THE STRANGE CITIES OF EARLY MEXICO
Principal prehistoric monuments--Aztec capital of Tenochtitlan--
Pyramids of Teotihuacan--Toltec sun-god--Pyramid of Cholula--Pyramids
of Monte Alban--Ruins of Mitla--Remarkable monoliths and sculpture--
Beautiful prehistoric stone-masonry--Ruins of Palenque--Temple of the
Sun, and others--Stone vault construction--Tropical vegetation--Ruins
of Yucatan--Maya temples--Architectural skill--Temples of
Chichen-Ytza--Barbaric sculpture--Effect of geology on building--The
Aztec civilisation--Land and social laws--Slavery--Taxes, products,
roads, couriers--Analogy with Peru--Aztec homes and industries--War,
human sacrifice, cannibalism--History, hieroglyphics, picture-writing--
Irrigation, agriculture, products--Mining, sculpture, pottery--Currency
and commerce--Social system--Advent of the white man.
The most remarkable of the remaining monuments in stone of the peoples
who successively or contemporaneously inhabited Mexico, are those
well-defined and fairly well-known groups of ruins scattered at wide
distances apart in the southern and south-eastern part of Mexican
territory. The principal of these are: Teotihuacan, at Texcoco, in the
Valley of Mexico; Cholula, in the State of Puebla; Monte Alban and
Mitla, in the State of Oaxaca; Palenque, in the State of Chiapas; Uxmal
and Chichen-Ytza, in the peninsula of Yucatan.
Of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan, or Mexico, but little of antiquity
remains, as, according to the historian of the Conquest, the place was
almost entirely razed to the ground by Cortes. It is probable, however,
that enduring stone edifices formed a much less considerable part of
this city than has been supposed. Nevertheless, modern excavations
continually lay bare portions of Aztec masonry, as well as sculptured
monoliths. A short time ago a sculptured tiger, weighing eight tons,
was unearthed and deposited in the museum in the capital. The principal
building of the Aztec city was the great Teocalli, upon whose site the
existing cathedral was built. This huge truncated pyramid has been
described already. It was surrounded by a great wall, upon the cornice
of which huge carved stone serpents and tigers were the emblematic
ornaments. From this wall four gates opened on to the four main
streets, which radiated away towards the cardinal points of the
compass. Its dimensions are given as 365 feet long by 300 feet wide at
the base, whilst the summit-platform was raised more than 150 feet
above the level of the streets and square. Here was set the great image
of the Aztec war-god, the idol of the abominable Huitzilopochtli which
Cortes and his men, after their frightful hand-to-hand struggle with
the Aztecs on this giddy platform, tumbled down the face of the pyramid
into the streets below, among the astonished Indians. The grandeur,
architecturally, of the ancient City of Mexico has probably been
somewhat exaggerated by the _Conquistadores_ and subsequent
chroniclers, whose enthusiasm sometimes ran riot.
The ruins of Teotihuacan are situated in the north-eastern part of the
valley of Mexico, some miles from the shores of Lake Texcoco and
twenty-five miles from the modern City of Mexico. They are generally
ascribed to the Toltecs, or, at any rate, to a civilised nation greatly
previous to the Aztecs; for the ruins were abandoned and their origin
unknown when these people arrived. Cortes and his Spaniards, defeated
and fleeing after the terrible struggle of the _Noche Triste_, passed
near to the great earth pyramids of the Sun and the Moon, which are the
main structures of Teotihuacan; but even at that time they were--as
they are to-day--mere mounds of earth, in which the pyramidal form has
been partly obliterated by the action of time.
[Illustration: PREHISTORIC MEXICO: THE PYRAMID OF THE SUN AT
TEOTIHUACAN, IN THE VALLEY OF MEXICO, SEEN FROM THE PYRAMID OF THE
MOON.]
The very extensive mounds and remains which constitute Teotihuacan are
of numerous pyramids, and some ruined walls which have been excavated
of recent years. All of these are formed of _adobe_ and irregular
pieces of the lava of which the adjoining hills are composed. Rude
carved monoliths of deities have, however, been recovered from the
_debris_. The main features of the ruins are, first, the "Pyramid of
the Sun," a huge mound which forms the most colossal structure of
prehistoric man in America. It measures, approximately, at its
base--for its outlines are so indefined that no exact form can be
adduced--some 700 feet on each side, rising upwards in the form of a
truncated pyramid rather less than 200 feet above the level of the
plain. Next, the "Pyramid of the Moon," a similar but smaller
structure--about 500 feet at base--distant from the first some
thousands of yards along a strange road or path across the plain, known
as _Micoatl_, or the "Path of the Dead," some two miles in length. From
the summit of the "Pyramid of the Moon" the beholder looks down into
the great courtyard of an adjoining group of ruins; thence his eye
travels along this pathway to where the huge "Pyramid of the Sun"
arises, far off, on its left-hand side. Between these and indeed beyond
them, and bordering on the "Path of the Dead"--probably so called in
relation to human sacrifice--are numerous other mounds, which were
formerly pyramids of similar character, but of much less magnitude.
Probably, in ages past, they were all crowned by temples, and ascended
by staircases and terraces--evidences of which, indeed, still
remain--whilst the slopes were probably covered with stone and stucco.
It is stated that upon the high summit of the great pyramid--that
dedicated to Tonatiuh, the sun--a huge stone statue of this deity was
placed, and that a plate of polished gold upon its front reflected back
the first rays of the rising sun. The name Teotihuacan signifies the
"house of the gods." Doubtless it was, in unknown centuries past, the
centre of a thriving civilisation and busy and extensive agricultural
population. To-day the great pyramid casts its shadow toward a small
village of _jacales_, upon a semi-arid plain.
The pyramid of Cholula is of truncated form, like most of these
numerous structures. Its height is 200 feet and its base measures 1,440
feet, which is greater than that of the pyramid of Cheops, and it forms
the oldest and largest teocalli in Mexico. The presiding deity of this
"house of God" was the mysterious Quetzalcoatl. In company with
Teotihuacan at Texcoco, and Papantla, in the State of Vera Cruz,
Cholula is ascribed to the Toltecs. The elevation above sea-level of
the site of this structure is 7,500 feet, and at the time of Cortes the
surrounding town is said to have contained a population of 150,000
inhabitants. Its summit is more than an acre in extension, and although
partly obliterated and overgrown, the pyramid is crowned to-day with a
Roman Catholic church of Spanish-American type. As has been described,
these Teocallis were for purposes of religious rite and sacrifice, and
upon their upper platforms were the sanctuaries, idols, and
never-extinguished sacred fire, all reached by exterior staircases up
the slope of the structure.
The State of Oaxaca--and part of the adjoining State of Guerrero--is
remarkable for the numerous ruins of prehistoric inhabitants scattered
upon its ridges and mountain crests. Terraces, pyramids, and walls
crown the summits and extend down the slopes, actually clashing in some
cases with the natural profiles of the hills, and causing the natural
and artificial to mingle in a strange, and at first glance, scarcely
distinguishable blend. These numerous ruins, and the small cultivated
terraced patches on the almost inaccessible hill slopes, bring to mind
the similar constructions of the old ruins and the singular "andenes"
of the Andes of Peru.[8] They point to a busy and numerous population
in former times, and in some cases the topography of whole mountain
slopes has been remodelled by the hand of prehistoric man. No place was
too inaccessible, and terrace and temple crown the Andine summits in
Peru at more than 16,000 feet elevation above sea-level, and in Mexico
in similar or greater profusion, but at less altitude.
[Footnote 8: See my book, "The Andes and the Amazon."]
Among the remarkable ruins of this nature, in Oaxaca, are those of
Monte Alban, near the capital city of Oaxaca. Here are entire crests of
mountains, cut away into terraces, quadrangles, and courts, and their
great extent and strange environment create a sense of awe and
amazement in the beholder. The utter abandonment and sense of solitude;
the high ridges, thousands of feet above the valley, which, dim and
distant through the atmospheric haze, glimmers below; the vast expanse
of sky and landscape, without a sound or touch of life, invests the
remains of those seemingly unreal or fairy cities of prehistoric man
with a sense of mystery and unfathomed time. Pyramid after pyramid,
terrace after terrace, the latter from 500 to 1,000 feet in length,
extend along the ridge of the Alban hill--the numerous truncated
pyramids rising, like the playthings of some prehistoric giant, from
the levelled places. The beholder may imagine the chain of Teocallis
which crowned them, lighted up at night by the glare of the
never-extinguished sacred fires, as the thronging multitude of the
great population of those barbaric peoples of pre-Columbian Mexico
pressed along the streets below. He may fill in, in his mind's eye, the
picture, fanciful and unreal, as if borrowed from the pages of some
Eastern romance, were it not that the actual vestiges of that time are
before him. Vast labour--probably directed by autocratic mandate
without heed of native life, and working throughout generations--must
have been employed to collect and raise up in place the stone, and
earth, and _adobe_ material of these pyramids, and to make the great
levellings and excavations upon these inaccessible summits. They were
cities, as well as mere places of religious ceremony, and a large
number of people must have dwelt in these "mansions in the skies."
[Illustration: PREHISTORIC MEXICO: RUINS OF MITLA; FACADE OF THE HALL
OF THE COLUMNS. (The steps have been "restored" by the photographer.)]
In the same State of Oaxaca are the famous ruins of Mitla, pride of the
archaeology of Mexico, situated some thirty miles from the state
capital of Oaxaca. These famous ruins of Mitla are of a different
character to the pyramidal structures of Monte Alban, although they
have a low pyramidal base and were built mainly for religious purposes,
it is probable, like most of these prehistoric monuments. They are
situated in an inhabited valley, and the ruins consist of five main
groups, some of which are exceedingly well preserved. Indeed, whilst
the ruins of Mitla are by no means so extensive as others described,
they are in the best state of preservation of any in the country. And
this is due both to their method of construction and to their
environment; for, unlike the low, tropical regions of Chiapas and
Yucatan, this district is at a considerable altitude above sea-level.
The great "palaces" or halls which these groups form, occupy an area of
about 1,800 feet from north to south, by 1,200 feet from east to west.
The principal groups are known as the "Hall of the Monoliths or
Columns," the "Catholic group," and the "Arroyo group." Like some of
the pyramids throughout Mexico, these are oriented, in this case the
variation being but a few degrees from the cardinal points of the
compass. The remarkable Hall of the Monoliths is a building some 125
feet long by 25 feet wide, with a row of great stone columns running
down the centre. These columns are cut from a single piece of trachyte,
15 feet in height, and 3 feet in diameter at the base, tapering
somewhat upwards, but of almost cylindrical form, without pedestal or
capital. Whilst these columns are intact, the roof, which was doubtless
supported on beams resting on the column, is gone. The weight of these
monoliths is calculated at five or six tons, and they were cut from
quarries in the trachyte rock of the mountains some five miles away,
and more than 1,000 feet above the site of Mitla. In this quarry
half-cut blocks for columns and lintels are still in place. Food for
thought, even for the modern engineer, is this work.
[Illustration: PREHISTORIC MEXICO: RUINS OF MITLA; HALL OF THE
MONOLITHS OR COLUMNS.]
But the monolithic columns here are by no means the only remarkable
features of the masonry of Mitla. The interior and exterior of these
great halls are carved with a beautifully executed geometrical
design--the Greek pattern enclosed in a quadrilateral, the blocks upon
which they are cut being exactly fitted and adjusted in their places
with scarcely visible joints. Indeed, at Mitla, as in other places in
the Americas--Huanuco[9] and Cuzco, in Peru, for example--it seems to
have been deemed an essential and peculiar art to adjust great blocks
of stone with so great a nicety that no mortar was necessary and the
joints almost invisible. This, of course, necessitated infinite time
and patience--both of which were at the disposal of these prehistoric
builders. It is to be recollected, in this connection, that each stone
was generally an individual and not a counterpart, and so often had to
be fitted to its fellows in the wall, by the laborious method of
continually placing and removing. The remarkable and intricate nature
of the mosaics and carved blocks at Mitla call forth the admiration of
the observer. A vast number of separate stones have been employed, each
requiring its respective forming, shaping, and placing, and one of the
halls alone shows more than 13,000 such stones in its walls. The stone
doorways to these halls are chaste, massive, and effective. The stone
lintels in some cases are more than 12 feet long, and nearly 4 feet
thick. Indeed, there exist at Mitla nearly a hundred examples of great
monoliths, whether columns, lintels, or roof stones, some weighing as
much as 15 tons, and up to 20 feet in length.
[Footnote 9: See the "Andes and the Amazon."]
The earliest account of the ruins of Mitla, by Francisco de Burgoa, a
priest of Oaxaca, who visited them in 1674, states that these beautiful
halls were the scene, in prehistoric times, of the most diabolical
rites. To-day the ruins are surrounded by a rude native population,
most of whom dwell in wretched _jacales_, in a waterless and sun-beat
valley--an environment in striking contrast to the antique splendour of
these halls of the earlier occupiers of the land.
The ruins of Palenque, in the State of Chiapas, are situated at the
base of the picturesque foothills of Tumbala, which border upon
Guatemala, in a true tropical environment of luxuriant forest and
brimming streams. From this setting the ruined temples and pyramids
stand forth like a vision of a charmed or fabled story. Dense tropical
undergrowth covers them, and grows again as soon as explorers, who have
removed portions of Nature's persistent covering, leave the place. The
main structures take the form of great truncated pyramids built up of
earth, stones, and masonry, with temples and palaces of masonry upon
their summits. Twelve of these pyramids have been discovered so far,
and eight are crowned by buildings, the principal of which are known
respectively as, the "Temple of the Sun," the "Temple of the Cross,"
"Temple of the Inscriptions," and the extensive group of ruins termed
"The Palace." These temples and palaces consist of massive masonry
walls, partly of roughly-shaped blocks, and partly of cut-and-carved
stone, and stucco sculpture, with numerous doorways or openings on to
the platform of the pyramid-summit. The interior of the buildings is a
singular vault-like construction, covered with roofs of masonry carried
by the vaulting. These vaults, however, do not embody the principle of
the arch, but rather of the off-set, or lean-to, and are very high in
proportion to their width. From the palace group arises a square tower
of four storeys, about 40 feet in height, forming the centre of the
group of extensive courts, buildings, and facades which surround it,
all built upon the summit of a pyramid some 200 feet square. As in the
Yucatan structures, the lintels over the doorway-openings in the walls
were of wood, and their decay has largely been the cause of the facades
having fallen into ruins, in many places. There are various interior
staircases to these buildings, and the huge and unique reliefs of human
figures are a remarkable feature of the interior. The beautiful figure
known as the Beau Relief is compared to the relief sculptures of
Babylon and Egypt. The material of construction was limestone,
generally in unshaped blocks, not laid in regular courses, but with
large quantities of mortar and stucco. The walls were lavishly painted
and coloured. Indeed, the nature of the building has doubtless obeyed
the character of the stone, which does not lend itself to careful
cutting and carving like the easily-worked trachyte of Mitla. A very
noteworthy structure of this prehistoric city, is the subterranean
passage-way for the stream, which passes down the valley upon whose
slopes the ruins of Palenque are situated. This, of stone-vaulted
construction, after the manner before described, is somewhat less than
1,000 feet long, and the stream still flows through a portion of it. On
every hand the extraordinary vigour of the tropical forest is evident,
and the dense growth of trees, vines, and herbs which cover valley,
pyramid, walls, and roofs, attest the power of the vegetable world.
The prehistoric structures of Yucatan--among the principal of which are
those of Uxmal and Chichen-Ytza--are exceedingly numerous. Indeed, the
traveller in this territory of the Mayas is rarely out of sight of
crumbling pyramid or temple, as he traverses the dense forests of these
curious flat and streamless limestone regions. Whilst most of these
edifices were for purposes of religious ceremonial, the object of many
of them can scarcely be conjectured. Their builders appear to have been
people of a peaceful nature, and their dwellings do not generally bear
evidence of defensive design. The architectural skill of the Mayas must
have been of a very high order. Among the buildings which exist some
are nearly perfect units of design, and seem almost to argue the use of
"working drawings," as the plan and detail must have been perfected as
a whole before the building was begun. This architectural skill of
conception, however, has been common in many countries. Some of the
buildings were in use when Cortes landed and fought on the shores of
Yucatan, nearly four hundred years ago; nevertheless, they are in a
remarkable state of preservation, notwithstanding the ravages both of
Nature and of man, tending towards their destruction; for on the one
hand, the roots of trees and profuse vegetation of a tropical region
are efficient levers in the throwing down of the masonry, and on the
other, the vandal ignorance of the surrounding inhabitants of the
modern towns of the region permits them to make use of the stones in
their own walls.
The ruins of Chichen-Ytza, the prehistoric city in the northern part of
Yucatan, are among the most important and best preserved of any of the
stone structures of the Americas. The ruins are grouped around two
great natural wells, the _cenotes_, famous in this remarkable
peninsula. Indeed, the derivation of the name of the old city is from
Maya words meaning the "Mouth of the Well," and it serves to show the
value in which these singular water-supplies were held in this
riverless region of Yucatan. Among the most interesting of the
structures of Chichen and Uxmal is that of the buildings known as El
Foloc, or "the Church." Another is that known as the "House of the
Nuns," and yet another the "Temple of the Tigers," which latter shows a
sculptured procession of tigers or lynxes. Again, "the Castle" is
remarkable, set upon a pyramid rising more than 100 feet above the
plain. The "Governor's Palace," the "House of the Pigeons," and "House
of the Turtles," are others of these remarkable structures.
The profuse and extraordinary, yet barbaric-appearing sculpture of the
facades and interiors of these buildings arrests the observer's
attention, and, indeed, fills him with amazement, as does their
construction in general. What instruments of precision did a rude
people possess who could raise such walls, angles, monoliths, true and
plumb as the work of the mason of to-day?
It would be beyond the scope of this work to enter more fully into the
details of these ruins. They have been minutely examined and described
by famous archaeologists, who have devoted much time thereto, and the
student may be referred to their works. The foregoing is but a sketch,
barely touching upon the extensive and beautiful handwork in stone of
the ancient dwellers of this land. Indeed, the traveller may behold
them for himself, without great risk or difficulty. He will observe
them with admiration. Pyramids rising from the plains or forest-seas
which surround them; strange halls where unknown people dwelt; great
cities where busy races lived. The character of the various groups of
ruins throughout the land shows the effect that the geology of the
respective regions has had upon the stone-masonry of these prehistoric
builders. As has been shown, the beautiful trachyte of Mitla, which,
whilst it is tough and enduring, is soft, and lends itself readily to
the chisel. The result has been handed down in the beautiful and exact
sculpture of the blocks and _grecques_ of the facades of these palaces:
work which could not have been performed in a more refractory stone.
Not a great distance away are the Monte Alban ruins, as described,
which, although extensive and remarkable, show nothing of exact and
intricate work in stone-shaping. The hard or silicious rocks which form
the immediate region, and the quartzite and crystalline limestone, did
not lend themselves, either in the quarry or under the chisel, to such
work. In Chiapas, the unshaped and uncoursed masonry of Palenque is
formed of a hard, brittle limestone, scarcely capable of being worked
to faces. No invisible joints, such as are the beauty of some of the
ancient stone structures of the Americas--North and South--were
possible, and mortar and stucco were freely employed. Very different,
however, was the limestone used in Yucatan. It was easily quarried from
its bed, and was of such a texture as lent itself to the profuse and
beautiful sculpture of those Maya cities of long ago. Again, the great
pyramidal structures of Teotihuacan and surrounding ruins of the Toltec
civilisation, had little for their composition but lavas of basaltic
nature, which did not possess a character adaptable for exact
stone-shaping. Thus it is seen how largely the existence, or
non-existence, of freestone influenced the character of these
prehistoric structures.
[Illustration: PREHISTORIC MEXICO: RUINS OF MITLA; THE HALL OF THE
GRECQUES.]
Of exceeding interest are these old buildings of the early Mexicans,
whether upon the open plains of the uplands, or buried in the glades of
the tropical forests. There they arise, great palace walls where
sculptured tigers and serpents, and strange designs, run in barbaric
riot around their ruined facades, above grim vaults, subterranean
passages, and chambers of inexplicable purpose. There they stand,
chapters in stone of the history of a people whose destiny it seems to
have been to have formed no link in the purpose and evolution of man; a
people who seem to have been upon the threshold of a true civilisation.
The form of government of the principal peoples of Anahuac, the Aztecs
and Texcocans, was an uncommon one--that of an elected monarchy. The
king or emperor was chosen, however, from among members of the royal
family, whether brothers or nephews of the preceding sovereign, by the
four appointed electors. He was installed with barbaric splendour, a
main feature of the event being the great sacrifice of human beings in
the Teocalli--that diabolical custom which ever robs the Aztec _regime_
of the dignity of any appellation beyond that of semi-civilisation.
Otherwise the Aztec _regime_ may be considered as a military democracy.
The land was held, to some extent, by great chiefs under a species of
feudal system which carried with it certain obligations as to military
service, but it was also assigned to the use of the people. The
monarchy became of a despotic character, and legislative power lay with
the sovereign, although a system of judicial tribunals administered
justice throughout the cities of the Empire, and the Aztec civilisation
had at least advanced far enough to acknowledge and uphold, by legal
machinery, the rights and security of individuals and of property. Like
the customs of the Incas of Peru, heavy penalties--generally of
death--were meted out for bribery or corruption of the officers of
justice.
Indeed, the great crimes were in most cases capital offences, as
murder, adultery, thieving, as well as the misappropriation of funds,
and the removal of land boundaries with intent to defraud. Marriage was
a solemn and binding ceremonial, and divorce could be obtained only
after a careful judicial inquiry and sanction. Slavery existed in
several forms--captives of battles, reserved for the sacrifice;
criminals, paupers, and debtors became slaves voluntarily; and children
of poor parents who were sold into a species of mild servitude or
dependency. No child, however, could be born into the condition of
slavery--a somewhat unique proviso among systems of servitude.
The land system was, in some respects, similar to that which obtained
amongst the Incas: a just and philosophical distribution of the soil
amongst the people who dwelt upon it. Indeed, in the matter of land
tenure, both the Incas and the Aztecs--these semi-civilised peoples of
prehistoric America--employed a system which the most advanced nations
of to-day--Great Britain or the United States--have not yet evolved,
although in the case of Britain it seems that such is slowly appearing.
The system was that of parcelling out the land among the families of
the villages or country-side, and did not permit its absorption by
large, individual landholders. The peasant thus had his means of
support assured, and it was forbidden to dispose of the land thus
allotted, which reverted to the State in the case of extinction of the
family. This land system was governed by a careful code of laws, in
these American communities. In Peru the individual ownership of land
was a very marked feature of the social _regime_.[10] Lands were
nevertheless set apart for the sovereign.
[Footnote 10: See my books "Peru," and the "Andes and the Amazon."
These land systems are worthy of study by economists upon the land
question to-day.]
Taxes were paid upon agriculture and manufacture, in goods. These
included most of the very varied products of the empire--varying as
they did with the wide range of climate and topography, just as the
products of the Mexico of to-day vary. Gold and copper utensils,
pottery, arms, paper, cochineal, timber, cocoa, grains, fruits, gums,
animals, and birds, and the beautiful feather-work in which the people
excelled, were among these. Spacious warehouses in the capitals existed
(as in Peru) for the storing of these, and any embezzlement or
maladministration was rigorously punished.
Another institution of the Aztecs which calls to the traveller's mind a
similar one among the coeval Incas of Peru, three thousand miles away
in South America, was that of their means of communication. Such were
maintained by relays of runners or postmen, who journeyed at great
speed over roads which connected the distant parts of the empire; and
it is stated that two hundred miles were covered in a day by these
trained messengers, each of which performed the two leagues--the
distance between the post-houses--within an hour. Just as the Inca
Emperor of Peru, at Cuzco, beyond the great Cordillera of the Andes,
was served with fish brought in _fresh_ from the Pacific Ocean, so
Montezuma, the Aztec monarch, also ate it, straight from the Gulf of
Mexico, at his capital of Tenochtitlan beyond the maritime Cordillera
of Anahuac. Striking and of marked interest to the traveller of to-day,
in those vast and rugged regions of Mexico and Peru, is this matter of
the native couriers, who journeyed over mountain roads, swollen rivers,
desert plains, and ice-crowned summits.
The wealthier people lived in houses of stone, finished and furnished
with certain barbaric luxuriance, in which tapestries woven and richly
coloured, and secured with fastenings of gold, had their place. A
remarkable industry and article of clothing of the early Mexicans was
the beautiful feather-work, made of the plumage of the many-coloured
birds, for which Mexico is famous. Surtouts of this feather-work were
worn outside their military dresses, or armour, of padded cotton.
War was the great mainspring of action of the Aztecs. It is true that
they had a long peaceful period after their establishing upon the
lake-girt island of the Eagle and the Serpent, and that they developed
their civilisation in some security within this natural fortification,
but nevertheless, as previously shown, they extended their conquests on
all sides. Fear, not regard, kept the subject-nations of Anahuac under
their sway, however, and this was one of the elements leading to the
downfall of the empire, in the course of time. Military orders were
much esteemed and bestowed. The armies were well equipped and drilled,
and breaches of discipline were rigorously punished. The hospitals,
which were established for the treatment of the sick and wounded,
called forth the praise of the Spanish chroniclers. Captives of war
were made as abundantly as possible, to be reserved for the sacrificial
stone of the war-god, and the Aztecs carried on this appalling practice
of human sacrifice to such an extent as has not been equalled by any
other nation. But the most atrocious part of the ceremony, as practised
on some occasions, was that of the serving up of the body of victims at
a repast, where they were eaten!--sheer cannibalism, which is vouched
for as their practice as a religious rite.
How was the history of the early Mexicans handed down and perpetuated?
It is probable that the ancient civilisations of America were near the
dawn of a literature when their culture was destroyed. They had already
some phonetic signs in use, from which, in the natural course of time,
an alphabet might have evolved; but the picture-writing, or clumsy
hieroglyphical representation of things in line and colour to express
ideas, was their main method. Yet their laws, State accounts, history,
and other matters were so recorded. When the Spaniards set foot on the
coast a hieroglyphical representation of them and their ships,
delineated on native paper, was in the hands of Montezuma a few hours
afterwards--a species of rapid edition of a newspaper indeed! But these
written records were supplemented by oral descriptions, and the two
methods in conjunction formed the Aztec literature. Paper for such
documents were made of skins, or cotton cloth, or of the fibrous leaves
of the _maguey_, and this last, a species of "papyrus," was carefully
prepared, and was of a durable nature. Aztec literature of this nature
existed in considerable quantities at the beginning of the Hispanic
occupation. It was thoroughly destroyed by the execrable act of the
first Archbishop of Mexico--Zumarraga, who, looking upon these papers
as "devilish scrolls," had them collected, piled up, and burnt! Some
few, however, escaped, and were preserved and published in Europe. Some
famous Maya documents of this nature, from Yucatan, have also brought
to light some details of those people.
The Mexicans' scientific knowledge was simple and primitive. Some
arithmetical system had been evolved, but, on the other hand, they had
calculated and adopted a chronology--probably it had been inherited
from the Toltecs--which displayed a remarkable precision, in that they
adjusted the difference of the civil and solar year in a way superior
to that of contemporary European nations.
In primitive Mexico--like primitive Peru--agriculture was far advanced
as an industry. Land was apportioned, as has been shown, on a
philosophical basis for the needs of the inhabitants. In that respect
the system was far superior to that of the Republic of Mexico of
to-day, where the whole surface of the land is mainly held by large
landholders. Irrigation was an advanced art, artificial canals being
made to conduct the water from the streams to the arid lands. The main
article of diet among the mass of the people--then, as now--was _maiz_,
which grows freely from highlands to lowlands. Bananas,
chocolate--indeed, the latter, _chocolatl_, is an Aztec word--were
among their numerous agricultural products. The _maguey_--the _Agave
americana_--was an invaluable ally of life and civilisation. It
afforded them the famous beverage of _pulque_; they made ropes, mats,
paper, and other things from its fibre; and the leaves furnished an
article of diet.
Mining was confined to the getting of gold from riverbeds, where it had
been concentrated by Nature, and possibly on a small scale by
amalgamation with quicksilver. Copper and tin were found and used, and
indeed to-day the natives in certain places beat out large copper
vessels[11] and offer for sale masses of rude copper _matte_,[11] from
their primitive earthen furnaces. The obsidian mines of Itzala
furnished them with tools for the cutting of stone, sculpture, and
other purposes, and for their terrible weapons of war.
[Footnote 11: I have used and purchased these articles in the State of
Durango.]
Sculpture and painting were very rudimentary, the former being confined
chiefly to the representation of repugnant deities, although the carved
stone edifices and temples were in some cases singularly beautiful, as
elsewhere described. The sculptured figures of Mexican deities, in some
cases, remind the traveller strongly of similar representations of the
Incas,[12] such as exist in the fastnesses of the Andes of Peru. The
famous Mexican Calendar stone, weighing about fifty tons, which was
brought for many miles over broken country to the Aztec capital, is one
of the most remarkable examples of their sculpture. Numerous smaller
examples of prehistoric sculpture exist, some beautiful in design and
execution. The feathered serpent is a frequent symbolical device upon
these native works of art.
[Footnote 12: The figure of the conventionalised serpent-god on the
onyx tablet found in 1895 in the Valley of Mexico and taken to the
Museum of Chicago (see Holmes's "Ancient Cities of Mexico") strongly
reminds me of the figure on the stone from Chavin in Peru (see "The
Andes and the Amazon").]
[Illustration: PREHISTORIC MEXICO: RUINS OF TEMPLE AT CHICHEN-YTZA, IN
YUCATAN.]
Pottery was made without the potter's wheel, by modelling; and painting
and burning were practised. Musical instruments were also made of clay.
Trade was conducted in ancient Mexico in great fairs or marketplaces,
not in shops, and indeed this custom is still that preferred by the
Mexican natives of the _peon_ class to-day. The currency consisted of
quills of gold-dust, small pieces of tin, and stamped copper, and
barter was a principal mode of transaction. The merchants were an
important class, carrying on extensive operations and expeditions far
beyond the borders of the empire, under armed escorts, and they
occupied often a position of political, and even diplomatic nature,
such as was a peculiar feature of Aztec civilisation.
Social conditions showed much of quiet civilisation and tolerance. The
women were never employed in the fields; and they took equal part with
the men in social matters. They were modest and not unattractive,
traits which remain to this day among the peasant class of Mexico. The
_menage_ of Aztec homes, method of feasting, foods, napery, ablutions,
and other matters, as recorded by the historians show a marked stage of
refinement, except for the abominable practice of cannibalism.
Chocolate and _pulque_ were the favourite drinks.
Any survey of the Aztec customs shows a remarkable fact--they seem to
have received their civilisation and customs from more than one source.
For among the most refined habits and methods the most barbarous and
disgusting acts are found. A refined and humane spirit of culture
seems, by some method, or at some time, to have been grafted on to a
spirit of primitive savagery, and each to have retained its character
and practices. But their social system was not an unhappy one for their
people. It was an epoch of handiwork, where all were employed and all
were fed; and if there were few comforts and enlightenments in their
life, there was, at least, little misery, such as is so freely
encountered in the life of modern civilisation.
But destiny was now to compass the end of the Aztec _regime_, for from
the shores of the stormy waters of the seas towards the sunrise, came
rumours of strange white men. Who were they? asked the Aztec emperor
and his advisers, in solemn conclave. Were they not those heralded by
the long-expected Quetzalcoatl? If so, of what use was it to defy the
fates, which had set forth long ago that the land should be ruled, some
day, by a white race coming from the East? And when a fleet of great
"water-houses," with white wings, touched at Yucatan, and the swift
runners brought the tidings over nigh a thousand miles of forest and
mountain in a few days, the credulous ear of Montezuma listened easily.
And when the Spaniards landed at Vera Cruz, and won their way up to the
fastnesses of Anahuac, it was still the hand of destiny. The time was
fulfilled, the arm of civilisation had reached out towards the West,
and it fell athwart the Great Plateau of unknown Mexico.