tlacaehuatl (FCbk9f6v)

his iconographic example, featuring a human skin (tlacaehuatl) and the person that might have been flayed as part of a religious ceremony called Tlacaxipehualiztli (the flaying of people also the name of the month when captives were slain), is included in this digital collection for the purpose of making potential comparisons with related hieroglyphs. The term selected for this example comes from the keywords chosen by the team behind the Digital Florentine Codex. There is no gloss, per se. This example shows a bird’s eye view of the flayed human skin lying face down on a tiled floor. It is an orange color. The scalp is still attached, showing tousled hair. A person kneels at the skin, which is probably his own skin, as he is pink with red bloody splotches. The face looks like a semi-skeletal one, suggesting the person is dead (even if still kneeling, semi-upright), what might have been referred to as a teomicqui (deceased person with a divine dimension). The text refers to the sacrifice of sometimes 400 captives during this religious festival, Tlacaxipehualiztli, which has the name of the relevant divine force, Xipe Totec, partly embedded in the term. Some priests wore these human skins in the spirit of the divine force and in the hope of spring and the regeneration it can bring.