CHAPTER XI

THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES (_continued_)

Mexican and Central American Cultures--Aztec and Maya Scripts and

Calendars--Nahua and Shoshoni--Chichimec and Aztec Empires--

Uncultured Mexican Peoples: _Otomi_; _Seri_--Early Man in

Yucatan--The Maya to-day--Transitions from North to South

America--_Chontal_ and _Choco_--The _Catio_--Cultures of the Andean

area--The Colombian _Chibcha_--Empire of the Inca--_Quichuan_ Race

and Language--Inca Origins and History--The _Aymara_--_Chimu_

Culture--Peruvian Politico-Social System--The _Araucanians_--The

_Pampas Indians_--The _Gauchos_--_Patagonians_ and _Fuegians_--

Linguistic Relations--The _Yahgans_--The _Cashibo_--The _Pana

Family_--The _Caribs_--_Arawakan Family_--The _Ges (Tapuyan)

Family_--The _Botocudo_--The _Tupi-Guaranian Family_--The

_Chiquito_--_Mataco_ and _Toba_ of the Gran Chaco.

In Mexico and Central America interest is centred chiefly in two great

ethnical groups--the _Nahuatlan_ and _Huaxtecan_--whose cultural,

historical, and even geographical relations are so intimately interwoven

that they can scarcely be treated apart. Thus, although their

civilisations are concentrated respectively in the Anahuac (Mexican)

plateau and Yucatan and Guatemala, the two domains overlap completely at

both ends, so that there are isolated branches of the Huaxtecan family

in Mexico (the Huaxtecs (Totonacs) of Vera Cruz, from whom the whole

group is named, and of the Nahuatlan in Nicaragua (Pipils, Niquirans,

and others)[873].

This very circumstance has no doubt tended to increase the difficulties

connected with the questions of their origins, migrations, and mutual

cultural influences. Some of these difficulties disappear if the

"Toltecs" be eliminated (see p. 342), who had hitherto been a great

disturbing element in this connection, and all the rest have in my

opinion been satisfactorily disposed of by E. Foerstemann, a leading

authority on all Aztec-Maya questions[874]. This eminent archaeologist

refers first to the views of Seler[875], who assumes a southern movement

of Maya tribes from Yucatan, and a like movement of Aztecs from Tabasco

to Nicaragua, and even to Yucatan. On the other hand Dieseldorff holds

that Maya art was independently developed, while the link between it and

the Aztec shows that an interchange took place, in which process the

Maya was the giver, the Aztec the recipient. He further attributes the

overthrow of the Maya power 100 or 200 years before the conquest to the

Aztecs, and thinks the Aztecs or Nahuas took their god Quetzalcoatl from

the "Toltecs," who were a Maya people. Ph. J. Valentini also infers that

the Maya were the original people, the Aztecs "mere parasites[876]."

Now Foerstemann lays down the principle that any theory, to be

satisfactory, should fit in with such facts as:--(1) the agreement and

diversity of both cultures; (2) the antiquity and disappearance of the

mysterious Toltecs; (3) the complete isolation at 22 deg. N. lat. of the

Huaxtecs from the other Maya tribes, and their difference from them; (4)

the equally complete isolation of the Guatemalan Pipils, and of the

other southern (Nicaraguan) Aztec groups from the rest of the Nahua

peoples; (5) the remarkable absence of Aztec local names in Yucatan,

while they occur in hundreds in Chiapas, Guatemala, Honduras and

Nicaragua, where scarcely any trace is left of Maya names.

To account for these facts he assumes that in the earliest known times

Central America from about 23 deg. to 10 deg. N. was mainly inhabited by Maya

tribes, who had even reached Cuba. While these Mayas were still at quite

a low stage of culture, the Aztecs advanced from as far north as at

least 26 deg. N. but only on the Pacific side, thus leaving the Huaxtecs

almost untouched in the east. The Aztecs called the Mayas "Toltecs"

because they first came in contact with one of their northern branches

living in the region about Tula (north of Mexico city)[877]. But when

all the relations became clearer, the Toltecs fell gradually into the

background, and at last entered the domain of the fabulous.

Now the Aztecs borrowed much from the Mayas, especially gods, whose

names they simply translated. A typical case is that of Cuculcan, which

becomes Quetzalcoatl, where _cuc_ = _quezal_ = the bird _Trogon

resplendens_, and _can_ = _coatl_ = snake[878]. With the higher culture

developed in Guatemala the Aztecs came first in contact after passing

through Mixtec and Zapotec territory, not long before Columbian times,

so that they had no time here to consolidate their empire and assimilate

the Mayas. On the contrary the Aztecs were themselves merged in these,

all but the Pipils and the settlements on Lake Nicaragua, which retained

their national peculiarities.

But whence came the hundreds of Aztec names in the lands between Chiapas

and Nicaragua? Here it should be noted that these names are almost

exclusively confined to the more important stations, while the less

prominent places have everywhere names taken from the tongues of the

local tribes. But even the Aztec names themselves occur properly only in

official use, hence also on the charts, and are not current to-day

amongst the natives who have kept aloof from the Spanish-speaking

populations. Hence the inference that such names were mainly introduced

by the Spaniards and their Mexican troops during the conquest of those

lands, say, up to about 1535, and do not appear in Yucatan which was not

conquered from Mexico. Foerstemann reluctantly accepts this view,

advanced by Sapper[879], having nothing better to suggest.

The coastal towns of Yucatan visited by Spaniards from Cuba in 1517 and

onwards were decidedly inferior architecturally to the great temple

structures of the interior, though doubtless erected by the same people.

The inland cities of Chichen-Itza and Uxmal by that time had fallen from

their ancient glory though still religious centres[880].

The Maya would thus appear to have stood on a higher plane of culture

than their Aztec rivals, and the same conclusion may be drawn from

their respective writing systems. Of all the aborigines these two alone

had developed what may fairly be called a script in the strict sense of

the term, although neither of them had reached the same level of

efficiency as the Babylonian cuneiforms, or the Chinese or the Egyptian

hieroglyphs, not to speak of the syllabic and alphabetic systems of the

Old World. Some even of the barbaric peoples, such as most of the

prairie Indians, had reached the stage of graphic symbolism, and were

thus on the threshold of writing at the discovery. "The art was

rudimentary and limited to crude pictography. The pictographs were

painted or sculptured on cliff-faces, boulders, the walls of caverns,

and even on trees, as well as on skins, bark, and various artificial

objects. Among certain Mexican tribes, also, autographic records were in

use, and some of them were much better differentiated than any within

the present area of the United States. The records were not only painted

and sculptured on stone and moulded in stucco, but were inscribed in

books or codices of native parchment and paper; while the characters

were measurably arbitrary, _i.e._ ideographic rather than

pictographic[881]."

The Aztec writing may be best described as pictographic, the pictures

being symbolical or, in the case of names, combined into a rebus. No

doubt much diversity of opinion prevails as to whether the Maya symbols

are phonetic or ideographic, and it is a fact that no single text,

however short, has yet been satisfactorily deciphered. It seems that

many of the symbols possessed true phonetic value and were used to

express sounds and syllables, though it cannot be claimed that the Maya

scribes had reached that advanced stage where they could indicate each

letter sound by a glyph or symbol[882]. According to Cyrus Thomas, a

symbol was selected because the name or word it represented had as its

chief phonetic element a certain consonant sound or syllable. If this

were _b_ the symbol would be used where _b_ was the prominent element of

the word to be indicated, no reference, however, to its original

signification being necessarily retained. Thus the symbol for _cab_,

'earth,' might be used in writing _Caban_, a day name, or _cabil_,

'honey,' because _cab_ is their chief phonetic element.... One reason

why attempts at decipherment have failed is a misconception of the

peculiar character of the writing, which is in a transition stage from

the purely ideographic to the phonetic[883]. From the example here

given, the Maya script would appear to have in part reached the rebus

stage, which also plays so large a part in the Egyptian hieroglyphic

system. _Cab_ is obviously a rebus, and the transition from the rebus to

true syllabic and alphabetic systems has already been explained[884].

The German Americanists on the other hand have always regarded Maya

writing as more ideographic, and H. Beuchat adopts this view, for "no

symbol has ever been read phonetically with a different meaning from

that which it possesses as an ideogram[885]."

But not only were the Maya day characters phonetic; the Maya calendar

itself, afterwards borrowed by the Aztecs, has been described as even

more accurate than the Julian itself. "Among the Plains Indians the

calendars are simple, consisting commonly of a record of winters

('winter counts'), and of notable events occurring either during the

winter or during some other season; while the shorter time divisions are

reckoned by 'nights' (days), 'dead moons' (lunations), and seasons of

leafing, flowering, or fruiting of plants, migrating of animals, etc.,

and there is no definite system of reducing days to lunations or

lunations to years. Among the Pueblo Indians calendric records are

inconspicuous or absent, though there is a much more definite calendric

system which is fixed and perpetuated by religious ceremonies; while

among some of the Mexican tribes there are elaborate calendric systems

combined with complete calendric records. The perfection of the calendar

among the Maya and Nahua Indians is indicated by the fact that not only

were 365 days reckoned as a year, but the bissextile was

recognized[886]."

In another important respect the superiority of the Maya-Quiche peoples

over the northern Nahuans is incontestable. When their religious systems

are compared, it is at once seen that at the time of the discovery the

Mexican Aztecs were little better than ruthless barbarians newly clothed

in the borrowed robes of an advanced culture, to which they had not had

time to adapt themselves properly, and in which they could but

masquerade after their own savage fashion.

It has to be remembered that the Aztecs were but one branch of the

Nahuatlan family, whose affinities Buschmann[887] has traced northwards

to the rude Shoshonian aborigines who roamed from the present States of

Montana, Idaho, and Oregon down into Utah, Texas, and California[888].

To this Nahuatlan stock belonged the barbaric hordes who overthrew the

civilisation which flourished on the Anahuac (Mexican) table-land about

the sixth century A.D. and is associated with the ruins of Tula and

Cholula. It now seems clear that the so-called "Toltecs," the

"Pyramid-builders," were not Nahuatlans but Huaxtecans, who were

absorbed by the immigrants or driven southwards.

To north and north-west of the settled peoples of the valley lived

nomadic hunting tribes called Chichimec[889], merged in a loose

political system which was dignified in the local traditions by the name

of the "Chichimec Empire." The chief part was played by tribes of Nahuan

origin[890], whose ascendancy lasted from about the eleventh to the

fifteenth century, when they were in their turn overthrown and absorbed

by the historical Nahuan confederacy of the _Aztecs_[891] whose capital

was Tenochtitlan (the present city of Mexico), the _Acolhuas_ (capital

Tezcuco), and the _Tepanecs_ (capital Tlacopan).

Thus the Aztec Empire reduced by the Conquistadores in 1520 had but a

brief record, although the Aztecs themselves as well as many other

tribes of Nahuatl speech, must have been in contact with the more

civilised Huaxtecan peoples for centuries before the appearance of the

Spaniards on the scene. It was during these ages that the Nahuas

"borrowed much from the Mayas," as Foerstemann puts it, without greatly

benefiting by the process. Thus the Maya gods, for the most part of a

relatively mild type like the Maya themselves, become in the hideous

Aztec pantheon ferocious demons with an insatiable thirst for blood, so

that the teocalli, "god's houses," were transformed to human shambles,

where on solemn occasions the victims were said to have numbered tens of

thousands[892].

Besides the Aztecs and their allies, the elevated Mexican plateaus were

occupied by several other relatively civilised nations, such as the

_Miztecs_ and _Zapotecs_ of Oajaca, the _Tarasco_ and neighbouring

_Matlaltzinca_, of Michoacan[893], all of whom spoke independent stock

languages, and the _Totonacs_ of Vera Cruz, who were of Huaxtecan

speech, and were in touch to the north with the Huaxtecs, a primitive

Maya people. The high degree of civilisation attained by some of these

nations before their reduction by the Aztecs is attested by the

magnificent ruins of Mitla, capital of the Zapotecs, which was captured

and destroyed by the Mexicans in 1494[894]. Of the royal palace

Viollet-le-Duc speaks in enthusiastic terms, declaring that "the

monuments of the golden age of Greece and Rome alone equal the beauty of

the masonry of this great building[895]." In general their usages and

religious rites resembled those of the Aztecs, although the Zapotecs,

besides the civil ruler, had a High Priest who took part in the

government. "His feet were never allowed to touch the ground; he was

carried on the shoulders of his attendants; and when he appeared all,

even the chiefs themselves, had to fall prostrate before him, and none

dared to raise their eyes in his presence[896]." The Zapotec language is

still spoken by about 260 natives in the State of Oajaca.

Farther north the plains and uplands continued to be inhabited by a

multitude of wild tribes speaking an unknown number of stock languages,

and thus presenting a chaos of ethnical and linguistic elements

comparable to that which prevails along the north-west coast. Of these

rude populations one of the most widespread are the Otomi of the central

region, noted for the monosyllabic tendencies of their language, which

Najera, a native grammarian, has on this ground compared with Chinese,

from which, however, it is fundamentally distinct. Still more primitive

are the Seri Indians of Tiburon island in the Gulf of California and the

adjacent mainland, who were visited in 1895 by W. J. McGee, and found to

be probably more isolated and savage than any other tribe remaining on

the North American Continent. They hunt, fish, and collect vegetable

food, and most of their food is eaten raw, they have no domestic animals

save dogs, they are totally without agriculture, and their industrial

arts are few and rude. They use the bow and arrow but have no knife.

Their houses are flimsy huts. They make pottery and rafts of canes. The

Seri are loosely organised in a number of exogamic, matrilineal, totemic

clans. Mother-right obtains to a greater extent perhaps than in any

other people. At marriage the husband becomes a privileged guest in the

wife's mother's household, and it is only in the chase or on the

war-path that men take an important place. Polygyny prevails. The most

conspicuous ceremony is the girls' puberty feast. The dead are buried in

a contracted position. "The strongest tribal characteristic is

implacable animosity towards aliens.... In their estimation the

brightest virtue is the shedding of alien blood, while the blackest

crime in their calendar is alien conjugal union[897]."

It is noteworthy that but few traces of such savagery have yet been

discovered in Yucatan. The investigations of Henry Mercer[898] in this

region lend strong support to Foerstemann's views regarding the early

Huaxtecan migrations and the general southward spread of Maya culture

from the Mexican table-land. Nearly thirty caves examined by this

explorer failed to yield any remains either of the mastodon, mammoth,

and horse, or of early man, elsewhere so often associated with these

animals. Hence Mercer infers that the Mayas reached Yucatan already in

an advanced state of culture, which remained unchanged till the

conquest. In the caves were found great quantities of good pottery,

generally well baked and of symmetrical form, the oldest quite as good

as the latest where they occur in stratified beds, showing no progress

anywhere.

The caves of Loltun (Yucatan) and Copan (Honduras), examined by E. H.

Thompson and G. Byron-Gordon, yielded pre-Mayan debris from the deep

strata. Perhaps this very ancient population was of the same race as the

little known tribes still living in the forests of Honduras and San

Salvador[899].

Since the conquest the Aztecs, and other cultured nations of Anahuac,

have yielded to European influences to a far greater extent than the

Maya-Quiche of Yucatan and Guatemala. In the city of Mexico the Nahuatl

tongue has almost died out, and this place has long been a leading

centre of Spanish arts and letters[900]; yet the Mexicans yearly

celebrate a feast in memory of their great ancestors who died in defence

of their country[901]. But Merida, standing on the site of the ancient

Ti-hoo, has almost again become a Maya town, where the white settlers

themselves have been largely assimilated in speech and usages to the

natives. The very streets are still indicated by the carved images of

the hawk, flamingo, or other tutelar deities, while the houses of the

suburbs continue to be built in the old Maya style, two or three feet

above the street level, with a walled porch and stone bench running

round the enclosure.

One reason for this remarkable contrast may be that the Nahua culture,

as above seen, was to a great extent borrowed in relatively recent

times, whereas the Maya civilisation is now shown to date from the epoch

of the Tolan and Cholulan pyramid-builders. Hence the former yielded to

the first shock, while the latter still persists to some extent in

Yucatan. Here about 1000 A.D. the cities of Chichen-Itza, Uxmal and

Mayapan formed a confederacy in which each was to share equally in the

government of the country. Under the peaceful conditions of the next two

centuries followed the second and last great Maya epoch, the Age of

Architecture, as it has been termed, as opposed to the first epoch, the

Age of Sculpture, from the second to the sixth century A.D. During this

earlier epoch flourished the great cities of the south, Palenque,

Quirigua, Copan, and others[902]. Despite their more gentle

disposition, as expressed in the softer and almost feminine lines of

their features, the Mayas held out more valiantly than the Aztecs

against the Spaniards, and a section of the nation occupying a strip of

territory between Yucatan and British Honduras, still maintains its

independence. The "barbarians," as the inhabitants of this district are

called, would appear to be scarcely less civilised than their

neighbours, although they have forgotten the teachings of the padres,

and transformed the Catholic churches to wayside inns. Even as it is the

descendants of the Spaniards have to a great extent forgotten their

mother-tongue, and Maya-Quiche dialects are almost everywhere current

except in the Campeachy district. Those also who call themselves

Catholics preserve and practise many of the old rites. After burial the

track from the grave to the house is carefully chalked, so that the soul

of the departed may know the way back when the time comes to enter the

body of some new-born babe. The descendants of the national astrologers

everywhere pursue their arts, determining events, forecasting the

harvests and so on by the conjunctions of the stars, and every village

has its native "Zadkiel" who reads the future in the ubiquitous crystal

globe. Even certain priests continue to celebrate the "Field Mass," at

which a cock is sacrificed to the Mayan Aesculapius, with invocations to

the Trinity and their associates, the four genii of the rain and crops.

"These tutelar deities, however, have taken Christian names, the Red, or

God of the East, having become St Dominic; the White, or God of the

North, St Gabriel; the Black, or God of the West, St James; and the

'Yellow Goddess' of the South, Mary Magdalene[903]."

* * * * *

To the observer passing from the northern to the southern division of

the New World no marked contrasts are at first perceptible, either in

the physical appearance, or in the social condition of the aborigines.

The substantial uniformity, which in these respects prevails from the

Arctic to the Austral waters, is in fact well illustrated by the

comparatively slight differences presented by the primitive populations

dwelling north and south of the Isthmus of Panama.

At the discovery the West Indies were inhabited by two distinct

peoples, both apparently of South American origin. The populations of

the Greater Antilles, Cuba, Jamaica, Santo Domingo and Porto Rico were

of Arawak stock, as were also the Lucayans of the Bahamas. The Lesser

Antilles were peopled by Caribs, whose culture had been somewhat

modified by the Arawaks who had preceded them. As regards influences

from the north-west and west, Joyce considers that intercourse between

Yucatan and Western Cuba was confined to occasional trading voyages and

did not long antedate the arrival of the Spaniards. The same applies to

Florida where, however, Antillean influences may be traced, especially

in pottery designs[904]. According to Beuchat, however, the Guacanabibes

of Cuba are of common origin with the Tekestas of Florida. Other tribes

from Florida spread to the Bahamas, Cuba[905], and perhaps Hayti, but

were checked by Arawaks from South America who mastered the whole of the

West Indies. Last came the more vigorous but less advanced Caribs, also

from the southern mainland (of Arawak origin according to Joyce and

Beuchat). The statement of Columbus that the Lucayans[906] were "of good

size, with large eyes and broader foreheads than he had ever seen in any

other race of men" is fully borne out by the character of some old

skulls from the Bahamas measured by W. K. Brooks, who regarded them as

belonging to "a well-marked type of the North American Indian race which

was at that time distributed over the Bahama Islands, Hayti, and the

greater part of Cuba. As these islands are only a few miles from the

peninsula of Florida, this race must at some time have inhabited at

least the south-eastern extremity of the continent, and it is therefore

extremely interesting to note that the North American crania which

exhibit the closest resemblance to those from the Bahama Islands have

been obtained from Florida[907]." This observer dwells on the solidity

and massiveness of the Lucayan skulls, which bring them into direct

relation with the races both of the Mississippi plains and of the

Brazilian and Venezuelan coast-lands, though the general ethnography of

Panama and Costa Rica reveals no active influence exerted by tribes of

Colombia and Venezuela, except in eastern Panama[908].

Equally close is the connection established between the surviving

Isthmian and Colombian peoples of the Atrato and Magdalena basins. The

Chontal of Nicaragua are scarcely to be distinguished from some of the

Santa Marta hillmen, while the Choco and perhaps the Cuna of Panama have

been affiliated to the Choco of the Atrato and San Juan rivers. The

cultural connection between the tribes of the Isthmus and of Colombia

appears especially in the gold-work and pottery of the Chiriqui; at the

Chiriqui Lagoon, however, Nahuan influence is perceptible[909].

Attempts, which however can hardly be regarded as successful, have even

been made to establish linguistic relations between the Costa Rican

Guatuso and the Timote of the Merida uplands of Venezuela, who are

themselves a branch of the formerly widespread Muyscan family.

But with these Muyscans we at once enter a new ethnical and cultural

domain, in which may be studied the resemblances due to the common

origin of all the American aborigines, and the divergences due obviously

to long isolation and independent local developments in the two

continental divisions. In general the southern populations present more

violent contrasts than the northern in their social and intellectual

developments, so that while the wild tribes touch a lower depth of

savagery, some at least of the civilised peoples rise to a higher degree

of excellence, if not in letters--where the inferiority is

manifest--certainly in the arts of engineering, architecture,

agriculture, and political organisation. Thus we need not travel many

miles inland from the Isthmus without meeting the Catio, a wild tribe

between the Atrato and the Cauca, more degraded even than the Seri of

Tiburon island, most debased of all North American hordes. These Catio,

a now nearly extinct branch of the Choco stock, were said to dwell like

the anthropoid apes, in the branches of trees; they mostly went naked,

and were reported, like the Mangbattus and other Congo negroes, to

"fatten their captives for the table." Their Darien neighbours of the

Nore valley, who gave an alternative name to the Panama peninsula, were

accustomed to steal the women of hostile tribes, cohabit with them, and

carefully bring up the children till their fourteenth year, when they

were eaten with much rejoicing, the mothers ultimately sharing the same

fate[910]; and the Cocoma of the Maranon "were in the habit of eating

their own dead relations, and grinding their bones to drink in their

fermented liquor. They said it was better to be inside a friend than to

be swallowed up by the cold earth[911]." In fact of the Colombian

aborigines Herrera tells us that "the living are the grave of the dead;

for the husband has been seen to eat his wife, the brother his brother

or sister, the son his father; captives also are eaten roasted[912]."

Thus is raised the question of cannibalism in the New World, where at

the discovery it was incomparably more prevalent south than north of the

equator. Compare the Eskimo and the Fuegians at the two extremes, the

former practically exonerated of the charge, and in distress sparing

wives and children and eating their dogs; the latter sparing their dogs

because useful for catching otters, and smoking and eating their old

women because useless for further purposes[913]. In the north the taste

for human flesh had declined, and the practice survived only as a

ceremonial rite, chiefly amongst the British Columbians and the Aztecs,

except of course in case of famine, when even the highest races are

capable of devouring their fellows. But in the south cannibalism in some

of its most repulsive forms was common enough almost everywhere. Killing

and eating feeble and aged members of the tribe in kindness is still

general; but the Mayorunas of the Upper Amazon waters do not wait till

they have grown lean with years or wasted with disease[914]; and it was

a baptized member of the same tribe who complained on his death-bed that

he would not now provide a meal for his Christian friends, but must be

devoured by worms[915].

In the southern continent the social conditions illustrated by these

practices prevailed everywhere, except on the elevated plateaus of the

western Cordilleras, which for many ages before the discovery had been

the seats of several successive cultures, in some respects rivalling,

but in others much inferior to those of Central America. When the

Conquistadores reached this part of the New World, to which they were

attracted by the not altogether groundless reports of fabulous wealth

embodied in the legend of _El Dorado_, the "Man of Gold," they found it

occupied by a cultural zone which extended almost continuously from the

present republic of Colombia through Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia right

into Chili. In the north the dominant people were the semi-civilised

Chibcha, already mentioned under the name of Muysca[916], who had

developed an organised system of government on the Bogota table-land,

and had succeeded in extending their somewhat more refined social

institutions to some of the other aborigines of Colombia, though not to

many of the outlying members of their own race. As in Mexico many of the

Nahuatlan tribes remained little better than savages to the last, so in

Colombia the civilised Muyscans were surrounded by numerous kindred

tribes--Coyaima, Natagaima, Tocaima and others, collectively known as

Panches--who were real savages with scarcely any tribal organisation,

wearing no clothes, and according to the early accounts still addicted

to cannibalism.

The Muysca proper had a tradition that they owed their superiority to

their culture-hero Bochica, who came from the east long ago, taught them

everything, and was then placed with Chiminigagua, the creator, at the

head of their pantheon, and worshipped with solemn rites and even human

sacrifices. Amongst the arts thus acquired was that of the goldsmith, in

which they surpassed all other peoples of the New World. The precious

metal was even said to be minted in the shape of discs, which formed an

almost solitary instance of a true metal currency amongst the American

aborigines[917]. Brooches, pendants, and especially grotesque figurines

of gold, often alloyed with silver and copper, have been found in great

numbers and still occasionally turn up on the plateau. These finds are

partly accounted for by the practice of offering such objects in the

open air to the personified constellations and forces of nature, for the

primitive religion of all the Andean tribes consisted of nature-, in

particular sun-cults. Near Bogota was a temple of the Sun, where

children were reared for sacrifice[918]. Any mysterious sound emanating

from a forest, a rock, a mountain pass, or gloomy gorge, was accepted as

a manifestation of some divine presence; a shrine was raised to the

embodied spirit, and so the whole land became literally crowded with

local deities. This world itself was upborne on the shoulders of

Chibchacum, a national Atlas, who now and then eased himself by shifting

the burden, and thus caused earthquakes. In most lands subject to

underground disturbances analogous ideas prevail, and when their source

is so obvious, it seems unreasonable to seek for explanations in racial

affinities, contacts, foreign influences, and so forth.

It has often been remarked that at the advent of the whites the native

civilisations seemed generally stricken as if by the hand of death, so

that even if not suddenly arrested by the intruders they must sooner or

later have perished of themselves. Such speculations are seldom

convincing, because we never know what recuperative forces may be at

work to ward off the evil day. When the Spaniards arrived in Colombia

they found at one end of the scale naked and savage cannibals, at the

other a people with a feudal form of government, whose political system

was progressive, who, though possessing no form of writing, had a system

of measures and a calendar, and who were skilled in the arts of weaving,

pottery, and metallurgy[919]. The chiefs of the Chibcha were all

absolute monarchs and the appointment of priests rested with them.

Succession to the chieftainship was matrilineal, and installation in the

office was attended by much ceremony. A great gulf separated nobles and

commoners; slavery existed as an institution but slaves were well

treated. Polygyny was permitted, but relatives within certain degrees

might not marry[920]. This feebly organised political system broke to

pieces at the first shock from without, and so disheartened had the

people become under their half theocratic rulers, that they scarcely

raised a hand in defence of a government which in their minds was

associated only with tyranny and oppression. The conquest was in any

case facilitated by the civil war at the time raging between the

northern and southern kingdoms which with several other semi-independent

states constituted the Muyscan empire. This empire was almost

conterminous southwards with that of the Incas. At least the numerous

terms occurring in the dialects of the Paes, Coconucos, and other South

Colombian tribes, show that Peruvian influences had spread beyond the

political frontiers far to the north, without, however, quite reaching

the confines of the Muyscan domain.

But for several centuries prior to the discovery the sway of the

Peruvian Incas had been established throughout nearly the whole of the

Andean lands, and the territory directly ruled by them extended from the

Quito district about the equator for some 2500 miles southwards to the

Rio Maule in Chili, with an average breadth of 400 miles between the

Pacific and the eastern slopes of the Cordilleras. Their dominion thus

comprised a considerable part of the present republics of Ecuador, Peru,

Bolivia, Chili, and Argentina, with a roughly estimated area of

1,000,000 square miles, and a population of over 10,000,000. Here the

ruling race were the Quichua, whose speech, called by themselves

_ruma-simi_, "the language of men," is still current in several

well-marked dialects throughout all the provinces of the old empire. In

Lima and all the seaports and inland towns Spanish prevails, but in the

rural districts Quichuan remains the mother-tongue of over 2,000,000

natives, and has even become the _lingua franca_ of the western regions,

just as Tupi-Guarani is the _lingoa geral_, "general language," of the

eastern section of South America. The attempts to find affinities with

Aryan (especially Sanskrit), and other linguistic families of the

eastern hemisphere, have broken down before the application of sound

philological principles to these studies, and Quichuan is now recognised

as a stock language of the usual American type, unconnected with any

other except that of the Bolivian Aymaras. Even this connection is

regarded by some students as verbal rather than structural, an

interchange of a considerable number of terms being easily explained by

the close contact in which the two peoples have long dwelt.

As to the origin of the Incas we cannot do better than follow the views

of Sir Clements Markham, who has made a careful study of the various

early authorities. His account (_The Incas of Peru,_ 1910) is based

largely on the works of Spanish military writers such as Ciezo de Leon

and Pedro Pizarro (cousin of the conqueror), of priests like Molina,

Montesinos, and the half-breed Blas Valera, and on those of the Inca

Garcilasso de la Vega, son of a Spanish knight and an Inca princess. The

megalithic ruins of Tiahuanacu, at the southern end of Lake Titicaca,

mark the earliest known centre of culture in southern Peru. They are

situated on a lofty plateau, over 13,000 feet above the sea, and are the

remains of a great city built by highly skilled masons who used enormous

stones. The placing of such monoliths, unrivalled except by those of

ancient Egypt, indicates a dense and well-organised population. The

famous monolithic doorway is elaborately carved, the central figure

apparently representing the deity, while on either side are figures,

human- or bird-headed, kneeling in adoration (_op. cit._, pls. at pp.

26, 28). Now it seems probable that the builders of this megalithic city

were the ancestors of the Incas, assuming that a substratum of truth

underlies the Paccari-tampu myth.

The end of the early civilisation is stated to have been caused by a

great invasion from the south, when the king was killed in a battle in

the Collao, north of Lake Titicaca. A state of barbarism ensued. A

remnant of the royal house took refuge in a district called Tampu-Tocco

("Window Tavern")[921] and there preserved a vestige of their ancient

traditions and civilisation. Elsewhere religion deteriorated to nature

worship, here the kings declared themselves to be children of the sun.

Montesinos' list of kings gives 27 names for this period of Tampu-Tocco,

which may cover 650 years.

The myth, which is "certainly the outcome of a real tradition, ... the

fabulous version of a distant historical event," tells how Manco Ccapac

and the three other Ayars, his brothers, the children of the sun, came

forth with their wives from the central opening or window in the hill

Tampu-Tocco. They advanced slowly at the head of several _ayllus_

(lineages). Ayar Manco took the lead, and he had with him a falcon-like

bird revered as sacred, and a golden staff which he flung ahead; when it

reached soil so fertile that the whole length sank in, there the final

halt was to be made. This happened in the fertile vale of Cuzco. The

date of these events would be about four centuries before the Spanish

conquest.

Farther north at about 15 deg. S. lat. the Inca civilisation was preceded,

according to Uhle, by the very ancient one of Ica and Nazca, where dwelt

a people who made pottery but were ignorant of weaving. The same

authority has also discovered about Lima the remains of a tall people,

who made rude pottery, nets, and objects of bone[922].

Manco established himself in the Cuzco valley, his third successor

finally subjugating the tribes there. The early position of the Incas,

cemented by judicious marriages, seems to have been one of priority in a

very loose confederacy. The rise of the Incas was due to the ambition of

the lady Siuyacu whose son, Inca Rocca, appears to have been the pioneer

of empire; material prosperity began under him, schools were erected and

irrigation works begun. Then from a strip of land 250 miles long between

the gorge of the Apurimac and the wide fertile valley of Vilcamayu, the

empire was extended to form the Ttahua-ntin-suyu, "the four provinces,"

of which the northern one, Chinchay-suyu, reached to Quito, and the

southern, Colla-suyu, into Chili. This southward extension was due to

the efforts of Pachacuti who succeeded after hard fighting in annexing

the region around Lake Titicaca, and the new territory was named after

the Collas, the largest and most powerful tribe thereabouts. In order to

pacify the region permanently large numbers of Collas were sent as

_mitimaes_, or colonists, as far as the borders of Quito, while their

places were filled by loyal colonists from Inca districts. Among these

were a number of Aymaras from the Quichuan region of the Pachachaca, a

left bank tributary of the Apurimac, who were settled among the

remaining Lupacas on the west shore of Lake Titicaca at Juli. Thither

came Jesuit fathers in 1572 and learnt the language of the Lupacas from

these Aymara colonists, who had been there three generations; the name

Aymara was given by the priests not only to the Lupaca language but to

those spoken by Collas and other Titicacan tribes. Thus the name Aymara

is now generally but quite erroneously applied to the language and

people of this region; it was first so used in 1575. It must be pointed

out, however, that other authorities regard the Aymara and Quichua as

entirely distinct. A. Chervin[923] discusses the physical differences at

great length and concludes that they are two separate brachycephalic

peoples.

The Peruvians were primarily agriculturists, maize and at higher

altitudes the potato being their chief crops. Their aqueducts and

irrigation systems moved the admiration of early chroniclers, as did

also their roads and suspension bridges[924]. The supreme deity and

creator was Uira-cocha, who was worshipped by the more intellectual and

had a temple at Cuzco. The popular religion was the worship of the

founder of each _ayllu_, or clan, and all joined in adoration of the sun

as ancestor of the sovereign Incas. Sun-worship was attended by a

magnificent ritual, the high priest was an official of highest rank,

often a brother of the sovereign, and there were over 3000 Virgins of

the Sun (_aclla_) connected with the cult at Cuzco. The peasants put

their trust in _conopas_, or household gods, which controlled their

crops and their llamas. The calendar had been calculated with

considerable ingenuity, and certain festivals took place annually and

were usually accompanied with much chicha-drinking. It is remarkable

that so advanced a people kept all their elaborate records by means of

_quipus_ (coloured strings with knots).

Here is not the place to enter into the details of the astonishing

architectural, engineering, and artistic remains, often assigned to the

Incas, whose empire had absorbed in the north the old civilisation of

the _Chimu_, perhaps of the _Atacameno_, and other cultured peoples

whose very names have perished. The Yunga (Mochica or Chimu), conquered

by the Inca Tupac Yupanqui, had a language radically distinct from

Quichuan, but have long been assimilated to their conquerors.

The ruins of Grand Chimu (modern Trujillo) cover a vast area, nearly 15

miles by 6, which is everywhere strewn with the remains of palaces,

reservoirs, aqueducts, ramparts, and especially _huacas_, that is,

truncated pyramids not unlike those of Mexico, whence the theory that

the Chimus, of unknown origin, were "Toltecs" from Central America. One

of these huacas is described by Squier as 150 feet high with a base 580

feet square, and an area of 8 acres, presenting from a distance the

appearance of a huge crater[925]. Still larger is the so-called "Temple

of the Sun," 800 by 470 feet, 200 feet high, and covering an area of 7

acres. An immense population of hundreds of thousands was assigned to

this place in pre-Inca times; but from some rough surveys made in 1897

it would appear that much of the space within the enclosures consists of

waste lands, which had never been built over, and it is calculated that

at no time could the number of inhabitants have greatly exceeded 50,000.

We need not stop to describe the peculiar civil and social institutions

of the Peruvians, which are of common knowledge. Enough to say that here

everything was planned in the interests of the theocratic and

all-powerful Incas, who were more than obeyed, almost honoured with

divine worship by their much bethralled and priest-ridden subjects. "The

despotic authority of the Incas was the basis of government; that

authority was founded on the religious respect yielded to the descendant

of the sun, and supported by a skilfully combined hierarchy[926]." From

remote antiquity the peoples of this area were organised into _ayllus_

each occupying part of a valley or a limited area. It was a patriarchal

system, land belonging to the _ayllu_, which was a group of families.

The Incas systematised this institution, the _ayllu_ was made to

comprise 100 families under a village officer who annually allotted land

to the heads of families. Each family was divided by the head into 10

classes based on age. Ten _ayllus_ (now termed _pachacas_) formed a

_huaranca_. A valley with a varying number of _huarancas_ was termed a

_hunu_; over four _hunus_ there was an imperial officer. "This was

indeed Socialism," Markham observes, "existing under an inexorable

despotism" (p. 169).

Beyond the Maule, southernmost limits of all these effete civilisations,

man reasserted himself in the "South American Iroquois," as those

Chilian aborigines have been called who called themselves _Molu-che_,

"Warriors," but are better known by their Quichuan designation of

_Aucaes_, "Rebels," whence the Spanish Aucans (Araucan, Araucanian).

These "Rebels," who have never hitherto been overcome by the arms of any

people, and whose heroic deeds in the long wars waged by the white

intruders against their freedom form the topic of a noble Spanish epic

poem[927], still maintain a measure of national autonomy as the friends

and faithful allies of the Chilian republic. Individual freedom and

equality were leading features of the social system which was in the

main patriarchal. The Araucanians were led by four independent chiefs,

each supported by five _ulmen_, or district chiefs, whose office was

hereditary but whose authority was little more than nominal. It was only

in time of national warfare that the tribes united under a

war-chief[928]. Not only are all the tribes absolutely free, but the

same is true of every clan, sept, and family group. Needless to say,

there are no slaves or serfs. "The law of retaliation was the only one

understood, although the commercial spirit of the Araucano led him to

forego personal revenge for its accruing profit. Thus every injury had

its price[929]."

The basis of their belief is a rude form of nature worship, the

principal deities being malignant and requiring propitiation. The chief

god was Pillan, the thunder god. Spirits of the dead go west over the

sea to a place of abundance where no evil spirits have entry[930]. And

this simple belief is almost the only substitute for the rewards and

punishments which supply the motive for the observance of an artificial

ethical code in so many more developed religious systems.

In the sonorous Araucanian language, which is still spoken by about

40,000 full-blood natives, the term _che_, meaning "people," occurs as

the postfix of several ethnical groups, which, however, are not tribal

but purely territorial divisions. Thus, while _Molu-che_ is the

collective name of the whole nation, the _Picun-che_, _Huilli-che_, and

_Puel-che_ are simply the North, South, and East men respectively. The

Central and most numerous division are the _Puen-che_, that is, people

of the pine district, who are both the most typical and most intelligent

of all the Araucanian family. Ehrenreich's remark that many of the

American aborigines resemble Europeans as much as or even more than the

Asiatic Mongols, is certainly borne out by the facial expression of

these Puenche. The resemblance is even extended to the mental

characters, as reflected in their oral literature. Amongst the specimens

of the national folklore preserved in the Puenche dialect and edited

with Spanish translations by Rodolfo Lenz[931], is the story of a

departed lover, who returns from the other world to demand his betrothed

and carries her off to his grave. Although this might seem an adaptation

of Buerger's "Lenore," Lenz is of opinion that it is a genuine Araucanian

legend.

Of the above-mentioned groups the Puelche are now included politically

in Argentina. Their original home seems to have been north of the Rio

Negro, but they raided westwards and some adopted the Araucanian

language[932] and to them also the Chilian affix _che_ has also been

extended. Indeed the term Puelche, meaning simply "Easterns," is applied

not only to the Argentine Moluche, whose territory stretches east of the

Cordilleras as far as Mendoza in Cuyo, but also to all the aborigines

commonly called _Pampeans_ (_Pampas Indians_) by the Europeans and

_Penek_ by the Patagonians. Under the designation of Puelche would

therefore be comprised the now extinct _Ranqualche_ (Ranqueles), who

formerly raided up to Buenos-Ayres and the other Spanish settlements on

the Plate River, the _Mapoche_ of the Lower Salado, and generally all

the nomads as far south as the Rio Negro.

These aborigines are now best represented by the _Gauchos_, who are

mostly Spaniards on the father's side and Indians on the mother's, and

reflect this double descent in their half-nomadic, half-civilised life.

These Gauchos, who are now also disappearing before the encroachments

of the "Gringos[933]," _i.e._ the white immigrants from almost every

country in Europe, have been enveloped in an ill-deserved halo of

romance, thanks mainly to their roving habits, splendid horsemanship,

love of finery, and genial disposition combined with that innate grace

and courtesy which belongs to all of Spanish blood. But those who knew

them best described them as of sordid nature, cruel to their women-kind,

reckless gamblers and libertines, ruthless political partisans, at times

even religious fanatics without a spark of true religion, and at heart

little better than bloodthirsty savages.

Beyond the Rio Negro follow the gigantic Patagonians, that is, the

_Tehuelche_ or _Chuelche_ of the Araucanians, who have no true

collective name unless it be _Tsoneca_, a word of uncertain use and

origin. Most of the tribal groups--_Yacana_, _Pilma_, _Chao_ and

others--are broken up, and the former division between the Northern

Tehuelche (Tehuelhet), comprising the _Callilehet_ (Serranos or

Highlanders) of the Upper Chupat, with the Calilan between the Rios

Chupat and Negro, and the Southern Tehuelche (Yacana, Sehuan, etc.),

south to Fuegia, no longer holds good since the general displacement of

all these fluctuating nomad hordes. A branch of the Tehuelche are

unquestionably the _Ona_ of the eastern parts of Fuegia, the true

aborigines of which are the _Yahgans_ of the central and the _Alakalufs_

of the western islands.

Hitherto to the question whence came these tall Patagonians, no answer

could be given beyond the suggestion that they may have been specialised

in their present habitat, where nevertheless they seem to be obviously

intruders. Now, however, one may perhaps venture to look for their

original home amongst the _Bororo_ of Matto Grosso, a once powerful race

who held the region between the Rios Cuyaba and Paraguay. These Bororo,

who had been heard of by Martius, were visited by Ehrenreich[934] and by

Karl von den Steinen[935], who found them to be a nomadic hunting people

with a remarkable social organisation centring in the men's club-house

(_baito_). Their physical characters, as described by the former

observer, correspond closely with those of the Patagonians: "An

exceptionally tall race rivalling the South Sea Islanders, Patagonians,

and Redskins; by far the tallest Indians hitherto discovered within the

tropics," their stature ranging nearly up to 6 ft. 4 in., with very

large and rounded heads (men 81.2; women 77.4). With this should be

compared the very large round old Patagonian skull from the Rio Negro,

measured by Rudolf Martin[936]. The account reads like the description

of some forerunner of a prehistoric Bororo irruption into the Patagonian

steppe lands.

To the perplexing use of the term Puelche above referred to is perhaps

due the difference of opinion still prevailing on the number of stock

languages in this southern section of the Continent. D'Orbigny's

emphatic statement[937] that the Puelche spoke a language fundamentally

distinct both from the Araucanian and the Patagonian has been questioned

on the strength of some Puelche words, which were collected by Hale at

Carmen on the Rio Negro, and differ but slightly from Patagonian. But

the Rio Negro lies on the ethnical divide between the two races, which

sufficiently accounts for the resemblances, while the words are too few

to prove anything. Hale calls them "Southern Puelche," but they were in

fact Tehuelche (Patagonian), the true Pampean Puelche having disappeared

from that region before Hale's time[938]. I have now the unimpeachable

authority of T. P. Schmid, for many years a missionary amongst these

aborigines, for asserting that d'Orbigny's statement is absolutely

correct. His Puelche were the Pampeans, because he locates them in the

region between the Rios Negro and Colorado, that is, north of Patagonian

and east of Araucanian territory, and Schmid assures me that all

three--Araucanian, Pampean, and Patagonian--are undoubtedly stock

languages, distinct both in their vocabulary and structure, with nothing

in common except their common polysynthetic form. In a list of 2000

Patagonian and Araucanian words he found only two alike, _patac_ = 100,

and _huarunc_ = 1000, numerals obviously borrowed by the rude Tehuelche

from the more cultured Moluche. In Fuegia there is at least one

radically distinct tongue, the Yahgan, studied by Bridges. Here the Ona

is probably a Patagonian dialect, and Alakaluf perhaps remotely allied

to Araucanian. Thus in the whole region south of the Plate River the

stock languages are not known to exceed four: Araucanian; Pampean

(Puelche); Patagonian (Tehuelche); and Yahgan.

Few aboriginal peoples have been the subject of more glaringly

discrepant statements than the Yahgans, to whom several lengthy

monographs have been devoted during the last few decades. How

contradictory are the statements of intelligent and even trained

observers, whose good faith is beyond suspicion and who have no cause to

serve except the truth, will best be seen by placing in juxtaposition

the accounts of the family relations by G. Bove, a well-known Italian

observer, and P. Hyades of the French Cape Horn Expedition, both

summarised[939]:--

_Bove._

The women are treated as slaves. The greater the number of wives or

slaves a man has the easier he finds a living; hence polygamy is

deep-rooted and four wives common. Owing to rigid climate and bad

treatment the mortality of children under 10 years is excessive; the

mother's love lasts till the child is weaned, after which it rapidly

wanes, and is completely gone when the child attains the age of 7 or

8 years. The Fuegian's only lasting love is the love of self. As

there are no family ties, the word "authority" is devoid of meaning.

_Hyades._

The Fuegians are capable of great love which accounts for the

jealousy of the men over their wives and the coquetry sometimes

manifested by the women and girls.

Some men have two or more wives, but monogamy is the rule.

Children are tenderly cared for by their parents, who in return are

treated by them with affection and deference.

The Fuegians are of a generous disposition and like to share their

pleasures with others. The husbands exercise due control, and punish

severely any act of infidelity.

These seeming contradictions may be partly explained by the general

improvement in manners due to the beneficent action of the English

missionaries in recent years, and great progress has certainly been made

since the accounts of King, Fitz-Roy and Darwin[940].

But even in the more favoured regions of the Parana and Amazon basins

many tribes are met which yield little if at all to the Fuegians of the

early writers in sheer savagery and debasement. Thus the _Cashibo_ or

_Carapache_ of the Ucayali, who are described as "white as Germans, with

long beards[941]," may be said to answer almost better than any other

human group to the old saying, _homo homini lupus_. They roam the

forests like wild beasts, living almost entirely upon game, in which is

included man himself. "When one of them is pursuing the chase in the

woods and hears another hunter imitating the cry of an animal, he

immediately makes the same cry to entice him nearer, and, if he is of

another tribe, he kills him if he can, and (as is alleged) eats him."

Hence they are naturally "in a state of hostility with all their

neighbours[942]."

These Cashibo, _i.e._ "Bats," are members of a widespread linguistic

family which in ethnological writings bears the name of _Pano_, from the

Pano of the Huallaga and Maranon, who are now broken up or greatly

reduced, but whose language is current amongst the Cashibo, the Conibo,

the Karipuna, the Setebo, the Sipivio (Shipibo) and others about the

head waters of the Amazons in Peru, Bolivia, and Brazil, as far east as

the Madeira. Amongst these, as amongst the Moxo and so many other

riverine tribes in Amazonia, a slow transformation is in progress. Some

have been baptized, and while still occupying their old haunts and

keeping up the tribal organisation, have been induced to forego their

savage ways and turn to peaceful pursuits. They are beginning to wear

clothes, usually cotton robes of some vivid colour, to till the soil,

take service with the white traders, or even trade themselves in their

canoes up and down the tributaries of the Amazons. Beyond the Rubber

Belt, however, many tribes are quite untouched by outside influences.

The cannibal Boro and Witoto, living between the Issa and Japura, are

ignorant of any method of producing fire, and their women go entirely

nude, though some of their arts and crafts exhibit considerable skill,

notably the plaitwork and blow-pipes of the Boro[943].

In this boundless Amazonian region of moist sunless woodlands fringed

north and east by Atlantic coast ranges, diversified by the open

Venezuelan llanos, and merging southwards in the vast alluvial plains

of the Parana-Paraguay basin, much light has been brought to bear on the

obscure ethnical relations by the recent explorations especially of Paul

Ehrenreich and Karl von den Steinen about the Xingu, Purus, Madeira and

other southern affluents of the great artery[944]. These observers

comprise the countless Brazilian aborigines in four main linguistic

divisions, which in conformity with Powell's terminology may here be

named the CARIBAN, ARAWAKAN, GESAN and TUPI-GUARANIAN families. There

remain, however, numerous groups which cannot be so classified, such as

the Bororo and Karaya of Matto Grosso, while in the relatively small

area between the Japura and the Waupes Koch-Gruenberg found two other

language groups, Betoya and Maku in addition to Carib and Arawak[945].

Hitherto the Caribs were commonly supposed to have had their original

homes far to the north, possibly in the Alleghany uplands, or in

Florida, where they have been doubtfully identified with the extinct

Timuquanans, and whence they spread through the Antilles southwards to

Venezuela, the Guianas, and north-east Brazil, beyond which they were

not known to have ranged anywhere south of the Amazons. But this view is

now shown to be untenable, and several Carib tribes, such as the Bakairi

and Nahuqua[946] of the Upper Xingu, all speaking archaic forms of the

Carib stock language, have been met by the German explorers in the very

heart of Brazil; whence the inference that the cradle of this race is to

be sought rather in the centre of South America, perhaps on the Goyaz

and Matto Grosso table-lands, from which region they moved northwards,

if not to Florida, at least to the Caribbean Sea which is named from

them[947]. The wide diffusion of this stock is evidenced by the

existence of an unmistakably Carib tribe in the basin of the Rio

Magdalena beyond the Andes[948].

In the north the chief groups are the Makirifare of Venezuela and the

Macusi, Kalina, and Galibi of British, Dutch, and French Guiana[949]

respectively. In general all the Caribs present much the same physical

characters, although the southerners are rather taller (5 ft. 4 in.)

with less round heads (index 79.6) than the Guiana Caribs (5 ft 2 in.,

and 81.3).

Perhaps even a greater extension has been given by the German explorers

to the Arawakan family, which, like the Cariban, was hitherto supposed

to be mainly confined to the region north of the Amazons, but is now

known to range as far south as the Upper Paraguay, about 20 deg. S. lat.

(_Layana_, _Kwana_, etc.), east to the Amazons estuary (_Aruan_), and

north-west to the Goajira peninsula. To this great family--which von den

Steinen proposes to call _Nu-Aruak_ from the pronominal prefix _nu_ = I,

common to most of the tribes--belong also the _Maypures_ of the Orinoco;

the _Atarais_ and _Vapisiana_ of British Guiana; the _Manao_ of the Rio

Negro; the _Yumana_; the _Paumari_ and _Ipurina_ of the Ipuri basin; the

_Moxo_ of the Upper Mamore, and the _Mehinaku_ and _Kustenau_ of the

Upper Xingu.

Physically the Arawaks differ from the Caribs scarcely, if at all, more

than their Amazonian and Guiana sections differ from each other. In

fact, but for their radically distinct speech it would be impossible to

constitute these two ethnical divisions, which are admittedly based on

linguistic grounds. But while the Caribs had their cradle in Central

Brazil and migrated northwards, the Arawaks would appear to have

originated in eastern Bolivia, and spread thence east, north-east and

south-east along the Amazons and Orinoco and into the Paraguay

basin[950].

Our third great Brazilian division, the Gesan family, takes its name

from the syllable ges which, like the Araucan _che_, forms the final

element of several tribal names in East Brazil. Of this the most

characteristic are the _Aimores_ of the Serra dos Aimores coast range,

who are better known as Botocudo, and it was to the kindred tribes of

the province of Goyaz that the arbitrary collective name of "Ges" was

first applied by Martius. A better general designation would perhaps

have been _Tapuya_, "Strangers," "Enemies," a term by which the Tupi

people called all other natives of that region who were not of their

race or speech, or rather who were not "Tupi," that is, "Allies" or

"Associates." Tapuya had been adopted somewhat in this sense by the

early Portuguese writers, who however applied it rather loosely not only

to the Aimores, but also to a large number of kindred and other tribes

as far north as the Amazons estuary.

To the same connection belong several groups in Goyaz already described

by Milliet and Martius, and more recently visited by Ehrenreich, von den

Steinen and Krause. Such are the Kayapo or Suya, a large nation with

several divisions between the Araguaya and Xingu rivers; and the Akua,

better known as Cherentes, about the upper course of the Tocantins.

Isolated Tapuyan tribes, such as the Kames or Kaingangs, wrongly called

"Coroados," and the Chogleng of Santa Catharina and Rio Grand do Sul,

are scattered over the southern provinces of Brazil.

The Tapuya would thus appear to have formerly occupied the whole of East

Brazil from the Amazons to the Plate River for an unknown distance

inland. Here they must be regarded as the true aborigines, who were in

remote times already encroached upon, and broken into isolated

fragments, by tribes of the Tupi-Guarani stock spreading from the

interior seawards[951].

But in their physical characters and extremely low cultural state, or

rather the almost total absence of anything that can be called

"culture," the Tapuya are the nearest representatives and probably the

direct descendants of the primitive race, whose osseous remains have

been found in the Lagoa Santa caves, and the Santa Catharina

shell-mounds (_sambaqui_). On anatomic grounds the Botocudo are allied

both to the Lagoa Santa fossil man and to the _sambaqui_ race by J. R.

Peixoto, who describes the skull as marked by prominent glabella and

superciliary arches, keel or roof-shaped vault, vertical lateral walls,

simple sutures, receding brow, deeply depressed nasal root, high

prognathism, massive lower jaw, and long head (index 73.30) with

cranial capacity 1480 c.c. for men, and 1212 for women[952]. It is also

noteworthy that some of the Botocudo[953] call themselves _Nacnanuk_,

_Nac-poruc_, "Sons of the Soil," and they have no traditions of ever

having migrated from any other land. All their implements--spears, bow

and arrows, mortars, water-vessels, bags--are of wood or vegetable

fibre, so that they may be said not to have yet reached even the stone

age. They are not, however, in the promiscuous state, as has been

asserted, for the unions, though temporary, are jealously guarded while

they last, and, as amongst the Fuegians whom they resemble in so many

respects, the women are constantly subject to the most barbarous

treatment, beaten with clubs or hacked about with bamboo knives. One of

those in Ribeiro's party, who visited London in 1883, had her arms,

legs, and whole body covered with scars and gashes inflicted during

momentary fits of brutal rage by her ephemeral partner. Their dwellings

are mere branches stuck in the ground, bound together with bast, and

though seldom over 4 ft. in height accommodating two or more families.

The Botocudo are pure nomads, roaming naked in the woods in quest of the

roots, berries, honey, frogs, snakes, grubs, man, and other larger game

which form their diet, and are eaten raw or else cooked in huge bamboo

canes. Formerly they had no hammocks, but slept without any covering,

either on the ground strewn with bast, or in the ashes of the fire

kindled for the evening meal. About their cannibalism, which has been

doubted, there is really no question. They wore the teeth of those they

had eaten strung together as necklaces, and ate not only the foe slain

in battle, but members of kindred tribes, all but the heads, which were

stuck as trophies on stakes and used as butts for the practice of

archery.

At the graves of the dead, fires are kept up for some time to scare away

the bad spirits, from which custom the Botocudo might be credited with

some notions concerning the supernatural. All good influences are

attributed by them to the "day-fire" (sun), all bad things to the

"night-fire" (moon), which causes the thunderstorm, and is supposed

itself at times to fall on the earth, crushing the hill-tops, flooding

the plains and destroying multitudes of people. During storms and

eclipses arrows are shot up to scare away the demons or devouring

dragons, as amongst so many Indo-Chinese peoples. But beyond this there

is no conception of a supreme being, or creative force, the terms

_yanchong_, _tapan_, said to mean "God," standing merely for spirit,

demon, thunder, or at most the thunder god.

Owing to the choice made by the missionaries of the Tupi language as the

_lingoa geral_, or common medium of intercourse amongst the

multitudinous populations of Brazil and Paraguay, a somewhat exaggerated

idea has been formed of the range of the Tupi-Guarani family. Many of

the tribes about the stations, after being induced by the padres to

learn this convenient _lingua franca_, were apt in course of time to

forget their own mother-tongue, and thus came to be accounted members of

this family. But allowing for such a source of error, there can be no

doubt that at the discovery the Tupi or Eastern, and the Guarani or

Western, section occupied jointly an immense area, which may perhaps be

estimated at about one-fourth of the southern continent. Tupi tribes

were met as far west as Peru, where they were represented by the Omagua

("Flatheads[954]"), in French Guiana the Emerillons and the Oyampi

belong to this stock, as do the Kamayura and Auetoe on the Upper Xingu,

and the Mundurucu of the middle Tapajoz.

Some attention has been paid to the speech of the Ticuna of the Maranon,

which appears to be a stock language with strong Pana and weak

Aymara[955] affinities. Although its numeral system stops at 2, it is

still in advance of a neighbouring _Chiquito_ tongue, which is said to

have no numerals at all, _etama_, supposed to be 1, really meaning

"alone."

Yet it would be a mistake to infer that these Bolivian Chiquito, who

occupy the southernmost headstreams of the Madeira, are a particularly

stupid people. On the contrary, the Naquinoneis, "Men," as they call

themselves, are in some respects remarkably clever, and, strange to say,

their otherwise rich and harmonious language (presumably the dominant

_Moncoca_ dialect is meant) has terms to express such various

distinctions as the height of a tree, of a house, of a tower, and other

subtle shades of difference disregarded in more cultured tongues[956].

But it is to be considered that, _pace_ Max Mueller, the range of thought

and of speech is not the same, and all peoples have no doubt many

notions for which they have no equivalents in their necessarily

defective languages. The Chiquito, _i.e._ "Little Folks," were so named

because, "when the country was first invaded, the Indians fled to the

forests; and the Spaniards came to their abandoned huts, where the

doorways were so exceedingly low that the Indians who had fled were

supposed to be dwarfs[957]." They are a peaceful industrious nation, who

ply several trades, manufacture their own copper boilers for making

sugar, weave ponchos and straw hats, and when they want blue trousers

they plant a row of indigo, and rows of white and yellow cotton when

striped trousers are in fashion. Hence the question arises, whether

these clever little people may not after all have originally possessed

some defective numeral system, which was merely superseded by the

Spanish numbers.

The Gran Chaco is another area of considerable modification induced by

European influence, and there only remain hybridised descendants of many

of the ancient peoples, for example, the Abipone of the Guaycuru family.

Pure survivals of this family are the Mataco and Toba of the Vermejo and

Pilcomayo rivers. These two tribes were visited by Ehrenreich, who

noticed their disproportionately short arms and legs, and excessive

development of the thorax[958]. The daily life, customs, and beliefs of

these and other Chaco Indians have been admirably described and

illustrated by Erland Nordenskioeld[959], who lived and travelled among

them. The Toba and Mataco frequently fall out with the neighbouring

Choroti and Ashluslays of the Pilcomayo anent fishing rights and so on,

but the conflict consists in ambuscades and treachery rather than in

pitched battles. Weapons consist of bows and arrows and clubs, and

lances are used on horseback. Enemies are scalped and these trophies are

greatly prized, being hung outside the victor's hut when fine and

playing a part on great occasions. On the conclusion of peace both sides

pay the blood-price for those slain by them in sheep, horses, etc.

Within the Choroti or Ashluslay village all are equal, and though

property is held individually, the fortunate will always share with

those in want, so that theft is unknown. To kill old people or young

children is regarded as no crime[960].

FOOTNOTES:

[873] Some Nahuas, whom the Spaniards called "Mexicans" or "Chichimecs,"

were met by Vasquez de Coronado even as far south as the Chiriqui

lagoon, Panama. These Seguas, as they called themselves, have since

disappeared, and it is no longer possible to say how they strayed so far

from their northern homes.

[874] "Recent Maya Investigations," _Bur. Am. Eth. Bull._ 28, 1904, p.

555.

[875] _Alterthuemer aus Guatemala_, p. 24.

[876] _Analysis of the Pictorial Text inscribed on two Palenque

Tablets_, N. York, 1896.

[877] H. Beuchat however considers that "the Toltec question remains

insoluble"; though the hypothesis that the Toltecs formed part of the

north to south movement is attractive, it is not yet proved, _Manuel

d'Archeologie americaine_, Paris, 1912, pp. 258-61.

[878] Quetzalcoatl, the "Bright-feathered Snake," was one of the three

chief gods of the Nahuan pantheon. He was the god of wind and inventor

of all the arts, round whom clusters much of the mythology, and of the

pictorial and plastic art of the Mexicans.

[879] _Globus_, LXVI. pp. 95-6.

[880] Herbert J. Spinden, "A Study of Maya Art," _Mem. Peabody Mus._

VI., Cambridge, Mass. 1913, p. 3 ff., and _Proc. Nineteenth Internat.

Congress Americanists_, 1917, p. 165.

[881] J. W. Powell, _16th Ann. Rep. Bur. Am. Eth._ 1894, p. xcv.

[882] Sylvanus Griswold Morley ("An Introduction to the Study of the

Maya hieroglyphs," _Bur. Am. Eth. Bull._ 57, 1915), briefly summarises

the theories advanced for the interpretation of Maya writing (pp.

26-30). "The theory now most generally accepted is, that while chiefly

ideographic, the glyphs are sometimes phonetic." This author is of

opinion "that as the decipherment of Maya writing progresses, more and

more phonetic elements will be identified, though the idea conveyed by a

glyph will always be found to overshadow its phonetic value" (p. 30).

[883] "Day Symbols of the Maya Year," _16th Ann. Rep. Bur. Am. Eth._

1894, p. 205.

[884] p. 32 ff.

[885] _Manuel d'Archeologie americaine_, p. 506.

[886] _16th Ann. Rep. Bur. Am. Eth._ 1894, p. xcvi. In "The Maya Year"

(1894) Cyrus Thomas shows that "the year recorded in the Dresden codex

consisted of 18 months of 20 days each, with 5 supplemental days, or of

365 days" (_ib._). S. G. Morley points out (_Bur. Am. Eth. Bull._ 57,

pp. 44-5) that though the Maya doubtless knew that the true length of

the year exceeded 365 days by 6 hours, yet no interpolation of

intercalary days was actually made, as this would have thrown the whole

calendar into confusion. The priests apparently corrected the calendar

by additional calculations to show how far the recorded year was ahead

of the true year. Those who have persistently appealed to these

Maya-Aztec calendric systems as convincing proofs of Asiatic influences

in the evolution of American cultures will now have to show where these

influences come in. As a matter of fact the systems are fundamentally

distinct, the American showing the clearest indications of local

development, as seen in the mere fact that the day characters of the

Maya codices were phonetic, _i.e._ largely rebuses explicable only in

the Maya language, which has no affinities out of America. A careful

study of the Maya calendric system based both on the codices and the

inscriptions has been made by C. P. Bowditch, _The Numeration, Calendar

Systems and Astronomical Knowledge of the Mayas_, Cambridge, Mass. 1910.

The Aztec month of 20 days is also clearly indicated by the 20

corresponding signs on the great Calendar Stone now fixed in the wall of

the Cathedral tower of Mexico. This basalt stone, which weighs 25 tons

and has a diameter of 11 feet, is briefly described and figured by T. A.

Joyce, _Mexican Archaeology_, 1914, pp. 73, 74; cf. Pl. VIII. fig. 1.

See also the account by Alfredo Chavero in the _Anales del Museo

Nacional de Mexico_, and an excellent reproduction of the Calendar Stone

in T. U. Brocklehurst's _Mexico To-day_, 1883, p. 186; also Zelia

Nuttall's study of the "Mexican Calendar System," _Tenth Internat.

Congress of Americanists_, Stockholm, 1894. "The regular rotation of

market-days and the day of enforced rest every 20 days were the

prominent and permanent features of the civil solar year" (_ib._).

[887] _Spuren der Aztek. Sprache_, 1859, _passim_.

[888] Linguistic and mythological affinities also exist according to

Spence between the Nahuan people and the Tsimshian-Nootka group of

Columbia. Cf. _The Civilization of Ancient Mexico_, 1912, p. 6.

[889] "Chiefly of the Nahuatl race" (De Nadaillac, p. 279). It should,

however be noted that this general name of Chichimec (meaning little

more than "nomadic hunters") comprised a large number of barbarous

tribes--Pames, Pintos, etc.--who are described as wandering about naked

or wearing only the skins of beasts, living in caves or rock-shelters,

armed with bows, slings, and clubs, constantly at war amongst themselves

or with the surrounding peoples, eating raw flesh, drinking the blood of

their captives or treating them with unheard-of cruelty, altogether a

horror and terror to all the more civilised communities. "Chichimec

Empire" may therefore be taken merely as a euphemistic expression for

the reign of barbarism raised up on the ruins of the early Toltec

civilisation. Yet it had its dynasties and dates and legendary sequence

of events, according to the native historian, Ixtlilxochitl, himself of

royal lineage, and he states that Xolotl, founder of the empire, had

under orders 3,202,000 men and women, that his decisive victory over the

Toltecs took place in 1015, that he assumed the title of "Chichimecatl

Tecuhti," Great Chief of the Chichimecs, and that after a succession of

revolts, wars, conspiracies, and revolutions, Maxtla, last of the

dynasty, was overthrown in 1431 by the Aztecs and their allies.

[890] H. Beuchat, _Manuel d'Archeologie americaine_, pp. 262-6.

[891] Named from the shadowy land of Aztlan away to the north, where

they long dwelt in the seven legendary caves of Chicomoztoc, whence they

migrated at some unknown period to the lacustrine region, where they

founded Tenochtitlan, seat of their empire.

[892] "The gods of the Mayas appear to have been less sanguinary than

those of the Nahuas. The immolation of a dog was with them enough for an

occasion that would have been celebrated by the Nahuas with hecatombs of

victims. Human sacrifices did however take place" (De Nadaillac, p.

266), though they were as nothing compared with the countless victims

demanded by the Aztec gods. "The dedication by Ahuizotl of the great

temple of Huitzilopochtli in 1487 is alleged to have been celebrated by

the butchery of 72,344 victims," and "under Montezuma II. 12,000

captives are said to have perished" on one occasion (_ib._ p. 297); all

no doubt gross exaggerations, but leaving a large margin for perhaps the

most terrible chapter of horrors in the records of natural religions.

Cf. T. A. Joyce, _Mexican Archaeology_, pp. 261-2.

[893] A popular and well-illustrated account of Huichols and Tarascos,

as also of the Tarahumare farther north, is given by Carl Lumholtz,

_Unknown Mexico_, 2 vols. New York, 1902.

[894] Cf. Hans Gadow, _Through Southern Mexico_, 1908, map p. 296, also

p. 314.

[895] Quoted by De Nadaillac, p. 365.

[896] p. 363.

[897] _17th Ann. Rep. Bur. Am. Eth. 1895-6_, Pt. 1 (1898), p. 11.

[898] _The Hill Caves of Yucatan_, New York, 1903.

[899] H. Beuchat, _Manuel d'Acheologie americaine_, 1912, p. 407.

[900] "In the city of Mexico everything has a Spanish look"

(Brocklehurst, _Mexico To-day_, p. 15). The Aztec language however is

still current in the surrounding districts and generally in the

provinces forming part of the former Aztec empire.

[901] C. Lumholtz, _Unknown Mexico_, II. p. 480; cf. pp. 477-80.

[902] Sylvanus Griswold Morley, "An Introduction to the Study of the

Maya Hieroglyphs," _Bur. Am. Eth. Bull. 57_, 1915, pp. 2-5.

[903] E. Reclus, _Universal Geography_, XVII. p. 156.

[904] T. A. Joyce, _Central American and West Indian Archaeology_, 1916,

pp. 157, 256-7. An admirable account is given of the material culture

and mode of life of these peoples at the time of the discovery.

[905] The rapid disappearance of the Cuban aborigines has been the

subject of much comment. Between the years 1512-32 all but some 4000 had

perished, although they are supposed to have originally numbered about a

million, distributed in 30 tribal groups, whose names and territories

have all been carefully preserved. But they practically offered no

resistance to the ruthless Conquistadores, and it was a Cuban chief who

even under torture refused to be baptized, declaring that he would never

enter the same heaven as the Spaniard. One is reminded of the analogous

cases of Jarl Hakon, the Norseman, and the Saxon Witikind, who rejected

Christianity, preferring to share the lot of their pagan forefathers in

the next world.

[906] H. Beuchat, pp. 507-11, 526-8.

[907] Paper read before the National Academy of Sciences, America, 1890.

[908] T. A. Joyce, p. 2, who deals with the archaeology, as far as it is

known as yet, of Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. Cf. especially

linguistic map at p. 30 for distribution of tribes.

[909] T. A. Joyce, _South American Archaeology_, 1912, p. 7.

[910] "The travels of P. de Cieza de Leon" (Hakluyt Soc. 1864, p. 50

f.).

[911] Sir C. R. Markham, "List of Tribes," etc., _Journ. Roy. Anth.

Inst._ XI. 1910, p. 95. "This idea was widespread, and many Amazonian

peoples declared they preferred to be eaten by their friends than by

worms."

[912] Quoted by Steinmetz, _Endokannibalismus_, p. 19.

[913] C. Darwin, _Journal of Researches_, 1889, p. 155. Thanks to their

frequent contact with Europeans since the expeditions of Fitzroy and

Darwin, the Fuegians have given up the practice, hence the doubts or

denials of Bridges, Hyades, and other later observers.

[914] V. Martius, _Zur Ethnographie Brasiliens_, 1867, p. 430.

[915] Herbert Spencer, _The Principles of Ethics_, 1892, I. p. 330.

[916] The national name was _Muysca_, "Men," "Human Body," and the

number twenty (in reference to the ten fingers and ten toes making up

that score). _Chibcha_ was a mimetic name having allusion to the sound

_ch_ (as in Charles), which is of frequent recurrence in the Muysca

language. With man = 20, cf. the Bellacoola (British Columbia) 19 = 1

man - 1; 20 = 1 man, etc.; and this again with Lat. _undeviginti_.

[917] W. Bollaert, _Antiquarian, Ethnological, and other Researches in

New Granada_, etc. 1860, _passim_.

[918] T. A. Joyce, _South American Archaeology_, 1912, p. 28.

[919] _Ibid._ p. 44.

[920] T. A. Joyce, _loc. cit._ pp. 18-22.

[921] Markham locates it in the province of Paruro, department of Cuzco;

Hiram Bingham, director of the Peruvian Expeditions of the Nat. Geog.

Soc. and Yale University, identifies it with Machu Picchu (_Nat. Geog.

Mag.,_ Washington, D. C., Feb. 1915, p. 172).

[922] H. Beuchat, pp. 573-5. For culture sequences in the Andean area

see P. A. Means, _Proc. Nineteenth Internat. Congress of Americanists,_

1917, p. 236 ff., and _Man_, 1918, No. 91.

[923] _Anthropologie Bolivienne_, 3 vols. Paris, 1907-8.

[924] An admirable account of the material culture of Peru is given by

T. A. Joyce, _South American Archaeology_, 1912, cap. VI.

[925] _Peru_, p. 120.

[926] De Nadaillac, _Pre-Historic America_, 1885, p. 438.

[927] Alonzo de Ercilla's _Araucana_.

[928] T. A. Joyce, _South American Archaeology_, 1912, p. 243; R. E.

Latham, "Ethnology of the Araucanos," _Journ. Roy. Anth. Inst._ XXXIX.

1909, p. 355.

[929] Latham, p. 356.

[930] _Ibid._ pp. 344-50.

[931] In the _Anales de la Universidad de Chile_ for 1897.

[932] T. A. Joyce, p. 240.

[933] Properly _Griegos_, "Greeks," so called because supposed to speak

"Greek," _i.e._ any language other than Spanish.

[934] _Urbewohner Brasiliens_, 1897, pp. 69, 110, 125.

[935] _Unter den Naturvoelkern Zentral-Brasiliens_, 1894, pp. 441-3, 468

ff.

[936] _Quarterly Journal of Swiss Naturalists_, Zurich, 1896, p. 496

ff.; cf. T. A. Joyce, _South American Archaeology_, 1912, pp. 241-2.

[937] _L'Homme Americain_, II. p. 70.

[938] They were replaced or absorbed partly by the Patagonians, but

chiefly by the Araucanian Puelche, who many years ago migrated down the

Rio Negro as far as El Carmen and even to the coast at Bahia Blanca.

Hence Hale's Puelche were in fact Araucanians with a Patagonian strain.

[939] _Mission Scientifique de Cap Horn_, VII., par P. Hyades et J.

Deniker, 1891, pp. 238, 243, 378.

[940] For the latest information and full bibliography see J. M. Cooper,

_Bureau Am. Eth. Bull. 63_, 1917, and _Proc. Nineteenth Internat.

Congress Americanists_, 1917, p. 445; also, C. W. Furlong, _ibid._ pp.

420 ff., 432 ff.

[941] Markham, "List of Tribes," etc., _Journ. Roy. Anth. Inst._ XI.

1910, pp. 89-90.

[942] _Ibid._

[943] T. Whiffen, _The North-West Amazons_, 1915, pp. 48, 78, 91, etc.

[944] For the material culture of the Araguayan tribes, cf. Fritz

Krause, _In den Wildnissen Brasiliens_, 1911.

[945] T. Koch-Gruenberg, _Zwei Jahre unter den Indianern_, 2 vols.

Berlin, 1910. See Vol. II. map after p. 319.

[946] Ehrenreich, _loc. cit._ p. 45 ff.; von den Steinen, _loc. cit._ p.

153 ff.

[947] It should be stated that a like conclusion was reached by Lucien

Adam from the vocabularies brought by Crevaux from the Upper Japura

tribes--Witotos, Corequajes, Kariginas and others--all of Carib speech.

[948] A. C. Haddon, _The Wanderings of Peoples_, Cambridge, 1911, p.

109.

[949] Described by E. F. im Thurn, _Among the Indians of Guiana_,

London, 1883.

[950] A. C. Haddon, _The Wanderings of Peoples_, pp. 110-11.

[951] V. d. Steinen, _Unter den Naturvoelkern Zentral-Brasiliens_, p.

157. "D'apres Goncalves Dias les tribus bresiliennes descendraient de

deux races absolument distinctes: la race conquerante des Tupi ... et la

race vaincue, pourchassee, des Tapuya...."; V. de Saint-Martin, p. 517,

_Nouveau Dictionnaire de Geographie Universelle_, 1879, A--C.

[952] _Novos Estudios Craniologicos sobre os Botocudos_, Rio Janeiro,

1882, _passim_.

[953] Possibly so called from the Portuguese _botoque_, a barrel plug,

from the wooden plug or disc formerly worn by all the tribes both as a

lip ornament and an ear-plug, distending the lobes like great leathern

bat's-wings down to the shoulders. But this embellishment is called

_tembeitera_ by the Brazilians, and Botocudo may perhaps be connected

with _beto-apoc_, the native name of the ear-plug.

[954] They are the _Cambebas_ of the Tupi, a term also meaning

Flatheads, and they are so called because "apertao aos recemnacidos as

cabecas entre duas taboas afim de achatal-as, costume que actualmente

han perdido" (Milliet, II. p. 174).

[955] Such "identities" as Tic. _dreja_ = Aym. _chacha_ (man); _etai_ =

_utax_ (house) etc., are not convincing, especially in the absence of

any scientific study of the laws of _Lautverschiebung_, if any exist

between the Aymara-Ticuna phonetic systems. And then the question of

loan words has to be settled before any safe conclusions can be drawn

from such assumed resemblances. The point is important in the present

connection, because current statements regarding the supposed reduction

of the number of stock languages in South America are largely based on

the unscientific comparison of lists of words, which may have nothing in

common except perhaps a letter or two like the _m_ in Macedon and

Monmouth. Two languages (cf. Turkish and Arabic) may have hundreds or

thousands of words in common, and yet belong to fundamentally different

linguistic families.

[956] A. Balbi, _Atlas Ethnographique du Globe_, XXVII. With regard to

the numerals this authority tells us that "il a emprunte a l'espagnol

ses noms de nombres" (_ib._).

[957] Markham, _List of the Tribes_, p. 92.

[958] _Urbewohner Brasiliens_, p. 101.

[959] "La vie des Indiens dans le Chaco," trans. by H. Beuchat, _Rev. de

Geog. annuelle_, t. VI. Paris, 1912. Cf. also the forthcoming book by R.

Karsten of Helsingfors who has recently visited some of these tribes.

[960] While this account of Central and South America was in the Press

Clark Wissler's valuable book was published, _The American Indian_, New

York, 1917. He describes (pp. 227-42) the following culture areas:

X. The Nahua area (the ancient Maya and the later Aztec cultures).

XI. The Chibcha area (from the Chibcha-speaking Talamanca and

Chiriqui of Costa Rica to and including Colombia and western

Venezuela).

XII. The Inca area (Ecuador, Peru and northern Chili).

XIII. The Guanaco area (lower half of Chili, Argentine, Patagonia,

Tierra del Fuego).

XIV. The Amazon area (all the rest of South America).

XV. The Antilles (West Indies, linking on to the Amazon area).