Note 21 — Chapter III · THE GREAT GODS

“Historia de los Mexicanos por sus Pinturas.”21—Collecting and summarizing the scattered notices regarding Uitzilopochtli in the above-named work, we find it stated that he was the fourth and youngest son of Tonacatecutli and Tonacaciuatl, his elder brothers being the Red Tezcatlipocâ, the Black Tezcatlipocâ, and Quetzalcoatl. Uitzilopochtli is here also called Omitecatl, “and for another name Magueycoatl (Snake of the Maguey). He was called Ochilobos (the Spanish rendering of Uitzilopochtli) because he was left-handed and was chief god to those of Mexico and their god of war. He was born without flesh but with bones, and thus he remained six hundred years, in which nothing was made, ‘neither the gods nor their father.’ Taking counsel with Quetzalcoatl, they fashioned the sun, then they made a man, Oxomoco, and a woman, Cipactonal, commanding him to till the earth and her to spin and weave, and created other things.”