Your Aztec birth date affected your whole life...

The Aztecs believed that their health and future destiny were directly linked to the day they were born on and to the rituals that midwives performed on that day.

Everything began with pregnancy and birth. Midwives and mothers knew perfectly well that “what the mother drank, what she ate, that also the baby absorbed; it took from her”.

Straight after birth the midwife performed an important ritual linked to the baby’s destiny: she cut the birth cord, a symbol of the child’s connection to its mother and source of life. If the baby was a girl, she buried the cord near the home’s hearth, and if it was a boy, it was placed in a battlefield.

For anyone born on one of the first four day signs of the sacred calendar (Alligator, Wind, House, Lizard), the maize/flower/sun lords Centeotl or Xochipilli would control the birth, Xochiquetzal or Centeotl would present the child, Macuilxochitl or Xochipilli would cut the umbilical cord, and Mayahuel would suckle the child. A future of plenty...!

But day-signs Water, Dog, Monkey and Grass involved gods linked to ritual sacrifice and death, and these day-signs would mean a difficult birth and life. BIRTHDAYS WERE TAKEN SERIOUSLY!