His significance can be conjectured. He seems to be of a warlike nature,
for he is almost always represented armed with the lance and also as
engaged in combat and, in some instances, pierced by the lance of his
opponent, god F, for example in Tro. 3c, 7a, 29*a. The peculiar object
with parallel stripes, which he wears on his head is a rope from which a
package frequently hangs. By means of a rope placed around his head the
god frequently carries a bale of merchandise, as is the custom today
among the aborigines in different parts of America. On 4b and 5a in the
Cod. Tro. this can plainly be seen. All these pictures lead us to
conclude, that we have here to do with a god of _travelling merchants_. A
deity of this character called Ekchuah has been handed down to us, who is
designated explicitly as a _black_ god. In favor of this is also the
fact, that he is represented fighting with F and pierced by the latter.
For the travelling merchant must, of course, be armed to ward off hostile
attacks and these are admirably symbolized by god F, for he is the god of
death in war and of the killing of the captured enemy. The god is found
in the Codex Troano in the following places and on many pages two or
three times: pp. 2, 3, 4, 5, always with the hieroglyph, then without it
on pp. 6, 7, 19, 4*c, 14*b, 17*a, 18*b and again with the hieroglyph
on pp. 22*a, 23*a, 25*a; finally it is found again without the
hieroglyph on pp. 29*a, 30*a, 31*, 32*, 33*, 34*. In the Codex
Cortesianus god M occurs in the following places: p. 15, where he strikes
the sky with the axe and thus causes rain, p. 19 (bottom), 28 (bottom,
second figure), 34 (bottom) and 36 (top). M is always to be recognized by
the encircled mouth and the drooping under-lip; figures without these
marks are not identical with M, thus for example in Tro. 23, 24, 25, 21*.
Tro. 34*a shows what is apparently a variant of M with the face of an
old man, the scorpion's tail and the vertebrae of the death-god, a figure
which in its turn bears on its breast the plainly recognizable head of M.
God M is also represented elsewhere many times with the scorpion's