COATLICUE

(Nahuatl: Serpent Skirt), Aztec earth goddess, symbol of the earth as creator and destroyer, mother of the gods and mortals. The idea that she embodies is powerfully concretized in her statue (National Museum of Anthropology, Mexico City)her face is of two fanged serpents; her skirt is of interwoven snakes (snakes symbolize fertility); her breasts are flabby (she nourished many); her necklace is of hands, hearts, and a skull; her fingers and toes are claws (she feeds on corpses, as the earth consumes all that dies). Called also Teteoinnan (Mother of the Gods) and Toci (Our Grandmother), she was but a manifestation of the earth goddess, who also appeared as Cihuacatl (Snake Woman; like Coatlicue, called Tonantzin [Our Mother]), fearsome goddess of childbirth, and as Tlazoltotl (q.v.), goddess of sexual impurity and wrongful behaviour.