Page 563 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

been defeated. The glyph for the place, which
geographically lay close to a body of water, and a
glyph for heaven with curls of flowers and reeds
separate the first from the second sections. In the
second section the bearded god 2 Wind, perhaps
Quetzalcoatl-Ehecatl himself, dives from heaven
onto a priest with tusks, while i Grass (indicated
by his headdress shaped like the head of a macaw)
and 3 Lizard (whose head and arm are all that are
visible) make an offering to him. 3 Lizard and the
tusked priest are seated on the symbol of the rain
god, which separates the second section from the
third. The third section is dedicated to the year 9
Rain. The god is portrayed with reeds, flowers,
and feathers emerging from his hands and
streams of water from his mouth and with a
female head and right arm symbolizing the fertil-
ity of that year. This section is separated from the
following one by the glyph for water and two
symmetrical tufts of grass.
The fourth section is dedicated to the year
2 House and the noble 2 Grass seated on the glyph
for Tlaloc and two alligators, perhaps the top-
onyms of the place where 2 Grass settled. The
fifth section is dedicated to the year 2 Reed (?) as
well as the conversation between the tusked priest
shown above and an Aztec king or noble (as indi-
cated by the classic xiuhuitzolli headdress) on the
predella of an altar. The sixth section shows the
rain god, who scatters his beneficial waters on a
house, alternating with the warm rays of the sun
placed at the base of the section. The roof of a
palace with its roof ornaments separates and pro-
tects i Rabbit; the latter, having shed his battle
clothes, sits on the glyph for the year 4 Rain and
receives an offering from a person of rank.
The stories recounted on the back of this atlatl
are, unlike those on other Aztec ceremonial
atlatls, more historical than ritual in nature. This
fact, along with the frequent symbols for the year
in distinct Mixtec style, the indication of the
characters by their calendar names, and the liveli-
ness of the carving and the gilding, suggest that
this atlatl is the work of a Mixtec artist who was
familiar with Aztec taste.
Nothing is known of its history before 1902
when the founder of the Museo di Antropologia e
Etnologia of the University of Florence, Paolo
Mantegazza, bought it along with a second atlatl
from a Mr. Tosi, "merchant in artistic objects in
Florence/' for 500 lire, an enormous sum at that
time. The two atlatls were kept in a late seven- 385
teenth- or early eighteenth-century leather case were the warriors of Huitzilopochtli, the god of
and had been in the possession of "an old family EAGLE WARRIOR the sun and of war. The eagle was a symbol of the
resident in Florence for some time" whose name Aztec sun, whose enclosure was found in the excava-
the antiquarian refused to divulge (Florence ms. earthenware and plaster tions at the northern end of the Great Temple
n.d.). Research carried out by Sara Ciruzzi (1983) lyo x 118 x 55 (66 /s x 46^/2 x 2i /s) in Mexico-Tenochtitlan. Two life-size sculptures
5
7
in the state archives of Florence on the inventories reference: Nicholson 1983, #5 representing these warriors were found on
of the Medici Guardaroba and Armory yielded no either side of the main door of this enclosure, on
information, thus providing no support for the CNCA—INAH— MEX, Museo Templo Mayor, benches decorated with serpents and warriors
Medici collection provenance proposed by D. Mexico City in procession.
Bushnell (1905). L.L.-M. The eagle warriors and the jaguar warriors were Each of the sculptures is formed of four sec-
the elite soldiers of Aztec society. The former tions. The first is the head, where, in the present
562 CIRCA 1492