The Identity of the Central Deity on the Aztec Calendar Stone

Abstract

Of the extant artistic monuments created by the Aztecs of Pre-Columbian Mexico, the Aztec Calendar Stone is undoubtedly the most important (Fig. 1). The thirteen-and-a-half foot circular polychromed basalt relief has been used to illustrate Postclassic Mexican cosmological concepts and the nature of their manifestation in Postclassic visual art more often than any other single image of the period.1 Discovered in 1790 lying face down in the Plaza Mayor of Mexico City (formerly the Aztec capital Tenochtitlán), and seen today in the Museo Nacional de Antropologia in Mexico City, the Calendar Stone has, further, come to symbolize for the Mexican people the beauty and complexity of their Pre-Columbian heritage. Given its dual role as a national symbol and a key to scholarly understanding of Postclassic art and cosmology, it is critically important that the iconography of the Calendar Stone be fully comprehended.

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