Cihuacoatl commands the Cihuateteo, the fearsome spirits of women who died in childbirth, leading them as they descend at crossroads to steal children and strike the living with seizures and madness.
Quetzalcoatl descended to Mictlan and outwitted Mictlantecuhtli to steal the bones of the dead from prior ages. Cihuacoatl, in her guise as Quilaztli, ground the bones in her jade bowl, and Quetzalcoatl bled over them — from that mixture of divine blood and ancestral remains the Macehualtin, the people of the Fifth Sun, took form.
Cihuacoatl ground the shattered Bones of the Ancestors in a jade bowl at Tamoanchan, preparing the sacred bone meal onto which Quetzalcoatl shed his blood to give life to the fifth humanity.
Cihuacoatl counseled Huitzilopochtli during the Mexica migration, urging the people onward and sanctioning the practice of human sacrifice that would sustain the Fifth Sun.
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