to another myth, pounded the human bones brought by Quetzalcoatl from the Underworld into a paste, from which men were formed—an allusion to the belief current in Mexico that man was made, or at least “built up,” from maize.25 Sahagun says of her26 that she dispensed adverse fortune, poverty, abjectness, and misery. She was wont to appear to men in the guise of a richly dressed lady, such as frequented the court. Through the night she wandered, howling and bellowing. Occasionally she was seen carrying a cradle, and when she vanished, examination showed that the resting-place of what was believed to be an infant contained nothing but an obsidian knife, such as was used in human sacrifice.27 There are also indications that she presided over childbirth.
TEMPLES
Ciuacoatl had a temple called the Tlillan Calmecac, or “Black College,” where dwelt those priests devoted to her service.28
NATURE AND STATUS
The circumstance that Ciuacoatl appears with the skull of a dead person leads to the conclusion that, besides being an earth-deity, she had phantom or underworld characteristics—a common connection for a grain-goddess. From her hymn we gather that she has a magical influence over the plantation and growth of the maize. She is, perhaps, a prototype of the Ciuateteô, the disappointed and vengeful women who had died in their first childbed, and the myth of her cradle containing the sacrificial knife is eloquent of the connection of the Earth-goddess with human sacrifice. Her martial character,