Xochipilli, Flower Prince, is the Aztec god of art, beauty, dance, music, games, flowers and maize, closely tied to the pleasures and creative energies of life. He is honored as patron of the ballgame and of patolli, a board game played with marked beans, and his cult is closely bound to that of Xochiquetzal, goddess of love and craftwork, with whom he shares the flower and beauty complex. A famous stone statue of Xochipilli, found on the slopes of the volcano Popocatepetl and now in Mexico's National Museum of Anthropology, is carved over its entire surface with stylized flowers and other forms that later botanical and ethnobotanical study has identified as depictions of psychoactive plants, including mushrooms, tobacco and morning glory, tying him to ritual use of these substances alongside his patronage of music, dance and play. Xochipilli is closely associated with Macuilxochitl, Five Flower, foremost of the Ahuiateteo, the two sharing patronage of games, gambling, music and pleasure so closely that some accounts treat them as the same figure under different names.
Facts
Function
Domain / Function Domain / Function Domain / Function Domain / Function Domain / Function Domain DetailAs patron of the ahuiateteo pleasures, Xochipilli's domain has also been read by art historians as extending to male homosexuality and to the ritual use of inebriating and psychoactive plants such as tobacco, morning glory and psilocybin mushrooms, an association inferred from the carved plant motifs covering his surviving cult statue. 2 Belief
TheologyPolytheistic: many gods 1 The Aztec god of art, beauty and pleasure closely bound to Xochiquetzal and Macuilxochitl, matching the reading already carried by Quetzalcoatl and Mixcoatl for the same pantheon. History
Historical NoteXochipilli's carved stone statue, now in Mexico City's National Museum of Anthropology, bears stylised flower and mushroom cap forms that some botanists and ethnobotanists have read as depictions of psychoactive plants including psilocybin mushrooms, tobacco and morning glory, an identification other specialists regard as speculative and unproven. 2 Identity
Also Known AsSome colonial era sources identify Xochipilli with Piltzintecuhtli, a youthful solar deity, treating the two names as descriptions of one god of youth, art and pleasure rather than as separate figures, though the equation is not made consistently across surviving accounts. 1 Origins
Origin of the NameXochipilli combines the Nahuatl words for flower, xochitl, and prince or noble, pilli: Flower Prince. 2 Sources
Textual NoteA well known Aztec statue of Xochipilli, now in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, is carved with stylized flowers and other motifs some modern researchers have proposed represent psychoactive plants known to Aztec ritual use, though the identification remains debated rather than settled among specialists. 1 Disputed
Origin AccountXochipilli is closely associated with, and by some accounts treated as a youthful aspect of, the maize and flower deity Centeotl, the two sharing iconographic elements including flower and butterfly motifs in surviving Aztec sculpture. 2 Colonial era chroniclers and modern scholars of Aztec religion are not consistent about whether Xochipilli and Centeotl represent one deity under two names, a father and son pair, or two distinct but closely related figures within the wider complex of flower and maize deities, so the relationship is recorded here as a genuine open question rather than a settled identity. Attributions
Mythic AssociationXochipilli is closely associated with Macuilxochitl, Five Flower, foremost of the Ahuiateteo, sharing patronage of games, gambling, music and pleasure so closely that some accounts treat the two as the same figure under different names. 2 Attestation
Veneration TodayHistorically attested; no continuous cult 2 HistoricityNot a historical person: a divine or other-than-human being 2 Cult
Attributes and IconographyA famous stone statue of Xochipilli, found on the slopes of the volcano Popocatepetl and now in Mexico's National Museum of Anthropology, is carved over its entire surface with stylized flowers later identified as depictions of psychoactive plants, including mushrooms, tobacco and morning glory. 2 Worship and PracticeAs patron of the ritual ballgame, players petitioned Xochipilli before a match, since the game carried ritual weight of its own that tradition tied closely to his domain of fertility, pleasure and play rather than to sport alone. 2 Position Profile
Key TextA famous Aztec stone statue of Xochipilli, now held in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City, is carved over its entire surface with stylized depictions of psychoactive plants and mushrooms, including what researchers have identified as morning glory, tobacco and possibly psilocybin mushroom motifs, evidence scholars connect to his patronage of ecstatic states achieved through sacred plants. 2 In Other Languages (11 names)
- زوشيبيللي
- Σοτσιπίλλι
- زوشیپلی
- Xōchipilli
- ショチピリ
- 소치필리
- Шочипилли
- Макуільшочітль
- 索奇皮利
- Xochipili
- Хоћипили
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
Macuilxochitl and Xochipilli share patronage of games, gambling, music and pleasure so closely that some accounts treat them as the same figure under different names, others as distinct members of the same complex.
This source names Xochipilli directly: "Wikipedia's article on Xochipilli, the Aztec deity of beauty, youth, love, art, music and flowers, published by the Wikimedia Foundation and maintained by its community of editors."
This source names Xochipilli directly: "work catalogue entry, titled "Xochipilli (An Imagined Aztec Music)," carrying Carlos Chavez's own programme note describing the piece as "the result of my thoughts on topics of Mexican antiquity and..."
This source names Xochiquetzal directly: "his cult is closely bound to that of Xochiquetzal, goddess of love and craftwork, with whom he shares the flower and beauty complex."
Belongs to Tradition
Xochipilli is a major god of the Aztec pantheon, patron of art, music, games and flowers.
Depicted In
The work's own title, carried by the publisher's own catalogue, names Xochipilli outright in both of his aspects, Xochipilli and Macuilxochitl.
Sources
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