Rethinking the Reverse of the Codex Cospi : Ritual Offerings to Divine Effigies in Temples

Abstract This article reinterprets the reverse of the Codex Cospi , a Postclassic Central Mexican manuscript. Challenging long-standing views that the iconography in its plates refers to hunting rituals or protective ceremonies against poisonous animals, the article argues that they instead record ritual protocols for the presentation of offerings to divine effigies enshrined in temples. Through a comparison with other codices, archaeological data, and historical sources, the article proposes that the anthropomorphic figures depict temple images of deities, while the surrounding elements encode offerings of blood, aromatic, and coloring substances intended to be deposited before these images in prescribed quantities and sequences. Situating this imagery within Mesoamerican practices of communication with the divine, the article suggests that the reverse of the Codex Cospi functioned as a ritual manual complementing its divinatory obverse. Finally, it considers the possibility that the reverse has been produced in the workshop of a modest, possibly rural community, thereby illuminating the social context of this rare manuscript.