Camaxtli- Aztec GodDeity"God of War"

The Tlaxcalan God

Camaxtli was the principal deity of Tlaxcala, the powerful city-state east of the Valley of Mexico that resisted Aztec expansion for generations. Where the Mexica of Tenochtitlan marched under Huitzilopochtli, the Tlaxcalans fought under Camaxtli, a god of war and the hunt who carried bow and arrows as weapons of both. His temple stood at the center of Tlaxcalan life, and festivals honoring successful hunts and military victories were conducted in his name.

The Florentine Codex treats Camaxtli and Mixcoatl, the Cloud Serpent, as essentially the same deity under different regional names. Both were hunters associated with the stars, and both were bound to the same myth: the begetting of the mortal who became Quetzalcoatl.

The Birth of Quetzalcoatl

The Histoyre du Mechique tells how Camaxtli pursued a woman named Chimalman, shooting arrows at her as a hunter would at prey. She stood unflinching before the god, catching or deflecting each arrow he loosed. Her fearlessness drew him to her, and from their union she conceived Ce Acatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl, the future priest-king of Tula. But Chimalman did not survive the birth. She died bringing the child into the world, leaving him to grow into his inheritance without the mother who had stood fearless before a god.