Because this book is primarily concerned with the chronological interpretation of events in the life of Lord Eight Wind of Suchixtlan, it is helpful to clarify those major historical personages with whom he interacted, or whose later lives he influenced, some of whom were his descendants. This book is about Mixtec manuscripts and the people who wrote them. It is thus reasonable to let the books themselves speak to us, insofar as is possible.
The following data are from the Mixtec codices themselves, generally in the sequence presented in those documents, with modern calendar equivalent dates added to allow us to make historical sense of them from our perspective. Commentary is minimal for the most part, but sometimes I cannot restrain myself. Perhaps interested persons, whether general reader or scholar, will be moved to acquire photographic copies of the codices for private study and, yes, enjoyment. Many are available on the Internet, particularly at the FAMSI Web site, and excellent photo facsimiles can be obtained from the Akademische Druck- u., Verlagsanstalt, Graz, Austria. Whether one reads them or not, they remain great visual art, with vivid imagery that can be appreciated by the historian, art historian, artist, anthropologist, archaeologist, and the merely curious. After all, Dover Press kept Zelia Nuttall’s artist-copied edition of the codex named for her and Lord Zouche in print for years not because anyone was actually reading it, but because it is great art.
Of the following biographies, the only extensive one is that of Lord Eight Deer Jaguar Claw, the Usurper of Tilantongo. Although not of direct royal descent, he became the most powerful ruler in the land. Instead of being destroyed and written out of the pages of Mixtec history, he is remembered with pride. He was glorious, ambitious, intelligent, insightful, culturally reforming (apparently he committed the cultural heresy of banishing the all-powerful Oracle of the Dead at Chalcatongo), conniving, treacherous, unstoppable, the founder of Tilantongo’s second dynasty—in short, a politician worthy of Julius Caesar, and a military leader worthy of Napoleon.
After his assassination in AD 1115, his descendants (he had several wives) were welcomed because everyone wanted to be related to Eight Deer the Great. Even those who had every reason to hate him married his daughters (Selden 8-IV, 9-I). Although mentioned in every major Mixtec codex, Lord Eight Deer’s biography is the exclusive subject of Codex Zouche-Nuttall reverse and comprises at least half of the Codex Alfonso Caso fragments. The biography provides us not only with Eight Deer’s mighty deeds, but also insight into the Mixtecs’ use of their indigenous calendar. Each part of Eight Deer’s life in Codex Zouche-Nuttall appears with dates in the 365-day solar year. Whereas the War from Heaven events, which transpired in the time of the precedent Lord Eight Wind Twenty of Suchixtlan, are mysterious and even vague, resisting interpretation, many of those in Lord Eight Deer Jaguar Claw’s biography are not. Many days recorded in the 260-day sacred calendar for Eight Deer events are obvious calendric sequences. An example of this occurs on ZN page 75, where Eight Deer and his heroic companions travel across the water to conquer the Place Where the Sky Is Held Up; in other words, Eight Deer and his companions enter the sky where Lord Nine Wind Quetzalcoatl first lifted it above the earth. The three day dates are sequential, and our conclusion is obvious: the journey across the water, or the battle to conquer the place, took three days. Besides providing a complete schematic outline of the Eight Deer biography on ZN pages 42–84, every day recorded therein is considered in the appendix, and the sequences marked.
Lord Two Rain Twenty Jaguars, the last king of Tilantongo’s first royal dynasty, is the man whom Eight Deer replaced. He was born Seven Reed, had his name changed to the more auspicious one of Two Rain (to no avail), sponsored a disastrous war against Tilantongo’s lineage ally Jaltepec at age six, and died (some say by “assisted” suicide) at age twenty-one. He was unmarried and left no descendants; however, he did leave something very useful—an empty throne. The enterprising Eight Deer Jaguar Claw used that vacancy as his road to ultimate power and everlasting fame.
Lady Six Monkey, the Warrior Princess of Jaltepec and the queen of Hua Chino (Red and White Bundle), also survives as a compelling historical personage. Her biography in Codex Selden is a detailed one. After the six-year-old Lord Two Rain Twenty Jaguars of Tilantongo sponsored an attack against her town of Jaltepec, she sought redress from the oracle of Chalcatongo, severed the marriage alliance with Tilantongo with the oracle’s connivance, and married Lord Eleven Wind, the king of Tilantongo’s rival polity, Hua Chino. She gave him two illustrious sons, the princes Four Wind and One Alligator. Eight Deer Jaguar Claw executed her and her husband in AD 1101–1102, when he settled the war begun years before by Lord Two Rain Tilantongo. Their son, Four Wind, is the suspected assassin of Lord Eight Deer Jaguar Claw, and surely the man who replaced him. His brother, One Alligator, ruled his mother’s polity, Jaltepec, and both brothers married Eight Deer’s daughters, the princesses of Tilantongo. Four Wind (the great-grandson of our protagonist Lord Eight Wind of Suchixtlan) married several wives, lived into his seventies, and produced a line of descent still ruling when Pedro de Alvarado marched into Oaxaca in AD 1521. The Lienzo de Zacatepec mentions Lord Four Wind from the “long ago time” as a founder of the Zacatepec dynasty.
Lady Six Monkey’s document is Codex Selden, the tonindeye of Jaltepec. It is interesting not only for content. A palimpsest written over an older manuscript, and unfolding through twenty pages from bottom to top, it is from the early Spanish Colonial era. Considering the animosity between Tilantongo and Jaltepec, it is not surprising to discover Lord Eight Deer mentioned in it only as the father of the two Tilantongo princesses married by Six Monkey’s sons, the princes Four Wind and One Alligator. Virtually every other major Mixtec manuscript features Eight Deer with prominence: Vindobonensis Mexicanus I reverse records Eight Deer’s expanded lineage, Zouche-Nuttall reverse (outlined below) is Eight Deer’s political biography (and he is mentioned on the obverse as well), and he also appears in Bodley obverse and reverse, and the Codex Alfonso Caso (Colombino-Becker I fragments).
Abbreviations used in the following schematics are:
ZN |
Zouche-Nuttall |
Sel |
Selden |
Bod |
Bodley |
Becker-I |
Alfonso Caso (listed only as its fragment in the Vienna Library) |
con |
Conquest |
These schematics and small essays are: (1) a historical concordance of the three heroes, (2) the biography of Lord Eight Deer Jaguar Claw, (3) the biography of Lord Two Rain Twenty Jaguars of Tilantongo, (4) and the biography of Lady Six Monkey of Jaltepec/Hua Chino. Finally, appendices II and III deal with chronological sequences in the 260-day calendar as tables.
I. Historical Concordance of the Three Heroes
(For the sake of space, numerals in personal names are expressed as such.)
AD 1008. Lord 8 Wind of Suchixtlan + Lady 10 Deer. Their two daughters are the Princesses 2 Snake and 9 Wind.
♀2 Snake + ♂10 Flower Tilantongo. Their sons are ♂12 Lizard Tilantongo and ♂10 Eagle Tilantongo.
AD 1041. ♂10 Eagle + ♀9 Wind Jaltepec. Their daughter is ♀6 Monkey, born AD 1073.
AD 1043. ♂12 Lizard Tilantongo + ♀4 Flint and ♀4 Alligator. A son of the marriage is ♂5 Motion, who marries ♀2 Grass. Their son ♂2 Rain is born AD 1075.
AD 1063. Birth of ♂8 Deer Jaguar Claw the Usurper.
AD 1073. Birth of ♀6 Monkey Jaltepec.
AD 1075. Birth of ♂2 Rain Tilantongo.
AD 1081. ♂2 Rain conferences with ♂8 Wind Suchixtlan’s mummy. ♂2 Rain attacks Jaltepec.
AD 1083. The meeting at Chalcatongo: ♂8 Deer, ♀6 Monkey Jaltepec, ♂11 Wind Hua Chino.
AD 1083. ♂8 Deer at Tututepec.
AD 1091. ♀6 Monkey Jaltepec + ♂11 Wind Hua Chino.
AD 1092. Birth of ♂4 Wind Hua Chino.
AD 1095. Birth of ♂1 Alligator Hua Chino.
AD 1096. ♂2 Rain Tilantongo dies/suicides.
AD 1100. ♂8 Deer conferences with ♂2 Rain’s mummy.
AD 1101. ♂8 Deer destroys Hua Chino, executes ♀6 Monkey and ♂11 Wind, but spares their sons 4 Wind and 1 Alligator.
AD 1102. ♂8 Deer executes ♂11 Wind Hua Chino’s sons 10 Dog and 6 House.
AD 1102. ♂1 Alligator rules Jaltepec.
AD 1103. ♂8 Deer marries ♀13 Snake Hua Chino.
AD 1105. ♂8 Deer marries ♀6 Eagle Chalcatongo.
AD 1115. ♂8 Deer is sacrificed.
This begins the biography of Lord 8 Deer Jaguar Claw, the king of Tilantongo, as told by the Mixtec codices Zouche-Nuttall reverse, Bodley, Selden, and the Alfonso Caso fragments (Colombino-Becker I).
Figure AI.1. Codex Zouche-Nuttall page 45 (British Museum folio no. 50). Lord Eight Deer at Tututepec. From right to left: Column a, two conquests; Column b, a conquest, then Eight Deer’s cave empowerment ceremony; Column c, a ballcourt ceremony; Column d, sacrifice at Star Temple, Tututepec. (© Trustees of the British Museum, The British Museum Company, Ltd.)
Figure AI.2. Codex Zouche-Nuttall page 75 (British Museum folio no. 80), introduction to the Battle in the Sky. (© Trustees of the British Museum, The British Museum Company, Ltd.)
Figure AI.3. Codex Selden 3135 (A.2), page 6. (Sociedad Mexicana de Antropología, Mexico, 1964)
Codex Selden is the primary document for Lady Six Monkey’s biography, but she also appears in Bodley, Zouche-Nuttall, and Alfonso Caso. In my classes, I refer to Codex Selden as a glorious fascination. Page 5-III illustrates the founding of the second dynasty at Jaltepec by a woman named Nine Wind. She is the daughter of Lord Eight Wind and Lady Ten Deer of Suchixtlan. Lady Nine Wind is actually shown conducting a royal bundle ceremony before the temple at Jaltepec—usually a male ruler’s prerogative. She then marries a relative from Tilantongo, a royal prince named Lord Ten Eagle, who was the son of Lord Ten Flower and Lady Two Snake. The first three children of this marriage, all sons, are sacrificed at Chalcatongo, but the fourth child, Lady Six Monkey, lives. She is apparently under the tutelage of an oracular priest named Lord Ten Lizard, who is, presumably, a functionary of Chalcatongo. This priest is her guide in important events, especially those leading up to Lady Six Monkey’s betrothal to the lord of Hua Chino, Eleven Wind.
The bundle ceremony by Six Monkey’s mother, Lady Nine Wind, is interesting because it gives the reader the impression that it rectifies or revalidates an earlier ceremony conducted at the end of the first Jaltepec dynasty. The first dynasty of Jaltepec failed for unspecified reasons soon after that bundle event. A king of Jaltepec’s first dynasty, Lord Ten Reed, was involved in a series of bundle events prior to his dynasty’s failure. Codex Selden (3-I–IV) shows two priests named Ten Lizard and Three Flower making two bundles suffixed with the bar numbers for “twenty.” Then, also in the presence of Lord Ten Reed, a priest named Ten Flint conducts a bundle ceremony. In the final two registers of Selden page 3, Lord Ten Reed either makes a bundle or opens it. Although Alfonso Caso interprets the contents as gifts for royals, they appear to be specifically bundle-related and are twenty objects in number, presented in strict order in groups of two: twelve in the first group, eight in the second. Lord Ten Reed’s son Three Rain conducts a bundle event just before the record of his dynasty ends.
These objects in Ten Reed’s bundle are: a copper axe, a stone-blade axe, two ropes, a cup of blood, a cup holding a heart, a red circular object, a white circular object, an incense bag, a cup holding an unidentified substance, and a kind of eagle-down purse attached to head and arm. Then, in the second group, an eagle head, a red and white eagle head, two jaguars on scaffolds, a regular eagle on a scaffold, a red and white eagle on a scaffold, a spear and shield with ñuu head, and then the bundle itself with ñuu head atop it. The white figures outlined in red give the impression of spirits or ghosts.
Fourteen places with seventeen rulers follow this bundle event. Lord Ten Reed rules at two places, which are not Jaltepec; then he conducts a ceremony before an unidentified temple and marries Lady Two Snake (the daughter of Lord Five Flower and Lady Five Flower). This union produces a son instead of a daughter. His name is Lord Three Rain. He conducts a bundle ceremony before the temple at Jaltepec and then marries Lady Seven Death, daughter of Lord One Snake and Lady Eight Flint. At this point, the first dynasty of Jaltepec ends.
As mentioned, the second dynasty of Jaltepec’s first ruler is a woman named Nine Wind. Her marriage with Lord Ten Eagle of Tilantongo produces at first three sons, who are sacrificial victims at Chalcatongo. Only their fourth child, Lady Six Monkey, lives. From the time of her parents, there is emphasis on Jaltepec’s relationship/alliance with Chalcatongo and its female oracle of the dead.
The bold implication of the data is that the first dynasty of Jaltepec failed because its final ruler was male. The second dynasty of Jaltepec continued by sacrificing preceding male children in favor of a royal female named Six Monkey.
The following is a summary of the events told in Codex Selden pages 1 through 9-II. It covers both the first and second dynasties of Jaltepec because data revealed in the first are relevant to Lady Six Monkey’s biography.
Page 1-I. Year 4 or 5 Reed Day 2 House. Year 4 Reed would be AD 951, year 5 Reed AD 939. Year 6 Reed would be AD 979. The page is damaged, and reading of the inscribed date is insecure, so there is a twenty-eight-year margin of error because of image erosion.
In the sky: the gods 1 Motion and 1 Death. A reed dart opens a hill, and from it is born Lord 11 Water. He goes to a place called Effigy Head in a Cave and marries Lady 7 Eagle there.
Page 1-II. Their child is Lady 10 Eagle, who marries Lord 4 Eagle. His parents are Lord 10 House and Lady 1 Grass from Serpent River. The child of this marriage between 10 Eagle and 4 Eagle is Lady 8 Rabbit.
Page 1-III. Two elderly priests, Lords 10 Lizard and 10 Flint Earth Monster Mouth, confer at a lake in which there is a bird’s head, a reed bundle, and a copper axe. These two priests then consult with the lineage couple of Apoala: Lady 9 Alligator and her husband, Lord 5 Wind from the Sky.
Page 2-I. Year 10 Reed Day 2 Grass. AD 983? This column of pictogram text presents a complicated tableau. Presided over by the two priests, Lords 10 Lizard and 10 Flint, the Birth Tree at Apoala produces Lord 2 Grass, who is the intended husband of Lady 8 Rabbit (1-II). Six other males are born from the tree: the Lords 1 Eagle River Hair, 3 Water Maguey Hair, 5 Rabbit Vulture Hair, 5 Motion Eagle Hair, 5 Lizard Rain God, and 5 Eagle Rain God. Three connected objects qualify these births. Reading from top to bottom, they are: a bird in a bowl, a turtle-serpent in a bowl, and a personified flint knife with rope held by a hand.
Page 2-II. Year 10 Reed Day 4 Deer. AD 983? This year is the same as previously inscribed on page 2-I; however, the days have changed. The interval between Day 2 Grass and Day 4 Deer is fifteen days. Therefore, fifteen days transpires between the two events. The second event is the marriage of Lord 2 Grass to Lady 8 Rabbit, the child of Lord 4 Eagle and Lady 10 Eagle, previously mentioned.
Page 3-I. The child of this marriage is Lord 10 Reed Eagle Blood.
Year 2 Flint Day 3 Rain, AD 988: In this year, two priests named 10 Snake and 3 Flower make a bundle each. There are four black bars signifying the number 20 beneath the second bundle.
Page 3-II. The third priest, 10 Flint Earth Monster Mouth, offers a tobacco-pouring ceremony before six objects. Reading from right to left, these objects are:
a ñuu bundle,
a kind of bundle composed of three objects, spotted like jaguar skin, sitting in a cup horizontally divided by two reeds attached to the three objects by a rope,
a rectangle of seven planks,
a rectangle of five tree trunks,
a grass-like serpent,
and a large cauldron container filled with hot red rocks.
This is presided over by Lord 10 Reed, seated at the foot of a temple.
Page 3-III–4-III. Year 5 Reed Day 6 Death. AD 991. Lord 10 Reed before twenty connected objects divided into two groups. This bundle-related ceremony is witnessed or attended by several lords from different places.
Page 4-III. Year 9 House Day 7 Eagle. AD 1021. Lord 10 Reed conducts a ceremony before a temple.
Page 5-I. Year 12 Flint Day 7 Deer. AD 1024. Lord 10 Reed marries Lady 2 Lizard Star Foot. She is the daughter of Lord 5 Flower and Lady 5 Flower of Flower Tree Hill.
Page 5-II. The child of this marriage is Lord 3 Rain. He offers incense before the bundle at Jaltepec Temple. Lord 3 Rain marries Lady 7 Death, the child of Lord 1 Snake and Lady 9 Flint of Star River Hill. The first dynasty of Jaltepec ends here.
Page 5-III. Lord 8 Wind Twenty and Lady 10 Deer of Suchixtlan. Their daughter is Lady 9 Wind, who offers incense before the bundle at Jaltepec Temple.
Page 5-IV. Year 3 House Day 10 Deer. AD 1041. Lady 9 Wind marries Lord 10 Eagle of Tilantongo. He is the child of Lord 10 Deer and Lady 10 Flower. Their first son, Lord 1 Reed Ball Court, dies by sacrifice at Chalcatongo.
Page 6-I. Their second child, Lord 12 Water, dies by sacrifice at Chalcatongo. Their third child, Lord 3 Water, dies by sacrifice at Chalcatongo. Year 9 House Day 8 Vulture. AD 1073. Their fourth child, Lady 6 Monkey, confers with a priest named 10 Lizard at Chalcatongo. Male children having been sacrificed at Chalcatongo, female rule continues at Jaltepec in the person of 6 Monkey. The political relationship between Jaltepec and Chalcatongo is also the subject of these tableaux.
Page 6-II. Year 4 House Day 4 Wind. AD 1081. Tilantongo attacks Jaltepec during the reign of the boy-king 2 Rain. The leader of the Tilantongo forces, Lord 3 Lizard, suffers defeat, and thus Tilantongo loses the war. Lord 2 Rain consults a ritual object in a cave.
Page 6-III. Year 5(6) Reed Day 6 Snake. AD 1083. Priest 10 Lizard and Lady 6 Monkey consult Lord 6 Vulture. Lady 6 Monkey journeys underground.
Page 6-IV. She emerges at Chalcatongo, where she and Lord 11 Wind of Hua Chino consult with the oracle Lady 9 Grass. Six ritual objects are shown in the remainder of this register.
Page 7-I. Six more ritual objects are listed, including an ornamented chile pepper. Year 10 Reed Day 10 Wind. AD 1087. Seven people, two of them women, dance around an ancestor bundle. Year 12 House Day 7 Flower. AD 1089. The nuptial bath of Lady 6 Monkey and Lord 11 Wind.
Page 7-II. Nine gifts (seven garments and two fans) are listed in order. Year 13 Rabbit Day 9 Snake. AD 1090. The priest 10 Lizard presents gifts to Lords 2 Flower and 3 Alligator.
Page 7-III. Led by Lord 3 Alligator, Lord 2 Flower bears Lady 6 Monkey on a journey. On the way, they are insulted by Lords 6 Lizard and 2 Alligator.
Page 7-IV. Lady 6 Monkey consults with the oracle of Chalcatongo, Lady 9 Grass, who presents her with the implements of war and soldiers.
Page 8-I. Lady 6 Monkey attacks and captures Lord 6 Lizard and Lord 2 Alligator at Wasp Hill. She sacrifices Lord 2 Alligator before the temple at Jaltepec.
Page 8-II. Carried by Lord 2 Flower, Lady 6 Monkey journeys to Hua Chino. Lord 3 Alligator leads her other captive, Lord 6 Lizard, to that place. She sacrifices 6 Lizard before the temple.
Page 8-III. Before Lord 2 Flower, Lady 6 Monkey receives a new garment, and thus a new name: War Garment. Lady 6 Monkey and Lord 11 Wind rule Hua Chino.
At this point, Codex Selden fails to mention the fact that Lord 8 Deer of Tilantongo subsequently executes 6 Monkey and 11 Wind in AD 1101–1102.
The following is a schematic of Codex Selden’s biography of Lady 6 Monkey.
The importance of Lady Six Monkey’s biography is therefore demonstrated in her son, Lord Four Wind, who by uniting the royal bloodlines of Jaltepec (Lord Eight Wind at Suchixtlan/Cerro Jasmin), Hua Chino (descended from Hill of the Wasp), and Lord Eight Deer at Tilantongo constituted the sine qua non of royal descent in the Mixteca. Adding to this impeccable lineage, Lord Four Wind is shown in Codex Bodley pursued by Lord Eight Deer’s Tolteca/Chichimeca sponsor, Lord Four Jaguar, until he receives the nose piercing and ornament of a Toltec techutli and alliance, as did Eight Deer himself. From the birth of Lord Eight Wind in AD 935 until this marriage between Lord Four Wind and Lady Ten Flower Tilantongo, 189 years had elapsed.
