stock inhabiting the land were giants, many of whom had perished by
flood, fire, and earthquake. Then came a body of men who wished to
reach the sun, and for this purpose they reared a tower. The sun,
angered at the presumption of the earth-dwellers in aspiring to
share with the gods the dwellings in the heavens, summoned all of
the supernatural powers; the building was destroyed; and the guilty
mortals were scattered over the earth. A mythical legislator then
appears in Central America who teaches the people, the offspring of
the giants, the arts of civilized life. The basis of this folklore
may not unreasonably be ascribed to the finding of the bones of large
extinct animals and, on the site of the Central American ruined
cities, of mammoth statues of human beings. The residuum of truth
seems to be that the Mexicans of the Conquest were correct in their
common tradition that their ancestors had come from the north, and
that the country had been gradually occupied by successive swarms of
invaders who came south while they were still dependent on hunting
game for their food and were finally reduced to settled forms of life
by the cultivation of maize. The various tribes who took part in this
migration are called by the Mexican word “Nahuatlaca,” used to denote
those communities who were dependent on agriculture and followed a
nahua or rule of life dictated by a custom administered by hereditary
chiefs. At the beginning of the sixteenth century the Nahuatlaca had
reached the present limits of Costa Rica. That there were aboriginal
inhabitants is inferred from the mention of the Otomi, the Huaxtecs,
the Totonacs, and the Ulmecs, who at the time of the Conquest occupied
districts not overrun by the Nahuatlacan immigration.
In the first stage of the southward movement the Toltecs take the
lead; it is stated that, being expelled from their own country, they
came from the region of the north by both land and sea. Their chief
center in their new land was Tollan, a pueblo which stands on a
tributary of the Moctezuma River, a stream which falls into the Gulf
of Mexico. This place seems to have been once a center of trade, for
the Toltecs had the reputation of being clever craftsmen. In addition
to knowledge of preparing skins and of manufacturing clothing and
articles of domestic use, they must have become familiar with various
metals and with the employment of stone for building. Colored stones
and crystals were used in their decorative work; from the coasts were
brought the colored shells with which they covered their buildings, and
the feathers which were woven into their tapestry. Besides this, they
had a reputation for the knowledge of medicinal plants. The ruins of
Tollan are extensive; as described by those who saw some of the still
extant buildings at the time of the Conquest, they must have been most
impressive. Sahogun mentions especially the Chalchiauhapan (On the blue
water) because it was built between the two forks of the river. There
were richly decorated apartments, four being more magnificent than the
rest. One was called the House of Gold, another the House of Green
Jade and Turquoise; a third room was covered with colored sea-shells
arranged as mosaics, the interstices being filled with silver; the
last room was decorated in red stones, combined with colored shells.
There were besides four rooms adorned with tapestry made of the plumage
of different colored birds. As with Selinus, a famous Greek city in
Sicily, the downfall of Tollan must have been sudden, for there was an
unfinished building seen in the ruins with remarkable pillars in the
form of rattlesnakes, and also a mound in process of construction to be
used as a foundation of a building of unusually large size. This fate
seems to have overtaken it some centuries before the Spanish conquest,
and was probably due to an insurrection among the subordinate pueblos.
The name Toltec came to be used as a synonym for a builder in stone or
a worker of metals, and it was due to the influence of this race that
the other branches of the Nahuatlaca stock made their progress in the
civilizing arts. Not only do they stand out among other peoples of the
New World as prominent in the pursuit of useful arts and in artistic
achievement, but they deserve a place of honor because the deity they
worshipped, Suetzalcohuatl, was not propiatiated by sacrifices of
blood, but by offerings of maize, perfumes, and flowers. Probably many
of them migrated to the regions of Central America, where they were
able to preserve their own traditions. Here can be seen better than
in the neighborhood of their ancient capital the specimens of their
artistic skill. Some of the Toltecs of the dispersion took refuge at
Cholula, which at the time of the Conquest was the chief seat of Toltec
arts and religion, and also the center of the slave trade. Not far off
is the town of Tlaxcallan.
The dissolution of the Toltec control was followed by a long period
marked by successive waves of migration. Some of these nomadic tribes
who described themselves as Chichimecs of the sun (Teo Chichimecs)
established themselves in the strong places of the mountains, and took
possession of Tlaxcallan, making it their center. In time this pueblo
and its neighbors became of great importance, emigrants spreading from
it over parts of Yucatan and Central America. Even at the time of the
Spanish conquest the territory which Tlaxcallan dominated, although it
was only forty miles in its greatest length and considerably narrower
in breadth, mustered 50,000 warriors.
The spread of the Nahuatlaca race by their various emigrating swarms
brought them over all parts of the Mexican plateau, and also to the
coast both of the Atlantic and Pacific, but the center of their rule
lay in the narrow Valley of Mexico, probably once the crater of an
immense volcano surrounded by a girdle of mountains. There were fifty
pueblos in the valley placed on or near the four lakes which, by
changes in the distribution of land and water, had taken the place of
the one large body of water that had once filled the extinct crater.
Before the coming of the Nahuatlaca the district was occupied by the
Otomis, whose language is still spoken in the neighborhood of Mexico
City.
When the migration took place, Tezcuco, situated on the northeastern
shore of the lake, became a dominant pueblo, and was at the head
of a considerable confederacy. On the western side of the lake was
another group of pueblos known as the Tecpanecs, who were rivals of
Tezcuco. Here there settled about the year 1200 a vagrant tribe of the
Chichimecs; the new arrivals were named by the Tecpanecs crane people
or Aztecs, probably from their habit of wading in the marshy shores of
the lake while engaged in fishing. The newcomers proved industrious,
and in the course of time reclaimed the marshy island, building on the
land two towns, the villages of Tenochtitlan (place of a prickly pear)
and Tlatelolco (place of a hill). According to Aztec folklore, when
they took possession of the island, they found on it a prickly pear
tree growing on a rock and on this rock they saw an eagle devouring a
snake. This fable is still recalled in the present arms of the republic
of Mexico.
The two Aztec pueblos on the lake remained distinct communities until
1473, a fact which suggests their being built on separate islands,
according to the traditional account. By help of the Aztecs, who were
skilled in the art of war, the Tecpanec confederacy made great advances
in dominating the valley. There was a little contest with Tezcuco when
the confederates demanded from its people the usual tribute of cotton
cloth; Tezcuco was taken and handed over to the Aztecs as a reward for
their valuable services. The growing importance of the island pueblos
soon, however, aroused the jealousy of the Tecpanecs and they resolved
to suppress the two island communities by transferring the inhabitants
to the shores of the lake. In the war which followed, though many of
the people of the islands were at first reluctant to try conclusions
with their powerful neighbors, the counsels of their warlike leader,
Ischohuatl, prevailed. Azcapozalco, the center of the Tecpanec
confederacy was captured, and with this conquest, which took place in
or about the year 1428, Tenochtitlan or Mexico became the dominant
power in the valley.
The island pueblos showed a statesmanlike policy in dealing with
their neighbors; Tezcuco was restored to something like an autonomous
position, and in the group of pueblos in the valley, of which the
island communities were now the head, an equitable distribution of the
tribute formerly collected by the Tecpanecs was made. Tezcuco also,
and Tlacopan, a Tecpanec pueblo, were given a specific district over
which to preside, and were allowed to pursue untrammeled their own
line of conquest. To secure the dominant power of Mexico, causeways
were built in three directions to the shore, and with other works
constructed on two of the lakes, by which the straits between the
lakes of Tezcuco and Xochimilco were bridged, a strong fortified place
came into existence which was practically impregnable. The warlike and
aggressive traditions of Ischohuatl were so well maintained throughout
the ninety-two years between the formation of the confederacy and the
advent of the Spanish invaders that large tracts of country outside of
the valley were turned into tributary regions.
A considerable portion of this work of expansion was done by
Ischohuatl’s successor, his nephew Montezuma the First, who ruled over
Tenochtitlan for twenty-eight years (1436-1464). During his reign the
limits of Mexican rule were extended nearly to those formed by the
Spaniards, the area of conquest being decided largely by commercial
reasons. Wherever in the Pacific district there were honey, cacao,
tangerines, precious stones, copal gums, cinnabar, and gold, that
region was marked out for absorption. These Pacific regions extended
800 miles in length and, because of the value of their products, were
the most important of all the Mexican dominion. On the side of the
Gulf of Mexico the eastern part of the present state of Vera Cruz
was rendered tributary; from this district the most prized object of
exportation was the quetzalli feathers used for standards and for
warriors’ plumes. There was trade from Mexico with the Caribs on the
Gulf, for Columbus met, in 1502, a Carib vessel having a cargo of
cotton cloaks, tunics, skirts, Mexican swords, stone knives, bronze
hatchets and bells, pans for smelting bronze, and cacao. From the time
of Montezuma I to the reign of the second of the name, the sovereignty
was held by three brothers in succession. During this period there was
a revolt of the sister community of Tlatelolco, the suppression of
which brought to an end the long existing equality in the confederation
headed by this pueblo. Apart from this the boundaries of the tributary
area do not seem to have been enlarged.
Altogether there are found in the roll of tributary pueblos 358 names
when Montezuma II was dominant chief (1502-1520). These were small
industrial settlements in all of which a particular kind of tribute was
prepared; some sent cotton cloths, others raw cotton, others timber
for fuel or building; from others came weapons, deerskins, tobacco.
The tributes were generally paid annually in prescribed quantities.
Under this system the great bulk of the population, the Nahuatlacan
peasantry, were condemned to a life of severest toil of all kinds
done in behalf of the warrior and priestly classes. The warriors,
too, every twenty days, had to take the field, partly as a military
exercise, partly also to provide the human sacrifices that, according
to their old elaborate Mexican ritual, had to be offered to the
gods. The priests took charge of the prisoners, prepared them for the
sacrifices, divided the flesh of the victims, and arranged their skulls
in the precincts of the temple, this being the method of keeping a
regular toll of the offerings. There were more commonplace tasks of the
priestly order, the Teopixqui, that must have filled up the intervals
between the frequent great sacrificial festivals. In each teopan, or
temple dedicated to a divinity, the sacred fire was kept ever burning;
besides, there was the regular offering of incense, four times a day,
at sunrise, noon, sunset, and midnight. To keep up this sequence of
devotion and also the prescribed immolations, at stated intervals the
heavens were scrutinized with official vigilance day and night. At
midnight all those attached to the teopan were aroused for the solemn
offering of blood that took place in a penitential chamber, each
worshiper supplying his share of blood by tearing his own body with a
strap of aloe thorns.
In their religious system the Aztecs, like the other members of the
Nahua stock, had reached, in a technical sense, a highly differentiated
standard. They had long left behind that stage of the lowest savage
life where there is no recognition even of spirits, those substantial
and active beings who are made responsible for the changes in the
material world that the savage cannot otherwise explain. When the
spirit is supposed to be composed, not of flesh and blood, but of some
ethereal matter the era of civilization begins. According to savage
belief the spirits are made in the image of a man, consisting of flesh
and blood like man, and also requiring, like him, nourishment of food
and drink. This principle took the widest extension in the Nahuatlacan
worship; with the development of tribal life and the organization of
confederacies there went hand in hand the regular provision of meat
and drink offerings organized on a very large scale to secure the
benevolence of the divinities. Various familiar forms of fetich worship
were employed. Probably before the fashioning of idols by the hand
of man natural objects such as plants, trees, mountains, and animals
were worshipped; for example, in Mexico there was a national annual
sacrifice to the mountains. In the frequent human sacrifices the victim
was slain with a stone knife, on a stone slab, while the neck and
limbs were kept in place by a collar and fetters made of stone. From
the maize plant developed some of the most important deities in the
Mexican religion. There was a long midsummer festival of eight days
devoted to this vegetable, one of the prime necessities of life, at
which one victim, a slave girl, was offered to the spirit dwelling in
the maize. At the end of the eighteenth century the idol before which
the sacrificial ceremony was performed was discovered in one of the
squares in Mexico, recalling the procession in which it was carried,
bound round with skulls, dead snakes, maize leaves, and ears. The toad,
as the offspring of water and the symbol of the water spirit, was an
object of veneration. The rabbit, as an animal considered totally
devoid of sense, was worshipped as a drink god, to whom offerings were
made that the worshipper might escape the deleterious effects of an
over indulgence in pulque. Like other people in the primitive stage of
culture the Mexicans venerated rivers and lakes as manifestations of
will.
The common practice of worship of the dead prevailed also in Mexico,
where its existence is attested by the preservation of the skull,
or by the blocks of stone surmounted by enormous human heads which
invariably denote the distinguished dead, because the gods are always
represented with all their limbs. There was also a large heavenly
hierarchy, gods of the atmosphere and stellar powers, some being
associated with particular mountains, but the most important of all
was Tezcatlipoca the giver and sustainer of life, the symbol of the
wind, the bestower of life and death. Next to him came the sun god,
Huitzilopochtli. He being a living person was, as appeared from the
natural phenomena seen in the succession of the seasons and the change
from day to night, especially in need of food. His vitality frequently
shows signs of failing. It is therefore especially incumbent upon
man to help him in this struggle for existence. So necessary was the
maintenance of this principle of religious faith that the sun always
received a share of the human victims offered to the other divinities.
But all sorts of vegetable and animal life were offered to this needy
divinity, who seemed to the Mexicans to show such constant signs of an
impaired vitality. In the pictures of the Aztecs the rays of the sun,
significantly represented as long crimson tongues licking up blood,
constantly appear. The order of society was so regulated as to keep
the sun in full vigorous condition; hence the never ending slaughter
of human victims supplied by incessant warfare with neighboring
tribes to provide the food supply for the sun. If there had been
large animals in Mexico, these ghastly immolations of human victims
might not have stained the progress of the Aztec people, for it is an
established principle that the search for food is closely related to
the development of religion among primitive races.
As the people of Nahuatlaca stock advanced economically and
politically, they applied the results of their experience to their
primitive tribal religion. Along with the system of tributes which
maintained the dominant pueblo, there were expeditions made for
securing the tribute to the sun god, called in the language of
religious imagery “the plucking of flowers.” As the service of the god
was connected with military expeditions, Huitzilopochtli was the Aztec
god of war, the tutelar divinity of the warrior class. Twice a year in
Mexico there were special rites in the building called the Abode of
the Eagles, where the warriors assembled to send a messenger to their
patron. In the principal court of the building there was a colossal
symbol of the sun, in the shape of a solar wheel sending forth rays of
gold. Before it was a great stone at the top of forty steps, called the
cap of the eagles; the middle of the altar was hollowed out to receive
the victim’s blood, and here the poor captive was brought dressed in
the colors of the sun. He carried a staff, a shield, and a bundle of
coloring matter, the purpose of which seems to have been to enable the
sun to decorate his face. Just before the immolation the victim was
addressed in the following words: “Sir, we pray you go to our god, the
sun, and greet him on our behalf; tell him that his sons and warriors
and chiefs, those who remain here, pray for him to remember them and
to favor them from that place where he is, and to receive this small
offering which we send him. Give him this staff to help him on his
journey and this shield for his defense, and all the rest you have in
this bundle.” Those who fell on the field of battle were believed, as a
reward, to be transported into the house of the sun, where they became
his servants and shared in his constant banquets.
With the eclecticism common to all religions and that specially marks
its primitive type, an ancient god of the Toltecs, Quetzalcohuatl, also
a solar deity, was adopted as a member of the Aztec divine hierarchy.
According to tradition, this divine being left his abode in heaven for
the purpose of showing beneficence to mankind. From him man learnt the
arts of life, and while he was on earth the age of gold prevailed.
Unlike the other deities, his character was mild and kindly, for he
was described as being averse to war and sacrifice. Constantly crossed
in his purposes by wizards, he floated away on a raft. There was a
general belief that he would return and restore the reign of peace, an
anticipation which was popular among the tribes who felt the burden of
the Aztec domination. Each year, with an inconsistency not foreign to
higher forms of religion, human sacrifices were offered under the guise
of messengers sent to inform the benign Quetzalcohuatl of the need of a
speedy deliverance.
As might have been expected, exaggerated estimates are given by the
early authorities of the number of human beings slaughtered in the
course of the year; but, in any case, it must have been great, for in
the small and poor region of Tlaxcallan from one pueblo 405 captives
were sacrificed at the chief feast of the local deity. Naturally, in
the dominant pueblo the proportions of the human victims offered to the
gods must have far exceeded these limits.
Closely connected with the Aztec religion was the development of an
ingenious, if imperfect method of reckoning time. It was apparently
evolved independently, for in the Old World there was nothing like
it. The basis of time reckoning was the period of twenty days, and
each day of this division had a proper sign or name. The periodic
expeditions against neighboring hostile tribes were controlled by this
division, as were also the holding of markets and the arrangement of
tributes. There were eighteen of these divisions, which regulated the
various festivals of the religious year. For secular purposes the
360 day year was corrected by adding to it a period of five days, a
fractional part of the twenty-day period. On these supplementary five
days all public ceremonies ceased. The chronological system consisted
of a combination of great cycles, each of fifty-two years’ duration.
And each great cycle was divided into four smaller cycles of thirteen
years.
The economic and political basis of Aztec life was the pueblo, or
tribal community, in which frequently each clan of the tribe had a
localized quarter, each provided with the temple of the particular
deity recognized by the clan as its protector. Through the wars
of conquest with weaker pueblos there had grown up a rudimentary
feudalism, according to which the distinguished warriors were
established in the subject pueblos as proprietors of the best lands
in them. The possession of these lands could descend to the sons or
might be alienated for the benefit of a distinguished chieftain. The
food supply of the country so controlled was regular, hence there was
no need of a nomadic life. Wealth was increasing, and the population
growing. Habits of industry were encouraged, with the result that the
principle of the division of labor to a certain extent existed. Some
forms of craftsmanship, too, were cultivated, specialized in particular
communities; for example, Cholula was famous for its potters, while
the art of the goldsmith was practised at Azcapozalco. Clothing was
manufactured, the houses and buildings were decorated internally,
and there was an elaborate cuisine. Montezuma’s meal is described as
consisting of thirty sorts of stews. He used chafing-dishes to keep
them warm, and he also drank chocolate and ate fruit as a second course.
There was a system of customary law administered by qualified
officials, and, for controlling the conduct of the people, there
existed an extremely elaborate rule of life which implied discipline
and the recognition of social duties and family obligations. The
Aztecs had standards of value, but no coined money and no standards of
measurement, nor anything like an alphabet or even a syllabary. In the
“pinturas,” however, there were a few purely phonetic symbols.
The darker side of Aztec rule is seen in the enforced human labor
exacted to supply the tributes in kind, and in the revolting system
of organized cannibalism, the outgrowth of their elaborate ritual.
Some of the neighboring tribes successfully resisted both these types
of oppression, while those who were too weak to do so depended on the
mysteriously predicted deliverance from their yoke. In any case, the
way for a rapid conquest had been well prepared.
II THE CAREER OF CORTEZ