Domestic vs. Elite Religious Cults: Revisiting the Huastec Tlazolteotl-Ixcuina Deity Complex

Summary

Pre-Columbian Huastec stone sculptures and clay figurines for the most part have been interpreted as deities and assumed to belong to the same religious cult. They also have typically been interpreted through a central Mexican lens and been identified as and associated with Late Postclassic central Mexican deities. Female figures in particular have been interpreted as Tlazolteotl, the central Mexican goddess of parturition, sexuality, and purification—a deity thought to be closely related to the Teenek (Huastec-Maya) goddess Ixcuinan, the lady of cotton. This presentation will reassess this interpretation, taking into account new archaeological data alongside well-known pictorial and textual sources. It also address interpretations of this Tlazolteotl cult from a broader Gulf Coast perspective and consider the Classic-to-Postclassic connections. We propose that although Huastec figurines and sculptures share stylistic features, they indicate different levels of cult. While the female sculptures appear to represent Huastec high-status women, female figurines seem to reflect local domestic cults tied to the cultivation of cotton.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Society for American Archaeology 83rd Annual Meeting, Washington, DC (2018)

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Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 19988