Hui/Chol: Excerpts from Of Enemies & Venison (2026)
Figure 11: Huichol net used to catch deer. Photo by Lumholtz (1903: 141). Digitally enhanced using AI.
[§3,1: The Use of Lassos & Nets]
“The use of lassos and nets in Mesoamerica was still very common in hunting contexts until very recently, before the widespread use of guns. We have already discussed the equivalence between hunting and warfare. We return to this point, adding that these traps were also used against humans, such as the conquistadors, who were particularly afraid of being caught in them (Flores, 1984: 21). At the beginning of the 20th century, the Tarahumaras were still using techniques of this kind to hunt deer, as were the Nahuas of Guerrero with their maguey fibre rope traps (Olivier, 2015a: 188). Other relatively contemporary examples exist among the Totonaques of Veracruz, the Mixtecs of the state of Oaxaca and the Huichol, who use istle nets tied to trees to capture deer. These are camouflaged by an ingenious black paint made from burnt corncobs, as shown in the photo taken by Norwegian ethnographer Carl Sofus Lumholtz in the early 20th century (Figure 11). In his book Mexico Unknown (1987), he wrote about Huichol techniques:
The use of traps and lassos is also attested to in a number of historical documents at the time of contact with Cortez's troops, whether in Alonso de Molina's Vocabulario (1970) under the various variations of the word nitra (lasso) or in Sahagún's texts on the Otomis. Speaking of the latter, the missionary wrote that "they only enjoyed hunting rabbits, hares, quail and deer with nets, arrows, glue and other ingredients that they used to make use of" (1880: 666). The various codices also contain a series of pictograms illustrating the deer-hunting technique described above (Figure 12). It should be pointed out that the content of the Codex Madrid tends to focus on the Maya and Yucatán populations. Does this prevent us from generalising the use of such techniques to the Aztecs? Again, by no means. The Codex Borbonicus, the contents of which come from observations made in the Mexico basin, and the Tonalamatl Aubin (a codex possibly produced in Tlaxcala) also demonstrate the capture of prey by lassos and various traps (Olivier, 2015a: 185-186). While there is some debate about the nature of the animals depicted, Olivier is on the side of those who consider that deer are depicted (Olivier, 2015a: 187).
According to Olivier, there is no doubt that the spread of traps and lassos in Mesoamerica stemmed from a certain need to capture deer alive (2015a: 325). This necessity involved the sacrifice of deer, in particular by cardiectomy (Figure 9). Olivier's proposal, as discussed in the previous section, is that the deer are assimilated to war captives and Mimixcoa. In this sense, they should undergo the same treatment.
[§3,2: Mimetic Technics]
Disguising oneself as prey is a mimetic technique that was widely used in Mesoamerica, which is not at all surprising in view of the dynamic of identification as we have presented it, of an analogist-animist ontology and of its implications in our particular context. The deities, whether Tlaloc, Xochiquetzal (Codex Borgia, 1963: 27-59) or Tlazolteotl (Codex Laud, 1994: 42), are themselves represented wearing deer horns, which goes hand in hand with the ambiguity of the positions (of the deer and their personalities) discussed in the second chapter.
In Maya ceramics from the pre-Cortesian period, it is possible to see representations in which hunters disguise themselves as deer by putting on their skins in order to approach them (Reents Budet, 1994: 34). Historically, such a technique was also used in central Mexico, as reported by Cervantes de Salazar in his Cronica de Nueva Espana. In the 16th century, Olivier (2008: 48) wrote of the inhabitants of Tenochtitlan that they
Such a technique also existed at the beginning of colonization among the Timucuas of Florida and more recently among the Zacatecs (and others), and continued to exist until the 20th century among a number of indigenous peoples in Mexico and Guatemala (Olivier, 2015a: 191).
Alternatively, a range of musical mimetic techniques, whistling, singing or playing musical instruments, were used to attract deer. In fact, a number of instruments in Mesoamerica were made from parts of the animal, including femurs, antlers and skins, and even human bones, most probably from captive warriors, which further establishes the equivalence between deer and sacrificial warriors (Olivier, 2015a: 287). The Mexica possessed omichicahuaztli (Figure 13), a kind of instrument carved from a deer femur that worked by friction, attached to a resonance box, in the manner of a guiro. As reported by Alvarado Tezozómoc, a Mexican chronicler and grandson of the tlatoani Moctezuma II, these instruments were used mainly in funerary contexts following wars (1878:301). Other instruments, such as the flute, were played in hunting contexts. The flute bearing the figure of Mixcoatl mentioned above (Figure 10), as Olivier points out, was very probably used as a lure to attract deer (2015a: 285).
As recounted by Brother Diego de Landa, at the time of contact with the Spanish, the Maya of Yucatán had whistles made from deer bone stems to animate their warriors (Landa, 1986: 36). We can therefore assume that these instruments were also used in warfare (Olivier, 2015a: 285). From an analysis of the Vocabulary of the Tseltal Language (a sub-language of Maya spoken in southern Mexico at the time the work was written in 1570), a work by Brother Domingo de Ara, Mario Humberto Ruz considers that the use of whistles in deer hunting is certain. He points to the proximity between the word oquezan - meaning "to blow into flutes" or "into reeds" - and oquemtayeuh chig, meaning "to claim the deer" (1996: 100).
More recently, the Huichol of the 20th century scraped together deer bones to the accompaniment of hunters' songs to lure them into their traps. The Naguas of Pajapan still use a whistle to call the deer, which they call gamito. The whistle is made from a reed and a deerskin membrane to produce a vibration. For Olivier, it is clear that the use of these kinds of techniques (disguises, like music) stems from an erotic vision of the hunt (Olivier, 2015a: 121), which, it should be remembered, is a constant in the Mesoamerican world that extends as far as the Amazon and even among the Cree of Canada (Olivier, 2015a: 141).
[§3,3, Hunting Techniques During Quecholli]
We have already discussed the Quecholli veintena, a festival in which the god Mixcoatl is celebrated by several peoples in the region in addition to the Mexica. According to the accounts we have from Christian friars Diego Durán and Bernardino de Sahagún, it is possible to highlight one or more particular hunting techniques and strategies.
According to the writings of Sahagún and his informants, during the first days of the veintena, people spent time making arrows, abstaining from alcohol and sexual activity. They also practised a form of bloodletting, which, it should be remembered, is the equivalent of sacrifice (Graulich, 2005), to ensure that the deer would "allow themselves to be hunted": "it was said that penance was thus made for going deer hunting afterwards" (Sahagún, 1880: 72). The great hunting party dedicated to Mixcoatl took place on Zacatépec, a mountainside near Tacubaya covered in tall grass, hence its name, which comes from çacatl (grass or straw) and tepetl (mountain) (Sahagún, 1880: 72). Early in the morning, after having breakfasted together and decked themselves out for the hunt, sometimes dressed in the manner of the Mimixcoa (Figure 8), the people would form a large circle around the hill "with the aim of gathering the animals that were to be captured or killed" (Olivier, 2015a: 359). As the Codex Florence states:
The deer heads ended up bloodied, as trophies in front of the hunters' homes, undergoing treatment similar to that of captives in war and sacrifices (Olivier, 2015a: 314-321). Those who had caught prey were offered various feather ornaments or food by Moctezuma II.
Similarly, in Diego Durán's writings, we find references to fasting in order to win favour a few days before the big hunt, as well as the use of the strategy of collectively surrounding the hill to prevent the animals from escaping (Olivier, 2015a: 361). More and more of the animals made their way to the summit, where they were eventually arrowed or captured. One of the differences with Sahagún's account is that the animals were sacrificed "in the same way as the men," most of whom had been sacrificed in the early days of the festival before the personifier of Mixcoatl, the representative of Quecholli (Olivier, 2015a: 361). The flesh of the prey was then cooked and eaten with amaranth bread. From Sahagún's account, it is impossible to know in what proportion during the hunting party the animals were captured to be killed sacrificially (although the Quecholli hunt is already a ritualistic/sacred setting in itself) as opposed to those that died at the moment of capture. Sahagún's account does not specify anything about animal sacrifice other than that the human victims were tied up like quadrupeds and that they were mounted on the altar "so tied up as to imply that they were like deer that were carried to the sacrifice" (Sahagún, 1880: 148). That being said, even if the hunters were armed with arrows and bows (Sahagún, 1880: 146), it seems to me that the tactic of encirclement can generally be understood as a capture technique that was aimed more at catching than killing at the precise moment, with a view to sacrifice. This seems to be confirmed by Durán, who points out that "only animals dedicated to Camaxtli [another name given to Mixcoatl] were sacrificed in this festival." In Historia de las indias de Nueva España, we read