Tezcatlipoca Symposium

29th Nov 2005

Tezcatlipoca, adapted from Codex Borgia

For the first time ever, a major international symposium on the great creator god Tezcatlipoca took place at Birkbeck College, London on Saturday November 26th. 2005. (Written/compiled by Ian Mursell/Mexicolore)

Guest speakers included Henry B. Nicholson and Cecelia Klein (University of California, Los Angeles), Eduardo Matos Moctezuma (Instituto Nacional de Antropolgía e Historia, Mexico), Guilheim Olivier (Instituto de Investigaciones Históricas, UNAM, Mexico), Emily Umberger (Arizona State University), Elizabeth Baquedano (Birkbeck College, University of London), Colin McEwan, Caroline Cartwright, Andrew Middleton, Rebecca Stacey (British Museum), Juan José Batalla (Universidad Complutense, Madrid), and Susan Milbrath (Florida Museum of Natural History).

The symposium opened with a presentation by the 'grandfather' of Aztec research, Professor Henry B. Nicholson, setting the whole event in the broad context of our knowledge of Aztec culture (as he pointed out, 'Aztecs' is a very inadequate term for the style of the late post-Classic period: the Aztecs themselves called themselves the 'Tenochca-Tlatelolca-Colhua-Mexica', or just 'Mexica' for short!). Professor Nicholson reminded the audience of just some of the key features of Tezcatlipoca: omnipotent, virile, art sorcerer, darkness, jaguar, 'were-animal' par excellence, total power, Jupiter, blended with Ometeotl in the supreme heaven, 'every creature was powerless before him...'

We will be drawing on some of the many ‘pearls of wisdom’ (the Aztecs would have called them ‘jades’) that were showered by the experts onto all those present at the symposium well into the future. In the meantime, we point out two roads leading to exciting new discoveries: Professor Juan José Batalla’s paper on the ‘ezpitzal’ symbol associated with Tezcatlipoca (follow link below)...

... and the work pioneered by experts at the British Museum on the construction of the famous Tezcatlipoca turquoise skull mask: the original skull belonged to a man of some 30 years of age. One of 9 turquoise mosaic pieces in the Museum, it remains a rare example of an original Aztec skull mask (more info from the BM link below...)

Tezcatlipoca - a new clue uncovered

Comments (3)

Thierry Borel

28th Jul 2015

A book has been published in 2014 on the basis of the symposium:
Tezcatlipoca, Trickster and supreme Deity, Ed. by Elizabeth Baqudano, with contributions of several of the participants of the symposium. Univ. Press of Colorado, ISBN 978-1-60732-287

Mexicolore

Thanks, Thierry, for flagging this up. Yes, Elizabeth’s book is highly recommended, and we have a lovely copy that she kindly signed for us (she’s on our Panel of Experts)!

José Joaquín Lunazzi

29th Jun 2015

Thanks for the information. I too hope to receive more. I am interested on the mirror Tezcatlipoca is represented as being one foot.

otirudam

27th May 2011

What an interesting Teskatlipoca Symposium, it will be great if u can post here all or most of the presentations exposed by such remarkable prehispanic experts. Teskatlipoca has always been a fascinating enticing godly concept of very peculiar characteristics most commonly shrouded in mystery and confussing issues. Its a tantalizing subject. Thank you Mexicolore !

Tezcatlipoca, adapted from Codex Borgia