Baraja Mexicana Calendárica

Above: title page of the booklet accompanying Baraja Mexicana Calendárica, by Luis J. Coria.

Title page of the Spanish booklet accompanying Baraja Mexicana Calendárica, by Luis J. Coria. The page gives the deck title, describes it as containing Mexican and Maya dates and hieroglyphs, and records the registration number and Mexico City address.

Above: velvet-covered cardboard box for Baraja Mexicana Calendárica, with circular gold title label.

Velvet-covered cardboard box for Baraja Mexicana Calendárica. The circular gold label bears the title of the deck, with a small central emblem. The box is similar in construction to Fournier boxes of the same period.

The deck follows the standard French format, with 52 cards and two jokers. It features 13 deities repeated across each suit. The jokers depict Mayahuel, the Aztec goddess of fertility, abundance, mystical intoxication and the agave plant. Each card incorporates calendar elements and hieroglyphs, linking the pack to the Aztec 52-year cycle.

The deck is available with a solid green or black back, colours of symbolic significance for the Aztecs. It also features Tonatiuh, the Aztec god of the Sun, often associated with the Fifth Sun.

The deck is presented in a single-piece velvet-covered cardboard box, similar in construction to Fournier's boxes from the same period.

Information about this deck is difficult to find, as it appears to be a scholarly self-published deck from the 1970s. Luis J. Coria created it in the Colonia Nápoles neighbourhood of Mexico City. The deck comes with a handcrafted booklet in Spanish, which presents ancient Mexican culture and calendars over roughly thirty pages. It also has an official Mexican ownership registration and is referenced by Fournier as vol. 1, page 315, #55 of Mexico.

Above: Tezcatlipoca, Tonacacihuatl, Huitzilopochtli and Quetzalcoatl shown in the hearts and clubs suits, with calendar glyphs repeated above and below each card.

Above: The same deities return in diamonds and spades, with calendar glyphs repeated above and below each card.

Above: Number cards, Mayahuel jokers and the two back designs show the deck’s wider iconography.