Aztec Monoliths as Time-Shaping Devices. Coatlicue, Piedra del Sol and Piedra de Tízoc

Abstract

This article presents a new interpretation of the most famous artistic monuments manufactured by the Aztecs, or Mexica, of Ancient Mesoamerica in the 15th and 16th centuries. Going beyond traditional artistic and iconographic interpretations, it strives to understand this huge works as beings endowed with “agency” that organized and controlled the flow of time and space, the “chronotopes” constructed by the Mexica. The analysis shows the magnitude of the networks mobilized by the Mexica to build these monuments, and also the effects they strived to achieve through them, all within the frame of their “ritual” actions to keep the cosmos working.