The Aztec sun stone, Stone of the Sun (Spanish: Piedra del Sol) or Aztec calendar stone is a large monolithic sculpture that was excavated in the Zócalo, Mexico City's main square on December 17, 1790.
Measuring about 3.6 meters (12 feet) in diameter, 1.22 meters (4 feet) in thickness and weighing 24 tons, the original basalt version is presently on display at the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City's Chapultepec Park.
While it is often called the "Aztec Calendar," it is a symbolic portrayal of the four disasters that led to the demise of the four prior Universes in Aztec cosmology. It also contains a hieroglyphic and pictographic layout of how the Aztecs measured time, and was primarily a religious and cosmological artifact.
The Aztec Calendar page also contains more information on how the Aztecs marked time.
Understanding the Sun Stone
The Aztecs believed that four prior Universes existed and the Sun Stone depicts each one of these iterations. The Aztecs believed that they were living in the fifth and last creation of their world.[citation needed] To this end, the Aztec Sun Stone is dedicated to the sun god Tonatiuh, who was believed to have been the fifth sun god, as a means to prevent further catastrophe and end of the world by performing regular human sacrifices in his honor.
Center
In the center of the sun stone is believed to be either the sun god Tonatiuh or the earth god Tlaltecuhtli. The central figure's tongue is shown to be a sacrificial knife, while the circles on either ends depict claws holding human hearts for sacrificial purposes.
The Four Worlds
The four squares around the central deity depict the previous four suns (the four prior Universes) that perished. On the top right square is depicted the jaguar. Moving to the left is the wind, below the wind is fiery rain and in the bottom right square is water.
The Twenty Days
Continuing outward from the inner circle, the next concentric circle consists of twenty squares, each naming one of the twenty different days of the Aztec month. Clockwise, these days are:
- Snake - Coatl
- Lizard - Cuetzpallin
- House - Calli
- Wind - Ehecatl
- Crocodile - Cipactli
- Flower - Xochitl
- Rain - Quiahuitl
- Flint - Tecpatl
- Movement - Ollin
- Vulture - Cozcacuauhtli
- Eagle - Cuauhtle
- Jaguar - Ocelotl
- Cane - Acatl
- Herb - Malinalli
- Monkey - Ozomatli
- Hairless Dog - Itzquintli
- Water - Atl
- Rabbit - Tochtli
- Deer - Mazatl
- Skull - Miquiztli
Each Aztec year consisted of eighteen months and each month had 20 days. Five more dots called Nemontemi were added inside the circle, which depicted days for sacrifice, bringing up the total number of days to 365.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piedra_del_sol
