Aztec creator gods

The Tezcatlipocas created four couple-gods to control the waters by Tlaloc and Chalchiuhtlicue;[2] the Earth by Tlaltecuhtli and Tlalcihuatl;[3] the underworld (Mictlan) by Mictlantecuhtli and Mictecacihuatl;[3] and the fire by Xantico and Xiuhtecuhtli.

By Aztec times (14th–16th century ad), Tezcatlipoca's manifold attributes and functions had brought him to the summit of the divine hierarchy, where he ruled together with Huitzilopochtli, Tlaloc, and Quetzalcoatl.

He presided over the telpochcalli ("young men's houses"), district schools in which the sons of the common people received an elementary education and military training.

He rewarded virtue by bestowing riches and fame, and he chastised wrongdoers by sending them sickness (as leprosy) or by reducing them to poverty and slavery.

Red Tezcatlipoca is Xipe-Totec or Camaxtle, and his representations first appeared at Xollalpan, near Teotihuacan, and at Texcoco, in connection with the Mazapan culture—that is, during the post-Classic Toltec phase (9th–12th century ad).

During Tlacaxipehualiztli ("Flaying of Men"), the second ritual month of the Aztec year, the priests killed human victims by removing their hearts.

Other victims were fastened to a frame and put to death with arrows; their blood dripping down was believed to symbolize the fertile spring rains.

The pressure of the northern immigrants brought about a social and religious revolution, with a military ruling class seizing power from the priests.

His sea voyage to the east should probably be connected with the invasion of Yucatán by the Itza, a tribe that showed strong Toltec features.

As the god of learning, of writing, and of books, Quetzalcoatl was particularly venerated in the calmecac, religious colleges annexed to the temples, in which the future priests and the sons of the nobility were educated.

Huitzilopochtli is presented as the deity who guided the long migration the Aztecs undertook from Aztlan, their traditional home, to the Valley of Mexico.