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CHALCHIUHTLICUE. Around 1535, in the region of Xochimilco, the Franciscan missionary friar Bernardino de Sahagún destroyed a “stone idol” placed inside a fountain where the Indians had been accustomed to offer copal incense. It was undoubtedly a statue of Chalchiuhtlicue (“Her Skirt Is Jade”), the Aztec goddess of water. She may have been one of the descendants of the “Great Goddess,” the principal deity of Teotihuacan during the Classic period, who is widely represented in frescoes and identified in the monumental statues known as the Goddess of Water and the Idol of Coatlinchan. In Aztec statuary of the Postclassic period, Chalchiuhtlicue is sometimes confused with the maize goddesses Xilonen and Chicomecoatl. A deity whom the Tlaxcaltecs called Matlalcueye (“Possessor of a Blue Skirt”) appears in several pictorial manuscripts (e.g., the codices of the Borgia Group, the Codex Borbonicus, and the Codex Telleriano-Remensis) as patron of the day Snake (Coatl) and of the thirteenth month, which begins with 1 Reed (Ce Acatl)—two calendar signs associated with water and fertility. Her ornaments include a helmet formed from the head of a serpent, two black rectangles painted on her cheeks, a jade necklace, a mirror or disk worn as a pectoral, and a triangular cape (quechquemitl) or skirt (cueitl) decorated with jade (chalchihuitl); the latter gives rise to her name. Born on the day 7 Rain (Chicome Quiahuitl), Chalchiuhtlicue was the wife of the rain god Tlaloc and the mother of Tecuciztecatl, the moon god. Under the name Iztac Chalchiuhtlicue, she gave birth to the Mimixcoa, who fought the first holy war in order to nourish the sun and the earth. Chalchiuhtlicue was associated with the Sun (Age) of Water (Atonatiuh), or Sun of Jade (Chalchiuhtonatiuh), which was destroyed by a flood. A great inundation caused by the rupture of an aqueduct constructed under the historical ruler Ahuitzotl was attributed to her wrath. Called Apozonallotl (“Foam of Water”) and Acuecueyotl (“Wave”), she was also the Atlacamani (“Temptress”) who engulfed ships. During the feast of Etzalcualiztli, water merchants and boatmakers offered her a slave, who was sacrificed together with an image of Tlaloc. During Huey Tozoztli, a young girl dressed as Chalchiuhtlicue was slain and cast into the whirlpool of Pantitlan. Chalchiuhtlicue shared with Huixtocihuatl, goddess of salt water, the title “Oldest Sister of the Tlaloque” (the rain deities). Because they were divinities of rain and mountains, they were worshipped during the veintenas (20-day months) of Tepeilhuitl and Atemoztli in the form of amaranth-seed effigies representing mountains. Midwives invoked the name of Chalchiuhtlicue when washing newborn children in order to purify them. Likewise, healers called upon the goddess when practising hydromancy to locate the tonalli (spirits) of sick children. Under the name Chalchiuhuehue—also worshipped by the Pipil of Nicaragua—she presided over marriage ceremonies. Depicted in jade, the symbol of water and abundance, Chalchiuhtlicue personified the precious element of life, as this invocation by a midwife illustrates: “Here is thy mother, the mother of all of us, Chalchiuhtlicue. Take it [the water], receive it. Here is wherewith thou wilt endure, wherewith thou wilt continue to live on earth.”