example. Nearly all the accounts tell us that Quetzalcoatl was never
married, and that he held himself aloof from all women, in absolute
chastity. We are told that on one occasion his subjects urged upon him the
propriety of marriage, and to their importunities he returned the dark
answer that, Yes, he had determined to take a wife; but that it would be
when the oak tree shall cast chestnuts, when the sun shall rise in the
west, when one can cross the sea dry-shod, and when nightingales grow
beards.[1]

[Footnote 1: Duran, in Kingsborough, vol. viii, p. 267. I believe Alva
Ixtlilxochitl is the only author who specifically assigns a family to
Quetzalcoatl. This author does not mention a wife, but names two sons,
one, Xilotzin, who was killed in war, the other, Pochotl, who was educated
by his nurse, Toxcueye, and who, after the destruction of Tollan,
collected the scattered Toltecs and settled with them around the Lake of
Tezcuco (_Relaciones Historicas_, p. 394, in Kingsborough, vol. ix). All
this is in contradiction to the reports of earlier and better authorities.
For instance, Motolinia says pointedly, "no fué casado, ni se le conoció
mujer" (_Historia de los Indios, Epistola Proemial_).]

Following the example of their Master, many of the priests of his cult
refrained from sexual relations, and as a mortification of the flesh they
practiced a painful rite by transfixing the tongue and male member with
the sharp thorns of the maguey plant, an austerity which, according to
their traditions, he was the first to institute.[1] There were also in the
cities where his special worship was in vogue, houses of nuns, the inmates
of which had vowed perpetual virginity, and it was said that Quetzalcoatl
himself had founded these institutions.[2]

[Footnote 1: _Codex Vaticanus_, Tab. xxii.]