e Cihuacoatl
performed an annual ceremony already mentioned, was called tlal-xic-co,
literally "in the navel of the earth or land" (from tlalli=earth, land or
country, xictli=navel and co=in) (Sahagun, book II, appendix). Besides
this edifice there was, in the middle of the lagoon of Chalco, an island,
which, to this day, bears the name of Xico=in the navel or centre. This
indicates the curious circumstance that the edifice and island had
apparently been regarded as forming "ideal centres," and shows that the
name of Mexico itself may have been associated with the same conception
being, as it was, the central seat of government. Gomara states that "the
city was divided into two halves or parts, one named Tlal-telolco=small
island (literally, 'in the earth-mound') and the other named Mexico, which
means 'something which flows,' " (Histoire Generalle des Indes, Paris,
1634, chap. 38). The Nahuatl word alluded to can be no other than the verb
memeya which, according to Molina, signifies "water, or something liquid
which issues or flows in many directions." I have already pointed out that
the Maya words to express water which rises and overflows, high tide and,
by extension, abundance and plenty, are tul, tulnah and, finally, tulaan,
past participle of tul. If the particle "me" conveyed the above idea, its
combination with xico would cause the name Mexico to be replete with
significance and to mean "the figurative centre whence all maintenance
proceeded and flowed in all directions, throughout the land."

The Borgian Codex furnishes representations of identical meaning. On page
4 a human body, the centre of which forms a large red disc, is stretched
across the double tau-shaped tlachtli which obviously represents the four
quarters, being painted with their four symbolic colors. It is
particularly noteworthy that the limbs of the central figure are
represented as wearing the green skin of a lizard, while its face is
enclosed in the open jaws of the reptile. It should also be noted here
that whilst the Nahuatl names are cuetz-palin and topitzin, the Maya term
for lizard is mech or ix-mech. On the same page a similar, but smaller,
figure is depicted on a background representing the nocturnal heaven. On
the following page the figure of a dead woman is stretched on a red disc
whilst a priest is drilling the fire-stick into a circular symbol, with
four balls, which is the well-known symbol for chalchiuitl=jade. As the
name of the