“The dogs they breed for food…are quite tasty.” - Hernan Cortes [1526] (conquistador who leads conquest of the Aztecs)

Dog skeletons are found in Chupícuaro (West Mexican) burials; they were apparently sacrificed.

Dogs “walk with their noses to the ground…dig in the earth…eat carion… They have night vision… [and sense] sounds and smells that are imperceptible to humans.” Benson (1997) (contemporary scholar)

Dogs are the first domesticated animal; evidence of their presence in the new world dates back c.5,000 years

Remains of dogs in midden (excavated waste piles) suggest dogs were added to the Mesoamerican diet c.1600-750 BCE

Dog sculptures are found in the shaft-tombs of Western Mexico

Dogs are known for their devotion and companionship. For the Aztecs, dogs were “a constant companion…happy, amusing.” – Sahagun [1569] (Priest who collects ethnographic data re: Aztecs--as he converts them to Christianity)

Xolotl was a diety with canine attributes worshiped by central Mexicans. He was the companion/twin brother/alter ego (stories vary) of Queztalcoatl (Plumed Serpent deity). Queztalcoatl and Xolotl are said to have gone “to the underworld to retrieve the bones of ancestral humans, to create the present human race.”

Queztalcoatl imagery is found at the site of La Campana, Colima, in western Mexico (c.700-900 ACE); dog sculptures are found in tombs here, as well.

Source: Susan Toby Evans, Ancient Mexico and Central America, p.215