Trecena 2, Opening on Ocelotl

Trecena 2 opens on 1 Ocelotl, the jaguar, under the patronage of Quetzalcoatl, the feathered serpent, god of wind, learning and the priesthood, whose myth cycle traces him from the ruler of Tollan through exile and self-immolation to rebirth as the morning star. Sahagun's fourth book gives this week a hard augury, reading those born in it as at risk of death in captivity, their days inviting misfortune that only penance and careful attention could turn aside, a severity that sits uneasily beside Quetzalcoatl's usual character as a civilising, priestly god, a reminder that a trecena's reading followed the day sign's own nature, here the jaguar's violence, more than the patron's temperament.

The tonalpouhque held real remedial power over such a week: Sahagun records that a reader could move a child's naming day within the trecena to a more favourable number among its thirteen, a practice that mattered most precisely under signs like this one, where the raw augury was unwelcome. Quetzalcoatl's patronage here sits alongside his more famous roles as patron of the calmecac priestly schools and of Tollan's legendary learning, a different face of the same deity than the wind god Ehecatl who patronises the second day sign in the twenty sign count.