Ometecuhtli and Omecihuatl, the primordial dual couple, generated the four Tezcatlipocas — Xipe Totec, Tezcatlipoca, Huitzilopochtli, and Quetzalcoatl — along with Xolotl, as the foundational forces of creation.
⚠ Huitzilopochtli's origin is dual-layered: the Historia de los Mexicanos por sus Pinturas places him among the four sons of Ometeotl, while the Florentine Codex narrates his miraculous birth from Coatlicue at Coatepec.
Tezcatlipoca seized Xochiquetzal from Tlaloc by force and claimed her as his own, an abduction that caused Tlaloc's rains to cease in grief and rage.
Chalchiuhtotolin is the jewelled turkey nahual of Tezcatlipoca, an ominous bird form through which he spreads pestilence and misfortune.
Tezcatlipoca manifests as Ixtlilton, the Little Black Face, whose obsidian-dark countenance channels the night god's power into healing — temple jars of sealed black water opened only for sick children, cured by the same darkness that the Smoking Mirror commands.
Tepeyollotl, Heart of the Mountain, is the jaguar aspect of Tezcatlipoca whose roar echoes through caves and whose tread shakes the earth in tremors.
Quetzalcoatl and Tezcatlipoca are locked in cosmic rivalry — each toppled the other's Sun in the cycle of ages, and Tezcatlipoca engineered Quetzalcoatl's downfall and exile from Tollan through trickery and sorcery.
Tezcatlipoca dangled his foot into the primordial waters as bait, and when Cipactli bit it off, Quetzalcoatl seized the thrashing monster so the two gods could tear her apart and fashion the world from her body.
⚠ Some sources identify the slain earth monster as Tlaltecuhtli rather than Cipactli; the two may represent the same cosmogonic event with different traditional names for the victim.
Tezcatlipoca and Quetzalcoatl seized Tlaltecuhtli, the monstrous earth deity thrashing in the primordial waters, and tore her in two — one half became the sky, the other the earth, her body still crying out for blood in the darkness.
⚠ The Histoyre du Mechique names the creature Tlaltecuhtli; the Historia de los Mexicanos por sus Pinturas calls her Cipactli. Both describe the same cosmogonic tearing.
Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl, Huitzilopochtli, and Xipe Totec created Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue to preside over water and rain, appointing them lords of the waters as part of the gods' ordering of the newly made world.
The Four Tezcatlipocas — Tezcatlipoca, Quetzalcoatl, Huitzilopochtli, and Xipe Totec — are the primordial sons of Ometeotl who took turns presiding over the successive Suns, each age ending in catastrophe when one brother overthrew another.
⚠ The Historia de los Mexicanos por sus Pinturas names this specific grouping. Other traditions substitute Tlaloc for Huitzilopochtli or vary the identifications of the four brothers.
Tezcatlipoca disguised himself and tricked Quetzalcoatl into drinking pulque at Tollan, causing his disgrace. Shamed, Quetzalcoatl departed Tollan and journeyed east to the coast.
Chalchiuhtlicue reigned as sun of the Fourth Age, Nahui Atl, until Tezcatlipoca struck her down — she wept tears of blood for fifty-two years, and her grief became the great flood that drowned the earth and turned its people into fish.
Tezcatlipoca abducted Xochiquetzal from her husband Tlaloc, taking the goddess of beauty and flowers as his own consort.
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