Page:Mexican Archæology.djvu/68

42 with the game tlaxtli. Xochiquetzal was the especial patroness of weaving and embroidery, of which arts she was the supposed inventor. The male equivalent to this goddess was Xochipilli, god of flowers, dance, song and games (PL V, ). He is figured with the high crest of the coxcoxtli bird on his head, a white butterfly painted on his mouth, and occasionally with the tear face-paint. He appears to have been introduced from the Xelhua district on the Oaxaca border, and in one of his manifestations was known by the calendrical name of Macuil Xochitl (Five Flower), in which case he bears a hand painted across his mouth (a constant feature of gods into whose name the number five enters). He was further regarded as identical with, or as the son of, Pilzintecutli, a sun-god, who again was thought to be the son of Mictlantecutli, the lord of the underworld. During recent excavations in Mexico city, a stone figure of Xochipilli was found with a large number of miniature musical instruments in stone and pottery.

Among the gods of fertility must be reckoned those who presided over octli (Fig. 4, f), the intoxicating drink obtained from the maguey (the American aloe, Agave americana). These deities were connected with the harvest, and also bore a relation to the moon; they were regarded as innumerable, a fact explained by an early chronicler as typifying the countless forms of drunkenness, and were spoken of collectively as Centzon Totochtin or the "Four hundred (i.e. innumerable) Rabbits." Many names of these guds have come down to us; they were all regarded as brothers, and it is possible that each one represents a section of the Mexican population, especially as their names seem taken from the names of places. If so their number would point to an early date for the discovery of octli. Tezcatzoncatl is said by some to be the chief, by others Izquitecatl, or again Ome Tochtli, (Two Rabbit, a calendrical name taken from the date of