#cipactli

In the primordial waters swam a creature, a goddess, in the form of a monstrous caiman-fish beast. The gods Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl decided that the liquid world should be inhabited by land and people, and so they sought to use the beast as a catalyst. In one version they transform into snakes and wrap around her body, splitting her into the sky and earth, and in another version Tezcatlipoca dangles his foot into the water as bait, the two then mangling her body to form the earth and its various landscapes. She awaits, maw agape, for blood sacrifice; to return blood and flesh to the ground is to return food and shelter to the people. In some art she is shown instead as a male, and is referenced as such, while in others she is female, and rarely it is mentioned that she is both at the same time.

Pantheon: Aztec

Domain or Function: Body is destroyed and used to form the earth, provides fertile soil and favorable conditions when sacrificed to.

Alternate Names: Tlalteotl, Tlalcihuatl

Character Traits: A monstrous beast who requires blood sacrifice, giving back to those who give to her.

Visual Traits: Depicted often as a monster with traits of a caiman, fish, or frog. She has skulls on her limbs and a gaping mouth of teeth, sometimes with hair, a skull-bones skirt, and blood or a flint knife in her mouth. In some depictions she has maize growing out of her back.

Symbolism: Caiman, flint, blood, maize.