Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs

by Camilla Townsend

The Chichimec barbarians bossed the others around, but it was not exactly the Chichimecs’ fault that they exhibited such rough, uncouth behavior. One of the more malicious gods had tricked them: he left a foundling for them to find and take pity on and raise as their own. They adopted him, having no way of knowing that the creature’s sole purpose was to make trouble for them. In a bawdy tale designed to catch the audience’s attention, the 1540s storyteller described the ensuing crisis: When Huemac became a young man, he gave orders that the Nonohualca tend to his home. Then the Nonohualca said to him, “So be it, my lord. May we do what you desire.” The Nonohualca came to tend to his home. And then he demanded women of them. He said to the Nonohualca, “You are to give me women. I order that the buttocks be four spans wide.” The Nonohualca said to him, “So be it. Let us first seek where we can get one whose buttocks are four spans wide.” Then they brought four women who had not yet known sexual pleasure. But as to size, they were not enough. He said to the Nonohualca, “They are not of the size I want. Their buttocks are not four spans wide. I want them really big.” The Nonohualca left in great anger.28