Codex Fejérváry-Mayer — Wikipedia

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The first page of the Fejérváry-Mayer codex represents, in the center, Xiuhtecuhtli, the god from fire to red skin, where four jets of blood or lava are spanning four jets. The colors indicate the four cardinal points, the yellow representing the north. Each district is made up of a tree, a bird and two deities [ first ] .
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The Codex Fejérváry-Mayer is a prehispanic Mesoamerician codex of the Borgia group, also commonly called under the name of Tonalamate of the Pochtecas (that’s to say “Divinatory Calendar Book of merchants” ).

The codex bill is typically native: it was made on animal skin with a length of 3.85 m which was folded into an accordion, in 22 double-sided painted sheets of a rectangular format of 16.2 cm out of 17.2 cm [ 2 ] .

When the Duke of Loubat had a facsimile of this codex edited in 1901, the Codex was designated under the codex fejérváry-Mayer name, named after the last two collectors having kept it [ 3 ] .

The famous epigraphist Miguel León-Portilla then attributed to him in 1985 the name of Tonalamate of the Pochtecas , in agreement with the interpretation of its content [ 4 ] .

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The realization of the Fejérváry-Mayer codex would be prior to 1521 [ 5 ] .

Its history was unknown until 1829, when Gabriel Fejérváry had a copy of this codex for the book achieved Antiquities of Mexico from Edward King, Viscount of Kingsborough (better known as Lord Kingsborough) [ 3 ] .

Franz Pulszky, nephew of Gabriel Fejérváry, inherited in 1851 from the Codex with the rest of the antiquity collection of his uncle [ 3 ] . In economic difficulty, he sold the codex to collector Joseph Mayer [ 3 ] . The latter made in 1867 donation from his collection to the Liverpool Free Public Museum, where he has always been preserved since [ 3 ] .

A facsimile of the codex was carried out at the request of the Duke of Loubat [ 3 ] In 1901 [ 6 ] .

This prehispanic codex was classified in the Borgia group by Eduard Seler for its pictorial style similarities with the other group codex [ 7 ] . Alfonso Caso then deduced from the resemblance of the style of the paintings of Tizatlán, in the state of Tlaxcala, with that of the Borgia Codex, that all the group codex came from a region between Puebla and Tlaxcala [ 7 ] . EN 1961, Karl Nowotny (in) , without denying the hypothesis of Alfonso Caso, noticed a mixture influence in the style of the Fejérváry-Mayer codex [ 7 ] . Mayanist J. Eric S. Thompson, based on resemblances to the Madrid codex, estimated that a Maya influence was also detected [ 7 ] . Miguel León-Portilla concludes that it is likely that this codex is an expression of cultural interbreeding induced by commercial contacts between the pochtecas of Tlatelolco or Tenochtitlan with the cultures whose influence transparently in the codex [ 8 ] ; He concludes that the exact place to realize the codex can be any of the largest codex production sites located on the Pochtecas road, except Tenochtitlan, because the style of the codex whose origin could be attributed to The Mexican capital does not correspond to that of this manuscript [ 8 ] .

The specialists consider that this codex present, compared to the other codex of the Borgia group, in many points in common with the Laud codex [ 9 ] .

Like all precolonial codex, it reads from right to left.

It is a tonalamatl, a calendar of predictions and ceremonies devoted to certain protective deities such as Yacatecuhtli, God of merchants and traders. They probably used this calendar to determine the favorable dates to carry out their expeditions [ 8 ] .

  1. ↑ León-Portilla 2005, p. 20.
  2. ↑ Gordon Brotherston, Painted Books from Mexico , British Museum Press, 1995, p. 178
  3. ↑ a b c d e and f León-Portilla 2005, p. 8.
  4. ↑ (is) Miguel León-Portilla , ‘ Of orality and codices to “general history” » , Nahuatl culture studies , n O 29, , p. 137 ( p.73 of the file ), note 106 (ISSN  0071-1675) .
  5. ↑ (in) ‘ Codex Fejérváry Mayer » , on liverpoolmuseums.org.uk (consulted the ) .
  6. ↑ Read the introduction edition of this facsimile on the FAMSI website.
  7. ↑ A B C and D León-Portilla 2005, p. 9.
  8. ↑ A B and C León-Portilla 2005, p. ten.
  9. ↑ (is) Will Sprange , The gods in the Mexican codices of the Borgia group: an iconographic investigation , Fund of Economic Culture, , 517 p. (ISBN  968-16-1029-6 ) , p. 13-14 .

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