it succeeded in making his worship universal. The Nahua people regarded the other gods as objects of special devotion, but the worship of Tezcatlipocâ was general.
QUETZALCOATL = “FEATHERED SERPENT”
- Area of Worship: The Plateau of Anahuac.
- Minor Names: Chicunaui eecatl—“Nine Wind.” Ce acatl—“One Reed.”
- Relationship: Son of Iztacmixcoatl and Chimalman or Xochiquetzal; one of the Tzitzimimê.
- Calendar Place: Ruler of the second day-count, eecatl. Ruler of the second week, ce ocelotl. Ninth of the thirteen day-lords.
- Festivals: Ce acatl (movable feast). Atlacahualco.
- Compass Direction: East.
ASPECT AND INSIGNIA
General.—The insignia of Quetzalcoatl is fairly constant in its appearance. He usually wears the Huaxtec cone-shaped hat painted in the design of the jaguar-skin, which is occasionally divided vertically into a black or blue and a red field, having an eye in the middle. The hair is bound by a leather strap set with jewels, which has a conventional bird’s head on the front, and in Codex Borgia consistently shows a black, stepped pattern on a white ground. Elsewhere a bow with rounded ends takes the place of this strap, but in Borgia (sheet 62) the hair is bound up with two intertwined snakes. At the back of the neck a fan-shaped nape-ornament is usually seen, consisting of black feathers, from