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Mockeries and Metamorphoses of an Aztec God: Tezcatlipoca, "Lord of the Smoking Mirror. " By Guilhem Olivier. Translated by Michel Besson. Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2003. Pp. xiii, 403. Illustrations. Notes. Bibliography. Index. $75.00 cloth.
While Quetzalcoatl has received more than his fair share of attention, Guilhem Olivier's work promises to bring Tezcatlipoca to center stage thanks to this complex and thorough study. Tezcatlipoca took on many different guises and was known as Yohualli Ehecatl ("Night Wind"), Telpochtli ("Young Man"), Yaotl ("Enemy"), Iztli ("Obsidian"), Ce Miquiztli ("One Death"), and Ome Acatl ("Two Reed"). Several of these characteristics he shared with other deities. For example, Quetzalcoatl was also known as Ehecatl. Olivier introduces these personalities in the opening chapter, with a fuller development of all their nuances appearing in the last chapter.
In the second chapter Olivier analyzes Tezcatlipoca's various pictorial representations by listing all of the visible attributes and then developing tables to indicate which appear in which representation. He then compares those descriptions with ones given by eyewitnesses to the conquest. One important facet is Olivier's analysis of the tlaquimilolli or sacred bundle of Tezcatlipoca,...