Chronicles and Codices
The Memorial Library Exhibit
Aztlanahuac: Mesoamerica in North America
This exhibit of chronicles, books and codices (Pre-Columbian indigenous writing systems) is companion to our map exhibit at the Wisconsin Historical Society, which depicts place names that memorialize an ancient Mexican Indian presence in the United States.
In this display, the Tira de la Peregrinacion is a codex that commemorates the pilgrimage of the Aztec or Mexica Indians, who recount that they came somewhere from the North. Seven caves or seven families or clans are often depicted to mean seven communities. In fact, there were many migrations. As the Mexica recount, they were the last to leave from the North, oft called Aztlan. These northern origins are often depicted as emanating from Nayarit, Mexico. Other versions point to the Southwest. The map exhibit shows citations of the Ancient Homeland of the Aztecs being in the Four-Corners region (New Mexico, Arizona, Utah and Colorado.)
This project records numerous migrations from the north (United States and Canada) to the South (South of the United States) and visa versa. Oral traditions recall migrations by native peoples from the South into Canada. Azatalan is misnamed for the purported homeland of the Aztec/Mexica people, though it is related to the mounds in Cahokia, Illinois, which was developed by a corn-based culture.
Case Two: Symbolic representation of migration
The seeds of corn portray migration paths. Over the years, the Aztlanahuac project has inspired artwork and people have donated gifts toward these efforts. Pola Lopez, a Santa Fe, N.M., artist, who was inspired by the research, created the centerpiece artwork of the Mapa de Aztlan. UW art student Ben Grignon created a pot that recorded migration of his people, the Menominee. He also assisted with this display. Gonzales and Rodriguez invited Grignon and Lina Martin, both former students in their indigenous geography class, to submit work for this exhibit. Martin's necklace depicts a migration story of her Native American ancestors. Though Ben's pot broke, we include the shards here, just as there are shards of broken pottery throughout the Americas. Armando Lawrence paints the rabbit skin with a modern-day codex. The green cotton cloth was donated by a Xicano native elementary school, Semillas del Pueblo, in Los Angeles. The eagle on the Mexican flag is a depiction of the Aztec migration story. Corn, shells and parrot feathers also record evidence of migration, via vast trade networks. The carved Corn Mother recalls how Corn Woman led the Zuni into the Fourth World. Various Indigenous peoples recognize the Fourth World as the present-day world.
Case three: The codices, migration and movement
Some 15 codices survived the massive book burnings. The codices were part of a multi-layered communication system. They were read and performed by orators and ritual keepers, painted by both men and women and often only displayed as part of ceremonies. They contained both ritual knowledge, such as depictions of sacred bundles, ceremonies and sacred knowledge, but they also documented herbal knowledge, tributes, ascensions into power and land records. Many Indigenous elders can read the symbols, such as in the codices, based on their own cultural and ceremonial knowledge.
In this case, we see one of the most fundamental migrations-birth, death and regeneration. In Codex Borbonico, the depiction of Tlazolteotl (the Regenerative Principle and guardian of midwives and pregnant women) shows a being entering into her head. She begets the child, which is an exact replica of herself. This symbolizes the regeneration of life and spiritual migration. In the Dresden codex, we see the Mayan expression of Tlazolteotl. She is inundating the world with water. Many Native peoples' oral traditions recall how one world was destroyed by water.
Case four: How people were placed in the land
In the next case, the codices depict how people were placed in the land. They are attached to mountains by umbilical cords to express their authority. Symbolically, migration and movement were often depicted by feet as in the ball court scene. One key migration symbol in the codex of the -Tolteca Chichimeca- portrays the Seven Caves as a point of origin. Artwork by Laura Rodriguez, created for Aztlanahuac, depicts the blending of the seven caves origin story with that of the Aztecas, who were lead by a hummingbird spirit. They were instructed to look for the sign of an eagle perched on a Cactus.
Case five: Modern scholars
The final case displays modern scholars, who have addressed issues of land, origins, migrations, connections and stories among Indigenous peoples. The elder Nora Chapa Mendoza created the artwork, Mapa Azteca for the Aztlanahuac Project.
The Book of the Sun Tonatiuh
By Cecilio Orozco, retired professor, Calif State Univesity, Fresno
Professor Orozco has been researching for more than 20 years what he calls El Camino de Aztlan. In his book he posits that there is petroglyph evidence in Utah of what later became the Aztec Calendar.
The Chaco Meridian
By Steve Lasken
Has postulated that the Anazasi migrated vis astronomy (Chaco, Aztec and Paquime), as opposed to the traditional search for food and water. He also found Culiacan to be on the same meridian (unaware that it figures in the Aztec/Mexica migration stories), positing that followup research needs to be done to see if there is any significance to its location.
Ancient Footprints of Colorado
By Alfredo Figueroa
Figueroa, a community scholar and activist, has long posited that the origin of the Aztec/Mexica was in the lower Colorado basin.
Nahui Mitl
By Tlakaele
Tlakaele has dedicated his life to finding evidence throughout the continent of an ancient Toltec Four Arrows migration. Much evidence can be found in petroglyphs throughout the continent, also noting that place names such as Tulare and Tularosa are Nahuatl in origin, not Spanish or English. He was present at indigenous summits that discussed the Treaty of Guadalupe and the 1847 Disturnel map.
Aztecas del Norte
By Jack Forbes
In this ground breaking work, written in 1965, but published in 1973, Forbes, one of the nation's preeminent American Indian scholars, posits that people of Mexican origin are anashinabe or aboriginal to the continent. He was part of the Native American Movement in Southern California that first put forth that idea in 1961, also calling the U.S. Southwest as Aztlan and referring to the Nahuatl barrio of Analco (Santa Fe, NM) as the birthplace of the Chicano.
Historia de las Indias de la Nueva Espana I
by Fray Diego Duran 1570
A depiction of Nahuatl peoples departing from caves.
Memoria sobre las causas que han originado la situacion actual de la Raza Indigena. 1864
by Don Francisco Pimental
Here, the author begins by treacing the landscape, from the Gila River in the present-day U.S. Soutwest, to Nicaragua. This is the region that some historians view as being part of Greater Mesoamerica.
Mexico a Traves de los Siglos I
by D. Alfredo Chavero 1887
In this section on the mounds found in the United States -- from Texas, up the Missippii into Wisconsin -- the author posits that an animal cult from Guatemala -- specifically from the Usamacinta region -- was responsible for building the effigy mounds.
Prehistoria de Mexico 1923
by Plancarte Navarette
The author speaks of the Nahuas having left the region of Siberia near the Himalayas, before migrating south into the Americas then eventually into Mexico.Many linguyists trace American migration to this very region. However, not everyone is convinced of this hypothesis.
Seis Siglos de Historia Grafica de Mexico 1325-1900 V.I.
by Gustavo Casasola 1962.
Contains the image of the Buturini codex which depicts the departure of the Aztec/Meica peoples. in 1064 AD... and their arrival in Tenochtitlan-Mexico City in 1325.
Cantos al Sexto Sol
A collection of contemporary Aztlanahuac Writing
edited by Cecilio Garcia Camarillo, Roberto Rodriguez and Patrisia Gonzalez
This book is the result of the Aztlanahuac origins/migrations project. Together with Roberto Rodriguez and Patrisia Gonzales, co-directors of the project, the late Cecilio Xilo Garcia-Camarillo, respected Chicano poet, writer, editor, publisher, and activist, toiled for several years to put this special book together. In effect, it is his last work. The strength of this anthology is that it brings together voices from different generations and from different parts of the country and different parts of Turtle Island. Approximately 100 writers/poets and artists responded to the the call for a contemporary literary appraisal of the concept of Aztlan -- and to the notion of whether we belong here or not.
Garcia-Camarillo assembled legendary poets and writers from the Flor y Canto and Canto al Pueblo generation: Tigre, Ricardo Sánchez, Dorinda Moreno, José Montoya, José Antonio Burciaga, Carmen Tafolla, Juan Felipe Herrera, José the Black Hat Poet Montalvo, Naomi Quiñonez, Lalo Delgado, Diana Montejano, Nepthal' de Le-n and Manuel Gomez. Xilo also assembled more contemporary writers of equal repute, such as Ricardo del Castillo, Shirley Hill Witt and Gilberto Chavez Ballejo, native writer Suzanne Harjo, Puerto Rican poets Martín Espada and Antonia Darder and the transborder performance artist Guillermo Gomez Peña. Also featured are many younger poets/writers such as the powerful voices of Alice Aguilar, Tammy Gómez, Erika Gonzalez, Andrea Serrano Garcia and Salvadoran writer, Leticia Hernandez. All gave of themselves to this project, affirming with their stories and songs that the ancestors of today's Mexicans/Chicanos not only belong here but that all the indigenous peoples of the continent are connected.
This volume of contemporary Aztlanahuac writing is the first of three projected volumes that deal with the subject of origins and migrations in the Americas. The project was created as a result of a little map that shows that the ancestors of today's Mexicans/Chicanos come from what is today referred to as the Greater U.S. Southwest -- and as a result of our communities constantly being told to go back to where we come from.
ISBN 0-930324-88-9, $17.95
For information on how to order Cantos Al Sexto Sol Go to www.wingspress.com