The Native Races [of the Pacific states], Volume 5, Primitive History

The writers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries who derived their information from original sources, and on whose works all that has been written subsequently is founded, comprise, 1st, the conquerors themselves, chiefly Cortés, Diaz del Castillo, and the Anonymous Conqueror, whose writings only touch incidentally upon a few points of ancient history. 2d. The first missionaries who were sent from Spain to supplement the achievements of Cortés by spiritual conquests. Such were José de Acosta, Bernardino Sahagun, Bartolomé de Las Casas, Juan de Torquemada, Diego Duran, Gerónimo de Mendieta, Toribio de Benavente (Motolinia), Diego García de Palacio, Didaco Valades, and Alonzo de Zurita. Of these Torquemada is the most complete and comprehensive, so far as aboriginal history is concerned, furnishing an immense mass of material drawn from native sources, very badly arranged and written. Duran also devotes a large portion of his work267 to history, confining himself chiefly, however, to the annals of the Aztecs. The other authorities named, although containing full accounts of the natives and their institutions, devote comparatively little space to historical traditions; Sahagun is the best authority of all, so far as his observations go in this direction. All have been printed, either in the original Spanish or in translations, except Las Casas, whose great historical works exist only in manuscript. 3d. The native writers who after their conversion acquired the Spanish language and wrote on the history of their people, either in Spanish or in their own language, employing the Spanish alphabet. Most of them were thoroughly imbued with the spirit of their converters, and their writings as a class are subject to the same criticism. Domingo Muñoz Camargo, a noble Tlascaltec, wrote, about 1585, a history of his own people, which has been published only in a French translation. Fernando de Alvarado Tezozomoc, descended from the royal family of Azcapuzalco, wrote the chronicles of Mexican history from the standpoint of the Tepanecs, represented at the time of the Conquest by the kingdom of Tlacopan. Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl was a grandson of the last king of Tezcuco, from whom he inherited all that were saved of the records in the public archives. His works are more extensive than those of any other native writer, covering the whole ground of Nahua history, although treating more particularly of the Chichimecs, his ancestors.268

SECONDARY AUTHORITIES

In this class should be included the reported but little known writings of Juan Ventura Zapata y Mendoza, Tadeo de Niza, and Alonzo Franco.269 There are also many manuscripts by native authors whose names are unknown, brought to light by comparatively recent researches, and preserved for the most part in the Brasseur and Aubin collections in Paris. Their contents are unknown except through the writings of the Abbé Brasseur. The Popol Vuh is another important document, of which there are extant a Spanish and a French translation. 4th. Spanish authors who passed their lives mostly in Spain, and wrote chiefly under royal appointment. Their information was derived from the writers already mentioned, from the official correspondence of the colonists, and from the narratives of returning adventurers. Most of them touched upon aboriginal history among other topics. To this class belonged Peter Martyr, Francisco Lopez de Gomara, Antonio de Herrera, and Gonzalo Fernandez de Oviedo y Valdés. 5th. Catholic priests and missionaries who founded or were in charge of the missions at later periods or in remote regions, as Yucatan, Guatemala, Chiapas, Oajaca, Michoacan, and the north-western provinces of New Spain. They wrote chiefly in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and treat principally of the conversion of the natives, but include also in many cases their historical traditions and their explanations of the few aboriginal documents that fell into the possession of the converts. The number of such works is very great, and many of them have never been printed. Among the most important writers of this class are Diego de Landa, Diego Lopez Cogolludo, Padre Lizana, and Juan de Villagutierre Soto-Mayor, on Yucatan; Ramon de Ordoñez y Aguiar,270 Fuentes y Guzman,271 F. E. Arana,272 Francisco García Pelaez,273 and Domingo Juarros, on Guatemala; Francisco Nuñez de la Vega,274 Francisco Ximenez,275 and Antonio de Remesal, on Chiapas; Ribas, Alegre, and Arricivita on the north-western provinces; and Francisco de Burgoa on Oajaca. To the above should be added the regular records kept in all the missions, and the numerous letters and reports of the missionaries in distant provinces, many of which have been preserved, and not a few printed. There may also be included in this class the writings of some later Mexican authors, such as Boturini, Sigüenza y Góngora, Veytia, Leon y Gama, and Clavigero. Their works were mostly founded on the information supplied by their predecessors, which they did much to arrange and classify, but they also had access to some original authorities not previously used. Clavigero is almost universally spoken of as the best writer on the subject, but it is probable that he owes his reputation much more to his systematic arrangement and clear narration of traditions that had before been greatly confused, and to the omission of the most perplexing and contradictory points, than to deep research or new discoveries.

The preceding classes include all the original authorities, that is, all founded on information not accessible to later writers. These works have been the foundation of all that has been written since, except what has been developed from linguistic and other scientific researches. All that modern authors have done may be followed step by step, their facts as well as their conclusions.

Of the secondary authorities already alluded to, the condition and institutions of the natives, with the material relics of their past, not much need be said. It is only indirectly by means of comparisons that these authorities can help us in the study of history. How little they can teach unaided is illustrated in the case of the wild tribes, for whose history they are practically the only authorities. In Mexico and Central America the state of civilization as shown in native art, religion, government, or manners and customs, may indicate by resemblances or dissimilarities a connection or want of it between the different civilized tribes, and may thus corroborate or modify their written annals; it may even throw some light on the unity or diversity of its own origin by showing the nature of the connection between the Nahua and Maya cultures, in which striking resemblances as well as contrasts are observed. Outside of the regions mentioned, where there were no tangible records, we can only search among the wilder tribes for points of likeness by which to attach their past to that of the civilized nations. It may be foreseen that the results of such a search will be but meagre and unsatisfactory, yet on several important branches of the subject, such as the relation borne by the Mound-Builders and Pueblos to the southern nations, it furnishes our only light.

LANGUAGE AS A HISTORICAL AUTHORITY

Of the historical aids now under consideration, ethnology proper, the study of physical and mental characteristics, has yielded and promises apparently the least important results. In fact, as has been already pointed out in another part of this work, it has hardly acquired the right to be classed among the sciences, so far as its application to the American people is concerned. Theoretically it may, in a more perfect state of development than now exists, throw some light on the route and order of American migrations, possibly on the question of origin; thus far, however, ethnological studies have been practically fruitless. Results obtained from a comparison of the miscellaneous arts and customs of various tribes have likewise furnished and will continue to furnish but very slight assistance in historical investigations. Resemblances and dissimilarities in these respects depend intimately on environment, which in comparatively short periods works the most striking changes. Strongly marked analogies are noted in tribes that never came in contact with each other, while contrasts as marked appear in people but a short time separated. Under the same circumstances, after all, men do about the same things, the mind originating like inventions; and coincidences in arts and customs, unless of an extraordinary nature, may be more safely attributed to an independent origin resulting from environment, than to international identity or connection. That language is by far the best of these secondary authorities is conceded by all. No better proof of relationship between native tribes can be desired than the fact that they speak the same language, or dialects showing clear verbal and constructive resemblances. The most prominent abuse of this authority has been a disposition to connect the past of tribes in whose languages slight and forced verbal similarities are pointed out. There is also some difference of opinion about the use of the authority. That two tribes speaking the same languages or similar dialects have had a common origin, or have at least been intimately connected in the past, as tribes, is evident; but how far back that origin or connection may extend, whether it may reach back through the ages to the first division of the human race, or even to the first subdivision of the American peoples, is a disputed point. Fortunately the doubts that have been raised concern chiefly the question of origin, which for other reasons cannot yet be settled.276

Having thus given a sketch of the sources to which we may look for all that is known and has been conjectured respecting the American past, I shall proceed to place before the reader in the remaining chapters of my work what these authorities reveal on the subject. I have not, I believe, exaggerated their value, but fully comprehend the unsubstantial character which must be attributed to many of them. I am well aware that aboriginal American history, like the ancient Egyptian and Hebrew annals, differs materially in its nature and degree of accuracy from the history of England since the expedition of William the Conqueror, or of Mexico since the Conquest by Hernan Cortés. I do not propose to record such events only as may be made to conform to the modern idea of chronologic exactitude, rejecting all else as fabulous and mythic. Were such my purpose, a chapter on the subject already given in the second volume would suffice, with some contraction for the earlier epochs, and a corresponding expansion, perhaps, for Aztec history during the century immediately preceding the Conquest. On the contrary, I shall tell the tale as I find it recorded, mingled as it doubtless is at many points with myth and fable, and shall recount, as others have done, the achievements of heroes that possibly never lived, the wanderings of tribes who never left their original homes. It is not in a spirit of real or feigned credulity that I adopt this course, – on the contrary, I wish to clearly discriminate between fact and fancy wherever such discrimination may be possible, and so far as an extensive study of my subject may enable me to do so – but it is in accordance with the general plan of the whole work to record all that is found, rejecting only what may be proven false and valueless rather than what may possibly be so.

TREATMENT OF THE SUBJECT

I have compared the American past to a dark sea, from the bluff coast line of which projects an occasional cape terminating in precipitous cliffs, quicksands, and sunken rocks, beyond which some faint lights are floated by buoys. The old authors, as Torquemada, Clavigero, and Veytia, had but little difficulty in crossing from the headlands to the tower of Babel beyond the Sea of Darkness; they told the story, fables and all, with little discrimination save here and there the rejection of a tale infringing apparently on orthodoxy, or the expression of a doubt as to the literal acceptation of some marvelous occurrence. Of modern authors, those who, like Wilson, refuse to venture upon the projecting capes of solid rock and earth, who utterly reject the Aztec civilization with all its records, are few, and at this day their writings may be considered as unworthy of serious notice. Other writers, of whom Gallatin is a specimen, venture boldly from the main coast to the extremity of each projecting point, and acknowledge the existence of the rocks, sands, and buoys beyond, but decline to attempt their passage, doubting their security. These men, in favor of whose method there is much to be said, accept the annals of the later Aztec periods, but look with distrust upon the traditions of the Chichimec, Toltec, and Olmec epochs; and hardly see in the far distance the twinkling floating lights that shine from Votan's Empire of Xibalba. Then there are writers who are continually dreaming they have found secure footing by routes previously unknown, from rock to rock and through the midst of shifting sands. Such are the advocates of special theories of American history resting on newly discovered authorities or new readings of old ones. They carefully sift out such mythic traditions as fit their theories, converting them into incontrovertible facts, and reject all else as unworthy of notice; these, however, have chiefly to do with the matter of origin. Finally, I may speak of Brasseur de Bourbourg, rather a class by himself, perhaps, than the representative of a class. This author, to speak with a degree of exaggeration, steps out without hesitation from rock to rock over the deep waters; to him the banks of shifting quicksand, if somewhat treacherous about the edges, are firm land in the central parts; to him the faintest buoy-supported stars are a blaze of noon-day sun; and only on the floating masses of sea-weed far out on the waters lighted up by dim phosphorescent reflections, does he admit that his footing is becoming insecure and the light grows faint. In other words, he accepts the facts recorded by preceding authors, arranges them often with great wisdom and discrimination, ingeniously finds a historic record in traditions by others regarded as pure fables, and thus pushes his research far beyond the limits previously reached. He rejects nothing, but transforms everything into historic facts.

In the present sketch I wish to imitate to a certain extent the writers of each class mentioned, except perhaps the specialists, for I have no theory to defend, have found no new bright sun to illumine what has ever been dark. With the Spanish writers I would tell all that the natives told as history, and that without constantly reminding the reader that the sun did not probably stand still in the heavens, that giants did not flourish in America, that the Toltec kings and prophets did not live to the age of several hundred years, and otherwise warning him against what he is in no danger whatever of accepting as truth. With Wilson and his class of antiquarian sceptics I would feel no hesitation in rejecting the shallow theories and fancies evolved by certain writers from their own brain. With Gallatin I wish to discriminate clearly, when such discrimination is called for and possible, between the historic and the probably mythic; to indicate the boundary between firm land and treacherous quicksand; but also like Brasseur, I would pass beyond the firm land, spring from rock to rock, wade through shifting sands, swim to the farthest, faintest, light, and catch at straws by the way; – yet not flatter myself while thus employed, as the abbé occasionally seems to do, that I am treading dry-shod on a wide, solid, and well-lighted highway.

CHAPTER III.

THE PRE-TOLTEC PERIOD OF ABORIGINAL HISTORY

Subdivision of the Subject – Tzendal Tradition of the Votanic Empire – Votan's Book and its Contents as reported by Nuñez de la Vega, Cabrera, and Ordoñez – Testimony of Manners and Customs, Religion, Languages, and Monuments of the Civilized Nations respecting the Primitive Maya Peoples – The Quiché Record, or Popol Vuh – Civilizing Efforts of Gucumatz and his Followers – Exploits of Hunahpu and Xbalanque – Conquest of Xibalba – Migration from Tulan Zuiva, the Seven Caves – Meaning of the Quiché Tradition – Nahua Traditions – The Toltecs in Tamoanchan according to Sahagun – The Codex Chimalpopoca – Pre-Toltec Nations in Mexico – Olmecs and Xicalancas – The Quinames – Cholula and Quetzalcoatl – The Totonacs – Teotihuacan – Otomís, Miztecs, Zapotecs, and Huastecs – The Toltecs in Huehue Tlapallan – Migration to Anáhuac – The Chichimecs in Amaquemecan – Ancient Home of the Nahuatlacas and Aztecs – Primitive Annals of Yucatan – Conclusions.

TREATMENT OF THE SUBJECTDIVISION OF THE SUBJECT

In order to render more vivid than it would otherwise have been a picture of Nahua and Maya institutions as they were found in the sixteenth century, I have devoted one chapter of a preceding volume to an outline view of aboriginal history; to fill in so far as possible its details, is my remaining task. The sketch alluded to will prove convenient here, since it will enable me at various points to refer intelligibly and yet briefly to events somewhat in advance of their chronologic order. As has been stated, the sixth century is the most remote period to which we are carried in the annals of Anáhuac by traditions sufficiently definite to be considered in a strict sense as historic records. Prior to the sixth century there were doubtless other periods of Nahua greatness, for there is little evidence to indicate that this was the first appearance in Mexico of this progressive people, but previous development cannot be definitely followed – in a historical sense – although affording occasional glimpses which supply interesting matter for antiquarian speculation.

In the southern regions, where the Maya culture flourished, or what may be considered geographically as Central America, we have seen that the chronologic record is much less extensive and perfect even than in the north, taking us back in an oft-broken line only a few centuries beyond the Conquest. Yet we have caught traditional glimpses far back in the misty past of a mighty aboriginal empire in these tropical lands, of the earlier and grander stages of Maya culture, of Votan, of Xibalba, of even the early periods of Nahua civilization and power. Palenque, Copan, and their companions in ruin, the wonderful material monuments of the ancient epoch, proving it to be no mere creation of the imagination, have been described and pictured. With the breaking-up of the Maya empire into separate nations at an unknown date, the aboriginal history of Central America as a whole ceases, and down to a period closely preceding the Conquest, we have only an occasional event, the memory of which is preserved in the traditions of two or three nations.

The history of the Native Races may be most conveniently subdivided as follows; – 1st. The Pre-Toltec Period, embracing the semi-mythic traditions of the earliest civilization, extending down to a date – always preceding the sixth century, but varying in different parts of the territory – when the more properly historic annals of the different nations begin, and including also the few traditions referring to pre-Toltec nations north of Tehuantepec. 2d. The Toltec Period, referring like the two following periods to Anáhuac alone, and extending down to the eleventh century. 3d. The Chichimec Period, extending from the eleventh century to the formation of the tri-partite alliance between the Aztecs, Acolhuas, and Tepanecs in the fifteenth century. 4th. The Aztec Period, that of Aztec supremacy during the century preceding the Conquest. 5th. The annals of such Nahua nations outside the limits of the Aztec Empire proper as cannot be conveniently included in the preceding divisions. 6th. Historical traditions of the Wild Tribes of the north. 7th. The Quiché-Cakchiquel nations of Guatemala. 8th. Miscellaneous nations and tribes of Central America. 9th. The Maya nations of Yucatan.

The first division, the Pre-Toltec Period, to which the present chapter is devoted, will include the few vague traditions that seem to point to the cradle of American civilization, to the Votanic empire, to Xibalba, and to the deeds of the civilizers, or culture-heroes, in Tabasco and Chiapas. Who can estimate the volumes that would be required for a full narration of all that actually occurred within this period, had the record been made or preserved; – the development, from germs whose nature is unknown, of American civilization; the struggles and misfortunes of infant colonies; the exploits of native heroes; plots of ambition, glorious success, utter failure; the rise and fall of princes and of empires; wars, triumphs, defeats; oppression and revolt; political combinations and intrigues; religious strife between the fanatic devotees of rival divinities; seasons of plenty and of famine; earthquake, flood, and pestilence – a tangled network of events spread over the centuries; – to relate all that we may know of it a chapter will suffice.

VOTAN AND HIS DEEDS

I have told in another volume the mythic tale of Votan,277 the culture-hero, how he came to America and apportioned the land among the people. He came by divine command from Valum Chivim by way of Valum Votan, built a great city of Nachan, 'city of the serpents' – so called from his own name, for he was of the race of Chan, a Serpent – and founded a great empire in the Usumacinta region, which he seems to have ruled over as did his descendants or followers for many centuries. He was not regarded in the native traditions as the first man in America; he found the country peopled, as did all the culture-heroes, but by his teachings and by the aid of his companions he firmly established his own ideas of religion and government. So far as his memory was preserved by tradition he was a civilizer, a law-giver, the introducer of the Maya culture, worshiped moreover, after his disappearance, as a god. He came by sea from the east, but with the locality whence he started I have nothing to do here; neither is it necessary to indulge in speculation respecting the four mysterious visits which he paid after his arrival in America to his original home in the Old World, where it is gravely asserted he was present at the building of Solomon's temple and saw the ruins of the tower of Babel. His reported acts in the New World, whose people he came to civilize, were; – the dividing or apportioning of the lands among the people; their instruction in the new institutions they were required to adopt; the building of a great city, Nachan, afterwards the metropolis of an empire; the reception of a new band of disciples of his own race, who were allowed to share in the success already achieved by his enterprise; the subdividing of his empire after its power had become wide-spread in the land into several allied monarchies subordinate in a certain degree to Nachan, among whose capitals were Tulan, Mayapan, and Chiquimula; the construction of a subterranean road or 'snake hole' from the barranca of Zuqui to Tzequil; the deposit of a great treasure with tapirs as sacred animals in a 'house of gloom' at Huehuetan in Soconusco, protected by guardians called tlapianes, at whose head was a Lady Superior; and finally the writing of a 'book' in which was inscribed a complete record of all he had done, with a defense or proof of his claims to be considered one of the Chanes, or Serpents.278

THE BOOK OF VOTAN

This document is the authority, indirectly, for nearly all that is known from Tzendal sources of Votan and his empire. Francisco Nuñez de la Vega, Bishop of Chiapas, claims to have had in his possession279 and to have read this historical tract. He does not describe it, but from his having been able to read the contents, it would seem to have been, if genuine, not the original in hieroglyphics but an interpretation in European letters, although still perhaps in the Tzendal language. Of the contents, besides a general statement of Votan's coming as the first man sent by God to portion out the land, and some of his experiences in the Old World, this author says nothing definite. He claims to have had much knowledge of Tzendal antiquity derived from the work mentioned and other native writings, but he feared to perpetuate this knowledge lest it might "confirm more strongly an idolatrous superstition." He is the only authority for the deposit of the treasure in the Dark House at Huehuetan, without saying expressly that he derived his information from Votan's writings. This treasure, consisting of aboriginal relics, the bishop felt it to be his duty to destroy, and it was publicly burned in 1691. It is not altogether improbable that a genuine Maya document similar to the Manuscript Troano or Dresden Codex,280 preserved from the early times, may have found a native interpreter at the time of the Conquest, and have escaped in its disguise of Spanish letters the destruction that overtook its companions.