Serpents, Skeletons, and Ancestors?: The Tula Coatepantli Revisited

Abstract

Since Acosta's work in the 1940s, relief carvings of serpents entwined with partially skeletonized personages on the coatepantli at Tula have frequently been identified as images of the Nahua Venus deity, Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli. Comparing these Toltec sculptures with this deity's iconography in Late Postclassic to Colonial period manuscripts, however, provides no support for this identification. Based on the northern Mesoamerican cultural connections of the Toltecs, the author suggests parallels between the coatepantli reliefs and the public display of ancestral and sacrificial human remains at Chalchihuites sites. Identification of the coatepantli figures as venerated ancestors from an ancestral cult is also supported by iconographic and archaeological evidence from Tula. Parallels to the coatepantli images in depictions of both living elites and ancestors juxtaposed with serpents from other Mesoamerican art traditions bolster this interpretation. On the basis of the evidence, the author hypothesizes that the skeletonized figures at Tula symbolize deceased kings and honored warriors rather than conquered foes.

CERAMIC ROOF ORNAMENTS (ALMENAS) FROM CIHUATAN, EL SALVADOR: CONTEXTS, DESCRIPTIONS, AND INFERENCES FROM OTHER SITES

“…Regarding those “examples” of merlons shaped like the letter “G,” Jimenez (2010:Photo 70, also see Photo 69; following Acosta 1956:79) specifically identifies an example “in the shape of a cut conch-shell.” This is 75 cm tall, 68 cm wide and 8 cm thick. This also is the shape of the individual elements of the linear roof ornament on the 35 m long serpent wall, or Coatepantli, at Tula (Jimenez 2010:Photo 59; see Jordan 2013). This structure is located parallel to the north side of Pyramid B (Baez 2008:10, Figure 5).…”

“…Séjourné (2002:134, Figures 31, 40, 58, 67) illustrates examples from Cempoala, Chichen Itza, and seems to include a wall from “Tula-Hidalgo” in this category. The example from Chichen Itza (Séjourné 2002:139, Figure 67) is depicted as an ornamental line on the crest at the top of a structure's roof-comb and Séjourné’s “wall” appears to be the linear roof ornament on the Coatepantli at Tula (see Jordan 2013), an ornament discussed above.…”

Exchange Systems in Late Postclassic Mesoamerica: Comparing Open and Restricted Markets at Tlaxcallan, Mexico, and Santa Rita Corozal, Belize

“…At Tizatlan, the west altar depicts Tezcatlipoca, a god associated with merit and the value of persons regardless of ascribed status, and the Tlaltecuhtli-Tzitzimimeh complex, which references droughts, epidemics, war, death, and destruction (Caso 1927; López Corral et al 2019:345). The east altar depicts Tlahuizcalpantecuhtli and Xiucoatl, indicating themes of sacrifice, captives (defeated warriors), and war (Caso 1927; Jordan 2013:248). The Ocotelulco mural shows the birth of Tezcatlipoca surrounded by the Tlaltecuhtli-Tzitzimimeh complex (Contreras 1992; López Corral et al 2019:345).…”