Zompist Bboard Again

Ares Land wrote: ↑Wed Sep 09, 2020 1:55 pm Yes, holding some land communally is fairly common -- though I believe having most of the land communally owned was rare, if not unheard of in Europe.

There are degrees of communal ownership; in Europe it seems to have been encouraged by the open field system. The rights to land and the rights of inheritance are in conflict. Limitations on the right of alienation survive in Scandinavia.

Birth and youth

In Nahua belief, each human being has three souls: teyolia ('spirit, soul' more or less equivalent to personality), ihiyotl ('breath', vital force) and tonalli ('day' or 'fate'). You can lose your tonalli through great emotion or distress, a fairly serious condition that ultimately leads to death. (Belief in the three souls, and the possibility of losing one persists in parts of rural Mexico).

Souls are created in the 13th and highest heaven, Omeyocan ('place of duality') by Ometeotl [oːmeˈteoːt͡ɬ] , the Dual God, the primordial god(s), paired gods Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, 'Lord and Lady Two' viewed as a single entity. They're brought to the fetus during pregnancy (or maybe to the child at birth?) by Ehecatl, the Wind, an aspect of Quetzalcoatl.

Announcing a pregnancy was a major social occasion; elders from the calpolli and from the parents' family came to rejoice on the conception of a 'precious stone, a rich feather' (an example of difrasismo, a kind of parallelism common in Nahuatl rhetoric).
The family rejoices, of course. But generally, the Nahua liked to keep the worst possibilites in mind. So congratulations included a reminder that the woman may miscarry, or that she may die in childbirth. What will happen next is in the hands of Our Lord, that is Tezcatlipoca: the expectant mother had to pray and trust in the Lord.

Pregnant women are treated with much reverence: they finally get a break from demanding domestic duties. They should not see anything scary or distateful; not gaze at any red objects; not chew gum; have sex in moderation (lest the child be weak) but abstain entirely after the seventh month, llest he miss a hand or a foot. I'm just giving a selection of taboos here, there were many more.

Something should be told of midwives, both priests and physicians, and held with the respect due to these. (Not as much respect, though, as is owed to a male physician or priest). Steam baths, herbal remedies helped with the pregnancy and childbirth. Midwives could also move an unconveniently positioned baby, and handle stillbirths. All in all, they were evidently very competent and childbirth was less dangerous and painful than in Europe.
A woman during delivery was, metaphorically, a soldier at war and got appropriately rousing speeches. She enjoyed the protection of female goddesses, including Cihualcoatl and Yoalticitl
After birth, they were treated just like a successful warrior, with much reverence: she had captured a child much like a soldier captures a prisoner. She received the additional warning, that much peril still lay ahead. The baby could die early, or turn out to be an unworthy individual: all of that was up to Tezcatlipoca.
Women who died during childbirth were the distaff counterpart of soldiers killed in battle. They had the honor of accompanying the Sun during the afternoon (soldiers got the morning) and spent the afterlife in the West (Cihuātlāmpa [si.wa:tɬa:m.pa 'place of women') as Cihuateteo (divine women). Cihuateteo were terrifying goddesses, haunting the crosswords, stealing children and inducing men to adultery. Soldiers attacked, quite viciously, during the funerals of women dead in childbirth, in the hopes of seizing body parts: the relic of a cihuateotl was a powerful good luck charm.

As to the child, she or he was greeted with plenty of prayer and oratories. The gist of them was that she or he had come to a place of pain, for a nasty, brutish and short life: as in most occasions, the Nahua liked to focus on the negative and remind themselves that all was in the hand of Our Lord. Myself, I don't think it necessarily means that the Nahua believed that life sucks and then you die. The Nahuas valued humility -- even more, polite discourse revolved around exaggerate displays of humility. Their worldview sounds quite depressing to us but I don't think it was meant to be: they just didn't like to shy away from the fact that our life is short and we don't control much.

Male newborns were told that they were just in transit, so to speak: their true home was on the battlefield. To further hammer the point in, they were given a 'toy' shield and a miniature spear and their umbilical cord was entrusted to a soldier and buried near the frontline. Female newborns were told that their place was at home, and their umbilical cord buried near the hearth.

Fate, in Mesoamerican thought, was determined by the day of birth, or specifically its position in the 260 days ritual calendar. People were named according to their birth date; sometimes their name was their birth date. That's why a Toltec legendary king is named 1 Reed, and a Quiché demon 7 Macaw; that's also why tonalli means 'soul', 'fate' and 'day'. An astrologer was consulted; if the day of the child's birth turned out unlucky (and some days would condemn you to be a useless drunkard and die in shame, or other charming destinies) he would receive a name a few days later.
The name-giving was accompanied by prayer and ritual cleansing; all in all the ceremony was a lot like baptism.
I spare you the neighborhood party and the old folks getting drunk and pontifying.

Gender roles
A very quick word on these, as they should be unsurprising. Males work in the fields and die in battle like the manly, manly men they are; while women are in the kitchen, barefood and pregnant, they're beautiful but not too much, they rise before everybody else to prepare food. Just ordinary, run-of-the-mill sexism. They weren't quite as misogynistic as Europeans could be, though, and as if in compensation, women were held to be closer to the gods than men.

How about gay, queer, trans Mexica? Answering that should be unproblematic: the Nahuas shared European prejudice on the subject, and "sodomy" was punishable by cruel and unusual death.
At least, that's what they told the Spaniards, and there's the rub. The Spaniards had quite an unhealthy obsession with 'sodomy' and they considered it as evil as human sacrifice, if not more. (Case in point: Bernal Diaz notes with a great deal of approval that Moctezuma II 'is quite free of sodomy', nevermind that the king supposedly ate little kids for lunch...) So wouldn't it be natural for Nahua informants to align themselves with Spanish expectations? Wasn't the god Xochipilli said to be the patron of homesexuals? In any case, that question is the subject of much current research.

Early life

Early education was handled by the family; boys were taught to tend fields, to fish, and to row a canoe, while girls learned to cook, sweep, weave and spin. They would carry water and firewoods, starting from the age of 5. Even noble children were supposed to know something of agriculture, or weaving, as appropriate and there was no expectations that nobles would be free of labour. Lords and kings practiced polygamy and had an impressive number of children who, in turn, might take multiple wives: of course many pipiltin would have to earn a living.

Punishments could be harsh at times, especially as children got older. One punishment listed for boys above twelve was being held upside down over cooking chilli peppers. Puncture with maguey thorns were practiced as well, both as religious mortification and as punishment. Girls were forced to sweep at night and outside the house.
Children weren't fed much, except on religious festivals (there were, fortunately, many of them) -- the idea was that they would learn to endure hunger. (That seems common across North America too, where many cultures likewise hardened their children to pain and hunger).

Children were especially holy and pure 'jewels, untouched by filth'. Their prayer was held to be especially sacred, so adults enrolled them to pray with them. Unfortunately, the most important prayer was in the middle of the night and a splash of ice-cold water was considered a good way to wake kids up.


School

The Mexica had a public education system. As we've seen, parents handled early education, but kids were monitored on occasion at the calpolli temple; young commoners that showed promise could be set aside as possible future priests.

The tēlpochcalli ([teːlpoːtʃ'kalli], 'house of young men') trained male teens. It was more military training than school, and it was pretty rough training indeed. Students would eat very frugal meals, sweep the house, carry water and firewood, memorize songs and dance of praize to the gods; military training begain in earnest at the age of 15. At this point, they let a lock of hair grow, as a sign that they hadn't yet taken captives.
The older tēlpochcalli students would join military expeditions; they served as porters and bâtmen, mostly, but they would also team together to try and catch a prisoner.
The tēlpochcalli was administered and funded by the calpolli (each of them having its own school), with at its head the teachcauhtli ('captain'), chose among the successful soldiers of the neighborhood.

The wealthier commoners, nobles and would-be priests joined the calmecac ([kal'mekak] 'row of houses'), the religious college. Schooling began earlier than for telpochcalli students (as early as 5 or 6 for children of kings).

As in Ancient Sparta or in Britain at the height of the empire, the Mexica believed that adversity builds character, and that the best way to train the elite was to submit them to a lot of adversity, in the shape of a boarding school from hell.
Calmecac students were subject to the same harsh regimen as priests: plenty of ice cold water, self mortification () and rigorous fasts. Transgression was punished by having both student and teachers wounding the guilty party with thorns. Food was thrown to the students as if they were dogs. The midnight prayer services continued of course, and included a kind of pilgrimage far in the woods as well.
Calmecac students were taught good manners, politeness, writing (or the quasi-writing system in use), prayers, hymns, dancing. Military instruction was included as well. There was also a good deal of fetching water, carrying firewood, and sweeping.

Naturally, calmecac and telpochcalli kids despised each other, or at least there was quite a bit of rivalry. On the occasion of certain festivals, fights would break out between ones (and fairly nasty ones, too).

Girls were ducated at the calmecac too; the curriculum included weaving and spinning instead of military instruction. Oh, and extra sweeping because you can't have enough sweeping.

A calmecac was administered by one of the temples and headed by one of the priests.

For everyone but the priests, who neither married nor left the calmecac (they were required to live there), education ended with marriage.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 10:14 am In Nahua belief, each human being has three souls: teyolia ('spirit, soul' more or less equivalent to personality), ihiyotl ('breath', vital force) and tonalli ('day' or 'fate'). You can lose your tonalli through great emotion or distress, a fairly serious condition that ultimately leads to death. (Belief in the three souls, and the possibility of losing one persists in parts of rural Mexico).

This sounds interesting; you’ve already gone into a bit of detail about the tonalli, but could you explain a bit more about the roles of the other two?

(Also, I’ve heard that shamanistic traditions often believe in multiple souls, and I’ve heard that Mexica religion was originally descended from some sort of shamanism, so if that’s all correct then it would seem to match up quite well.)

All in all, they were evidently very competent and childbirth was less dangerous and painful than in Europe.

Huh, that’s pretty surprising. Relatedly, in terms of healthcare more generally (excluding childbirth), were the Mexica ahead or behind of Europe at the time?

As to the child, she or he was greeted with plenty of prayer and oratories. The gist of them was that she or he had come to a place of pain, for a nasty, brutish and short life: as in most occasions, the Nahua liked to focus on the negative and remind themselves that all was in the hand of Our Lord. Myself, I don't think it necessarily means that the Nahua believed that life sucks and then you die. The Nahuas valued humility -- even more, polite discourse revolved around exaggerate displays of humility. Their worldview sounds quite depressing to us but I don't think it was meant to be: they just didn't like to shy away from the fact that our life is short and we don't control much.

I wonder if this had any implications on the Christianization of the Mexica. See, I recently read Tom Holland’s book Dominion; one of its theses is that Christianity (and earlier Judaism, to an extent) was so successful amongst the Romans due to its belief in a personal god. Compared to the pre-existing Roman religion, in which the gods really didn’t care too much about the people, Holland says that such a belief would have been very attractive, contributing to the spread of Christianity amongst the Romans. If this thesis is correct, then that would predict that Christianity would have spread quickly amongst the Mexica as well; a tradition preaching optimism would in some ways be far preferable to one continually focussing on the negatives of life. So: did Christianity spread quickly or slowly amongst the Mexica, and why?

(Keep in mind: I’m not a Christian, so I could be getting my facts wrong here, and I’m not saying that Holland’s argument is true either; I’m simply saying that it’s a persuasive argument, and I’d like to know whether it’s true or not.)

Punishments could be harsh at times, especially as children got older. One punishment listed for boys above twelve was being held upside down over cooking chilli peppers. Puncture with maguey thorns were practiced as well, both as religious mortification and as punishment. Girls were forced to sweep at night and outside the house.

If anyone else is wondering what a maguey plant is:
(image hidden to save space; it’s nothing bad, just a big cactus-like thing with thorns)

The thorns actually aren’t as big as I would have expect — but they’re still quite sharp enough. I know that whenever I see one of these plants when I’m walking, I always give it a wide berth!

Children weren't fed much, except on religious festivals (there were, fortunately, many of them) -- the idea was that they would learn to endure hunger. (That seems common across North America too, where many cultures likewise hardened their children to pain and hunger).

Children were especially holy and pure 'jewels, untouched by filth'. Their prayer was held to be especially sacred, so adults enrolled them to pray with them. Unfortunately, the most important prayer was in the middle of the night and a splash of ice-cold water was considered a good way to wake kids up.

This is interesting to me because it seems quite contradictory from a European perspective. In Europe, a belief in children as ‘innocent jewels’ has always (as far as I’m aware) been followed by protecting and coddling them. But it seems that the Mexica had quite the opposite reaction. Do you have any idea why this might be?

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm (Also, I’ve heard that shamanistic traditions often believe in multiple souls, and I’ve heard that Mexica religion was originally descended from some sort of shamanism, so if that’s all correct then it would seem to match up quite well.)

Western tradition has multiple souls too (vegetative, animal, rational). And sometimes a soul / spirit distinction. Chinese has hun and po, and sometimes multiple subvarieties. I suspect dividing up the soul is a very common philosophical move, because it's so powerful as an explanatory metaphor.

I wonder if this had any implications on the Christianization of the Mexica. See, I recently read Tom Holland’s book Dominion; one of its theses is that Christianity (and earlier Judaism, to an extent) was so successful amongst the Romans due to its belief in a personal god. Compared to the pre-existing Roman religion, in which the gods really didn’t care too much about the people, Holland says that such a belief would have been very attractive, contributing to the spread of Christianity amongst the Romans. If this thesis is correct, then that would predict that Christianity would have spread quickly amongst the Mexica as well; a tradition preaching optimism would in some ways be far preferable to one continually focussing on the negatives of life.

I think you could make a good case that Christianity is pessimistic: humans are irredeemable on their own, Christ came to suffer, most people are going to hell, the world is a vale of tears, the body is a snare, the world is mostly run by the devil, hair shirts and penitence, etc.

I don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

(Modern Evangelicalism pushes the Jesus-is-your-pal idea a lot. People probably didn't feel that Tezcatlipoca was their pal. But that's largely because other elements of the belief system took that role. Anyway in Catholicism your supernatural pal was more your saint than Jesus, and that's one reason polytheists often convert easily: they simply make the saints into covert versions of their gods.)

zompist wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 9:35 pm

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm (Also, I’ve heard that shamanistic traditions often believe in multiple souls, and I’ve heard that Mexica religion was originally descended from some sort of shamanism, so if that’s all correct then it would seem to match up quite well.)

Western tradition has multiple souls too (vegetative, animal, rational). And sometimes a soul / spirit distinction.

Ah, yes, I do recall that first distinction now (it started with the ancient Greeks, I think?). Although I’ve never seen soul and spirit distinguished before; I always thought the two terms were synonymous.

I think you could make a good case that Christianity is pessimistic: humans are irredeemable on their own, Christ came to suffer, most people are going to hell, the world is a vale of tears, the body is a snare, the world is mostly run by the devil, hair shirts and penitence, etc.

Hmm, that’s true. I don’t know too much about Christianity, and this part of it is one I’m especially unfamiliar with. But I do wonder how much of this is a more recent development compared to older Christian traditions. (e.g. I’ve heard that ‘most people are going to hell’ originated with Protestanism, though I don’t know how true that is.)

I don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

Possibly…? I tried looking at the book again to see what Holland thinks about this, but he’s frustratingly vague on details so it’s hard to know what he thinks. (It also doesn’t help that this isn’t the main point of the book; his main goal was to show how the Western world is still fundamentally Christian, even when we try to deny that.)

My god, this is a wonderful read. May I say, Ars Lande, that your inclination to de-exotify these guys is enjoyable and refreshing, not to mention epistemically superior. I'm struck by the similarities of old mexico with what china looked like when between dynasties. or civil wars. the enemy thing is not weird at all: Game of Thrones, The Godfather, that zombie show with the cowboy guy, they're all steeped in this vibe. it's the vibe of people stuck together in an uncomfortable autocratic coalition and they'd all prefer to be to be king thank you very much. besides, being harmed by rulers is a real danger for many kinds of people, which is kind of the point if you think about. Hell, they're not even that alien economically! we assume that humans started out without private property, and the aztecs seemed to be in transition. the incas also had a similar thing: of course, it's easy to become inebriated with the word 'communes', they're not exactly democracies. traditional indigenous institutions these days, I'm told by Colombians, aren't great at women's rights, for example.

their tears represented rain

me? being potentially disturbed by a mental image? na, i'm a sturdy lad. no, what? no, you're sad! shut up, no you.

zompist wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 9:35 pmI don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

the arabs did get pretty angry when some prophet dude bashed their holy objects. how do you figure that importance translates to closeness tho? or, i guess in other words, it's hard to know for sure what people felt who didn't leave themselves much textual evidence (and even with textual evidence, things get lost in translation). being indifferent but pragmatically cooperative with the rulers is, very often, indistinguishable from sincere support.

(e.g. I’ve heard that ‘most people are going to hell’ originated with Protestanism, though I don’t know how true that is.)

I wonder... I remember the Quran was very casual in speaking about hell as a thing that would happen to many, many people, so the idea was at least floating around that area then. Ah, also.

jesus, apparently wrote:“Enter by the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is easy, that leads to destruction, and those who enter by it are many. For the gate is narrow and the way is hard, that leads to life, and those who find it are few” (Matt. 7:13–14).

Torco wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 12:28 am

zompist wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 9:35 pmI don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

the arabs did get pretty angry when some prophet dude bashed their holy objects. how do you figure that importance translates to closeness tho? or, i guess in other words, it's hard to know for sure what people felt who didn't leave themselves much textual evidence (and even with textual evidence, things get lost in translation). being indifferent but pragmatically cooperative with the rulers is, very often, indistinguishable from sincere support.

But they did leave textual evidence.

You quoted a bit from it: the Bible. Well, every genre in the Bible has close parallels in Canaanite or Akkadian literature: earnest prayers, glorifying prayers, complaints that everything sucks and your god didn't help, lamentations for a catastrophe, assurances that one has been righteous.

For Egypt, we have the Book of the Dead: spells and hymns that declare very openly that the deceased is personally blessed by the gods, is on their way to meet them, expects their help on the dangerous journey, and expects a comfortable afterlife.

We can't know of course if people had the same feelings about their gods that modern Christians do. But there's passion and personality in their writing; they sure write as if it was a "personal relationship" of the sort Christians claim to have.

And sure, plenty of people went along with it without caring overmuch. And we can't know what people felt who never wrote anything down-- on the other hand, things like the near-universal appearance of religious figurines suggest that the common people took some form of religion seriously.

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm This sounds interesting; you’ve already gone into a bit of detail about the tonalli, but could you explain a bit more about the roles of the other two?

(Also, I’ve heard that shamanistic traditions often believe in multiple souls, and I’ve heard that Mexica religion was originally descended from some sort of shamanism, so if that’s all correct then it would seem to match up quite well.)

The teyolia is your personality, what we think of as a soul. It's the part of you that leaves the body and goes on to the after life. It resides in the heart.
The ihiyotl resides in the liver; it's both breath and lifeforce. It's the part of you that "recharges" when you breathe and eat. You can use your lifeforce for healing others; the lifeforce of sinners is soiled and potentially dangerous. Corpses usually exhale a dangerous ihiyotl, but the ihiyotl of women who died in childbirth is what gives their relics their supernatural powers.

Mexica religion is syncretic, with aspects of various traditions: the Uto-Aztecans and later Nahua's original beliefs, Toltec belief, itself both inspired by Olmec religion and Nahua beliefs, Otomi and Yopi religion, etc. We don't really know what any of these traditions were like, but some ceremonies, healing rituals, in particular, strike me as being similar to shamanism.

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm Huh, that’s pretty surprising. Relatedly, in terms of healthcare more generally (excluding childbirth), were the Mexica ahead or behind of Europe at the time?

It's hard to say. Europe was probably ahead in terms of medical theory, and it was in contact with the Arab and Persian medical traditions.
Mexica medicine heavily relied on supernatural help, of course, but medical practice relied on empiric and practical remedies. We know of 1,200 medicinal plants used by Mexica doctors, and it seems many of them actually work.
The Mexica were also very much ahead in terms of hygiene.

If this thesis is correct, then that would predict that Christianity would have spread quickly amongst the Mexica as well; a tradition preaching optimism would in some ways be far preferable to one continually focussing on the negatives of life. So: did Christianity spread quickly or slowly amongst the Mexica, and why?

No softball questions, uh? OK, then. What follows are strictly my personal thoughts on the subject. I think properly answering your question would require a Ph.D thesis by someone a lot more competent than I am!

Greco-Roman urban elites were already looking for a new religion (there were many conversions to Judaism, neo-Platonists were building a new religion on top of the old ones, Mithraism was very successful as wel...) By contrast, Mexica elites were secure in their beliefs and they pointed out (with exquisite politeness that stemmed both from Nahua tradition and the fact that they had a gun - or a crossbow - to their head) that they had excellent theologians, thank your very much, and that the implication that the religious handed down to them by their revered ancestors was only demon worship was a tad insulting.
Whereas Roman augurs 'couldn't look at each other without laughing', Mexica priests said 'Let us perish, since our gods are already dead.'
So in a word, no, that thesis doesn't apply to the Mexica.

Since conversion was the stated goal of the Conquest, mass baptisms were rushed in. That would pose problem later on, because the sincerity of conversion was very much in doubt. Human sacrifice ceased almost instantly, but the missionary friars had a great deal of trouble getting rid of other, arguably more important, practices, such as traditional dances or the ritual calendar.

A little known and very suprising fact about Mesoamerican religion is its similarity to Christianity, and more specifically to Catholicism. The Mexica already worried about sin, they were familiar with baptism and confession. The idea of a god sacrificing himself to help mankind was very familiar to them, as was the idea of symbolically eating a god. They had a hierarchy of celibate priests. I could go on quite a bit with the parallels. In some ways it helped. In others it hindered: for instance the calmecacs were dismantled as hotbeds of idolatry and by the time the missionaries realized they were basically monasteries and precisely the tool they would have needed it was already too late.

The Mexica priests, when there still were priests, had this to say:
"You said / that we know not / the Lord of the Close Vicinity / to Whom the heavens and earth belong"

In other words, because the Mexica's unfailing politeness often hid what they really meant: "Are you seriously saying that we're morons? We already know about your God!"

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm This is interesting to me because it seems quite contradictory from a European perspective. In Europe, a belief in children as ‘innocent jewels’ has always (as far as I’m aware) been followed by protecting and coddling them. But it seems that the Mexica had quite the opposite reaction. Do you have any idea why this might be?

'Spare the rod and spoil the child.' Children had to live up to the very demanding moral standard the Mexica held up for themselves, and to survive in a dangerous world. And their world was indeed dangerous: hunger and famine were real and constant threats (the climate was capricious and native descriptions of famine are blood-curdling).
In addition, our sources focus on the children of the nobility, or even royalty, and they're perhaps not as representative as we'd like: royal children are often harshly treated (even Prince Charles' childhood looks pretty bleak!)
Finally, but that's an entirely personal idea, I'm not sure harsh punishments and spartan education preclude coddling and protection. The autobiography of Standing Bear, a Lakota leader, pictures plenty of emotional safety and extremely harsh physical trials. From an entirely different corner of the world, some autobiographical descriptions of childhood in late 19th century rural France describe both heavy-handed discipline and coddling. Isaac Bashevis Singer depicts an undeniably loving family in tales of his childhood even though the demands of his Hassidic upbringing were horribly harsh.

zompist wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 9:35 pm I don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

I have similar feelings about the Mexica gods. Even Tezcatlipoca could be your pal. Well, okay, maybe he'd be that one weird pal you have that your husband/wife can't stand. He's certainly very scary but after all, "He's not a tame jaguar". (With my sincerest apologies to CS Lewis who probably wouldn't like the company here very much.)

We're pretty certain that the god the average Mexica felt closest to was probably one of the fertility gods, or their calpolli's patron, or their trade's patron god. But Tezcatlipoca happens to be the god we know most about, because he was the god of Important People and he was assimilated to the Christian God, which made him a safe subject for native informants.

Torco wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 12:28 am My god, this is a wonderful read. May I say, Ars Lande, that your inclination to de-exotify these guys is enjoyable and refreshing, not to mention epistemically superior.

Thanks a lot! The Game of Thrones analogy is very much on my mind, though honestly, George RR Martin, eat your heart out. (but not in the literal, Mesoamerican sense)
As for the 'enemy' thing, the semantics of Nahuatl yaotl are even more complicated than I initially thought. Yaotl is also a boy's name, and in that context, it's translated as 'brave'...

Ares Land wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 7:48 am

If this thesis is correct, then that would predict that Christianity would have spread quickly amongst the Mexica as well; a tradition preaching optimism would in some ways be far preferable to one continually focussing on the negatives of life. So: did Christianity spread quickly or slowly amongst the Mexica, and why?

No softball questions, uh?

Evidently, sir or madam, you cannot know me well if you had expected me to refrain from asking any and all questions that come to mind.

(Or, less politely: I have always asked more questions than anyone else I know or have ever known, so deal with it! And yes, the trend continues in this very post.)

bradrn wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 8:34 pm This sounds interesting; you’ve already gone into a bit of detail about the tonalli, but could you explain a bit more about the roles of the other two?

(Also, I’ve heard that shamanistic traditions often believe in multiple souls, and I’ve heard that Mexica religion was originally descended from some sort of shamanism, so if that’s all correct then it would seem to match up quite well.)

The teyolia is your personality, what we think of as a soul. It's the part of you that leaves the body and goes on to the after life. It resides in the heart.
The ihiyotl resides in the liver; it's both breath and lifeforce. It's the part of you that "recharges" when you breathe and eat. You can use your lifeforce for healing others; the lifeforce of sinners is soiled and potentially dangerous. Corpses usually exhale a dangerous ihiyotl, but the ihiyotl of women who died in childbirth is what gives their relics their supernatural powers.

Mexica religion is syncretic, with aspects of various traditions: the Uto-Aztecans and later Nahua's original beliefs, Toltec belief, itself both inspired by Olmec religion and Nahua beliefs, Otomi and Yopi religion, etc. We don't really know what any of these traditions were like, but some ceremonies, healing rituals, in particular, strike me as being similar to shamanism.

Thanks for elaborating! That distinction makes perfect sense, really; I’m surprised I haven’t encountered it before (though perhaps that has more to do with the fact that I haven’t really researched this area at all).

The Mexica were also very much ahead in terms of hygiene.

How so?

Greco-Roman urban elites were already looking for a new religion (there were many conversions to Judaism, neo-Platonists were building a new religion on top of the old ones, Mithraism was very successful as wel...)

Any idea why this was? (Though perhaps this a question best answered in another thread.)

Whereas Roman augurs 'couldn't look at each other without laughing',

That’s an interesting statement — where did you see it? I did try looking it up, but all I found was a couple of quotes from obscure newspapers…

Mexica priests said 'Let us perish, since our gods are already dead.'

Another interesting statement! What do you mean by the gods being ‘already dead’?

A little known and very suprising fact about Mesoamerican religion is its similarity to Christianity, and more specifically to Catholicism. The Mexica already worried about sin, they were familiar with baptism and confession. The idea of a god sacrificing himself to help mankind was very familiar to them, as was the idea of symbolically eating a god. They had a hierarchy of celibate priests. I could go on quite a bit with the parallels. In some ways it helped. In others it hindered: for instance the calmecacs were dismantled as hotbeds of idolatry and by the time the missionaries realized they were basically monasteries and precisely the tool they would have needed it was already too late.

Wow, that’s a really impressive list of similarities. I think you should do a whole post elaborating on this at some point.

A further question on this: would you say that Mexica religion and Christianity/Catholicism have more similarities than differences, or vice versa? (I realise it may be impossible to answer this, but why would I let that stop me from asking it? )

In addition, our sources focus on the children of the nobility, or even royalty, and they're perhaps not as representative as we'd like: royal children are often harshly treated (even Prince Charles' childhood looks pretty bleak!)

Now that is something I hadn’t known. Evidently I need to read far more history.

Finally, but that's an entirely personal idea, I'm not sure harsh punishments and spartan education preclude coddling and protection. The autobiography of Standing Bear, a Lakota leader, pictures plenty of emotional safety and extremely harsh physical trials. From an entirely different corner of the world, some autobiographical descriptions of childhood in late 19th century rural France describe both heavy-handed discipline and coddling. Isaac Bashevis Singer depicts an undeniably loving family in tales of his childhood even though the demands of his Hassidic upbringing were horribly harsh.

I feel obliged to mention that, even if that was the case at the time, modern Hassids generally treat their children much better. (Source: I go to a Hassidic synagogue, even though I’m not too religious myself.)

zompist wrote: ↑Mon Sep 14, 2020 9:35 pm I don't know much about Greek and Roman polytheism, but I've read a lot recently on Egyptian, Akkadian, and Canaanite beliefs, to say nothing of Hinduism, and I feel that common Christian conceptions of them are wrong. I'm pretty sure people could feel as close to Osiris, Ba'al, or Ishtar as they could to Jesus.

I have similar feelings about the Mexica gods. Even Tezcatlipoca could be your pal. Well, okay, maybe he'd be that one weird pal you have that your husband/wife can't stand. He's certainly very scary but after all, "He's not a tame jaguar". (With my sincerest apologies to CS Lewis who probably wouldn't like the company here very much.)

Now this is getting really confusing. From what I’ve seen of him, Tezcatlipoca definitely cannot be described as a ‘pal’: alarmingly unpredictable, bringing men to their death, ‘Of no-one can he be a friend’, ‘We Are His Slaves’, ‘Enemy of Both Sides’. So why do you say that one can have a close relationship with Tezcatlipoca?

(Then again, perhaps Clendinnen, who I’m getting some of this stuff from, isn’t such a reliable source; for instance, she seems incredulous at the violence of Tenochtitlan, saying that ‘offenders against Moctezoma’s laws died most publicly … where adulterers were stoned or strangled and habitual drunkards had their heads beaten in by Moctezoma’s executioners’ — which sounds pretty much exactly like any ancient Middle Eastern city. I’d call that a clear instance of over-exotification if there ever was one.)

As for the 'enemy' thing, the semantics of Nahuatl yaotl are even more complicated than I initially thought. Yaotl is also a boy's name, and in that context, it's translated as 'brave'...

That’s not a polysemy that I would have expected, but it definitely makes sense. From what you’re saying, it sounds like the Mexica had a high regard for their enemies, and respected them greatly — is that correct?

bradrn wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 9:48 am Evidently, sir or madam, you cannot know me well if you had expected me to refrain from asking any and all questions that come to mind.

(Or, less politely: I have always asked more questions than anyone else I know or have ever known, so deal with it! And yes, the trend continues in this very post.)

No problem, of course. The questions are more than welcome: I appreciate very much the interest and the motivation to research new areas.

Thanks for elaborating! That distinction makes perfect sense, really; I’m surprised I haven’t encountered it before (though perhaps that has more to do with the fact that I haven’t really researched this area at all).

Oh, by the way, the notion of a triple soul is part of Jewish tradition as well, with ruach, nefesh and neshama. (Or maybe it's just Kabbalah?)

The Mexica were also very much ahead in terms of hygiene.

How so?

They bathed regularly, washed their hands and mouths before meals and before prayer, collected urine and excrement, kept the city streets clean. In short, they applied common sense, which was enough to be quite ahead of Europe at the time.

Greco-Roman urban elites were already looking for a new religion (there were many conversions to Judaism, neo-Platonists were building a new religion on top of the old ones, Mithraism was very successful as wel...)

Any idea why this was? (Though perhaps this a question best answered in another thread.)

I haven't explored the question much. I believe that Greek philosophy was, in fact, an alternate and concurrent belief system, even a religion, complete with sacrificed messiah (Socrates). The only problem was, it lacked something of a human touch. And indeed Christianity ended up absorbing a great deal of Greek philosophy. There are probably alternate timelines where neo-Platonism won instead

That’s an interesting statement — where did you see it? I did try looking it up, but all I found was a couple of quotes from obscure newspapers…

It's from Cicero, De Divinatione

Wikipedia wrote:That old saying by Cato is quite well known; he said he was surprised that one haruspex did not burst out laughing when he saw another one. (Latin: Vetus autem illud Catonis admodum scitum est, qui mirari se aiebat quod non rideret haruspex haruspicem cum vidisset) (II, 24, 51)

Mexica priests said 'Let us perish, since our gods are already dead.'

Another interesting statement! What do you mean by the gods being ‘already dead’?

Reportedly, that was said by priests during a religious debate shortly after the Conquest. The Mexica had been defeated, their temples destroyed, and the "debate" was clearly a sham; there was no chance that Mexica religion would be allowed to continue.

A further question on this: would you say that Mexica religion and Christianity/Catholicism have more similarities than differences, or vice versa? (I realise it may be impossible to answer this, but why would I let that stop me from asking it? )

Despite troubling parallelisms, Mexica religion and Christianity are still very different. There is sin, and there is sacrifice, but there's no notion of a god offering redemption from sin through sacrifice. The Mesoamerica end times are just the end times; there could be another world beyond, but there's no expectation that we'll be part of it or that it'll be any better than our own. Mexica cosmogony is built on the idea of competing and equal spiritual powers, a notion very alien to Christianity.

Now this is getting really confusing. From what I’ve seen of him, Tezcatlipoca definitely cannot be described as a ‘pal’: alarmingly unpredictable, bringing men to their death, ‘Of no-one can he be a friend’, ‘We Are His Slaves’, ‘Enemy of Both Sides’. So why do you say that one can have a close relationship with Tezcatlipoca?
(Then again, perhaps Clendinnen, who I’m getting some of this stuff from, isn’t such a reliable source; for instance, she seems incredulous at the violence of Tenochtitlan, saying that ‘offenders against Moctezoma’s laws died most publicly … where adulterers were stoned or strangled and habitual drunkards had their heads beaten in by Moctezoma’s executioners’ — which sounds pretty much exactly like any ancient Middle Eastern city. I’d call that a clear instance of over-exotification if there ever was one.)

All of these are indeed epithets of Tezcatlipoca. But the same sources also say: "Our Lord has many friends".
Think of Tezcatlipoca as your conscience. Your conscience always watches you (Tezcatlipoca means "Smoking Mirror", a diviniation obsidian mirror. Metaphorically the name means he sees everything) and many times its annoying or unpleasant, with its insistence that you always do the right thing. Yet, it's as close as a friend.
Tezcatlipoca is also a creator god, and a personification of fate. Fate and the will of creator gods are always inscrutable, and often unpleasant.
One difference is that Tezcatlipoca makes no particular claim of omnibenevolence. Still, he's not evil: he's also described as merciful and a protector of the weak.

I'm as surprised as you are at Clendinnen's judgements. There was plenty of cruel punishment in Europe at the time! The Spaniards also punished adulterers to death; in France we boiled counterfeiters to death.
Also, just because a law is on the books doesn't mean it's enforced, and I doubt they were enforced as strictly as Clendinnen implies. If Moctezuma had stoned every adulterer in Tenochtitlan, the death toll would have been far in excess of human sacrifice and the city would have been quickly depopulated.
There are many, many admonishments against drinking in the Florentine Codex. What it tells us for sure is that the Mexica tended to have huge drinking problems. We know that alcoholism was rampant in post-conquest Mexico so for all we know what Sahagun's native informants really meant was that the kings of old would never have condoned that kind of behaviour, not that Moctezuma actually bothered sending out the death squads for it.

As for the 'enemy' thing, the semantics of Nahuatl yaotl are even more complicated than I initially thought. Yaotl is also a boy's name, and in that context, it's translated as 'brave'...

That’s not a polysemy that I would have expected, but it definitely makes sense. From what you’re saying, it sounds like the Mexica had a high regard for their enemies, and respected them greatly — is that correct?

The root is yao- and it means 'war' when incorporated. I take it that both 'brave' and 'enemy' are derivations from the 'war' meaning, which seems to be the earliest sense.

But the Mexica indeed held their enemies in high regard, at least once they were captured. Some detail in my post on war, and more to come when I finally get to human sacrifice.

zompist wrote:...on the other hand, things like the near-universal appearance of religious figurines suggest that the common people took some form of religion seriously.

it may be the sociologist in me, but I'm inclined to talk about frequencies. clearly some people cared about religion very much, and some textual evidence does point towards a feeling of personal closeness towards god. Not that much, though, the bible is not that full of emotional closeness of the devotee to the deity, and there's the opposite too, a god that is distant, baffling, even somewhat eldritch. But of course, yes, the past likely had a distribution of religous feelings, just like the present does: now you have your genuine true faith zealots, the 'god is my personal fren' people, your chill dudes mostly there for the community and the barbecues, the people who mostly care about appearing pious to others, the spiritual seekers that are interested in religious practices from other faiths, the neurotically obsessed with ritual purity, and so on: the thing is, the textual record, sparse as it is, seems unsuited to give us very good data about the frequencies of these.

If this thesis is correct, then that would predict that Christianity would have spread quickly amongst the Mexica as well; a tradition preaching optimism would in some ways be far preferable to one continually focussing on the negatives of life. So: did Christianity spread quickly or slowly amongst the Mexica, and why?

some people just dislike optimism on principle. me, for example.

Ars Lande wrote:As for the 'enemy' thing, the semantics of Nahuatl yaotl are even more complicated than I initially thought. Yaotl is also a boy's name, and in that context, it's translated as 'brave'...

It's not uncommon for vibes of bravery, prowess, dangerousness and even antagonism to be bundled up, sometimes you just want to express that vibe, you know: like when you say something is formidable, or terrifying, or aweful, or more profanely, when you describe someone as a badass, or a dangerous motherfucker: you're acknowledging that they're powerful and worthy of praise, even though you and them might spill blood.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 11:59 am

Thanks for elaborating! That distinction makes perfect sense, really; I’m surprised I haven’t encountered it before (though perhaps that has more to do with the fact that I haven’t really researched this area at all).

Oh, by the way, the notion of a triple soul is part of Jewish tradition as well, with ruach, nefesh and neshama. (Or maybe it's just Kabbalah?)

Ah, yes, that is true. Though as far as I can tell, the distinction isn’t terribly important outside Kabbalah: I’m looking through a prayerbook right now, and it seems that nishmati (√neshama) and nafoshi (√nefesh) are both translated simply as ‘soul’.

Greco-Roman urban elites were already looking for a new religion (there were many conversions to Judaism, neo-Platonists were building a new religion on top of the old ones, Mithraism was very successful as wel...)

Any idea why this was? (Though perhaps this a question best answered in another thread.)

I haven't explored the question much. I believe that Greek philosophy was, in fact, an alternate and concurrent belief system, even a religion, complete with sacrificed messiah (Socrates). The only problem was, it lacked something of a human touch. And indeed Christianity ended up absorbing a great deal of Greek philosophy. There are probably alternate timelines where neo-Platonism won instead

Interesting… I’ve never thought about philosophy that way, but it does make a lot of sense. Today we think about it mostly in terms of scientific discoveries, but there were plenty of weirder beliefs as well (most famously, the Pythagoreans’ refusal to eat beans).

Now this is getting really confusing. From what I’ve seen of him, Tezcatlipoca definitely cannot be described as a ‘pal’: alarmingly unpredictable, bringing men to their death, ‘Of no-one can he be a friend’, ‘We Are His Slaves’, ‘Enemy of Both Sides’. So why do you say that one can have a close relationship with Tezcatlipoca?
(Then again, perhaps Clendinnen, who I’m getting some of this stuff from, isn’t such a reliable source; for instance, she seems incredulous at the violence of Tenochtitlan, saying that ‘offenders against Moctezoma’s laws died most publicly … where adulterers were stoned or strangled and habitual drunkards had their heads beaten in by Moctezoma’s executioners’ — which sounds pretty much exactly like any ancient Middle Eastern city. I’d call that a clear instance of over-exotification if there ever was one.)

All of these are indeed epithets of Tezcatlipoca. But the same sources also say: "Our Lord has many friends".
Think of Tezcatlipoca as your conscience. Your conscience always watches you (Tezcatlipoca means "Smoking Mirror", a diviniation obsidian mirror. Metaphorically the name means he sees everything) and many times its annoying or unpleasant, with its insistence that you always do the right thing. Yet, it's as close as a friend.
Tezcatlipoca is also a creator god, and a personification of fate. Fate and the will of creator gods are always inscrutable, and often unpleasant.
One difference is that Tezcatlipoca makes no particular claim of omnibenevolence. Still, he's not evil: he's also described as merciful and a protector of the weak.

The impression I’m getting now is of a deity who is fundamentally unpredictable, but who has foibles just like any human: he has a soft spot for the weak, and those in unpredictable situations, and is willing to be benevolent if one behaves as he wishes. For those acting in the proper manner, he is willing to be friendly and give rewards; for those who do not, beware, for — borrowing your phrase — he is ‘not a tame jaguar’. Is my impression here correct?

I'm as surprised as you are at Clendinnen's judgements. There was plenty of cruel punishment in Europe at the time! The Spaniards also punished adulterers to death; in France we boiled counterfeiters to death.
Also, just because a law is on the books doesn't mean it's enforced, and I doubt they were enforced as strictly as Clendinnen implies. If Moctezuma had stoned every adulterer in Tenochtitlan, the death toll would have been far in excess of human sacrifice and the city would have been quickly depopulated.
There are many, many admonishments against drinking in the Florentine Codex. What it tells us for sure is that the Mexica tended to have huge drinking problems. We know that alcoholism was rampant in post-conquest Mexico so for all we know what Sahagun's native informants really meant was that the kings of old would never have condoned that kind of behaviour, not that Moctezuma actually bothered sending out the death squads for it.

Ah, yes, I remember reading this before (in zompist’s PCK, I think?): the more a law is repeated, the more likely it is that people were violating it as much as possible.

Torco wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 10:07 pm It's not uncommon for vibes of bravery, prowess, dangerousness and even antagonism to be bundled up, sometimes you just want to express that vibe, you know: like when you say something is formidable, or terrifying, or aweful, or more profanely, when you describe someone as a badass, or a dangerous motherfucker: you're acknowledging that they're powerful and worthy of praise, even though you and them might spill blood.

Exactly! I propose that Nahuatl yaotl be henceforth translated as 'bad motherfucker'.

bradrn wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 10:32 pm Is my impression here correct?

Yes, I think so. Keeping in mind that I'm nowhere near qualified enough to have an authoritative opinion on the matter!
We also have to remember that with respect to Mexica, there'll forever be unanswered questions. We can get a picture of Nahua belief, but only through a mirror, darkly. We have to rely on archeological evidence, the handful of contemporary documents that survived and accounts written after 40 years of brutal repression.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 5:44 am I propose that Nahuatl yaotl be henceforth translated as 'bad motherfucker'.

"Which one is your wallet?" "The one that says 'Yaotl'."

Thank you very much for this thread, Ares Lande. It's very well-written.

Additionally, this topic has motivated me to finally buy that book on Classical Nahuatl that's been in my Amazon wish list for about five years!

Ares Land wrote: ↑Wed Sep 16, 2020 5:44 amExactly! I propose that Nahuatl yaotl be henceforth translated as 'bad motherfucker'.

When we replace the king with some dude, that dude is kinda the king already, you know? he's the king, the real king, and a bad motherfucker. so when people talk to the dude, they suck him off a bit, you know?

I did a bit of research on Mexica music, and discovered the purely nightmarish instrument called the death whistle. Not for the faint of heart, it was used in ceremonies and most probably to demoralize the enemy. It mimics the sound of human screaming:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9QuO09z-SI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4T9sYbRzcQ

The rest of the post will be much less nightmarish:
Azteca danza seems to be quite a lively scene.

You can check this out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWYbogRZ7U for an idea of how Mexica dances looked like. (no death whistles, promise).
I like Xavier Quijas Yxayotl's work a lot : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vacnAwt61cs

This song has a way of sticking your head: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aB7O6eFWIRw

Dance and music were sacred. They're one of the few religious traditions that managed to survive, perhaps a hint as to their importance.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Sep 19, 2020 5:24 am I did a bit of research on Mexica music, and discovered the purely nightmarish instrument called the death whistle. Not for the faint of heart, it was used in ceremonies and most probably to demoralize the enemy. It mimics the sound of human screaming:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I9QuO09z-SI
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y4T9sYbRzcQ

The rest of the post will be much less nightmarish:
Azteca danza seems to be quite a lively scene.

You can check this out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LiWYbogRZ7U for an idea of how Mexica dances looked like. (no death whistles, promise).
I like Xavier Quijas Yxayotl's work a lot : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vacnAwt61cs

This song has a way of sticking your head: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aB7O6eFWIRw

Dance and music were sacred. They're one of the few religious traditions that managed to survive, perhaps a hint as to their importance.

I'm sorry, but everything in this post is almost entirely bullshit.

There is no such thing as an "Aztec death whistle". There is no evidence that any Aztec instrument was meant to mimic the sound of human screaming, or that it was used in war. People just made it up because it sounded cool.

The "Danza Azteca" is a modern invention, not a preservation of anything pre-columbian. Some traditional indigenous dances are still practiced, but they reflect the actual living culture instead of being a pre-columbian time capsule, and so aren't exotic-looking enough to satisfy the people who want to romanticize the Aztecs.

Xavier Quijas Yxayotl is a charlatan.

The Tezcatlipoca "song" is a legitimate colonial Nahuatl text, but it's actually a prayer or invocation that was never meant to be set to music. The music and singing style is not indigenous at all. And the singer is not a native speaker and doesn't pronounce the words correctly. It wound have sounded more like this.

vlad wrote: ↑Sun Sep 20, 2020 12:44 am I'm sorry, but everything in this post is almost entirely bullshit.

There is no such thing as an "Aztec death whistle". There is no evidence that any Aztec instrument was meant to mimic the sound of human screaming, or that it was used in war. People just made it up because it sounded cool.

The "Danza Azteca" is a modern invention, not a preservation of anything pre-columbian. Some traditional indigenous dances are still practiced, but they reflect the actual living culture instead of being a pre-columbian time capsule, and so aren't exotic-looking enough to satisfy the people who want to romanticize the Aztecs.

Xavier Quijas Yxayotl is a charlatan.

The Tezcatlipoca "song" is a legitimate colonial Nahuatl text, but it's actually a prayer or invocation that was never meant to be set to music. The music and singing style is not indigenous at all. And the singer is not a native speaker and doesn't pronounce the words correctly. It wound have sounded more like this.

Do you have any evidence for these assertions? I’m willing to believe all of this is true — people certainly over-exoticise the Mexica enough — but I’ll need some evidence first.

Sorry, I'm afraid I posted a bit too quickly and didn't include my usual caveats!

The death whistle, as far as I know is very much real, though it was an uncommon instrument. Three of them have been found in archeological excavations.

We can't possibly know what their designers intended, as no written source mention these. They do sound like a human being screaming, but they could possibly have been meant to mimic wind sounds, or animal sounds. (It sounds a bit like a screeching owl, IMO). We do know they had a ceremonial purpose since they were buried with sacrificial victims.
There's indeed no direct evidence that they were used in war. But we know how the things sound, and we know the Nahuas used musical instruments, loud calls and whistles to demoralize the enemy. So the idea that they were used at war seems fairly probable.
Unless of course we have reason to doubt the archeological finds and/or the reconstruction of the sounds. I don't know about that.

As for Xavier Quijas Yxayotl, as vlad says, there's no time capsule preserving pre-Hispanic dances and music, of course. He merely uses instruments consistent with the time period, which is about as close to Mexica music as we can hope to get.
(Of course what the Mexica actually heard was most likely quite different.)

Similarly, I don't think danza Azteca accurately reflects pre-Hispanic dances (it seems I implied otherwise, so sorry about that). Though there are probably a lot of inaccuracies (I'm dubious of the clothes myself), the general look of them looks consistent with what little I know of Nahua dances. So, again, as close a look as we can get.

I'd be very glad for suggestions of more accurate reconstructions!

I can't possibly comment on whether Quijas Yxayotl is a charlatan, though it's very possible he made dubious claims to have a direct connections to pre-Hispanic Mexico that archeologists can't understand -- that sort of thing is unfortunately common.

I want to add my signature to the sincere expressions of thankfulness for this. I've taken a casual interest in Nahuatl as a language, but I don't think I've seen as condensed accounts of the culture before.

Ares Land wrote: ↑Tue Sep 15, 2020 11:59 am

Mexica priests said 'Let us perish, since our gods are already dead.'

Another interesting statement! What do you mean by the gods being ‘already dead’?

Reportedly, that was said by priests during a religious debate shortly after the Conquest. The Mexica had been defeated, their temples destroyed, and the "debate" was clearly a sham; there was no chance that Mexica religion would be allowed to continue.

It's worth mentioning on this topic that (I believe it was mentioned earlier in the thread?) the leveraging of religion as a tool of subjugation was a tactic very familiar to the Mexica!

Ares Land wrote: ↑Sat Sep 19, 2020 5:24 am I did a bit of research on Mexica music, and discovered the purely nightmarish instrument called the death whistle. Not for the faint of heart, it was used in ceremonies and most probably to demoralize the enemy. It mimics the sound of human screaming:

Jesus H. Particular Christ on a cheesy cracker with cheese on top! This immediately brings to mind a certain description that characterizes the trumpet as "a machine where you put in compressed air and divorce comes out"...