Book of Days: An Introduction to the Aztec Calendar with Jesse Hathaway Diaz
Thu, Aug 03
|Online Event
Available as an individual ticket, part of the Thursday Day Pass or General Admission Ticket.


Time & Location
Aug 03, 2023, 7:00 PM – 9:00 PM EDT
Online Event
About the event
The tonalpohualli, or count-of-days, is the sacred calendar of the Mexica, also known as the Aztecs. While a 365 day agricultural secular calendar, the xiuhpohualli, was used to determine important seasonal agricultural festivals and rituals, its was the day-count of the the tonalpohualli that described the flow of energies that permeated all existence. This ritual calendar both described and created an equilibrium of forces that kept the world in motion. Intimate knowledge of the Count-of-Days permeated all facets of Mexica life, but was itself an inheritance of a larger MesoAmerican calendric tradition, developed over millennia by the Zapotec and Olmec, truly blossoming with the Mayan Tzolk’in (Mayan Count-of-Days), and ultimately used by the Mexica and their contemporaries like the Mixtec.
This 260 day calendar is an interaction of 20 day signs (such as Crocodile, House, Water, Flower, etc.) and 13 numbers. It is the interaction of these two components describes…