Coatlicue
Also known as: She of the Serpent Skirt, Teteoh Innan
Mythological Narrative
Coatlicue's name means Serpent Skirt. She is the earth mother who devours and brings forth all things: her skirt is woven of braided snakes, her necklace strung with severed hands and human hearts around a skull pendant, her hands and feet clawed. Her head has been cut away, and from the stump of the neck rise two serpents facing one another, their profiles meeting to form her new face. Life and death are two surfaces of one body — the earth that swallows the dead also yields the maize.
Her most famous act is a birth. While sweeping the temple on Coatepec, Serpent Hill, as her duty required, a ball of down feathers drifted from the sky; she tucked it into her bosom and found herself with child. Her daughter Coyolxauhqui, the moon goddess, took the pregnancy as a disgrace and led her four hundred star brothers up the hill to kill their mother. At the moment of the assault, Huitzilopochtli burst from the womb fully armed, cut down his sister, scattered the stars, and saved her.
On 13 August 1790, workers repaving the central plaza of Mexico City dug up an andesite colossus of Coatlicue about 2.57 meters tall; the famous Sun Stone surfaced nearby later that year. Displayed at the Royal University, the statue so unsettled viewers that it was reburied more than once, and only in the nineteenth century did it remain permanently above ground. It now stands in the National Museum of Anthropology, one of the supreme works of Aztec monumental sculpture — its underside, forever pressed against the earth and hidden from human eyes, carries a relief of the earth lord Tlaltecuhtli.
Scholarly Commentary & Evolution
## She of the Serpent Skirt
Coatlicue, meaning "She of the Serpent Skirt," was the primordial **earth mother goddess** of the Aztecs, embodying both the terror and the nurturing power of the earth itself. Her famous statue in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City depicts her with a skirt of writhing serpents, a necklace of human hearts, hands, and skulls, clawed feet, and two serpent heads forming her face - representing the duality of life and death.
## Mother of Gods
Coatlicue was mother to the **Centzon Huitznahua** (the 400 stars of the southern sky), **Coyolxauhqui** (the moon goddess), and most importantly, **Huitzilopochtli** (the sun god). Her children represented the celestial bodies locked in eternal conflict, playing out the daily drama of sunrise as Huitzilopochtli defeated his siblings.
## The Birth at Coatepec
The central myth of Coatlicue tells of her miraculous pregnancy on the sacred mountain **Coatepec** (Serpent Hill). While sweeping the temple as a penitent, a ball of feathers descended from the heavens and she became pregnant. Her 400 sons, led by Coyolxauhqui, viewed this as a disgrace and marched to kill her. At the moment of her death, Huitzilopochtli sprang fully armed from her womb and slaughtered his siblings.
## Earth and Sacrifice
As an earth deity, Coatlicue required nourishment through sacrifice to remain fertile. The Aztecs believed the earth literally consumed the dead, recycling them into new life - hence her terrifying imagery of devoured hearts and severed limbs.
Cross-Pantheon Parallels & Archetypes
Academic Discussion & Critique
Exchange peer-reviewed hypotheses, comparative Indo-European etymologies, and archaeological field interpretations regarding Coatlicue.
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