Observations placeholder
Codex Azcatitlan - Aztecs and Mexica - Trance states and weighing
Identifier
011469
Type of Spiritual Experience
Background
These men are in a trance state not dead. I am having to guess here, for which I apologise, but this ceremony looks exactly like the weighing ceremony used in Ancient Egyptian mystery ceremonies, a symbolic mechanism of testing initiates before they finally go through the ceremony towards god like status.
There is also an alchemical feel about the picture - placed in a furnace symbolically in order to purify- the purpose of which is a form of purification by fire