also mentioned in the Codex Aubin (1981:60r); Codex Mexicanus (1952:86); Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco 1519–1633 (1989:242);


Chimalpahin 1998, 2:245–247; and Torquemada 1986, 1:642. 22. The actual count that appears in the archival record is dated to 1734. Apparently, at this date Tepechpan’s problems with Temascalapa still were not over, for the governor of Tepechpan, Don Lucas de los Rios, complained that Temascalapa had not been counted as Tepechpan’s sujeto (AGN Tierras 1649, exp. 2:206r)! Previously, Don Lucas had petitioned for a grant of land in compensation for the money he had spent defending Tepechpan in its suits with Temascalapa (AGN Tierras 2561, legajo 5). Based on this fact, one cannot help but wonder if it was he who later sold the Tira to Lorenzo Boturini, who was amassing his collection of Mexican manuscripts at about this same time. Chapter Seven 1. Unfortunately, it is impossible to know if each annotator provided his own interpretation or if he simply transcribed someone else’s oral explanation of the Tira. For simplicity, I treat the scribe and interpreter as one person. 2. The Anales de Cuauhtitlan (1992:110) credits Nezahualcoyotl with another hydraulic project, this time diverting water to Tenochtitlan. 3. Another gloss that floats above this one is problematic. It is highly effaced, and I suspect it had once been covered or whitewashed. The gloss reads, “y ytlamia . . . alcomatlili ahuehue. . . .” Noguez (1978, 1:92) reads the final word as “Ahuehuetzinco,” a town near Chietla, and he suggests that this gloss also references the place of Quaquauhtzin’s final battle. 4. Alternatively, this gloss may reference Cortés’s distribution of encomienda lands to the Spanish conquistadors, though the figure before him is clearly an indigenous warrior.

5. Annotator 1 alerts us to perhaps another Spanish royal’s death in his gloss of the painting of a funerary bundle (plate 19) above the year 6 Flint (1576). The word corona (crown) is clear, though the gloss is partially damaged and difficult to understand. 6. It is difficult to ascertain what else Annotator 1 omitted in the later portions of the Tira because of its poor condition towards the end. 7. Noguez (1978, 2:12–13) and Frederick Hicks (1992:7) add a -co suffix to Amaxaltzin(co) and Aztacuautzin(co) to make them place names, but I see no evidence to support this. Hicks (1992:7) reads this section as a transfer of lands from Tepechpan to Tenochtitlan during the reign of Ahuitzotl. He refers to Atlanmaxac, Amaxaltzinco, Tlacomolco, and Tlachiahualco, though he does not mention the other towns in this list.

8. Petlacalco appears in the Codex Mendoza (1992:22r) as a head town for tribute collection for Tenochtitlan, and Barlow (1949a:131–133) located the town on the western shores of Lake Texcoco just north of Tepetlacalco; however, any such town with this name has since disappeared. 9. The information on the relations among these various towns is predominantly derived from Gibson 1964:413–447; Gerhard 1993; and Hicks 1992. 10. Some of these cities’ names have alternative spellings: To‑ cayocan/ Tlacoyocan/ Tolcayocan, Cohuatitlan/Coatitlan, and Astacalco/Aztacalco. 11. This information comes from the following sources: Gibson 1964:74–76; Gerhard 1993:228; Pérez-Rocha and Tena 2000:41–42; Hicks 1992:5; and AGI Justicia (legajo 124, 4v).


12. This same point was made by Eloise Quiñones Keber (1995:126– 127) in reference to the Codex Telleriano-Remensis, and by Bas van Doesburg (2001) in relation to the Codex Porfirio Díaz. Appendix 1. A distinctive feature of Annotator 1’s writing is his variable use of nasals; that is, he inserted some nasals where they are not necessary and omitted others. For example, in this annotation, he omitted the “n” in the word Tozquentzin and added an “n” to the ends of the words tlatoani and cihuapilli. Though not typical, variable nasality is sometimes seen in Nahuatl alphabetic writing of the sixteenth century (Karttunen and Lockhart 1976:98).

143


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Index

Acacitl, 44 Acamapichtli, 26, 45, 47, 48, 62, 68, 123, 139n20 accession statements, 40, 41, 45, 48, 58, 60, 64, 103, 107, 125 Acocolco, 36 Acolhua, 46, 62; and battle with Azcapotzalco, 53–54; and ethnicity, 66; federation of, 2, 4, 66; historic tradition of, 33, 53; and migration, 30, 32; rulers of, 29; sources associated with, 6, 26, 28, 42, 49, 53; and the Spanish conquest, 94–95, 116, 127. See also Texcoco Acolhuacan, 56 Acolman, 3, 5, 115, 131 Acxoquautli, 33 Aguilar, Diego de, 121 Aguilera, Carmen, 29 Ahuehuetzinco, 142n3 Ahuitzotl, 60, 63, 143n7 alphabetic writing, 7, 8, 10, 15, 18, 19, 113, 119, 124, 126, 143n1 altepetl, 1, 2–5, 23, 40, 41, 42, 45, 63, 75, 91, 105, 114, 126, 134, 137nn5–6 Alva Ixtlilxochitl, Fernando de, 6, 40, 53, 61, 70, 95, 117, 121, 127, 129, 138n4 Alvarado, Pedro de, 73, 141n7 Amaquemecan Chalco, 6, 27, 126. See also Chalco amate paper, 13, 17, 138n1 Anales de Cuauhtitlan, 6, 54, 62, 63, 66, 121, 127, 142n2 Anales de Juan Miguel, 106 Anales de San Gregorio Acapulco, 118 Anales de Tlatelolco, 6, 53, 70 annals history, 1, 10, 14, 15, 19, 46, 49, 60, 62, 68, 70, 122, 126, 128 annotations, 8, 13, 19, 61, 62, 94, 95, 113–124, 133–136 Annotator 1, 18–19, 113–119, 122, 123, 133–136, 140n6, 143n1, 143n6 Annotator 2, 18, 119–122, 123–124 Annotator 3, 122, 123–124

Annotator 4, 19, 122–123 Annotator 5, 19, 123 armor, cotton, 35, 37, 97 Astacalco, 120–121, 143n10 Atl, 44 atlatl, 34, 37 Atotoztli, 68 Aubin, J. M. A., 19, 20, 138n6–7 Audiencia, 80, 89, 90, 91, 100, 107, 117 Augustinians, 5, 108 authority, signs of, 73, 82–83, 107, 113, 126. See also power; rulership, icons of Axayacatl, 60, 74, 79, 120, 140n11 Axolohuapan, 120–121 Azcapotzalco, 3, 34–36, 48, 51–56, 61, 62, 69, 70, 114; conquest of, 2, 6, 28, 32, 47, 52–56, 64, 71, 74 Aztec: conquests, 48, 56, 59; creation legend, 14; historical tradition, 33, 37; imperial control, 2, 6–7, 14–15; painting style, 15–18, 136n2; term, 137n3 Aztec Empire, 1, 9, 23, 67, 73, 116, 125, 126, 128, 137n3; consolidation of, 2, 14–15, 60, 125–126; formation of, 2; structure of, 2, 6, 56, 137n4. See also Triple Alliance Aztec pictorial writing, 1, 6–7, 9, 15, 16, 18, 73, 74, 94, 100, 137n2 Aztlan, 23, 24, 27–28, 42, 138n2 Baeza, Felipe de, 109 Baeza, Gerónimo de, 109, 137n9 Baeza de Herrera, Juan, 137n9 Baeza y de la Maresa, Don Fernando, 137n9 Bakhtin, Mikhail, 8 baptism, 102, 103, 116, 118 barbarity, 40, 45, 63, 127–128 Barnes, William, 141n12 Barthes, Roland, 8 Bathsheba, 61 Bhabha, Homi, 10 Bibliothèque Nationale de France, 20

155

Binding of the Years, 37. See also New Fire Ceremony bishops, 17, 100, 103, 108, 118, 128, 135 bloodline, noble, 23, 48. See also dynastic succession Boban, Eugene, 1, 138n3 Boone, Elizabeth, 15, 31, 49, 126, 137n2, 137n14 Boturini, Lorenzo, 20, 138n5, 142n22 boundary recognition, 124 bows and arrows, 25, 28–30, 32, 114, 138n4 Brooks, Francis, 141n2 bundles: cult, 36, 38, 41, 42, 44; funerary, 45, 46, 47, 52, 53, 58, 74, 75, 77, 80, 87, 98, 100, 103, 104, 108, 118 caballerías de tierra, 109 cabecera, 4–5, 126, 130; and status, 4, 63, 71, 89–92, 93, 120–121, 129 cabildo, 91–92, 113, 119. See also under specific cities cacique, 4 Çagualtitlan, 120 calendar: Aztec, 14–15, 26, 27, 45, 49, 68, 71, 138n1; Gregorian, 15, 16, 116 Calendar Stone, 14, 26, 32 calpulli, 2–5, 134, 137n6; lands, 62, 69, 71, 114, 115, 119, 122, 127 Caltzin, 46, 48, 69, 114, 115, 119, 127 Cantares Mexicanos, 140n15 Castañeda, Francisco de, 109 Castilla y León, 88 Castillians, 121. See also Spaniards Catholicism, 73. See also Christianity caves, 41, 42, 43 census counts, 103, 104, 105–106, 108, 109, 110, 118 Central Mexico, 2, 4, 9, 14–15, 23, 26, 49, 51, 56, 68, 73, 75, 80, 87, 92, 96, 97, 100, 105, 127, 129, 130 chair: European, 62, 77, 78, 80,

82–84, 93, 94, 102, 103, 104, 126, 141n10; folding, 86, 95, 104, 107; Spanish, 83. See also curule chair; hip-joint chair; x-chair Chalcatzingo, 139n17 Chalco, 3, 63, 95 Chapultepec, 31–36, 42, 45, 49, 139n12, 140n20 Charles V, 100, 141n2 Chiauhtla, 3, 63, 64, 65, 66, 75, 81, 91, 123, 129, 140n17 Chichimec, 23, 25, 28–31, 44, 97– 98, 114, 115, 133, 138n4 Chichimeca Tecuhtli, 138n4 Chicomoztoc, 27–28, 138n2 Chietla, 115, 134, 142n3 Chimalhuacan, 97 Chimalpahin, 6, 26, 27, 33, 36, 44, 47–48, 95, 96, 97, 100, 101, 106, 108, 126, 138n12 Chimalpopoca, 46, 47–48, 53, 58, 123; death of, 53, 55, 62, 74, 140n4 Cholula, 137n12 Christ, 128, 129 Christianity, 61, 73–78 passim, 91, 93, 101–102, 105, 117, 118, 128–129 churches, 63, 67, 115–116, 128 Cíbola, 97, 141n4 Citlaltepec, 118, 135 civility, 28, 38, 40, 45, 49, 64, 127–128 Cline, S. L., 137n10 clothing, European, 73, 80, 102– 107 passim Coanacochtzin, 75 coats of arms, 88, 119 Coatzontli, 32, 33, 37, 48, 139n8 cocoliztli, 87, 109. See also epidemics Codex Aubin, 38, 75, 76, 81, 82, 83, 87, 96–102 passim, 106, 118, 139n12 Codex Azcatitlan, 26, 27, 43, 49, 66, 67, 101, 139n12 Codex Azoyu, 126, 141n4 Codex Boturini, 23, 24, 26, 27, 30– 31, 34, 36, 38, 43, 49, 139n12 Codex en Cruz, 63–66, 75, 78, 81, 87, 89, 91, 96, 100, 101, 105–106, 117, 123 Codex Ixtlilxochitl, 66 Codex Kingsborough, 28 Codex Mendoza, 26, 38, 39, 42–48 passim, 54, 56, 57, 97, 139n14

156

Codex Mexicanus, 23–35 passim, 43, 49, 75, 77, 82, 87, 88, 94– 102 passim, 106, 109, 128, 130, 139n12 Codex of Hueychiapan, 126 Codex Osuna, 82, 85, 106, 141n1 Codex Porfirio Diaz, 143n12 Codex Ríos, 30, 53–54, 75, 139n10, 139n12 Codex Telleriano-Remensis, 13, 37, 53–55, 63, 66, 87, 101, 130, 141n3, 141n7, 143n12 Codex Xolotl, 6, 26, 30, 53–54, 61, 127, 137n7, 138n4, 139n1 Códice de Santa María Asunción, 138n5 Códice de Tlatelolco, 98, 99, 125 Cohuacalco, 120–121 Cohuatitlan, 120–121, 143n10 colonial discourse, 9–10, 138n16 colonialism: Mexica, 9; Spanish, 4–5, 9, 10, 93, 125 Colonial period, 1, 4–5, 10, 11, 15–16, 19, 63, 86, 87, 89, 93, 98, 101, 115, 118, 121, 122, 123 color, symbolic uses of, 40, 47. See also year disks, changes in color of composiciones, 123–124 confirmations, 118, 135 congregaciones, 123–124 conquest, 45, 47, 48, 92, 96, 98; ideogram of, 15, 34, 52. See also under Aztec and Spanish Contitlan, 36 Contreras, Don Pedro Moya de, 107 conversion, religious, 102 Copil, 33, 35, 43, 45 corn, 119 Coronado, Francisco Vasquez de, 97 corregidor, 4, 109 corregimiento, 4 Cortés, Hernán, 73–76, 79, 83, 86, 87, 93–96, 99–100, 106, 116, 117, 127, 141n2, 142n4, 142n8 Coxcoxtli, 30–31, 36, 37–38 Coyoacan, 140n8, 142n15 cozoyahualolli, 25, 28–30, 32, 33, 138n4 crops, 108, 109, 110, 119, 125, 130 cross, 73, 80, 100, 101, 103, 107, 117, 119, 128 crown, European, 77, 78, 80, 83, 84, 87, 98, 100, 103, 104


Cuauhtemoc, 74–81 passim, 92, 95, 101, 117, 141n9 Cuauhtinchan, 101 Cuauhtitlan, 3, 54, 56, 62, 63, 121, 129 Cuauhtlatoa, 53 cuauhtlatoani (pl. cuauhtlatoque), 79, 80, 81, 119, 141n8, 141n12 Cuauhtlequetzqui, 33, 43 Cuauhtlix, 32, 33, 35 Cuevas, Mariano, 142n8 Cuitlahuac, 74, 87 Culhua, 27, 28, 30, 38, 44, 49 Culhuacan, 3, 23, 27, 30–31, 33–38 passim, 41, 43, 96, 137n10 Culiacan, 77, 82, 96, 97, 135 Cummins, Tom, 8 curule chair, 82. See also chair; hipjoint chair; x-chair David, 61 Davies, Nigel, 30 Dávila, Alonso and Gil Gonzalez, 106, 119, 136 death statement, 45–46 de los Rios, Don Lucas, 142n22 discourse, 8, 10, 124, 130 Doesburg, Bas van, 143n10 Dominicans, 108 don, title, 117 double consciousness, 20 Douglas, Eduardo, 127 dove, 73, 75, 101, 117, 118, 119, 128 droughts, 130 Durán, Fray Diego, 6, 28, 38, 43 dynastic succession, 23, 26, 45, 49, 56–60, 68, 71. See also under specific cities Earth Monster, 43, 139n17 Ecatepec, 120–121 Elizabeth of Valois, 117 encomendero, 4 encomienda, 4, 121, 142n4 Enríquez, Don Martín, 103, 107, 136 epidemics, 5, 74, 83, 86–88, 92, 103–110 passim, 118, 125, 130, 141n13, 142n17, 142n21 escribano, 113. See also notary Esteban, Don Antonio de, 104, 109, 136 famine, 68, 130 Florescano, Enrique, 26

Florida, 97 foundation, 36, 45, 49. See also under specific cities Franciscans, 101, 108, 116, 118 friars, 75, 101, 116, 118, 128, 134. See also Augustinians; Dominicans; Franciscans Fuenleal, Don Sebastián Ramírez de, 100, 117 genealogy, 33, 34, 46, 68, 70. See also lineage gesso, 13, 14, 18, 19, 122, 123 Gibson, Charles, 93, 110 Gillespie, Susan, 6, 33, 56, 60, 68 gobernador, 4, 77, 80, 81, 83, 84, 114. See also governor God, Christian, 67, 73, 128–129 gods, Aztec, 73 Goupil, E. Eugene, 19, 20 governor, 98, 104, 110. See also gobernador grasshoppers, 108, 109–110, 119, 125, 136 Grove, David, 139n17 Guzmán, Don Esteban de, 98 Guzmán, Nuño de, 79, 96, 97, 141n3 hair: facial, 73, 77, 78, 80, 94, 99, 103, 104; female, 17, 34, 58, 59, 61, 138n5; gendered, 31; warrior top-knot, 44–45, 46, 48, 58, 69, 114. See also temillotl hanging, 74 Hapsburgs, 88, 126 Hassig, Ross, 15, 37 head tax, 105–106, 110 Heyden, Doris, 138n6 Hicks, Frederick, 56, 143n7 hip-joint chair, 77, 102. See also chair; curule chair; x-chair Historia Tolteca-Chichimeca, 101 historical revisionism, 5–7, 93, 125 historical tropes, 1, 7–9, 23, 40, 49, 53, 56, 71, 82, 91, 92, 96, 102, 125, 128 history, 23; audience, 7, 20; Aztec standardization of, 9, 68; bias in, 1, 6–7, 53; cyclical v. linear, 68; European conception of, 5–7; Nahua conception of, 1–2, 5–7, 9 Holy Spirit, 73, 128 Honduras, 74, 79, 117, 134

Horn, Rebecca, 140n8 huipil, 32, 59 Huitzilan, 120–121 Huitzilihuitl (Mexica tlatoani ), 58, 62 Huitzilihuitl (Mexica tribal leader), 30, 35, 37, 38, 44, 46, 47, 48 Huitzilopochtli, 26, 33, 38, 42, 43, 45, 64–67, 91, 108, 128–129. See also Mexica: patron deity of Huitzilxochtzin, 140n14 Huiznahuacac, 66 hybridity, 9–10 hydraulic project, 115, 140n6, 142n2. See also irrigation project Icxicuauhtli, 16, 25–32, 40–41, 45, 46, 68–69, 114, 133 identity, 2, 7, 10, 63, 90, 113, 124, 129, 130 ink, European, 13, 19 in petlatl, in icpalli, 45 irrigation project, 114, 140n3 Isabel, Doña, 68 Itzcoatl, 6, 26, 28, 32, 47, 53–59 passim, 62, 68, 140n5, 140n7 Ixtlilxochitl, 53–54, 61, 62, 139n1, 140n5 Ixtlilxochitl II, 94–95, 116–117, 127, 134 Jalisco, 141n3 juez de residencia, 98 kingship, 68 Kirchhoff, Paul, 31 Kristeva, Julia, 8 labor draft system, 110, 137n11. See also repartimiento labor obligations, 2–5, 103, 104, 105, 110, 118, 119, 130 Lake Texcoco, 2, 3, 23, 27, 96, 143n8 lance, steel-tipped, 73, 94, 99, 100 land, 2, 5, 40, 45, 62, 89, 96, 105, 109, 119–124; distribution of, 26, 58, 62–63, 69, 95–96, 115, 116, 119, 122, 127, 134; Spanish encroachment on, 124, 130 language, 8, 9 Lanyon, Anna, 142n18 Late Post-Classic period, 1, 2, 23, 63, 98, 128

Index

Lee, Jongsoo, 40 Leibsohn, Dana, 91 Lienzo de Tlaxcala, 75, 79, 83, 86, 87, 95, 127 lineage, 60, 62, 71. See also genealogy Liss, Peggy, 98 Lockhart, James, 75, 137n6 loincloth, 25, 28, 30, 32, 34, 36, 38, 46, 52 Maldonado, Don Cristóbal, 77–78, 87, 135 Malinalxochitl, 33 mantle, cotton, 28–30, 38, 51, 81, 107 Mapa Quinatzin, 6, 30, 42, 127, 137n7, 138n4, 139n14 Mapa Sigüenza, 28, 43, 44, 49 Mapa Tlotzin, 30, 32, 42, 44, 61, 127, 138n4 Marcus, Joyce, 137n2 Marqués del Valle, 94, 116, 121, 134, 135. See also Cortés, Hernán marriage, 23, 33, 44, 53, 56, 58, 60–62, 70, 71, 115, 126 Matlacihuatzin, 140n14 Maxtla, 51, 52, 53 Medina, Gerónimo de, 137n9 Mendoza, Antonio de, 80, 91, 97, 98, 103, 126, 135, 141n7 Mengin, Ernst, 95 mercedes, 109, 113 Mexica, 1, 2, 4; barbarity of, 63, 127; and the calendar, 15, 26–27, 37, 42, 49, 67–68; and conquest by Spain, 75, 128; conquests of, 45, 56; discourse of, 9; and expulsion from Chapultepec, 34–36, 45, 49, 139n12, 140– 141n20; and imperial rule, 6–7, 9, 14–15, 32, 37, 69; mercenaries in, 31, 34, 38; and migrants, 25, 28–33, 37, 41, 43, 44, 64–65, 108; and migration, 25–34, 47, 138n3; official history of, 6, 26, 28, 33, 42–49 passim, 68; patron deity of, 26, 63–67, 71, 73, 105, 128; rulers of, 15, 28, 33–34, 37, 60, 62, 67–68, 84, 103, 116, 119; and ruptures in ruling line, 37, 80–82; and sacred associations, 26–27, 43; and sacrifice, 128; and settlement at Chapultepec, 31–34, 42; and settlement at

157

Tepechpan, 36–40, 64, 140n20; sources associated with, 6, 49; as subjects of the Culhua, 38, 43, 49; and Tepanec War, 10, 26, 51–56; Toltec associations of, 30, 37, 44, 48, 49, 53–56, 128. See also Aztec Empire; Tenochtitlan Mexico, 1, 20, 108, 117, 118 Mexico City, 96, 100, 102, 104, 108, 136 Mexico City Cathedral, 104–105, 110, 118. See also San Francisco Church migration, 23–31, 49 mimicry, 10, 15 Mixton War, 83, 97–98, 99 Moctezuma, Leonor, 120 Montúfar, Alonso de, 102, 104, 118, 135 Morelos, 108 Motecuhzoma I, 52, 59, 60, 62, 68, 69, 140nn9–10 Motecuhzoma II, 37, 60, 68, 69, 74, 75, 79, 81, 141n2 Motelchiuhtzin, Andrés de Tapia, 77, 79, 81, 82, 95, 141n12 Moya de Contreras, Don Pedro, 107 Mundy, Barbara, 20 Nahuas, 5, 7, 9, 26, 75, 98, 99, 108, 124, 127, 137n3 Nahuatl, 13, 21, 113, 124, 131, 137n3, 141n6 Narváez, Pánfilo de, 73 Nazohuatl, 33, 37, 48 New Fire Ceremony, 15, 35, 37, 45, 46, 58, 69. See also Binding of the Years New Mexico, 83, 97, 135 New Spain, 4–5, 9, 20, 80, 86, 94, 97, 98, 99–107, 113, 117, 118, 119 New World, 101, 128 Nezahualcoyotl, 6, 28, 40, 53–54, 60, 61–62, 65–66, 70, 115, 121, 128, 127, 129, 134, 138n4, 140nn5–6, 140n14, 142n2 Nezahualpilli, 6, 61, 94 Nicholson, H. B., 14, 28–29, 68 Noguez, Xavier, 1, 89, 94, 119, 142n10, 143n7 notary, 113, 119 nudity, 35, 139n10

158

Nueva Galicia, 97 number symbolism, 14

Quinatzin, 123 Quiñones Keber, Eloise, 54, 143n12

obsidian club, 35, 51, 97 Old Testament, 129 Olid, Cristóbal de, 74 Olmec, 139n17 Ome Tochtzin, 59, 62, 63, 64, 70, 86, 115, 117, 134 Oñate, Cristóbal de, 97 One Flint, 24, 25, 26–27, 32, 40, 42, 46, 47, 49, 56, 59, 68, 140n5, 140n7 One Rabbit, 26, 34, 37, 51 Otontecuhutli, 51

Rappaport, Joanne, 8 rebellions: Creole, 106; Cuauhtemoc, 74–75; Dávila brothers, 106; indigenous, 117, 141n2 Relación de la genealogía, 27 Relación de Michoacan, 138n15 Relaciones geográficas, 5, 21, 38, 128; of Tepechpan, 5, 41, 52, 62, 115; of Teotihuacan, 115; of Texcoco,115 Renaissance, stylistic techniques of, 15–16 repartimiento, 110, 119. See also labor draft system Robertson, Donald, 16, 137n2 Romances de los señores de Nueva España, 140n15 rulership, icons of: Aztec, 77, 82– 84; European, 77–78, 82–84, 94; Mexica, 126. See also authority, signs of; power

paint: European, 13, 74; indigenous, 13 Panitzin, Don Diego de Alvarado, 79–84 passim Peralta, Gastón de, 103, 136, 142n19 Peru, 80, 107 petate mat, 46, 52 Petlacalco, 119, 120, 143n8 Philip II, 117 Pichardo, José Antonio, 14, 19, 20, 138n3 Plano en papel de maguey, 141n12 Pomar, Juan Bautista de, 40, 66, 115, 127 population loss, 105, 130, 131 post-colonial theory, 9 poststructuralist theory, 8 poverty, 103, 130 power, 1, 15, 49, 63, 71; icons of, 73, 82–84, 94. See also authority, signs of; rulership, icons of priests, Aztec, 33, 44, 52, 94 Primeros Memoriales, 28–29, 33, 51, 81, 84, 138n4 primordial titles, 19, 89, 95, 109, 124. See also títulos primor‑ diales privileges, 2, 5, 11, 71, 82, 95, 96, 126, 127, 130 procession, religious, 104, 108 public works, 2, 105, 110, 125 Quaquauhtzin I, 52, 56, 58, 60–62, 69, 70, 71, 114, 115, 128, 133, 134, 140n6, 142n3 Quaquautzin II, 59, 68, 69, 70, 71, 114, 134 Quetzalcoatl, 38. See also Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl


sacrifice, 47; animal, 36, 38–39, 41, 45, 65, 128; human, 35–39, 49, 128, 138n13 Sahagún, Bernardino de, 28–29, 33 San Francisco Church, 104–105, 136. See also Mexico City Cathedral San Juan River, 115 San Miguel Atlanmaxac, 122 Santa Ana Tlachyahualco, 122 Santiago, Don Bartolomé de, 78, 142n10 Santiago Tzacuala, 122 Schroeder, Susan, 6, 126 seats, bundled grass, 33, 42, 43, 44 service obligations, 5, 9, 105 skin, coloring of, 31, 73, 77, 78, 80, 84, 94, 101, 104, 105, 106, 207 smallpox, 74, 86–87, 134 Spain, 21, 70, 97, 99–100, 101, 103, 106, 117, 127, 134, 135, 136 Spaniards: arrival of, in Mexico, 1, 2, 9, 54, 73, 76, 83, 86, 94, 116, 121, 129, 130; attributes of, 73, 77, 93–94, 99, 103, 106 Spanish: conquest, 4, 5, 6, 10, 49, 64, 67, 73–76, 83, 92, 102, 125, 127; discourse, 9–10; empire, 1, 16, 73, 100, 108, 113, 116, 125– 127; invasion, 5, 59, 68, 69; rule,

4–9 passim, 63, 69, 71, 74, 102, 103, 110, 123–124, 127 speech scroll, 40, 41, 51, 79, 80, 94 staff of justice, 89 status, 1, 6, 28, 38, 126. See also cabecera: and status Stone, Cynthia, 138n15 Suárez de Mendoza, Don Lorenzo, 107, 136 sujetos, 4 Tacuba, 4, 6, 104. See also Tlacopan tapachichi, 109, 119. See also grasshoppers Tecama, 120–121 Tecpatepec Chalco, 52, 114, 140 Tecpitlalpa, 119 Tecuichpo, 68. See also Isabel, Doña Tehuetzquititzin, Diego, 80, 83, 84, 98–99 Temascalapa, 3, 5, 63, 73, 90, 91, 92, 109, 119, 122, 131, 142n33; and lawsuit with Tepechpan, 40, 70, 88–90, 92, 121, 139n14, 141n7, 141n14, 142n10, 142n22 Temictzin, 47, 48, 58, 71, 115, 123, 133, 139n19 temillotl, 46. See also under hair temples, 54, 63, 74, 104, 116. See also specific cities Temple Stone, 26, 42, 43 Tenanacihuatzin, 140n20 Tencoyotzin I, 46, 48, 69, 70, 71, 114, 115, 117, 119, 133, 134; death of, 52, 60, 62, 70, 74, 133 Tencoyotzin II, 59, 61, 62, 69, 70, 71, 114, 115, 122 Tenoch, 36, 37–38, 42, 44–45 Tenochca. See Mexica Tenochtitlan, 3, 32, 33, 43, 52, 102, 103, 113, 117, 120–121, 124; as capital of Aztec empire, 1, 2, 6, 10, 49, 51, 56; and conquest of Azcapotzalco, 10; and conquest of Tlatelolco, 71, 120–121; dynastic succession of, 59–60, 68, 69, 71, 78–82, 92; foundation of, 39, 41–45, 46, 122, 139n12; rulers of, 29, 32, 48, 76, 78–84 passim, 98–99, 103, 104, 107; sacred associations of, 32, 43, 49, 108; as seat of Spanish rule, 84, 86, 126; sources associated with, 54, 75, 81, 95; Spanish conquest of, 73–76, 116, 127;

and Templo Mayor, 63–66, 71– 76 passim. See also Mexica Tenyahualohuatzin, Don Hernando, 59, 69–70, 76, 114, 134 Teoculhuacan, 24–28 passim, 32, 138n2 teomama, 44 Teotihuacan, 3, 115 Teotihuacan River, 133. See also San Juan River Tepaneca, 2, 35, 46, 51–52, 53, 71, 74, 114, 117, 122, 133 Tepanec War, 10, 14, 45, 48, 50–62 passim, 69, 71, 74, 92, 114, 127 Tepechpan, 2, 3, 6, 11, 21, 29, 131, 133; and advancement over Tenochtitlan, 10, 23, 32–33, 38, 40, 45, 49, 50, 63–64, 127–128; allegiance of, to Spain, 10, 75, 84, 90, 92, 100, 108, 117, 126, 131; allegiance of, to Tenochtitlan, 10, 33, 49–65 passim, 69, 71, 74, 90, 115–116, 123, 126, 131; autonomy of, 5, 42, 51, 62, 71; cabecera status of, 4–5, 63, 89– 92, 105, 113, 137n11; cabildo of, 90, 91–92, 113; and the calendar, 42, 47, 51, 67–69; census counts in, 109, 118, 142n22; and Christianity, 5, 73, 76, 77, 91, 101, 102, 105, 108, 116, 118; church of, 90, 91–92, 104–105; and continuity of ruling line, 20, 70–71, 76, 78, 80, 90, 92, 93, 111, 124, 125, 129; dynastic succession of, 58–59, 67–71, 76–78, 92; elites of, 5, 7, 10, 110, 113, 118, 120, 126, 129, 130; encomienda of, 109, 137n9; epidemics in, 5, 73, 86–88, 105, 108, 118, 125; foundation of, 36, 40–45, 69, 90, 114; and hardships under Spanish rule, 10, 73, 92, 93, 103, 110, 125, 130, 131; interregnums at, 58, 69–71; labor obligations of, 118–119; lands of, 58, 90, 109, 115, 116, 120–122, 124, 131, 143n7; and lawsuit with Temascalapa, 40, 63, 73, 86, 88–90, 103, 119, 121, 139n14, 141n7, 141n14, 142n22; and membership in Aztec empire, 9, 15, 33, 49, 53, 73, 116, 125–126; and membership in Spanish

Index

empire, 9, 10, 15, 18, 19, 62–63, 73, 92, 98, 108, 116, 125–126; and membership in Texcocan/ Acolhua empire, 2, 4, 7, 49, 56, 60–62, 71, 90, 115, 123, 137n7, 137n11; Mexica settlement in, 36–40, 45, 115, 141n20; migration to, 25–31; place glyph of, 41, 63, 139n14; population loss in, 5, 88, 105–106, 108, 109, 110, 118; poverty of, 88, 103; prestige of, 71, 91–92, 103, 105, 106, 115, 129, 130; rulers of, 67, 76–78, 100, 104–117 passim, 126; sacred associations of, 27–28, 32, 51, 69, 129; and Spanish conquest, 73, 76; Spanish rule in, 117, 124; sujetos of, 4–5, 90, 91, 122, 125, 131, 137n9, 142n22; temple of, 2, 36, 41, 58, 59, 63–65, 67, 71, 91, 104–105, 115, 128; and the Tepanec War, 51–56, 69; Toltec associations of, 27, 44, 48, 114, 128; tribute obligations of, 88, 103, 106, 110, 118–119, women in, 60, 69, 93, 110 Tepechpan Painter A, 10, 16–17, 94–119 passim, 127–130; Acolhua influence on, 42, 44; agenda of, 23, 33, 42, 51, 76, 84; colonial history of, 71, 73–92; and date of contribution, 17; imperial history of, 51–71; and Mexica historic tradition, 44– 45, 47, 49, 92; pre-imperial history of, 23–50; style of work of, 16–17, 74, 141n9; and Tepanec War, 51–52, 56; and Texcoco, 49, 53, 62, 90, 116, 123, 124, 126 Tepechpan Painter B, 16, 17, 93– 102, 103, 116, 117, 142n9 Tepechpan Painter C, 16, 17–18, 102–106, 110, 113, 142n16 Tepechpan Painter D, 16, 18, 103, 106–110, 113, 142n20 Tepetlacalco, 120–121, 143n8 Tepetlaoztoc, 28, 102 Tepexpan, 2. See also Tepechpan Tepeyac, 142n8 tepotzicpalli, 33, 40, 45, 46, 49, 83, 84. See also throne Tepotzotlan, 120–121 Tequisistlan, 115 Tetentetl, 44 Texcoco, 3, 6, 9, 46, 56, 42, 61–62,

159

104, 115, 123, 134; and Aztec empire, 2, 67; cabildo of, 81, 91–92; civility of, 127–128; foundation of, 32, 122–123; rulers of, 28–29, 32, 81, 121, 129; sources associated with, 6, 29, 40, 44, 62, 67, 127; and Spanish conquest, 75, 94–96, 127; subjects of, 2, 4; temple of, 63, 64, 65–67, 75, 128; relations of, with Tenochtitlan, 2–4, 51, 53, 56, 127, 128; and Tepanec War, 53–54 Tezcatlipoca, 38, 66, 128 Tezcatzonco, 122 Tezozomoc, 53, 61–62, 70 Thirteen Reed, 31, 32, 42, 47, 59 Thomas, Nicholas, 129 throne, woven reed, 33, 36, 40, 41, 43, 51, 58, 80, 81, 82, 114, 126, 141n12. See also tepotzicpalli tilma, 25, 28–30, 32, 38, 40, 45, 46, 47, 77, 78, 102, 104, 107, 111. See also mantle, cotton time, 15, 16, 23, 26, 116 tira, 13, 14 Tira de Tepechpan: alphabetic annotations of, 13–14, 18–19, 21, 41, 61, 105, 113–124, 133–136; audience of, 13, 20–21; bias in, 1, 125; calendar used in, 14–15; and chronology of creation, 1, 8, 13–14, 16–19; as colonial discourse, 9–10; as community history, 10, 21, 126; and context of creation, 5, 7, 9, 19; contributors to, 1, 7–21 passim, 125, 126, 131; copies of, 19, 20, 77, 138n6– 7, 139n15; dual registers of, 1, 8, 23, 49, 53, 101, 107; format of, 1, 13–15, 138n4; function of, 7, 13, 19, 20, 21, 90, 131; historical manipulations in, 1–2, 7; history of, 19–21; as hybrid document, 9–10; and lawsuit with Temascalapa, 90; owners of, 7, 13, 14, 19–20; as palimpsest, 7–8, 13, 19; patrons of, 7, 102, 103, 125, 126, 131; strategies of, 125–131; theoretical approach to, 8–10 títulos primordiales, 88, 124. See also primordial titles Tizoc, 60, 63, 80, 84, 140n12

160

Tizoyuca, 5, 121 Tlacateotl, 53–54 Tlacopan, 2, 3, 56. See also Tacuba Tlacotzin, Juan Velázquez, 79, 95, 141n12 tlacuilo, 16, 137n1, 140n12 tlahuiztli, 97 Tlaloc, 66, 67, 128 Tlalpan province, 126 Tlatelolco, 3, 53–54, 56, 63, 64, 71, 75, 104, 120–121, 125, 129 tlatoani (pl. tlatoque), 2, 4, 5, 26, 40–47 passim, 70, 71, 75, 77, 83, 99–100, 102, 103, 108, 114, 117, 121, 134 Tlaxcala, 61, 75, 79, 83, 86, 87, 95, 127, 129, 130 tlaxicalli, 2 Tlotzin, 122–123 Tocayocan, 120–121, 143n10 Tollan, 43 Toltec bloodline, 33–34, 37, 44 Toltecs, 23, 27, 30, 38, 41, 49 Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl, 139n13. See also Quetzalcoatl Torquemada, Juan de, 37, 102, 106 Totolapan, San Guillermo, 108 Townsend, Richard, 26, 27 Toxcatl festival 73 Tozpanxochitl, 35, 38 Tozquentzin, 41, 43, 114, 133 tribute, 4–5, 9, 38, 62, 69, 86, 87, 88, 93, 95, 103–110 passim, 118, 130, 131, 137n12, 143n8; collection of, 15; exemptions from, 6, 97 Triple Alliance, 2, 4, 29, 56. See also Aztec Empire Tula, 23 turquoise, 30 turquoise diadem, 25, 28–51 passim, 58, 59, 60, 77–84 passim, 126, 128, 141n12 Two House, 42 Two Reed, 35, 36, 37, 45, 58, 69 typhus, 87 Unos anales coloniales de Tlatelolco, 106 uprisings, indigenous, 93, 96–98. See also rebellions Uriah, 61 Valdés, Felipe de, 118, 136


Valencia, Fray Martín de, 116 Valley of Mexico, 2, 3, 10, 20, 23, 28, 51, 63, 73, 87, 122–123 vara, 105 Vargas, Ynes de, 137n9 Velasco, Luis de, 80, 82, 104, 107, 126, 142n16 Velasco II, Luis de, 107 Velazco, Salvador, 61 viceroy, 76, 80, 84, 98–108 passim, 117 Virgin of Guadalupe, 142n8 vista de tierras, 109 Waldeck, Jean, 19, 20, 138n3–4 war, 2, 6, 74, 125, 135; ideogram for, 51, 98. See also conquest warriors: Acolhua, 53, 54; Aztec, 97; indigenous, 94, 96–98; Mexica, 34–35, 36, 37, 38, 43; Tepanec, 52, 53, 54, 139n1 women: political role of, 44, 115, 140n9; representations of, 31, 35, 59 writing, 7. See also alphabetic writing; Aztec pictorial writing Xaltocan, 3, 34–36, 37, 122–123 x-chair, 77, 80. See also chair; curule chair; hip-joint chair Xicomoyahual, 32, 33, 35 Xihuitl Temoc, 48 xihuitzolli, 25, 28–31, 38, 45, 49, 52. See also turquoise diadem Xilotepec, 126 Xipe Totec, 33 Xiuhcac, 44 Xochimilco, 3, 38, 137n12 Xochipilli, 97, 135 Xochiquentzin, Pablo, 79, 81–82, 141n12 Xochtzin, 58, 59, 60–62, 70, 71 year disks, changes in color of, 25, 26, 40, 42, 47, 52, 58, 59, 100, 104, 107, 142n10 years, Christian, 126 Yolloxochitl, Don Diego, 77, 83, 84, 135 Zacualtitlan, 120–121 Zumárraga, Juan de, 77, 98, 101– 102, 103, 118, 135, 142n8 Zúñiga, Alvaro Manrique de, 107

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