Note 56 — Chapter III · THE GREAT GODS

In my opinion the early significance of Tezcatlipocâ arises out of his connection with obsidian. This stone had an especial sanctity for the Mexicans, as it provided the sacrificial knives employed by the priests, and we possess good evidence that stone in its fetish form was worshipped even so late as the eighteenth century by the Nahuatl-speaking Chotas, who comprised it in a trinity with the Dawn and the Serpent.56 From a passage in Acosta57 we are justified in assuming that Tezcatlipocâ’s idol was of obsidian, and, like the Quiche god Tohil, mentioned in the Popol Vuh, he wore sandals of obsidian, as is witnessed by one of his representations in Codex Borbonicus, where his footgear is painted with the zigzag line of the obsidian snake.