User:Najawin/Sandbox 1

The Aztec calendar was a human dating system that cycled every 52 years over a period known as a xiuhmolpilli, leading to the New Fire Ceremony, where the years must be bound through ritualistic sacrifice to renew time. (PROSE: Against Nature) The calendar had a pair of sub-calendars serving dual purposes, one for tracking the solar year, and the tonalpohualli, which had religious significance. (PROSE: Nobody's Gift) (PROSE: Against Nature)

Part of the first calendar was the Nemontemi, (PROSE: Against Nature) comprised of nothing days. The Aztec year had 360 days, 18 months consisting of 20 days, so the last five days of the solar year were considered "Nothing" days, days on which nothing was sold in the markets and everything stopped. (PROSE: Nobody's Gift)

Tonalpohualli
When Peri asked for the date in "human terms" when they arrived in 3174, the Sixth Doctor sarcastically informed her that it was "nine-Ehecatl day" according to the Aztecs — "but that's hardly either here or there after all that unfortunate business with Cortez". (PROSE: Burning Heart)

Other terms in the Tonalpohualli took a similar form in Nahuatl, be it Ome Ozmatli (lit. "Two Monkey"), Chicoce Cuauhtli (lit. "Six Eagle"), etc, and it was structures into groupings of thirteen days called trecenas (lit. "group of thirteen"), and a grouping of twenty trecenas. Each of days, trecenas, and solar years were given names in this form.

Nahuatl to English translations of Tonalpohualli terms
Much of the Tonalpohualli was explicitly identified, both the terms used in Nahuatl and often the English translations of the terms. (Put in footnote: Note here that no relationship was given generally between symbol and number aside from when the two were used in a date together. This is merely a table that includes both.) (Also, unsure if we want to use the term "Symbol" here.) (PROSE: Burning Heart) (PROSE: Against Nature)

Religious significance
Every year, trecena, and day were presided over by specific deities in the tonalpohualli, and one could even expand this view to hold that an entire ilhuitl should be viewed in divinatory terms. The deities presiding over different parts of the tonalpohualli were as follows.


 * Camaxtli
 * Chantico
 * Itzpapalotl
 * Mixcoatl
 * Quetzalcoatl
 * Tepeyollotl
 * Tlamatzincatl
 * Tlazolteotl
 * Xipe Totec
 * Xochipilli

Behind the scenes
In the real world, it would be more accurate to characterize the Aztec calendar as a calendrical system rather than a single calendar, consisting of two separate calendars, the, which measured a solar year in 365 days, and the , which has religious, divinatory, purpose.

The xiuhpōhualli consisted of 18 twenty day "months" often referred to modernly as veintenas (lit. "group of twenty"), each of which had associated festivals, and five days added at the end of the year. While contemporary scholars agree that the Mexica were aware that the solar year was not precisely 365 days, they disagree on how the calendrical system handled this. Some have suggested that leap years were employed, Against Nature instead (GAAAAHHHHHHH I CAN'T FIND THE SOURCE I HAD ABOUT BURTON USING A CERTAIN BOOK)

Obviously a work in progress, I plan on adding an expansive BTS section