Tamoanchan
Tamōhuānchān
Name
According to a figurative etymology in the Florentine Codex of Sahagún (bk. 10, ch. 29, para. 14), "Tamoanchan probably means "We go down to our home".[2] The word tamoanchan does not actually come from the
Depiction in codices
When depicted in
The
Historic, earthly location
Besides the mythical Tamoanchan, Mexican historian and scholar of Mesoamerican belief systems Alfredo López Austin identifies several sacred sites that were historical localities associated with Tamoanchan. According to López Austin the three Tamoanchans located on earth were:
1) the Tamoanchan in Cuauhnahuac;
2) Tamoanchan Chalchiuhmomozco mentioned by Chimalpahin Cuauhtlehuanitzin (... where Chalco Amaquemecan was later established); and
3) the Tamoanchan ... mentioned in Sahagún's work."[8]
The first of these was where the first man and woman of the new re-peoplement were created (by Ehecatl), the "new Tamoanchan cave in the Province of Cuernavaca, actually Cuauhnahuac".[9]
The second of these was "a fountain ... in which they saw a goddess and which they called chalchiuhmatlalatl ("blue-green waters of chalchihuite ...") on a small hill next to Iztactepetl and Popocatepetl. ... Tamoanchan Chalchiuhmomozco was so sacred that no one could defecate there. The settlers had to travel four leagues to relieve themselves at a place called Cuitlatepec, or Cuitlatetelco, but, since they were great magicians, they flew there."
The third was the site where "the learned men, ... Tlaltecuin, and Xuchicahuaca, ... invented new sacred books, the count of destiny, the book of years, and the book of dreams."[11]
See also
- Francisco Plancarte y Navarrete
- Mythical place
- Aztlan
- Chicomoztoc
- Mesoamerican creation accounts
Notes
- ^ Mesoamerican mythologies and creation myths in general suppose that there had been worlds previous to this one, which the gods had made and destroyed. The number of such previous worlds varies from tradition to tradition; a common conception among Late Postclassic central Mexican peoples held that there had been four rounds of creation previous to the current one. See Miller and Taube (1993, pp.68–71).
- ^ López Austin (1997, p.283 [18]); see also Ibid., p.54.
- ^ Miller and Taube (1993, p.160)
- ^ Boone (2007, p.269 n.7:58)
- ^ See Miller and Taube (1993, pp.100,160).
- ^ Alfredo López Austin (transl. by Ortiz de Montellano) : Tamoanchan, Tlalocan. University Press of Colorado, 1997. p. 113, Fig. 12k
- ^ Alfredo López Austin (transl. by Ortiz de Montellano) : Tamoanchan, Tlalocan. University Press of Colorado, 1997. p. 116
- ^ López Austin (1997, p.53)
- ^ Historia de los mexicanos por sus pinturas. In :- A. Ma. Garibay K. (ed.) : Teogonía e historia de los mexicanos. México : Editorial Porrúa, 1965. p. 106
- ^ Quotation from López Austin (1997, p.54), who cites Chimalpahin's Memorial breve acerca de la fundación de la ciudad de Culhuacan.
- ^ See López Austin (1997, p.55). See also Ibid., at p.283 [17].