A mythical story recorded in the sixteenth-century Mexican history known as the But while these early accounts suggest that there were strict rules about drinking pulque, there were nevertheless plenty of circumstances in which people could and did drink freely, even to excess, both in the course of daily life and in ritual circumstances. Pulque is a viscous, milk-colored, alcoholic beverage produced by fermenting the sap obtained by the maguey plant. Indeed, it seems that the pulque itself was held as something essentially sacred, not only as a special offering to the gods but also in recognition of its powers to open one up to other realms. There were no regular exceptions from the fast.Once every 52 years during the New Fire ceremony, some priests would fast for an entire year. Children were given pulque during certain periods, including the month known as Hueypachtli, when boys and girls aged 9 or 10 drank pulque in a rite called Pilahuana, “drunkenness of the children” (picture 9).
Even rulers were not immune from the ill effects of overindulgence. The most common Aztec drinks were ātōle, and pulque – a fermented juice of maguey (the century plant) which was the main drink of commoners. According to one story, recounted in the sixteenth-century chronicles of the Franciscan friar Bernardino de Sahagún, a drunken Quetzalcoatl passed out in the middle of the road, as seen here in picture 2. In Aztec society, land could be owned by communities (calpolli) and parceled out to individual families for cultivation, or farmers could be resident tenants (mayeque) on large, privately owned estates. Celebrants brought him offerings of gifts and laid out food, and sang and played musical instruments in celebration. They would sometimes be mixed with other vegetables to make a soup or stew.The most important fruit and vegetables were chilli peppers, tomatoes, sweet potatoes, onions and avocados.Squash was also extremely popular, including courgettes and pumpkins. Some attendees would drink chocolate and consume hallucinogenic mushrooms so that they could describe their experiences and visions to the other guests.Before eating, each guest would drop some food on the ground as an offering to the god Tlaltecuhtli.In all aspects of life, the Aztecs stressed frugality, simplicity and moderation. Occasionally, the people would hunt and kill an animal, usually a turkey or a dog. The Aztecs of central Mexico appear to have been a fairly abstemious lot, issuing stern rules about who could drink the alcoholic beverage known as pulque, how much, and under what circumstances. One account by Sahagún describes the chief priest of “Ometochtzin,” or 2 Rabbit, bringing together a group of other pulque priests and organizing a kind of game in which 260 reed tubes were put into the sacred pulque vessel.
What appear to us to be ambivalent and even paradoxical attitudes toward drinking might be better understood in Aztec terms as a deep reverence and respect for the power of alcohol to make one vulnerable, to induce altered states of consciousness, and to manifest the realm of the divine. Worse, he might even fall over a cliff or into a chasm, as in this image (picture 4) of an unfortunate soul with a broken, bloody head who has fallen from a cliff; he tumbles down the mountainside, blood streaming from his head.Some accounts suggest that the penalties for drinking too much could be quite severe. The sap was placed in a large jug and allowed to rot.
Pulque, known to the Nahua as octli, was a drink made from the fermented juice of the maguey, or agave, plant. The two more well known drinks that the Aztecs drank were chocolate base drinks and octli. Nobles were allowed to drink, as were the priests. Children were also given pulque during the summertime festival of Tozoztontli, and in the ceremonial period known as Izcalli, the children received their pulque in extra-small-sized vessels, tiny pots that had been specially made for the young drinkers.Interestingly, the day 2 Rabbit was among the ritual times most closely associated with drinking pulque. It was most commonly drunk as Although cocoa was introduced to Europe in the early 16th century by Christopher Columbus, it was not until Hernan Cortes substituted sugar for spices that it became a commercial success.A scene depicting ritualistic cannibalism (Credit: Codex Cannibalism was deeply connected to Aztec mythology. For example, the festival of Tecuilhuitontli, which fell in July, was a special time for celebrating the salt merchants, who engaged in extensive drinking.
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