primordial sea monster of Aztec mythology
Cipactli
Cipactli is, in Aztec mythology, a primeval sea monster, part crocodile and part fish, whose body gave rise to the earth. It is also the first day of the tonalpohualli ritual calendar, which explains why the Aztecs held it in such high regard.
The myth
According to the stories, Cipactli was the only sea creature that existed at the beginning. It was always hungry, and every joint of its body bore an extra mouth. Tezcatlipoca lost a foot when he used it as bait to lure the monster closer, and together with Quetzalcoatl the creature was torn apart to create the world. From its body the earth was formed, split in half to make the sky and the ground.
With no room left for humans, two trees were raised to separate the two halves. Nine levels were left above people, "the nine that are above us", and nine worlds of the dead below. The count of time was entrusted to the couple Oxomoco and Cipactonal, advised by Quetzalcoatl. Their calendar had 18 months of twenty days each, and the first bore the creature's name.
Worship and religion
Its name headed the tonalpohualli, a count of 260 days that combined thirteen numbers with twenty signs. The days were understood as an orderly path from the most primitive to the most sublime, and the last was xochitl. Cipactonal, "Sign of Cipactli", was considered the first diviner.
Legacy
In the Maya Popol Vuh, the earthquake demon Zipacna apparently derives its name from Cipactli, and in twentieth-century Highland Maya oral tradition it appears as Sipak. In the Mixtec Vienna Codex, the day Crocodile is linked to the beginnings of dynasties.
Ancient sources: Aztec accounts recorded in the sixteenth century, such as the Teogonía e historia de los mexicanos, and the Maya Popol Vuh mention it, along with the Mixtec Vienna Codex.