Chapter V (1)

VOYAGE ALONG THE COAST--DOÑA MARINA--SPANIARDS LAND IN
MEXICO--INTERVIEW WITH THE AZTECS

1519

The fleet held its course so near the shore that the inhabitants could be seen on it; and, as it swept along the winding borders of the Gulf, the soldiers, who had been on the former expedition with Grijalva, pointed out to their companions the memorable places on the coast. Here was the _Rio de Alvarado_, named after the gallant adventurer, who was present also in this expedition; there the _Rio de Vanderas_, in which Grijalva had carried on so lucrative a commerce with the Mexicans; and there the _Isla de los Sacrificios_, where the Spaniards first saw the vestiges of human sacrifice on the coast. Puertocarrero, as he listened to these reminiscences of the sailors, repeated the words of the old ballad of Montesinos, “Here is France, there is Paris, and there the waters of the Duero,”[557] etc. “But I advise you,” he added, turning to Cortés, “to look out only for the rich lands, and the best way to govern them.” “Fear not,” replied his commander: “if Fortune but favors me as she did Orlando, and I have such gallant gentlemen as you for my companions, I shall understand myself very well.”[558]

The fleet had now arrived off San Juan de Ulua, the island so named by Grijalva. The weather was temperate and serene, and crowds of natives were gathered on the shore of the main land, gazing at the strange phenomenon, as the vessels glided along under easy sail on the smooth bosom of the waters. It was the evening of Thursday in Passion Week. The air came pleasantly off the shore, and Cortés, liking the spot, thought he might safely anchor under the lee of the island, which would shelter him from the _nortes_ that sweep over these seas with fatal violence in the winter, sometimes even late in the spring.

The ships had not been long at anchor, when a light pirogue, filled with natives, shot off from the neighboring continent, and steered for the general’s vessel, distinguished by the royal ensign of Castile floating from the mast. The Indians came on board with a frank confidence, inspired by the accounts of the Spaniards spread by their countrymen who had traded with Grijalva. They brought presents of fruits and flowers and little ornaments of gold, which they gladly exchanged for the usual trinkets. Cortés was baffled in his attempts to hold a conversation with his visitors by means of the interpreter, Aguilar, who was ignorant of the language; the Mayan dialects, with which he was conversant, bearing too little resemblance to the Aztec. The natives supplied the deficiency, as far as possible, by the uncommon vivacity and significance of their gestures,--the hieroglyphics of speech; but the Spanish commander saw with chagrin the embarrassments he must encounter in future for want of a more perfect medium of communication.[559] In this dilemma, he was informed that one of the female slaves given to him by the Tabascan chiefs was a native Mexican, and understood the language. Her name--that given to her by the Spaniards--was Marina; and, as she was to exercise a most important influence on their fortunes, it is necessary to acquaint the reader with something of her character and history.

She was born at Painalla, in the province of Coatzacualco, on the southeastern borders of the Mexican empire. Her father, a rich and powerful cacique, died when she was very young. Her mother married again, and, having a son, she conceived the infamous idea of securing to this offspring of her second union Marina’s rightful inheritance. She accordingly feigned that the latter was dead, but secretly delivered her into the hands of some itinerant traders of Xicallanco. She availed herself, at the same time, of the death of a child of one of her slaves, to substitute the corpse for that of her own daughter, and celebrated the obsequies with mock solemnity. These particulars are related by the honest old soldier Bernal Diaz, who knew the mother, and witnessed the generous treatment of her afterwards by Marina. By the merchants the Indian maiden was again sold to the cacique of Tabasco, who delivered her, as we have seen, to the Spaniards.

From the place of her birth, she was well acquainted with the Mexican tongue, which, indeed, she is said to have spoken with great elegance. Her residence in Tabasco familiarized her with the dialects of that country, so that she could carry on a conversation with Aguilar, which he in turn rendered into the Castilian. Thus a certain though somewhat circuitous channel was opened to Cortés for communicating with the Aztecs; a circumstance of the last importance to the success of his enterprise. It was not very long, however, before Marina, who had a lively genius, made herself so far mistress of the Castilian as to supersede the necessity of any other linguist. She learned it the more readily, as it was to her the language of love.

Cortés, who appreciated the value of her services from the first, made her his interpreter, then his secretary, and, won by her charms, his mistress. She had a son by him, Don Martin Cortés, _comendador_ of the Military Order of St. James, less distinguished by his birth than his unmerited persecutions.

Marina was at this time in the morning of life. She is said to have possessed uncommon personal attractions,[560] and her open, expressive features indicated her generous temper. She always remained faithful to the countrymen of her adoption; and her knowledge of the language and customs of the Mexicans, and often of their designs, enabled her to extricate the Spaniards, more than once, from the most embarrassing and perilous situations. She had her errors, as we have seen. But they should be rather charged to the defects of early education, and to the evil influence of him to whom in the darkness of her spirit she looked with simple confidence for the light to guide her. All agree that she was full of excellent qualities, and the important services which she rendered the Spaniards have made her memory deservedly dear to them; while the name of Malinche[561]--the name by which she is still known in Mexico--was pronounced with kindness by the conquered races, with whose misfortunes she showed an invariable sympathy.[562]

With the aid of his two intelligent interpreters, Cortés entered into conversation with his Indian visitors. He learned that they were Mexicans, or rather subjects of the great Mexican empire, of which their own province formed one of the comparatively recent conquests. The country was ruled by a powerful monarch, called Moctheuzoma, or by Europeans more commonly Montezuma,[563] who dwelt on the mountain plains of the interior, nearly seventy leagues from the coast; their own province was governed by one of his nobles, named Teuhtlile, whose residence was eight leagues distant. Cortés acquainted them in turn with his own friendly views in visiting their country, and with his desire of an interview with the Aztec governor. He then dismissed them loaded with presents, having first ascertained that there was abundance of gold in the interior, like the specimens they had brought.

Cortés, pleased with the manners of the people and the goodly reports of the land, resolved to take up his quarters here for the present. The next morning, April twenty-first, being Good Friday, he landed, with all his force, on the very spot where now stands the modern city of Vera Cruz. Little did the Conqueror imagine that the desolate beach on which he first planted his foot was one day to be covered by a flourishing city, the great mart of European and Oriental trade, the commercial capital of New Spain.[564]

It was a wide and level plain, except where the sand had been drifted into hillocks by the perpetual blowing of the _norte_. On these sand-hills he mounted his little battery of guns, so as to give him the command of the country. He then employed the troops in cutting down small trees and bushes which grew near, in order to provide a shelter from the weather. In this he was aided by the people of the country, sent, as it appeared, by the governor of the district to assist the Spaniards. With their help stakes were firmly set in the earth, and covered with boughs, and with mats and cotton carpets, which the friendly natives brought with them. In this way they secured, in a couple of days, a good defence against the scorching rays of the sun, which beat with intolerable fierceness on the sands. The place was surrounded by stagnant marshes, the exhalations from which, quickened by the heat into the pestilent malaria, have occasioned in later times wider mortality to Europeans than all the hurricanes on the coast. The bilious disorders, now the terrible scourge of the _tierra caliente_, were little known before the Conquest. The seeds of the poison seem to have been scattered by the hand of civilization; for it is only necessary to settle a town, and draw together a busy European population, in order to call out the malignity of the venom which had before lurked innoxious in the atmosphere.[565]

While these arrangements were in progress, the natives flocked in from the adjacent district, which was tolerably populous in the interior, drawn by a natural curiosity to see the wonderful strangers. They brought with them fruits, vegetables, flowers in abundance, game, and many dishes cooked after the fashion of the country, with little articles of gold and other ornaments. They gave away some as presents, and bartered others for the wares of the Spaniards; so that the camp, crowded with a motley throng of every age and sex, wore the appearance of a fair. From some of the visitors Cortés learned the intention of the governor to wait on him the following day.

This was Easter. Teuhtlile arrived, as he had announced, before noon. He was attended by a numerous train, and was met by Cortés, who conducted him with much ceremony to his tent, where his principal officers were assembled. The Aztec chief returned their salutations with polite though formal courtesy. Mass was first said by Father Olmedo, and the service was listened to by Teuhtlile and his attendants with decent reverence. A collation was afterwards served, at which the general entertained his guest with Spanish wines and confections. The interpreters were then introduced, and a conversation commenced between the parties.

The first inquiries of Teuhtlile were respecting the country of the strangers and the purport of their visit. Cortés told him that “he was the subject of a potent monarch beyond the seas, who ruled over an immense empire, and had kings and princes for his vassals; that, acquainted with the greatness of the Mexican emperor, his master had desired to enter into a communication with him, and had sent him as his envoy to wait on Montezuma with a present in token of his good will, and a message which he must deliver in person.” He concluded by inquiring of Teuhtlile when he could be admitted to his sovereign’s presence.

To this the Aztec noble somewhat haughtily replied, “How is it that you have been here only two days, and demand to see the emperor?” He then added, with more courtesy, that “he was surprised to learn there was another monarch as powerful as Montezuma, but that, if it were so, he had no doubt his master would be happy to communicate with him. He would send his couriers with the royal gift brought by the Spanish commander, and, so soon as he had learned Montezuma’s will, would communicate it.”

Teuhtlile then commanded his slaves to bring forward the present intended for the Spanish general. It consisted of ten loads of fine cottons, several mantles of that curious feather-work whose rich and delicate dyes might vie with the most beautiful painting, and a wicker basket filled with ornaments of wrought gold, all calculated to inspire the Spaniards with high ideas of the wealth and mechanical ingenuity of the Mexicans.

Cortés received these presents with suitable acknowledgments, and ordered his own attendants to lay before the chief the articles designed for Montezuma. These were an arm-chair richly carved and painted, a crimson cap of cloth, having a gold medal emblazoned with St. George and the dragon, and a quantity of collars, bracelets, and other ornaments of cut glass, which, in a country where glass was not to be had, might claim to have the value of real gems, and no doubt passed for such with the inexperienced Mexican. Teuhtlile observed a soldier in the camp with a shining gilt helmet on his head, which he said reminded him of one worn by the god Quetzalcoatl in Mexico; and he showed a desire that Montezuma should see it. The coming of the Spaniards, as the reader will soon see, was associated with some traditions of this same deity. Cortés expressed his willingness that the casque should be sent to the emperor, intimating a hope that it would be returned filled with the gold dust of the country, that he might be able to compare its quality with that in his own! He further told the governor, as we are informed by his chaplain, “that the Spaniards were troubled with a disease of the heart, for which gold was a specific remedy”![566] “In short,” says Las Casas, “he contrived to make his want of gold very clear to the governor.”[567]

While these things were passing, Cortés observed one of Teuhtlile’s attendants busy with a pencil, apparently delineating some object. On looking at his work, he found that it was a sketch on canvas of the Spaniards, their costumes, arms, and, in short, different objects of interest, giving to each its appropriate form and color. This was the celebrated picture-writing of the Aztecs, and, as Teuhtlile informed him, this man was employed in portraying the various objects for the eye of Montezuma, who would thus gather a more vivid notion of their appearance than from any description by words. Cortés was pleased with the idea; and, as he knew how much the effect would be heightened by converting still life into action, he ordered out the cavalry on the beach, the wet sands of which afforded a firm footing for the horses. The bold and rapid movements of the troops, as they went through their military exercises; the apparent ease with which they managed the fiery animals on which they were mounted; the glancing of their weapons, and the shrill cry of the trumpet, all filled the spectators with astonishment; but when they heard the thunders of the cannon, which Cortés ordered to be fired at the same time, and witnessed the volumes of smoke and flame issuing from these terrible engines, and the rushing sound of the balls, as they dashed through the trees of the neighboring forest, shivering their branches into fragments, they were filled with consternation, from which the Aztec chief himself was not wholly free.

Nothing of all this was lost on the painters, who faithfully recorded, after their fashion, every particular; not omitting the ships,--“the water-houses,” as they called them, of the strangers,--which, with their dark hulls and snow-white sails reflected from the water, were swinging lazily at anchor on the calm bosom of the bay. All was depicted with a fidelity that excited in their turn the admiration of the Spaniards, who, doubtless, unprepared for this exhibition of skill, greatly overestimated the merits of the execution.[568]

These various matters completed, Teuhtlile with his attendants withdrew from the Spanish quarters, with the same ceremony with which he had entered them; leaving orders that his people should supply the troops with provisions and other articles requisite for their accommodation, till further instructions from the capital.[569]

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Lewis H. Morgan, Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines, p. 222.

[2] See vol. i. chap, iv., and, for Ximenes, Prescott’s “Ferdinand and Isabella,” part ii. chap. vi.

[3] In this edition placed immediately after the Introduction.

[4] Extensive indeed, if we may trust Archbishop Lorenzana, who tells us, “It is doubtful if the country of new Spain does not border on Tartary and Greenland;--by the way of California, on the former, and by New Mexico, on the latter”! Historia de Nueva-España (México, 1770), p. 38, nota.{*}

{*}[The limits fixed by historical writers to the territories of the Aztec Confederacy vary startlingly. Prescott’s estimate is too large. Lewis H. Morgan (Houses and House Life of the American Aborigines, p. 223) considers its land area to have been about that of Rhode Island--the smallest State in the American Union--_i.e._, about 1250 square miles. Medio tutissimus ibis. The term Empire is misleading. The states of Querétaro, Guanajuato, Michoacán, Guerrero, and much of La Puebla, in modern Mexico, almost surround the so-called Empire of Montezuma. Possibly the tributary pueblos may have covered an area equal to that of the State of Massachusetts.--M.]

[5] I have conformed to the limits fixed by Clavigero. He has, probably, examined the subject with more thoroughness and fidelity than most of his countrymen, who differ from him, and who assign a more liberal extent to the monarchy. (See his Storia antica del Messico (Cesena, 1780), dissert. 7.) The abbé, however, has not informed his readers on what frail foundations his conclusions rest. The extent of the Aztec empire is to be gathered from the writings of historians since the arrival of the Spaniards, and from the picture-rolls of tribute paid by the conquered cities; both sources extremely vague and defective. See the MSS. of the Mendoza collection, in Lord Kingsborough’s magnificent publication (Antiquities of Mexico, comprising Facsimiles of Ancient Paintings and Hieroglyphics, together with the Monuments of New Spain. London, 1830). The difficulty of the inquiry is much increased by the fact of the conquests having been made, as will be seen hereafter, by the united arms of three powers, so that it is not always easy to tell to which party they eventually belonged. The affair is involved in so much uncertainty that Clavigero, notwithstanding the positive assertions in his text, has not ventured, in his map, to define the precise limits of the empire, either towards the north, where it mingles with the Tezcucan empire, or towards the south, where, indeed, he has fallen into the egregious blunder of asserting that, while the Mexican territory reached to the fourteenth degree, it did not include any portion of Guatemala. (See tom. i. p. 29, and tom. iv. dissert. 7.) The Tezcucan chronicler Ixtlilxochitl puts in a sturdy claim for the paramount empire of his own nation. Historia Chichimeca, MS., cap. 39, 53, et alibi.

[6] Eighteen to twenty thousand, according to Humboldt, who considers the Mexican territory to have been the same with that occupied by the modern intendancies of Mexico, Puebla, Vera Cruz, Oaxaca, and Valladolid. (Essai politique sur le Royaume de Nouvelle-Espagne (Paris, 1825), tom. i. p. 196.) This last, however, was all, or nearly all, included in the rival kingdom of Michoacán, as he himself more correctly states in another part of his work. Comp. tom. ii. p. 164.

[7] [Immediate decay follows death. All traces of a buried corpse vanish in three or four years.--M.]

[8] The traveller who enters the country across the dreary sand-hills of Vera Cruz will hardly recognize the truth of the above description. He must look for it in other parts of the _tierra caliente_. Of recent tourists, no one has given a more gorgeous picture of the impressions made on his senses by these sunny regions than Latrobe, who came on shore at Tampico (Rambler in Mexico (New York, 1836), chap. 1),--a traveller, it may be added, whose descriptions of man and nature in our own country, where we can judge, are distinguished by a sobriety and fairness that entitle him to confidence in his delineation of other countries.

[9] This long extent of country varies in elevation from 5570 to 8856 feet,--equal to the height of the passes of Mount Cenis or the Great St. Bernard. The table-land stretches still three hundred leagues farther, before it declines to a level of 2624 feet. Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. i. pp. 157, 255.{*}

{*}[“The Continental range of Humboldt does not exist. The Andean system ends in northern Colombia. The Rocky Mountain system ends in the plateau south of the City of Mexico. The system between lies across the trend of the other two systems and differs from them in origin. It belongs to the same chain which crops up in the Antilles, i.e., to the system appearing in Martinique and Santa Lucia.”--Robert T. Hill, of U. S. Geological Survey, in Century Magazine, July, 1902.--M.]

[10] About 62° Fahrenheit, or 17° Réaumur. (Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. i. p. 273.) The more elevated plateaus of the table-land, as the Valley of Toluca, about 8500 feet above the sea, have a stern climate, in which the thermometer, during a great part of the day, rarely rises beyond 45° F. Idem (loc. cit.), and Malte-Brun (Universal Geography, Eng. trans., book 83), who is, indeed, in this part of his work, but an echo of the former writer.

[11] The elevation of the Castiles, according to the authority repeatedly cited, is about 350 toises, or 2100 feet above the ocean. (Humboldt’s Dissertation, apud Laborde, Itinéraire descriptif de l’Espagne (Paris, 1827), tom. i. p. 5.) It is rare to find plains in Europe of so great a height.

[12] Archbishop Lorenzana estimates the circuit of the Valley at ninety leagues, correcting at the same time the statement of Cortés, which puts it at seventy, very near the truth, as appears from the result of M. de Humboldt’s measurement, cited in the text. Its length is about eighteen leagues, by twelve and a half in breadth. (Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. ii. p. 29.--Lorenzana, Hist. de Nueva-España, p. 101.) Humboldt’s map of the Valley of Mexico forms the third in his “Atlas géographique et physique,” and, like all the others in the collection, will be found of inestimable value to the traveller, the geologist, and the historian.

[13] Humboldt, Essai politique, tom. ii. pp. 29, 44-49.--Malte-Brun, book 85. This latter geographer assigns only 6700 feet for the level of the Valley, contradicting himself (comp. book 83), or rather Humboldt, to whose pages he helps himself _plenis manibus_, somewhat too liberally, indeed, for the scanty references at the bottom of his page.

[14] Torquemada accounts in part for this diminution by supposing that, as God permitted the waters, which once covered the whole earth, to subside after mankind had been nearly exterminated for their iniquities, so he allowed the waters of the Mexican lake to subside, in token of good will and reconciliation, after the idolatrous races of the land had been destroyed by the Spaniards! (Monarchía Indiana (Madrid, 1723), tom. i. p. 309.) Quite as probable, if not as orthodox, an explanation, may be found in the active evaporation of these upper regions, and in the fact of an immense drain having been constructed, during the lifetime of the good father, to reduce the waters of the principal lake and protect the capital from inundation.

[15] [It is perhaps to be regretted that, instead of a meagre notice of the Toltecs with a passing allusion to earlier races, the author did not give a separate chapter to the history of the country during the ages preceding the Conquest. That history, it is true, resting on tradition or on questionable records mingled with legendary and mythological relations, is full of obscurity and doubt. But whatever its uncertainty in regard to details, it presents a mass of general facts supported by analogy and by the stronger evidence of language and of the existing relics of the past. The number and diversity of the architectural and other remains found on the soil of Mexico and the adjacent regions, and the immense variety of the spoken languages, with the vestiges of others that have passed out of use,--all perhaps derived originally from a common stock, but exhibiting different stages of development or decay, and capable of being classified into several distinct families,--point to conclusions that render the subject one of the most attractive fields for critical investigation. These concurrent testimonies leave no doubt that, like portions of the Old World similarly favored in regard to climate, soil, and situation, the central regions of America were occupied from a very remote period by nations which made distinct advances in civilization, and passed through a cycle of revolutions comparable to that of which the Valley of the Euphrates and other parts of Asia were anciently the scene. The useful arts were known and practised, wealth was accumulated, social systems exhibiting a certain refinement and a peculiar complexity were organized, states were established which flourished, decayed,--either from the effects of isolation or an inherent incapacity for continuance,--and were finally overthrown by invaders, by whom the experiment was repeated, though not always with equal success. Some of these nations passed away, leaving no trace but their names; others, whose very names are unknown, left mysterious monuments imbedded in the soil or records that are undecipherable. Of those that still remain, comprising about a dozen distinct races speaking a hundred and twenty different dialects, we have the traditions preserved either in their own records or in those of the Spanish discoverers. The task of constructing out of these materials a history shorn of the adornments of mythology and fable has been attempted by the Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg (Histoire des Nations civilisées du Mexique et de l’Amérique-Centrale, durant les Siècles antérieurs à Christophe Colomb, 4 vols., Paris, 1857-59), and, whatever may be thought of the method he has pursued, his research is unquestionable, and his views--very different from those which he has since put forth--merit attention. A more practical effort has been made by Don Manuel Orozco y Berra to trace the order, diffusion, and relations of the various races by the differences, the intermixtures, and the geographical limits of their languages. (Geografía de las Lenguas y Carta etnográfica de México, precedidas de un Ensayo de Clasificacion de las mismas Lenguas y de Apuntes para las Inmigraciones de las Tribus, México, 1864.)--K.]

[16] [The uncertainty is not diminished by our being told that Tollan, Tullan, Tulan, or Tula (called also Tlapallan and Huehuetlapallan) was the original seat of this people, since we are still left in doubt whether the country so designated--like Aztlan, the supposed point of departure of the Aztecs--is to be located in New Mexico, California, the northwestern extremity of America, or in Asia. M. Brasseur de Bourbourg (whose later speculations, in which the name plays a conspicuous part, will be noticed more appropriately in the Appendix) found in the Quiché manuscripts mention of four Tollans, one of them “in the east, on the other side of the sea.” “But,” he adds, “in what part of the world is it to be placed? _C’est là encore une question bien difficile à résoudre._” (Hist. des Nations civilisées du Mexique, tom. i. pp. 167, 168.) Nor will the etymology much help us. According to Buschmann, _Tollan_ is derived from _tolin_, reed, and signifies “place of reeds,”--“Ort der Binsen, Platz mit Binsen gewachsen, _juncetum_.” (Über die aztekischen Ortsnamen, S. 682.) He refers, however, to a different derivation, suggested by a writer who has made it the basis of one of those extraordinary theories which are propounded from time to time, to account for the first diffusion of the human race, and more particularly for the original settlement of America. According to this theory, the cradle of mankind was the Himalayan Mountains. “But the collective name of these lofty regions was very anciently designated by appellations the roots of which were _Tal_, _Tol_, _Tul_, meaning tall, high, ... as it does yet in many languages, the English, Chinese, and Arabic for instance. Such were _Tolo_, _Thala_, _Talaha_, _Tulan_, etc., in the old Sanscrit and primitive languages of Asia. Whence came the Asiatic _Atlas_ and also the _Atlantes_ of the Greeks, who, spreading through the world westerly, gave these names to many other places and notions.... The Talas or Atlantes occupied or conquered Europe and Africa, nay, went to America in very early times.... In Greece they became _Atalantes_, _Talautians_ of Epirus, _Aetolians_.... They gave name to Italy, _Aitala_ meaning land eminent, ... to the Atlantic Ocean, and to the great Atlantis, or America, called in the Hindu books _Atala_ or _Tala-tolo_, the fourth world, where dwelt giants or powerful men.... America is also filled with their names and deeds from Mexico and Carolina to Peru: the _Tol-tecas_, people of Tol, and Aztlan, _Otolum_ near Palenque, many towns of _Tula_ and _Tolu_; the _Talas_ of Michuacan, the _Matalans_, _Atalans_, _Tulukis_, etc., of North America.” (C. S. Rafinesque, Atlantic Journal, Philadelphia, 1832-33.) It need hardly be added that Tula has also been identified with the equally unknown and long-sought-for _ultima_ _Thule_, with the simplifying effect of bringing two streams of inquiry into one channel. Meanwhile, by a different kind of criticism, the whole question is dissipated into thin air, _Tollan_ and _Aztlan_ being resolved into names of mere mythical import, and the regions thus designated transferred from the earth to the bright domain of the sky, from which the descriptions in the legends appear to have been borrowed. See Brinton, Myths of the New World, pp. 88, 89.--K.]

[17] Anahuac, according to Humboldt, comprehended only the country between the fourteenth and twenty-first degrees of north latiude. (Essai politique, tom. i. p. 197.) According to Clavigero, it included nearly all since known as New Spain. (Stor. del Messico, tom. i. p. 27.) Veytia uses it, also, as synonymous with New Spain. (Historia antigua de Méjico (Méjico, 1836), tom. i. cap. 12.) The first of these writers probably allows too little, as the latter do too much, for its boundaries. Ixtlilxochitl says it extended four hundred leagues south of the Otomi country. (Hist. Chichimeca, MS., cap. 73.) The word Anahuac signifies _near the water_. It was, probably, first applied to the country around the lakes in the Mexican Valley, and gradually extended to the remoter regions occupied by the Aztecs and the other semi-civilized races. Or possibly the name may have been intended, as Veytia suggests (Hist. antig., lib. 1, cap. 1), to denote the land between the waters of the Atlantic and Pacific.{*}

{*} [This suggestion of Veytia is unworthy of attention,--refuted by the actual application and appropriateness of the name, and by the state of geographical knowledge and ideas at the period when it must have originated. A modern traveller, describing the appearance of the great plains as seen from the summit of Popocatepetl, remarks, “Even now that the lakes have shrunk to a fraction of their former size, we could see the fitness of the name given in old times to the Valley of Mexico, _Anahuac_, that is, By the water-side.” Tylor, Anahuac; or Mexico and the Mexicans, Ancient and Modern (London, 1861), p. 270.--K.]

[18] Clavigero talks of Boturini’s having written “on the faith of the Toltec historians.” (Stor. del Messico, tom. i. p. 128.) But that scholar does not pretend to have ever met with a Toltec manuscript himself, and had heard of only one in the possession of Ixtlilxochitl. (See his Idea de una nueva Historia general de la América Septentrional (Madrid, 1746), p. 110.) The latter writer tells us that his account of the Toltec and Chichimec races was “derived from interpretation” (probably of the Tezcucan paintings), “and from the traditions of old men;” poor authority for events which had passed centuries before. Indeed, he acknowledges that their narratives were so full of absurdity and falsehood that he was obliged to reject nine-tenths of them. (See his Relaciones, MS., no. 5.) The cause of truth would not have suffered much, probably, if he had rejected nine-tenths of the remainder.{*}

{*} [Ixtlilxochitl’s language does not necessarily imply that he considered any of the relations he had received as false or absurd, nor does he say that he had rejected nine-tenths of them. What he has written is, he asserts, “the true history of the Toltecs,” though it does not amount to nine-tenths of the whole (“de lo que ello fué”), _i.e._, of what had been contained in the original records; these records having perished, and he himself having abridged the accounts he had been able to obtain of their contents, as well for the sake of brevity as because of the marvellous character of the relations (“son tan estrañas las cosas y tan peregrinas y nunca oidas”). The sources of his information are also incorrectly described; but a further mention of them will be found in a note at the end of this Book.--K.]

[19] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 2.--Idem, Relaciones, MS., no. 2.--Sahagun, Historia general de las Cosas de Nueva-España (México, 1829), lib. 10, cap. 29.--Veytia, Hist. antig., lib. 1, cap. 27.

[20] Sahagun, Hist. de Nueva-España, lib. 10, cap. 29.

[21] Sahagun, ubi supra.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., lib. 1, cap. 14.

[22] Description de l’Égypte (Paris, 1890), Antiquités, tom. i. cap. 1. Veytia has traced the migrations of the Toltecs with sufficient industry, scarcely rewarded by the necessarily doubtful credit of the results. Hist. antig., lib. 2, cap. 21-33.

[23] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 73.

[24] Veytia, Hist. antig., lib. 1, cap. 33.--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap 3.--Idem, Relaciones, MS., nos. 4, 5.--Father Torquemada--perhaps misinterpreting the Tezcucan hieroglyphics--has accounted for this mysterious disappearance of the Toltecs by such _fee-faw-fum_ stories of giants and demons as show his appetite for the marvellous was fully equal to that of any of his calling. See his Monarch. Ind., lib. 1, cap. 14.

[25] [This supposition, neither adopted nor rejected in the text, was, as Mr. Tylor remarks, “quite tenable at the time that Prescott wrote,” being founded on the statements of early writers and partially supported by the conclusions of Mr. Stephens, who believed that the ruined cities of Oaxaca, Chiapas, Yucatan, and Guatemala dated from a comparatively recent period, and were still flourishing at the time of the Spanish Conquest; and that their inhabitants, the ancestors, as he contends, of the degenerate race that now occupies the soil, were of the same stock and spoke the same language as the Mexicans. (Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas, and Yucatan.) But these opinions have been refuted by later investigators. Orozco y Berra, in an elaborate and satisfactory examination of the question, discusses all the evidence relating to it, compares the remains in the southern provinces with those of the Valley of Mexico, points out the essential differences in the architecture, sculpture, and inscriptions, and arrives at the conclusion that there was “no point of contact or resemblance” between the two civilizations. He considers that of the southern provinces, though of a far higher grade, as long anterior in time to the Toltec domination,--the work of a people which had passed away, under the assaults of barbarism, at a period prior to all traditions, leaving no name and no trace of their existence save those monuments which, neglected and forgotten by their successors, have become the riddle of later generations.{*} Geografía de las Lenguas de México, pp. 122-131. See also Tylor, Anahuac, p. 189, et seq.--K.

{*} [Charnay (Ancient Cities of the New World) holds that both Mitla and Palenque are of Toltec origin. He has no doubt whatsoever concerning Palenque. This he thinks was a Holy City whose inhabitants dispersed at the first alarm of the Conquest (p. 245). (See, further, p. 246.) Dr. Brinton holds that Father Duran, Historia de las Indias de Nueva España, Tezozomoc, Croníca Mexicana, and the Codex Ramirez identify the Toltecs with the Aztecs. As John Fiske puts it, “it is well to beware, however, about meddling much with these Toltecs.” Mr. Fiske urges like caution concerning the Chichimecs. Bandelier (Archæological Tour, p. 192) points out that Ixtlilxochitl, the historian of the Chichimecs, “wrote for an interested object, and with a view of sustaining tribal claims in the eyes of the Spanish government.”--M.]

[26] _Tezcuco_ signifies “place of detention;” as several of the tribes who successively occupied Anahuac were said to have halted some time at the spot. Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 10.{*}

{*} [“Über die Etymologie lässt sich nichts sicheres sagen,” says Buschmann, “so zuversichtlich auch Prescott, wohl nach Ixtlilxochitl, den Namen durch _place of detention_ übersetzt.” Uber die aztekischen Ortsnamen, S. 697.--K.]

[27] [It is difficult to reconcile the two statements that the Toltecs “were the true fountains of the civilization which distinguished this part of the continent in later times,” and that they “disappeared from the land as silently and mysteriously as they had entered it,” leaving an interval of more than a century before the appearance of the Aztecs and the Acolhuans. If the latter received from the former the knowledge of those arts in which they speedily rivalled them, it must have been by more direct communication and transmission than can be inferred from the mention of a small fraction of the Toltec population as remaining in the country,--a fact which has itself the appearance of having been invented to meet the difficulty. Orozco y Berra compares this transitional period with that which followed the overthrow of the Roman Empire; but if in the former case there was, in his own words, “no conquest, but only an occupation, no war because no one to contend with,” the analogy altogether fails. Brasseur de Bourbourg reduces the interval between the departure of the Toltecs and the arrival of the Chichimecs to a few years, and supposes that a considerable number of the former inhabitants remained scattered through the Valley. If, however, it be allowable to substitute probabilities for doubtful relations, it is an easier solution to believe that no interval occurred and that no emigration took place.--K.]

[28] The historian speaks, in one page, of the Chichimecs burrowing in caves, or, at best, in cabins of straw, and, in the next, talks gravely of their _señoras_, _infantas_, and _caballeros_!{*} Ibid., cap. 9, et seq.--Veytia, Hist. antig., lib. 2, cap. 1-10.--Camargo, Historia de Tlascala, MS.

[29] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 9-20.--Veytia, Hist. antig., lib. 2, cap. 29-54.

[30] [Some recent writers have contended that Mexico must have been peopled originally by migrations from the South. Aztec names and communities, and traces of Toltec settlements long anterior to the occupation of Anahuac by the same people, are found in several parts of Central America. The most primitive traditions, as well as the remains of the earliest civilization, belong also to the same quarter. This latter fact, however, is considered by Orozco y Berra as itself an evidence of the migrations having been from the North, the first comers having been naturally attracted southward by a warmer climate and more fertile soil, or pushed onward in this direction by successive invasions from behind. Contradictory inferences have in like manner been drawn from the existence of Aztec remains and settlements in New Mexico and Arizona. All that can be said with confidence is that neither of the opposing theories rests on a secure and sufficient basis.--K.]

[31] These were the Colhuans, not Acolhuans, with whom Humboldt, and most writers since, have confounded them.{*} See his Essai politique, tom. i. p. 414; ii. p. 37.

{*} [Humboldt, strictly speaking, has not confounded the Colhuans with the Acolhuans, but has written, in the places cited, the latter name for the former. “Letzterer Name,” says Buschmann, “ist der erstere mit dem Zusatz von _atl_ Wasser,--Wasser Colhuer.” (Uber die aztekischen Ortsnamen, S. 690.) Yet the two tribes, according to the same authority, were entirely distinct, one alone--though which, he is unable to determine--being of the Nahuatlac race. Orozco y Berra, however, makes them both of this stock, the Acolhuans being one of the main branches, the Colhuans merely the descendants of the Toltec remnant in Anahuac.--K.]

[32] [This is not quite correct, since the form used in the letters of Cortés and other early documents is _Temixtitan_, which is explained as a corruption of Tenochtitlan. The letters _x_ and _ch_ are convertible, and have the same sound,--that of the English _sh_. _Mexico_ is _Mexitl_ with the place-designation _co_, _tl_ final being dropped before an affix.--K.]

[33] Clavigero gives good reasons for preferring the etymology of Mexico above noticed, to various others. (See his Stor. del Messico, tom. i. p. 168, nota.) The name _Tenochtitlan_ signifies _tunal_ (a cactus) _on a stone_. Esplicacion de la Col. de Mendoza, apud Antiq. of Mexico, vol. iv.

[34] “Datur hæc venia antiquitati,” says Livy, “ut, miscendo humana divinis, primordia urbium augustiora faciat.” Hist. Præf.--See, for the above paragraph, Col. de Mendoza, plate 1, apud Antiq. of Mexico, vol. i.,--Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 10,--Toribio, Historia de los Indios, MS., Parte 3, cap. 8,--Veytia, Hist. antig., lib. 2, cap. 15.--Clavigero, after a laborious examination, assigns the following dates to some of the prominent events noticed in the text. No two authorities agree on them; and this is not strange, considering that Clavigero--the most inquisitive of all--does not always agree with himself. (Compare his dates for the coming of the Acolhuans, tom. i. p. 147, and tom. iv., dissert. 2:)--

A. D.

The Toltecs arrived in Anahuac 648 They abandoned the country 1051 The Chichimecs arrived 1170 The Acolhuans arrived about 1200 The Mexicans reached Tula 1196 They founded Mexico 1325

See his dissert. 2, sec. 12. In the last date, the one of most importance, he is confirmed by the learned Veytia, who differs from him in all the others. Hist. antig., lib. 2, cap. 15.

[35] [In a somewhat similar way was founded the Italian Venice. It was the fear of death at the hands of Attila and his Huns that caused the peopling of the islands among the lagoons of the Adriatic. It was the easy subsistence the lagoons afforded that caused the steady growth of the Italian village.--M.]

[36] [This confederacy occupied one of the strongest defensive positions ever held by Indians. It gradually extended its sway over a large part of the Mexican territory. This “sway,” however, as Fiske points out, was not a military occupation of the country. It was a “system of plunder enforced by terror.”--M.]

[37] The loyal Tezcucan chronicler claims the supreme dignity for his own sovereign, if not the greatest share of the spoil, by this imperial compact. (Hist. Chich., cap. 32.) Torquemada, on the other hand, claims one-half of all the conquered lands for Mexico. (Monarch. Ind., lib. 2, cap. 40.) All agree in assigning only one-fifth to Tlacopan; and Veytia (Hist. antig., lib. 3, cap. 3) and Zurita (Rapport sur les différentes Classes de Chefs de la Nouvelle-Espagne, trad. de Ternaux (Paris, 1840), p. 11), both very competent critics, acquiesce in an equal division between the two principal states in the confederacy. An ode, still extant, of Nezahualcoyotl, in its Castilian version, bears testimony to the singular union of the three powers:

“solo se acordarán en las Naciones
lo bien que gobernáron
las _tres Cabezas_ que el Imperio honráron.”
Cantares del Emperador

[38] See the plans of the ancient and modern capital, in Bullock’s “Mexico,” first edition. The original of the ancient map was obtained by that traveller from the collection of the unfortunate Boturini; if, as seems probable, it is the one indicated on page 13 of his Catalogue, I find no warrant for Mr. Bullock’s statement that it was the one prepared for Cortés by the order of Montezuma.

[39] [The first man chosen to be the chief of men (tlacatecuhtli), or superior officer of the confederacy, was Acamapichtli. His election took place in 1375, and he is sometimes called by European writers the “founder of the confederacy.” His name, translated, was “Handful of Reeds.” The succession of “chiefs of men” was as follows:

1. Acamapichtli (Handful of Reeds) 1375 2. Huitzilihuitl (Humming Bird) 1403 3. Chimalpopoca (Smoking Shield) 1414 4. Izcoatzin (Obsidian Snake) 1427 5. Montezuma I (Angry Chief) 1436 6. Axayacatl (Face in the Water) 1464 7. Tizoc (Wounded Leg) 1477 8. Ahuitzotl (Water Rat) 1486 9. Montezuma II 1502 10. Cuitlahuatzin 1520 11. Guatemotzin 1520

M.]

[40] Clavigero, Stor. del Messico, tom. i. lib. 2.--Torquemada, Monarch. Ind., tom. i. lib. 2.--Boturini, Idea, p. 146.--Col. of Mendoza, Part 1, and Codex Telleriano-Remensis, apud Antiq. of Mexico, vols. i., vi.--Machiavelli has noticed it as one great cause of the military successes of the Romans, “that they associated themselves, in their wars, with other states, as the principal,” and expresses his astonishment that a similar policy should not have been adopted by ambitious republics in later times. (See his Discorsi sopra T. Livio, lib. 2, cap. 4, apud Opere (Geneva, 1798).) This, as we have seen above, was the very course pursued by the Mexicans.

[41] Ixtlilxochitl, Hist. Chich., MS., cap. 36.

[42] [Robertson, in his History of America, was the first man to question the correctness of the judgment passed by the Spanish chroniclers upon the Aztec institutions. Subsequent American writers gave louder expression to his doubts. As has been said in the notes upon the preceding chapter, Mr. Morgan proved conclusively that the so-called “empire” was no empire at all, but only a confederacy of three tribes. Mr. Morgan, however, was sometimes led into inaccuracy and extravagance of statement because of his desire to place all the American aborigines on the same institutional plane.

Adolf Bandelier, pupil and disciple of Morgan, persevering and accurate scholar, investigated the subject in an entirely unprejudiced way and with a thoroughness which forces men to place almost implicit confidence in his conclusions. It is well here to summarize those conclusions.

The Mexican confederacy was made up of three tribes, the Aztecs, the Tezcucans, and the Tlacopans, who dwelt in neighboring pueblos.

Of these tribes the Aztecs and Tezcucans were superior to the Tlacopans. Spoils of war were always divided into five portions. The Tlacopans took one, their allies shared equally the other four parts. The Indian pueblos generally were designed to withstand a protracted siege, but the Mexican pueblos were almost impregnable. It is not likely that any other Indian tribes could have captured them. Dwelling securely in these great communal houses, which were also fortresses, the Aztec confederacy held many other tribes in subjection. It was only necessary for it to send its agents to other pueblos to secure at once the specified tribute. Failure to pay this tribute brought summary punishment at the hands of the warriors of the confederacy. The “empire” was “only a partnership formed for the purpose of carrying on the business of warfare, and that intended, not for the extension of territorial ownership, but only for an increase of the means of subsistence.” The subject peoples were never incorporated into the confederacy. The tribe remained intact. The houses the tribe occupied were common property, and so was the land cultivated. Neither land nor houses could be sold, and as the tribe increased in numbers new communal houses were built to accommodate the increase. The great fortress-dwellings in a, for savages, well-cultivated land prevented the subdivision of tribes which was constantly taking place in wilder North America.

Twenty clans, organized into four phratries, made up of the Aztec tribe. The clans were called “calpullis.” They were governed by a council of chiefs, “tecuhtli,” elected by the clan. There was an official head, the “calpullac,” whose duties were mainly civil, and also a military leader, the “ohcacautin” (“elder brother”). Painful religious ordeals accompanied the initiation of these men into office. Clan officers held their places during good behavior. Medicinemen, or priests, were members of the clan council. To the four phratries into which the clan was divided four quarters of the city of Mexico, each under its own captain, were assigned. Their titles were “man of the house of darts,” “chief of the eagle and cactus,” “blood-shedder,” and “cutter of men.” Of these captains the “chief of the eagle and cactus” was chief executioner. Their principal duty was to maintain order both within and without the pueblo. In each of these four quarters was an armory (“house of darts”), in which the weapons of the phratry were kept when its warriors were not engaged in warfare. The phratry was in Mexico primarily a military organization.

Twenty members, one from each clan, made up the tribal council which exercised supreme control over the Aztec tribe. The member who was chosen to represent the clan was called “tlatoani,” the “speaker,” and the council was called “tlatocan,” the “place of speech.” Sessions of the council were regularly held every ten days, and every eighty days an extra session was convened, to which the twenty “ohcacautins,” the four captains of the phratries, the two civil executives of the tribe, and some others were summoned. Its decisions were final.

As the clan had its civil head, or calpullac, so the tribe had a corresponding officer, the cihuacoatl, or “female snake.” The “snake woman” was always a man. He was chief judge of the clan and was elected for life by the tribal council. The “snake woman” was second in command to the “chief of men,” or tlacatecuhtli, the head war chief. While at first head war chief of the Aztecs, about the year 1430 the tlacatecuhtli was made head war chief and commander of the confederacy. Montezuma was “chief of men,” and the Spaniards saw him surrounded with such state that they not unnaturally supposed him to be king of the Aztecs. Montezuma’s position, however, was not at all that of a king, and most of the royal functions fell to the lot of the “snake woman.” Bandelier thinks the “chief of men” was only the chief military officer. He was elected by the “elder brothers” (ohcacautins) of the clans, the tribal council, and the leading priests, sitting in assembly. A principle of succession seems to have confined the election to members of a special clan. Moreover, from four officers--namely, a member of the priesthood called the “man of the dark house,” and the phratry captains called respectively “man of the house of darts,” “blood-shedder,” and “cutter of men”--the “chief of men” was always chosen. He exercised certain priestly functions after his election. His first official act was to offer incense to the war god Huitzilopochtli.{*} Montezuma was “priest commander” as well as “chief of men.”

{*} [Bancroft, Native Races of the Pacific States, vol. ii. p. 145.]

The “chief of men” held office during good behavior. He was, ex officio, a member of the tribal council, but he had little to do within the tribe limits. His functions were exercised outside the confederacy, and his special duty was to superintend the collection of tribute. His agents, called “crop-gatherers” (calpixqui), were appointed by the tribal council. It was their duty to visit the subject pueblos and to gather the tribute--maize, weapons, pottery, feather-work, female slaves, victims for sacrifice, or anything else which suited the victor’s fancy. The prisoners were forced to carry the other tribute to the tecpan, or tribal house, and were accompanied by couriers who saw that the tribute was duly delivered according to the directions given in picture-writing by the “crop-gatherers.” The office of calpixqui was most dangerous, being practically that of spy. All these institutions the Spanish historians noted without understanding. They supposed that there was a standing army; but every male was born a warrior, and so the people were the army. There was no nobility of any kind in Mexico. Merit alone determined the appointment to office. “No office whatever, no kind of dignity, was among the Mexicans transmissible by inheritance.”

Above the common warriors of the clan were two higher classes, the “distinguished braves” and the war chiefs proper. Among the “distinguished braves” were three classes, arranged according to attainments, none of the braves being elected, but all winning their place by valor. The war chiefs were elected. The “snake woman,” or “female snake,” acted as a check upon the head war chief, or “chief of men.” The two alternately took charge of forays. The elaborate decorations which adorned the “chief of men” in his official capacity may be seen represented in the sculptures at Palenque, especially upon the “tablet of the cross.”

The Aztecs conducted no long campaigns, and were not successful in protracted sieges, while they were always able to make a successful defence against enemies of their own class. Their pyramidal temples--teocalli--were admirable fortresses. In Mexico itself the causeways were essentially military constructions, and not simply roads to connect the city with the mainland. Captives taken in forays were “collared,” that is, they were secured by wooden collars fastened upon their necks. If they were specially unruly, and were continually striving to escape, the tendons of their feet were cut.

As the tribes increased new “calpullis” were formed and new communal houses were built. The Spaniards took it for granted that the tribal government which exercised authority over tribal soil could alienate that soil, but this was not the case. It was not until communal soil was done away with that private ownership was established.

Mr. Bandelier reaches the following conclusions:

1. Abstract ownership either by the state or the individual was unknown.

2. Right of possession was vested in the kin, or clan. The idea of alienation was never entertained.

3. Individuals only held the right to use certain lots.

4. No rights of possession were attached to any office or chieftaincy.

5. For tribal business certain lands were set apart independent of persons.

6. Conquest was followed not by annexation or apportionment, but by tribute.

7. Feudalism could not prevail under these conditions.