Aztlan-Chicomoztoc and the chronicles

Sat Feb 28 23:16:06 UTC 2009

Dear Maria, dear colleagues,

Thanks so much for your contribution to the 2009 Great Aztlan Debate! It's
much appreciated, since you've done a lot of work in this area.

I fully agree with you (and Henry Nicholson) on the need to conduct a
careful critical examination of the sources, one that includes, among
other things, an exacting philological analysis of the texts and their
affiliations.

And you are perfectly right that one should be careful not to assume, just
because a number of 16th- and 17th-century sources provide a particular
piece of information, that that information is independent in each. As you
point out, Motolinia was indeed a primary source for Lopez de Gomara,
Zorita, Mendieta, Torquemada, and so on. But, unless I am very mistaken,
no one has been suggesting so far that these sources are independent of
each other.

If I recall correctly, only Motolinia and Lopez de Gomara have been
mentioned so far in the debate, and not in connection with Aztlan or a
particular tradition. I had noted, in answer to a post from Roberto, that
Miguel Leon-Portilla was incorrect in asserting, on the one hand, that
Lopez de Gomara, following Cortes, only used 'los de Mexico' for the
Mexica and, on the other hand, that the term 'mexicano/a(s)' first came
into use after Diaz del Castillo made it popular. I mentioned in that
context that Motolinia was already using the term by 1541 at the latest.
I'm sure you will agree with me that this is not the same kind of thing as
you were talking about.

Cronica X is a fascinating subject! We still need a painstakingly thorough
study and test of this hypothesis, as also of Cronica Y, and, of course,
of the various other lost or presumed sources to which we could, perhaps,
assign for convenience the other letters of the alphabet. Barlow set us on
this path with his initial astute study, but a lot more needs to be done
before we can confidently say that we have solved the puzzle. Duran's
primary source, the Historia that he repeatedly mentions, may well be the
Cronica X, or at least a close relative.

As you (and I) have already said, there are a number of variants of the
Aztlan cycle, and these can indeed be placed in different source groups.
And, as you know, the specifics vary considerably -- e.g. as to how many
calpoltin of the Azteca Mexitin there were and how Chicomoztoc and
(Teo)colhuacan are treated geographically, geopolitically, and (if you'll
excuse the coinage) geomythologically.

For the sake of the discussion (since Susan Schroeder's extensive work on
Chimalpahin had been brought up), and to avoid unnecessarily long
documentation in what is just an exchange of ideas, I restricted myself in
previous posts to the Nahuatl texts of the Codex Aubin and Chimalpahin
(which includes passages adopted and adapted from Tezozomoc and Alonso
Franco that have not survived independently).

It is true, as you say, that Chimalpahin, like other sources of this early
period, frequently mixed materials gleaned from a variety of sources.
Ixtlilxochitl and Chimalpahin name quite a few of their primary informants
and materials. We know from this that Chimalpahin consulted learned Mexica
and Chalca nobles. The result is not a deliberate total synthesis (like
Ixtlilxochitl's Historia Chichimeca in contrast to his Relaciones) but a
series of related and overlapping accounts that are more or less faithful
to their sources (to the extent that we can judge this), though refined
and emended according to Chimalpahin's perception of things. Thus, he was
certainly not averse to blending material from one source into another, as
Schroeder and you have shown.

What we should not forget, however, is that Chimalpahin, unlike Lopez de
Gomara, to name but one example, was not simply consulting informants and
documents. He was himself at least cursorily acquainted with the
traditions as a result of his upbringing and heritage. He grew up
surrounded by elders familiar with Aztec-period traditions, but, at the
same time, he was versed in the methods of European scholarship.
Ixtlilxochitl is sometimes lost at sea in his attempt to interpret
unglossed pictorials, as we can see in his repeated attempts to read the
same glyphs. Chimalpahin was either much more skilled at this, or had
better consultants.

Chimalpahin indeed makes good use of what you call the Cronica X and Y
versions of the migration accounts. But BOTH versions (and Chimalpahin's
own retelling) support points I was making: namely, (1) that Aztlan was
generally understood in 16th-century Mexico, and probably earlier, to be
more than just the island of this name, as many in the past have
mistakenly assumed, and (2) that the Nahuatl ethnonym 'Azteca' included
more than just the Mexitin, although they are paramount and, in some
accounts, the only group explicitly named as such.

Nevertheless, we should keep in mind that Cronica X and Y are theoretical
constructs that, if they ever existed as discrete works or traditions, may
have included more -- or perhaps less -- than what we assume them to. If
we say that Cronica X only contained what is found in similar form in all
the extant works known to have used it, we adopt a minimalist approach
with regard to this construct. If we say that Cronica X itself used and
incorporated more than one traditional account (the norm in 16th-century
historiography and mythography), based on additional elements found only
in, say, two known sources, then we have a maximalist approach. Just as
much as two authors can add to, or blend into, their common primary source
the same secondary source independently of each other, so too can two
authors leave out (again independently) a secondary strand contained in
their primary source, in order to concentrate on a particular unitary
narrative, one that may have been gaining currency at the time. There are
arguments that can be made for each stance. We simply don't know for sure.
But it sure is fun, and worthwhile, to consider and to debate the options!

Maria, thanks again for your thought-provoking contribution. I'm really
looking forward to your upcoming article on the Seven Caves. Your
stimulating work in this area is something the 'Azteca', whoever they may
(or may not) have been, would have been very proud of!

All the best,
Gordon

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gordon Whittaker
Professor
Linguistische Anthropologie und Altamerikanistik
Seminar fuer Romanische Philologie
Universitaet Goettingen
Humboldtallee 19
37073 Goettingen
Germany
tel./fax (priv.): ++49-5594-89333
tel. (office): ++49-551-394188
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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