Overview Index Finder Use it Elements Celestial Divination Forces Esoteric Chakras Tree Foundations Oracles Materials Workings Correspondences Tarot Hour & Day Atmosphere Invocation Grimoire / Deities / Mictlantecuhtli Tradition · Aztec Mesoamerican
A note on this entry Mictlantecuhtli is the Aztec lord of Mictlan, the nine-level underworld, depicted with owl feathers in his headdress, and he is the ruler the dead must pass and the keeper of the bones which Quetzalcoatl tricks him out of - the entry is correct on all of this, including the nine levels. What is modern is the phrase 'he sets the tests the dead must pass': the obstacle journey of the dead (the crashing mountains, the blade wind, the blood river) is traditional, but it belongs to the road through the nine levels and its guide Xolotl, not to a set of ordeals the god administers. The planetary value Pluto, the metal 'plutonium' and the tarot values are modern.
Alternate Names Lord of Mictlan Lord of the Land of the Dead
Gender Expression Masculine
Titles Lord of Mictlan Keeper of the Ninth Level The Bone Lord
Domain Death The underworld The nine levels The bones The owls The journey Planetary Correspondence Pluto Correspondences Animals Serpent Scorpion Raven
Offerings Copal incense Paper Rubber Maize Pulque Autosacrifice blood Invocation Approach Address Mictlantecuhtli Lord of Mictlan The Bone Lord
Relationship The lord of the place the dead have to cross
Warning He tests the traveller and keeps what falls
Resonance The dying the bereaved those who sit with death
Symbols Skull Owl Bone Obsidian knife Mythology Summary Mictlantecuhtli is the Aztec lord of Mictlan, the nine-level underworld, a skeletal figure with an owl on his head who sets the tests the dead must pass and who is tricked by Quetzalcoatl for the bones of the ancestors. He is the road itself rather than the judge at the end of it.
Modern Practice Mictlantecuhtli is honoured at the Day of the Dead and in death work. His practice is the altar for the dead and the food shared with them.
Referenced by
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Every entry that names Mictlantecuhtli , grouped by the system it comes from.