Cihuateteo- Aztec SpiritSpirit"Women Warriors"

Warriors of the Setting Sun

The Cihuateteo, the "Divine Women," were the spirits of women who died in childbirth, transformed into beings of power and danger. In Aztec belief, a woman who died giving birth had fallen in battle as surely as any warrior struck down on the field. Just as male warriors who died in combat accompanied the sun from dawn to noon, escorting it up through the eastern sky, the Cihuateteo took over at the zenith and carried the sun westward into Cihuatlampa, the western region of the cosmos where the light died each evening. There they dwelt, honored and terrifying, waiting for the days when they would descend.

They appeared as pale women with skull faces and clawed hands, their hair wild, their expressions frozen in the rictus of death. On five specific days in the tonalpohualli, days like 1 Deer and 1 Rain, the Cihuateteo descended from the sky and haunted the crossroads of the living world. Parents barred their doors and kept children inside, for the spirits were especially dangerous to the young, bringing seizures and wasting illness. Food offerings were left at crossroads to appease them.

Fear and Power

The Cihuateteo inspired not only fear but hunger for their strength. Warriors sought them out on the five dangerous days, believing that a man who could steal a finger from one of these spirits would carry her courage into battle. The bodies of women who died in childbirth were guarded on the way to burial by armed midwives and kinsmen, for warriors would try to sever a finger or a lock of hair from the corpse before the spirit had fully departed, hoping to carry a fragment of that power as a talisman.