Although Mexican Independence Day... September 16th... is more than a week away, I have started seeing some decorations on buildings and Mexican flags flying from automobiles. So, even though I will be in Ohio on Independence Day, I decided to hang the decoration I bought last year on the door of the apartment.
The fake metallic medallion (it's actually plastic) is of the Mexican national emblem, and attached to it is a banner with the green, white and red of the Mexican flag.
The coat of arms has the image of the eagle perched on a cactus devouring a serpent, a symbol which has its origin in the founding of the Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan, present-day Mexico City.
Did you know that the official name of the country is "Estados Unidos Mexicanos" (the United Mexican States)?
According to Aztec mythology, the nomadic tribe that we refer to as the Aztecs (they actually called themselves the Mexica) were told by their god Huitzilopochtli to build their city where they saw an eagle perched on a prickly pear devouring a snake. However, there is debate as to whether the serpent was really a part of the sought after omen. Not all Aztec carvings include a snake, and some archaeologists say that what the eagle is grasping in its beak is not a serpent but rather an Aztec glyph representing war. Furthermore, unlike Western culture, where the snake was viewed as a symbol of evil and sin (think of the Garden of Eden), in Mesoamerica the snake was the symbol of wisdom. So the eagle and serpent might be a misinterpretation of Aztec carvings by Spanish chroniclers who saw it as the struggle between good and evil. In any event, the eagle and the serpent are what we have as the national emblem today.
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