The information provided here only scratches the surface of the historical traditions, which are many and varied. There are no books on how to "do" pre-Christian Mexican religion, and we believe this is for the best. While worship of the Teteo is open, we highly encourage all would-be practitioners to learn in community and educate themselves as much as possible about the cultures and beliefs held by the people of Tenochtitlan and the surrounding areas, as well as to better their understanding of the issues facing the modern-day indigenous descendants of the Azteca. Learning in community is one way to reify a decolonial worldview, and it is extremely important in knowing where we do - and do not - fit in the scheme of things.

Material here is roughly organized into categories, from the general to more niche, advanced areas of study. There are also resources provided for ancestral as well as non-ancestral practitioners, or anyone looking to decolonize their thinking. (We recommend decolonial material to everyone who wishes to learn more about all derivations of Mexicayotl, including Huehuemexicayotl!)

Foundations: Introductory reading
Delving Deeper: Exploring primary sources and cosmology
Advanced Reading: Culture, history, myth, and metaphysics
Glyphic Writing and Nahuatl
Theses, Dissertations, and Academic Works

Foundations: Introductory reading

Aside from the Florentine Codex, nothing in this section is primary source material. It is our opinion that seekers and practitioners unfamiliar with Mesoamerican worldviews, language conventions, and symbols might be better suited to familiarizing themselves with secondary, interpreted material first, to lay a solid base from which to explore and understand more difficult sources.

The Florentine Codex

The entirety of the Florentine Codex, or A General History of the Things of New Spain as it's properly titled, is very long and is a broad anthropological work on the life and culture of the Colhua-Mexica as recorded by Christianized indigenous informants in the early colonial era. It is not 100% reliable, but several parts are useful to the spiritual seeker: volumes 1-3, as well as 6 are a good start.

Aztec Philosophy: Understanding a World in Motion by James Maffie

There are issues with this formidable book, but Maffie's enthographic and linguistic exploration of his subject is worthy of consideration; in fact, this book has become a foundational read for understanding the Aztec's process theology/ontology. Teotl is also made uniquely easy to understand. However, we caution that Maffie imposes an outsider's artificial uniformity on a family of cultures and societal classes that were, in reality, richly diverse. He also makes the common claim that the Aztecs "had no gods". Read with some caution.

The Flayed God: The Mesoamerican Mythological Tradition by Roberta and Peter Markmann

A solid introduction to many of the primary myths of the Mexica and other groups, with images from codices.

The Fifth Sun: A New History of the Aztecs by Camilla Townsend

A retelling of the Spanish invasion through the eyes of the Indigenous Mexicans, a history as predominantly recalled by educated Indigenous authors rather than relying purely on European sources.

Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

An important decolonial work concerning the intersection of Indigenous animism and the scientific field of ecology. One cannot say that they truly honor and follow an Indigenous religious tradition without also accepting the intelligence and spiritual agency of plants, animals, and the land itself. This is a widely popular book, though note that there have been some Indigenous criticisms of it, including the author's choice to not properly acknowledge the influence of her predecessors.

Delving Deeper: Exploring primary sources and cosmology

The Popol Vuh

The Popol Vuh is a mythic text of the K'iche' Maya people of highland Guatemala and has some similarities to Aztec myth. Though it is not Mexica or Aztec, we believe that this is required reading for anyone interested in familiarizing themselves with Mesoamerican spiritual traditions.

Cantares Mexicanos: Songs of the Aztecs by John Bierhorst

The Broken Spears: The Aztec Account of the Conquest of Mexico by Miguel León-Portilla

Tezcatlipoca: Trickster and Supreme Deity edited by Elizabeth Baquedano

A series of essays about Tezcatlipoca's various aspects, dimensions, and relationships with other Teteo.

The Fate of Earthly Things: Aztec Gods and God-Bodies by Molly Bassett

An exploration if the various ways the Mexica experienced and facilitated localized, material embodiment of the Teteo (teixiptla), and what this tells us of their metaphysics.

Masks of the Spirit: Image and Metaphor in Mesoamerica by Roberta and Peter Markmann

Another one to read with some caution! A valuable book to get something of a taste for Mesoamerican metaphysics; the reader must keep in mind, however, that the authors are apply Jungian principles to their analysis. (A thorough criticism of the book can be read here.)

Advanced Reading: Culture, history, myth, and metaphysics

History and Mythology of the Aztecs: The Codex Chimalpopoca translated by John Bierhorst

A difficult text that recounts various myths or mythic histories. Much of the content is occult and hard to understand without a more advanced knowledge of the metaphors and symbolism used. This would be considered primary source material.

The Essential Codex Mendoza by Frances Berdan and Patricia Rieff Anawalt

The Codex Ramirez: History of the Mexicans as Told by Their Paintings translated and edited by Henry Phillips Jr.

The Labyrinth of Solitude by Octavio Paz

A landmark work by one of Mexico's most famous critics and thinkers about the legacy of colonialism which approaches a poetic understanding of ancestral trauma among contemporary Mexicans and Chicanos.

Fifteen Poets of the Aztec World by Miguel León-Portilla

Portilla presents translations of more than a dozen works of oral poetry from pre-Christian sources. Beautiful and haunting, the poems are presented and analyzed, with biographical information given about their authors. Readers must note, however, that Portilla was in the habit of translating Nahuatl words relating to gods in ways that favored a monotheistic bias.

Corn is Our Blood: Culture and Ethnic Identity in a Contemporary Aztec Indian Village by Alan R. Sandstrom

Teotl and *Ixiptlatli by Arild Hvidtfeldt

An early, foundational text on teotl, as well as the Mexican traditions surrounding material manifestations of the gods through the bundling of sacred objects, as well as the impersonation and sacrifice of teixiptlas, or persons who were made representatives of the gods on earth through ritual and sacrifice.

Stories in Red and Black: Pictorial Histories of the Aztecs and Mixtecs by Elizabeth Hill Boone

The Allure of Nezahualcoyotl by Jongsoo Lee