Chalchihuitlicue

Chalchihuitlicue : She of the Jade Skirt

Chalchihuitlicue is queen of rivers, lakes, and standing, still waters. The meaning of her name refers to a jade skirt, a metaphor for shining expanses of still water. Without Chalchihuitlicue, there is no irrigation. She presides over agriculture and was especially associated with cotton, a plant with huge moisture requirements for healthy growth.

Chalchihuitlicue provides for people but is also a goddess of destruction. In Nahuatl (Aztec) myth, Chalchihuitlicue was the regent of the previous world, known as 4 Water, destroyed by flooding.

Chalchihuitlicue also presides over amniotic fluids. She is a goddess of human as well as agricultural fertility. Pre-Christian Aztecs possessed birth rituals involving baptism in which Chalchihuitlicue played a prominent, presiding role.

ORIGIN:

Aztec

MANIFESTATION:

Chalchihuitlicue appears as a woman whose face is decorated with a pair of short black lines running vertically down her lower cheeks. She wears a headband studded with balls of cotton. Her skirt is adorned with jade, and she often wears a tasseled shawl.

ATTRIBUTES:

Ear of maize corn or corn cobs

Consort:

Tlaloc

Plants:

Corn, cotton, prickly pears

COLOURS:

The various shades of jade and turquoise

Minerals:

Jade, turquoise