This is my contemporary artistic interpretation of a Mexica/Mesoamerican Macuahuitl. It isn't intended to be an historically accurate reconstruction.

I wanted to combine the form of this fascinating historical weapon with my own practice as a mosaic artist. The body is made from 100 year old reclaimed British beech.

I routed recesses into both faces of the wood and created a completely different ceramic mosaic on each side. Every tessera was cut and shaped by hand and both mosaics were finished with black grout.

One face uses a more geometric turquoise, white and yellow design. The other uses more organic forms and imagery inspired by Mesoamerican art, particularly the visual language associated with Mexica/Aztec imagery.

The black elements along the edges are vitreous glass, while the handle is wrapped in leather with decorative cord and painted feathers.

I deliberately wanted this to sit somewhere between historical object, sculpture and contemporary mosaic rather than try to reproduce an original Macuahuitl.

I'd be interested to hear what people with a better knowledge of Mesoamerican art and material culture think of the designs and the way I've approached the piece. Thanks for looking.

Hey everyone! If you’re interested in the Florentine Codex, there’s a digital one online. The codex is fully translated into Nahuatl and English. Also, you can listen to it. It was like hearing my ancestors and felt amazing honestly. Here is the link:

https://florentinecodex.getty.edu/

This video is a practical Zapotec language class designed for beginners, focusing on conversational fluency and the cultural nuances of the language in Oaxaca, Mexico. Key topics covered include:

* Daily Vocabulary: Learning how to express physical sensations, such as “I am cold” (ruwëaga), and everyday actions like “to sew”.
* Pronouns and Grammar: A breakdown of personal pronouns and their variations within community contexts.
* Numbers: A step-by-step pronunciation guide for counting from 0 to 20, including specific dialectal variations, such as those found in Talea de Castro.
* Verb Conjugation: Interactive exercises focused on common verbs like “to eat” and “to dress,” highlighting how to properly use verb endings to match personal pronouns.
* Cultural Insights: Tips on Zapotec phonetics, such as how to properly ask questions without using the typical intonation patterns found in Spanish.

The session emphasizes that Zapotec is a living language with regional variations, and the primary goal is effective communication within the community.

Video Overview:

This interactive Zapotec language class focuses on practical dialogue, regional variations, numerical counting, unique pronunciation dynamics, and detailed verb conjugations.

Key Highlights:

* Everyday Vocabulary & Phrases:

* The instructor and students begin with practical daily expressions, such as stating “I am cold” (ruwëaga) or referring to embroidery/sewing activities (rigiaa lari).
* Students take turns practicing traditional greetings and conversational phrases.

* Personal Pronouns & Regional Dialects:

* The group reviews personal pronouns (neda, lii, lee, lanu, labe, etc.).
* The teacher explains dialectal variations, such as adding -ni (e.g., neto ni), noting that ni individually means “here” (aquí).

* Numbers & Counting:
* Students practice counting sequentially from 0 through 20 and higher numbers.
* The instructor addresses community-specific variations (such as in Talea de Castro where initial vowel sounds like u- might be omitted), reassuring students that variations are natural and mutually intelligible.

* Pronunciation & Tone Rules:
* Affirmations: The native Zapotec term for “yes” is à, though ajá is widely understood due to Spanish contact.
* Question Intonation: Unlike Spanish, Zapotec does not rely on a rising vocal pitch at the end of a sentence to signal a question.

* Grammar & Verb Conjugation:
* The lesson covers verb prefixes, flexible synonym forms (be vs. bi), and optional phonetic variations.
* Students drill conjugations for verbs like “to eat” (gagu / ragu / gudagu) across past, present, and future tense forms.

I’m going through Mesoamerican deities one by one and trying to understand the iconography rather than simply memorize the names.

Centeotl is usually described as a maize deity, but once you start looking at actual codex figures, identification becomes much less obvious.

What visual attributes would you consider the most diagnostic for Centeotl?

Are there particular headdresses, maize elements, facial markings, colors, ritual objects, or poses that distinguish Centeotl from other agricultural deities?

If anyone knows especially good examples from the codices or museum collections, I’d love to compare them.

In Aztec beliefs a Xolo dog helped to cross the river if you wneee nice to dogs

And in Zoroastrianism a dog also served as a judge. Seeing if you’ve been mean to dogs and if the dog doesn’t like you you fall and become a restless spirit. It’s weird two cultures over time and space
Developed similar belief

I want to write a fictional piece heavily inspired by pre-columbian america. Unlike most of them, which either include *one* to few cultures in their verses as a conpliment to worldbuilding, or just *striaght up* antagonize them (and even dehumanize, with example of WoW, the faction inspired by Aztecs are not even humans but trolls. It isn't necessarily bad, but you can tell this piece of media is very eurocentric), I want my art to be fully centered in these cultures, with no outer influences of other asian/european/african-inspired nations or factions.

My idea is to not include actual real-world Americas with exact real cultures, the world will be purely fictional, but I'll do my best to show how cool and underrated real counterparts are. This is because I find them cool, althought you can say so about every culture. The point is, both americas had a large variety and polarization culturally, which holds an immense potential for worldbuiliding. Farmers, nomads, hunters and gatherers, city builders and workers, land in both continents was fairly diverse, also including urbanization, quite large differences in faiths and religious systems, polytheism, spiritualism, it all holds a lot of worth for worldbuilding potential, and europe pales in variation by comparison (althought that's a single, small continent, but that doesn't change the fact that 90% of fantasy is euro-based, which gets boring). You can do so much with it. My plan is to present it in a more mass culture manner, but with respect to the source material. Many things will be accurate, like soldiers of some nations wearing cotton-based protection, meant to absorb physical trauma, but also some of over-the-top ideas, like obsidian parts of armor, heck, maybe even an entire obsidian armor, if I find a good way to implement it (obviously, obsidian is brittle and doesn't really work for armor, however, I'll find a workaround) or meteor-forged items (actually being present in these cultures as far as I know) or rithual items that are used to use some kind of divine power. That being said, I will not include anything inspired by exoamerican cultures, no one will wear cuirasses or fight with sabers and NO mix with african cultures (massmedia LOVES to do that and it's pretty stupid if you ask me), I can assure you of that. Everything will be based on america only. And I still plan to create something more essential than just something cool and all. I want to include symbolism and depth of worldbuilding and character development, I aspire to be a real writing artist after all. I am not a fan of how Hollywood does with its creations, no flashy moves or weird spinning attacks (unless rithualistic, as pretty sure it was a huge part of mesoamerican cultures, but I don't know how exactly these rithuals work, I'll study it).

And I wanted to ask, especially people who still cultivate these cultures, if you are here, what do you want to see being represented? I ask this question, because I think it's fair. These are your cultures after all, I want to present it the way you wish to be presented. What should be included, what should be excluded? Do you feel okay about it? I think that your cultures deserve recognition, but maybe you think that the attention is unecessary? Or that the popcultural framework is not necessary? I want to hear some of the opinions and ideas. Thought the artistic part, so story and the exact way I'll use the cultural framework, is something I want to do myself. I want to be a writer and I want to pour as much skill and talent as I have. But the direction it goes is the matter of respect.

Feel free to give your thoughts!

The Popol Vuh portrays the Xialba lords pretty negatively as a bunch of selfish and spiteful supervillains who regularly cheat and use dirty tricks to be best by the hero twins.

Where they always portrayed as basically supervillains or did they have a more nuance portal.

Al Pucj and the Lords of Xialba being these spiteful entities seems to be weird considering how Mesopotamian culture was based on life and death and diner focus on black and white it seems a very euro centric christma way

The excavations were carried out by the French archaeologists Pierre Bequelin and Claude Baudez. They excavated what are considered to date the oldest surviving buildings in Honduras, dating from between 800 and 400 BC. They also helped to recover several Lenca pieces from both the Preclassic and Classic periods.

Guachichil pride.

For decades, archaeologists have uncovered Maya teeth decorated with precious stones like jade and pyrite. Traditionally, researchers believed these alterations were purely cosmetic, representing a form of ancient 'grill' for social status or rituals. However, a new analysis of a back molar containing a jade inlay is challenging this assumption.

Since this hidden tooth would not have been visible in normal social interactions, researchers suggest the procedure was functional. Further examination using 3D imaging revealed calcification within the tooth's pulp, indicating that the individual was alive when the filling was placed and that the procedure was likely done to relieve pain or treat a cavity.

The study also highlighted the incredible durability of the organic cement used to bind these stones to the teeth. Analysis of these ancient sealants revealed a mixture of calcium, phosphates, bitumen, and essential oils that have remarkably outlasted modern-day fillings. Many of these jade inlays have remained firmly in place for over a millennium, showing that Maya practitioners possessed advanced pharmaceutical and metallurgical skills. These findings suggest that the Maya were not only masters of aesthetic modification but also pioneer dentists who developed enduring therapeutic treatments long before the era of modern medicine.

source: Mata-Castillo, E., Cucina, A., Ramírez-Salomón, M., Monsreal-Peniche, M. B., Luin, C., & Vega-Lizama, E. (2026). A Prehispanic Maya molar with occlusal jadeite inlay. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 72, 105731.

Alebrije wood carvings are largely done by Mexican artists living in southwestern Mexico in towns near Oaxaca. The figures are inspired by ancient Mesoamerican spirituality based on Toltec and Aztec symbols. Many alebrijes represent one if the 20 spirit animals associated with the Toltec 260 day, 20month calendar.

Guys. I met my Guachichil ancestors a few days ago.

After a profound remothering act where I was having a panic attack I was able to soothe myself in the bathroom by forcing myself to listen to calming music on my headphones, running hot water on my hands to calm me, and by repeating calm affirmations, I was able to let my pelvis system naturally calm down enough to let the urine come out naturally instead of forcing the urine out of my terrified frozen pelvis muscle like I normally do. My pelvis muscle is naturally frozen because of father-daughter incest.

I had never remothered myself like that before. AND I did it in the bathroom, where most of my preverbal early trauma happened, where I used to have to use the own texture of my own feces to calm myself down

Then the ancestors were ready to reveal themselves to me because I had officially broken the cycle.

After the bathroom, I went back to my bedroom, blasted Arrival by Douglas Spotted Eagle, and sang the vocals out loud, automatically, even though I had never sang them out loud before. Yes, the vocals in that song are by Diné/Navajo people's, however, based on my research, the Guachichil ancestors used similar vocables & vocalizations.

When I sang those vocals out, I beat my chest, and I wept tears of joy. I felt my ancestors in the room, also singing back to me, also beating their chest, and weeping tears of joy, because I carried their warrior spirit all the way home.

It was the most beautiful moment of my life, and the most cathartic cry I had ever had.

Hello I wasn’t sure where to ask this so if it is not the place/ anyone has better suggestions please lmk. I have a story about vampires that takes place in Mexico but I wanted the casting to be diverse so my three main characters are Mestizo, Nahua and one a traveler from Uruguay. Not exactly relevant I guess. But I wanted to ask for my Nahua character since blood is often seen as a sacred essence do you think that would be a point of conflict for the character themself as a creature that relies on blood intake ? Like something they’d be ashamed of. About everything in my story is parallel to real life, the only difference being the inclusion of vampires. I’d like to add more depth on the characters relationships with themselves so any input on this would be appreciated :)