CHAPTER XIX.

Mounds and Earthworks in North and Central America. — Migrations of the Toltecs and Aztecs. — The Quichés. — Aboriginal races. — Palenque. — Hieroglyphs. — Temples. — Desertion of the Temples and stone buildings in Yucatan. — Conquest of Yucatan by the Aztecs. — Antiquity of Palenque and Uxmal. — Aztec custom of imprisoning captives in cages and sacrificing them to the gods. — Civilisation of the Toltecs. — Note upon the symbol or Totem of the Serpent.

In the following chapters I propose to bring together the various notes upon the Indians and their temples and earthworks which were made when traversing Central America, and to add to them the conclusions which have been formed subsequently.

There are certain problems which particularly require to be examined. With respect to the antiquity of the stone buildings and pyramids, it would be difficult to attempt to do more than endeavour to form reasonable deductions from the evidence afforded by the state of those ruins, and the information given about them by the Indians at the time of the conquest. The conquerors, after they had settled in Yucatan and Guatemala, were accompanied by Spanish missionaries of great ability. We possess in the writings of Bishop Las Casas and Bishop Landa works of the greatest value, for both those prelates when they were engaged in their duties of converting the natives, were acquainted with the language of the tribes amongst whom they worked.

In the prosecution of researches into subjects which relate to Central America, it is desirable as a preliminary step to consider the comparative civilisation of the Indians, as far as that is brought into evidence by what has been discovered with respect to mounds and earthworks, not only in that region, but also throughout the valley of the Mississippi. A distinction must also be made between earthworks which are unquestionably of great antiquity, and those that possibly may have been raised since the date of the arrival of European settlers. Therefore the geometrically planned inclosures in Ohio should be excluded from this inquiry. It is otherwise with great ramparts such as those inclosing Fort Ancient on the steep promontory in the valley of the Little Miami, which are of special importance on account of the parallelisms with the similar fortifications made by the Quichés and Kachiquels in Guatemala.

There are exceptional circumstances connected with the mounds in North America. It has to be remembered that they were not always burial places. When De Soto arrived with his fleet in Florida, the chief cacique of the tribe dwelling near the landing place, was living on the top of a mound about fifty feet high. This mound was pointed out to me when I was at Tampa. It appeared to be made for the purpose of placing huts upon its summit. The platform was sufficiently large to give room for several dwellings. There are also mounds near the western bank of the Mississippi, between Natchez and the mouth of the Arkansas. One of them resembled that at Tampa, and had a wide level space on the summit.

When the earliest Spanish expedition passed through that part of the country, it was observed that the Indians frequently placed their houses upon artificial earthworks raised sufficiently high to be above the inundations. At Natchez the tribe, which, from their peculiar customs, have been called the sun worshippers, raised mounds primarily for the residence of their chiefs, who differed from other Indians of that rank, in being invested with special attributes in connection with ceremonies performed before the rising sun. But there were customs with respect to them which require to be noticed. It was stated by Father le Petit, who was for many years a missionary amongst the Natchez, that when their principal chief died his hut was demolished and a new mound was raised, upon which was built the wooden cabin of his successor in that dignity. It can be understood that where a large tribe having this custom dwelt for a long time in one place, it might happen that a series of connected platform mounds, forming an inclosure, would probably have a rectangular shape.

Higher up the Mississippi, above the junction of the Ohio, are the Cahokia earthworks. There were also several mounds placed on high ground near the east bank of the river, not far from the borders of Illinois and Wisconsin. One of these, which was about forty feet high, was opened ten years before I went to St. Paul’s. A vault was discovered beneath the level of the ground, which contained several skeletons sitting in a circle. The earth of which it was composed was a kind of loam, not occurring in the vicinity, and it was supposed that it must have been brought from a considerable distance by Indians who wished to show their respect for the burial place of their chiefs, by bringing tributes of earth taken from the ground near their encampments. The high mounds placed around the edge of the promontory, now called Dayton’s Bluff, and which are the most northern group in the valley of the Mississippi, have been described in a preceding chapter.

When I was in Chiapas, the Presbitero Macal told me that he was present when two mounds were examined in 1860, near San Cristobal. They were each ten feet high and covered vaults made of large flat slabs of stone. Within these tombs were two skulls, but nothing else was found. There were no weapons or fragments of pottery. In the vault under the mound in Illinois there were several large pieces of pottery, and on the surface, immediately above the tomb, were ashes and other evidences of fire.

But before proceeding farther with this subject, it is necessary to bring under consideration the progress of archæological knowledge in North America, since the date of my visit to the ancient mounds and earthworks in Ohio. Great advances have been made in the classification of the discoveries that have taken place in the burial mounds that exist throughout the United States. Deductions can consequently be established with regard to the civilisation of the Indians, and it has become possible to establish, upon a scientific basis, their position as a race. A long series of investigations have been completed, and a summary of the results published, under the auspices of the Smithsonian Institution, by Professor Cyrus Thomas.[97]

“It seems desirable at the present time,” he observes, “to make a statement explaining the plans and describing the work of the mound exploring division of the Bureau of Ethnology.”... “The questions relating to prehistoric America are to be determined not alone by the study of its ancient monuments, but by the study also of the languages, customs, art, beliefs, and folk-lore of the aborigines. Only by such a comprehensive study can the exact relations of the ancient archæological remains to the historic Indian tribes be made apparent. Major J. W. Powell, the Director of the Bureau, taking this comprehensive and scientific view of the subject, saw at the outset the necessity of deciding as soon as possible the question ‘Were the mound builders Indians?’”

The work was carried on for several years, and Professor Thomas states that “Over two thousand mounds have been explored, including almost every known type as to form.... Nothing trustworthy has been discovered to justify the theory that the mound builders belonged to a highly civilised race, or that they were a people who had attained a higher culture status than the Indians. It is true that works and papers on American archæology are full of statements to the contrary, which are generally based on the theory that the mound builders belonged to a race of much higher culture than the Indians. Yet when the facts on which this opinion is based are examined with sober, scientific care, the splendid fabric which has been built upon them by that great workman, imagination, fades from sight.” Professor Thomas also observes—“That the links discovered directly connecting the Indians and mound builders are so numerous and well established that there should be no longer any hesitancy in accepting the theory that the two are one and the same people.”

The origin and nature of the American mounds, and the customs of the Indians who raised them, have also been investigated by Professor Lucien Carr. He claims “that the mounds and inclosures of Ohio, like those in New York and the Gulf States, were the work of the red Indians of historic times, or of their immediate ancestors.”[98]

With reference to this much debated question of the formation of these inclosures, a re-survey of several of them was made. The measurements of Professor Thomas and his assistants appear to have established the fact of the geometrical accuracy of the octagonal, square and circular works near Newark.[99] In the introduction to the memoir upon the Ohio mounds, Professor Thomas observes that “The constantly recurring question ‘Who constructed these works?’ has brought before the public a number of widely different theories, though the one which has been most generally accepted is that they originated with a people long since extinct or driven from the country, who had attained a culture status much in advance of that reached by the aborigines inhabiting the country at the time of its discovery by Europeans. The opinions advanced in this paper, in support of which evidence will be presented, is that the ancient works of the State are due to Indians of several different tribes, and that some at least of the typical works, were built by the ancestors of the modern Cherokees.”[100]

As a consequence of the examination of the Indian mounds throughout the United States, the majority of the modern American archæologists consider that the aboriginal inhabitants were never in a higher state of civilisation than they were when they first became known to Europeans. It is not however the questions of the burial mounds, and the importance of what has been found in them which have chiefly to be considered here. Attention should be principally directed to the difficult problem respecting the great fortified ramparts of Fort Ancient.

The traditions of the Delawares,[101] which affirmed that the defensive earthworks of Ohio were built by the Tallegwi, have generally been accepted as being well founded. They were stated to have been a powerful tribe who built fortifications and entrenchments. Finally they abandoned their lands and went southwards, down the valley of the Mississippi and never returned. It may be conjectured, after observing the similar works and methods of selecting their defensive positions in Guatemala, that the Tallegwi were the same race who were afterwards known as Toltecs. The probability of this assumption being reasonable, becomes more evident when the group of platform and circular mounds on the plains near Mixco are observed to be similar to those raised on the plains of Cahokia near the banks of the Mississippi.

The question of the condition of intelligence amongst the North American Indians, has a direct bearing upon the problem of the origin of the civilisation of the Toltecs and Aztecs, and it is satisfactory to know that there are sound reasons for supposing that the Indians who constructed the fortified camps in Ohio were not more advanced in knowledge than the tribes who were dwelling in that region at the time of the discovery of America by Columbus.

Several years after the conquest of Mexico, the Spaniards sent expeditions into the southern parts of Central America, and conquered the Quichés and the surrounding country, in which were situated the ramparts defending Utatlan and Patinamit. It was subsequently considered desirable that investigations should be made into the ancient systems by which the aboriginal inhabitants had been governed by their caciques, and orders were given to this effect by the Emperor Charles the Fifth and by his successor Philip the Second. In the reports of the officers who conducted these inquiries, it was stated that an extraordinarily rigid line of caste was maintained amongst the Quichés. There was an absolute distinction between the ruling families descended from the caciques, and the great mass of the races who were under their control. It was also evident, judging from the language of several appeals made by Indian chiefs to obtain justice and to have their rank and authority acknowledged, that they considered the working classes of Indians as their absolute slaves.

“There was no instance,” states the historian Juarros, “of any person being appointed to a public office, high or low, who was not selected from the nobility; for which reason, great anxiety was felt by them to keep the purity of their lineage unsullied. To preserve this rank untainted in blood, it was decreed by the law, that if any cacique or noble should marry a woman who was not of noble family, he should be degraded to the caste of mazegual or plebeian, assume the name of his wife, and be subject to all the duties and services imposed upon plebeians.” These services generally consisted of works performed by forced labour. The lands belonging to the ruling families were cultivated in this manner, and, in fact, the Indians of the native and working class were entirely at the disposal of their masters. One of the Spanish bishops, whose diocese was in Mexico, mentions that he had ascertained that these mazeguales could be sold or killed by their owners. There were marked differences in the dress of the people. The mazeguales wore, as a rule, nothing but the loin cloth, or sometimes, as is the case now with the Lacandones, a long cotton shirt, reaching nearly to the feet. It was a matter of observation amongst the conquerors that the inferior classes of Indians were submissive, but that their rulers were intractable, harsh and warlike.

It is inexpedient to pursue this particular subject to any great extent, for it is made clear by the reports of the Spanish authorities that the relations of the governing class of the Quichés to the other Indians under their rule were those of a race of conquerors to a race of slaves, and the victors treated those whom they had conquered in a manner in accordance with the habits of a savage and barbarous tribe of North American Indians. This much may be admitted from the consideration of the circumstances of the laws and customs of the Quichés at the time of the arrival of the Spaniards. But if a due estimation is also given to the evidence afforded by the strange and otherwise inexplicable similarities in the methods of choosing fortified positions and raising ramparts with those in Ohio, it becomes reasonable to infer that the Quiché chiefs originally migrated from that part of North America.

It is however necessary to note that, at whatever period their migration may have taken place, it cannot be granted or inferred that the Ohio tribes brought with them any knowledge of architecture, or of any form of civilisation, for had it been otherwise, they would have left behind them some vestiges of that civilisation or mechanical skill. It is especially remarkable that throughout the length and breadth of North America there is not the smallest fragment of any hewn stone building, or of any carved stone hieroglyphic characters. Thus the theory of migratory tribes of Indians bringing with them from the North into Mexico, a comparatively advanced knowledge of arts and sciences is opposed to all evidence. It is almost certain that the state of civilisation that at one time existed in the regions of Chiapas and Yucatan, was introduced into the country at some period subsequent to the arrival of the invading tribe, unless it can be established that the aboriginal races already possessed a competent intelligence, and an architectural capacity. A proposition of this character cannot be reasonably maintained, for it is known that in the fifteenth century the Indians in Cuba and Haiti, the Caribs on the coasts south of Yucatan, and the aborigines in the interior were savages, existing in a low state of human intelligence. This subject respecting the Indian migrations and the state of civilisation that was existing, or had existed, in Central America, can be more definitely considered after attention has been directed to the question of the antiquity and purpose of the buildings at Palenque and Uxmal. It is much to be regretted that Palenque was not known to the Spaniards when Cortes marched within a few leagues of it in 1524. Possibly, at that time it had not been long abandoned, and perhaps some of the caciques dwelling in that part of the valley of the Usamacinta might have been able to explain the meaning of the hieroglyphs. Unfortunately the ruins were not discovered until more than two centuries had elapsed, and nothing could be ascertained from the Indians which gave the slightest clue to their signification. It has been surmised—and there are good reasons for thinking that the surmise may be correct—that the characters relate to the migrations of the tribes. But in consequence of the incomplete knowledge of these Indian hieroglyphs, it would be impossible to attempt to form any satisfactory conjectures regarding their meaning.

There exists, however, graven on the tablet of the cross, two figures which, if I am correct in my opinion with regard to them, are of the greatest importance in establishing certain facts with regard to the builders of Palenque. Upon referring to the illustration of the altar tablet that was placed within the temple of the cross, it will be noticed that the two standing figures offering sacrifice to the quetzal or sacred bird of Quiché, are evidently intended to represent persons actually living at the time that the altar was designed, for there is nothing fantastic in the costume that is worn by them. If a careful examination is made into the details of their dress it will, I think, be concluded that these men were the chief caciques of the Quichés.

“The nobles,” observes Juarros, “wore a dress of white cotton dyed or stained with different colours, the use of which was prohibited to the other ranks. This vestment consisted of a shirt and white breeches, decorated with fringes; over these was drawn another pair of breeches, reaching to the knees and ornamented with a species of embroidery; the legs were bare; the feet protected by sandals, fastened over the instep and at the heel by thongs of leather; the sleeves of the shirt were looped above the elbow, with a blue or red band; the hair was worn long, and tressed behind with a cord of the colour used upon the sleeves, and terminating in a tassel, which was a distinction peculiar to the great captains; the waist was girded with a piece of cloth of various colours, fastened in a knot before; over the shoulders was thrown a white mantle, ornamented with figures of birds, lions and other decorations of cord and fringe. The ears and lower lip were pierced, to receive star-shaped pendants of gold or silver.”

Upon an examination of the figures it will be observed that, although their dress corresponds with what is described as being worn by the Quiché caciques, neither of them are wearing sandals. But, on the altar of the temple placed on an adjacent mound, the same figures are again offering sacrifices, and the tallest of them is wearing sandals precisely as described above. It was the custom among the Quichés to associate with the principal cacique another chief, to whom was intrusted the control and management of the troops and the conduct of all hostilities, and it is stated that sometimes this chief was the eldest son of the cacique. As the second temple appears to have been dedicated to the god of war, it may be assumed that the shorter figure was intended to represent a war chief. He is dressed in accordance with that rank and wears a mantle and a heavy tassel. In this temple the chief is drawn as standing upon a kneeling captive, but in that dedicated to Quetzalcoatl he is placed upon a block of stone, upon which is a hieroglyph. To Quetzalcoatl the offering appears to have been in conformity with the attributes assigned to him, of religion and education. Possibly the child, held in the hands of the tallest cacique, was dedicated to serve in the temple after having been trained for the priesthood in the monastery.

It is satisfactory to be able to establish the conclusion that the figures are caciques of the Quichés, for it thereby becomes possible to advance a few steps towards the solution of a problem which presents many difficulties with regard to the period of the construction of Palenque, and state of civilization of the builders. In a manuscript left in a Franciscan convent by one of the descendants of the Quichés, an account was given of the migrations of that tribe before they settled near Utatlan. It was stated that they reached that country after a long journey from Mexico, and adopted the name of Quiché in memory of one of their leaders; but before that time the people were called Toltecs.

Before endeavouring to establish conclusions with regard to Palenque, attention should be directed to the temples and other stone buildings in the adjacent regions. With respect to the numerous groups of ruins in Yucatan, we possess the testimony of the Spanish priests who dwelt in their parishes in that country at a period when many of the governing class of Indians were of the same generation as those who inhabited the land when it was conquered. One of these missionaries was Father Landa, who was not only zealous in the performance of his duties, but also studied the language and civilisation of the race amongst whom he dwelt. He was present in Tihoo soon after the capture of that Indian settlement, which was afterwards chosen for the site of the city of Merida.

He states that in that place there were several stone edifices. He made a plan of the largest of them from which it is evident that they were of the same character as those at Uxmal. Tihoo was occupied by the Spanish forces in 1541, and the terraces, upon which were placed the principal buildings, were given to the Franciscans as a site for their convent. The friars began their work in 1547. Thus only six years had elapsed since the Indians had left their town. Landa’s descriptions of the state and condition of the ancient ruins are therefore of the greatest assistance in forming conclusions with regard to them.

The principal edifice was placed upon the highest of three terraces, each of which was surrounded or faced by thick walls, and approached by steps. There was a large interior quadrangle having ranges of rooms or cells occupying the four sides. These were similar to those in the “House of the Nuns” at Uxmal. In the vicinity there were several pyramids which had small temples on their summits. It was observed that all these structures appeared to have been disused for a considerable period. The Franciscans found that the Indian structures were covered with thick brushwood. This was cleared away. The buildings were destroyed and the materials supplied the stone required for their church and convent.[102]

The fact that the desertion of the temples had occurred before the arrival of the Spaniards is important. It explains many of the circumstances then existing in Yucatan which otherwise would be unintelligible. When the conquerors settled in that land they were surprised to find numerous stone buildings in various parts of the country, all of which were unoccupied. They were informed that they had not been abandoned in consequence of their conquest. They found that it was impracticable to obtain from the natives any explanation of the nature of the events which had happened and had caused this change. Thus the problem regarding the purposes of these extensive buildings, and the architectural skill of the constructors was as obscure to them at that time as it is now to the present inhabitants.

At Izamal, about thirty-five miles east of Tihoo, there were also numerous temples, and it was noticed by Landa that there were evidences of there having been a paved road between the two places. A Franciscan convent was established at Izamal, and a brief account of its temples was written in 1663 by Father Lizana, in which he states, with respect to the ruins in Yucatan, that the deserted edifices appeared to have been of one style of architecture, and that some of them were so perfect that it might be said that twenty years had not elapsed since they were built. These edifices were however, he observes, not inhabited by the Indians when the Spaniards arrived. The natives lived scattered in huts amongst the woods, but they used them as temples or sanctuaries, and occasionally performed religious ceremonies and fasts there.[103]

The Franciscan missionaries were not able to obtain from the natives an intelligible explanation of the events that had occurred which had caused the temples to be abandoned. But they were informed that an invasion had taken place about two hundred years before their arrival, and many of the caciques and ruling families had been driven out of the land. The invaders did not occupy the sacred buildings, and allowed them to fall into ruin, but they were visited occasionally by those who still had faith in the ancient gods and wished to offer sacrifices to them. It was ascertained that the greater part of Yucatan had become subject to the control of chiefs belonging to the Aztec race, and that several of them paid tribute to Montezuma.

The question of the antiquity of the temples of Palenque, Uxmal and other structures of that character must therefore, in a great degree, be decided by the evidence upon which are based the traditions of the migrations of the Toltecs who preceded the Aztecs, and were the first of the hordes who conquered the aboriginal races of Central America. The historians who have investigated those traditions concur in considering that the arrival of the Toltecs within Mexican territory happened in the seventh century. After remaining some time in the northern part of the country, they migrated southwards to Cholula, Palenque and Yucatan.[104] If the historic evidence is accepted as being trustworthy, it follows that all the stone edifices in these regions must have been erected later than that date. The Aztecs arrived at the close of the twelfth century. Therefore it may be concluded that Palenque was built later than the eighth century, and was deserted before the fourteenth century. Uxmal is evidently more modern than Palenque, and it may be assumed that it was constructed after the tenth century, and abandoned not much earlier than a hundred years before the Spaniards landed upon the shores of the New World.

The Aztec chiefs introduced into Yucatan one of their barbarous customs which was similar to what was practised by them elsewhere. It was found by the conquerors, that in Mexico they kept slaves and prisoners in cages, where these victims were fattened and prepared for sacrifice.[105] After having been killed and offered as propitiations to the gods their bodies were eaten. In 1511, it happened that a Spanish vessel was wrecked upon some shoals fifteen leagues south of the island of Jamaica. The crew after having been thirteen days in an open boat, landed upon the north-eastern shores of Yucatan near Cape Catoche, and were made captives by the cacique of the district. Valdivia, who was in command, together with four of his men, were at once sacrificed and eaten, others were put in cages, but several of these men escaped. When the fleet under the command of Cortes anchored off Cozumel, in 1519, one of the captives, named Aguilar, went on board the flagship.

Bernal Diaz, who was with the expedition and saw this man when he arrived, relates that when Aguilar came before the presence of Cortes he cowered down according to the manner of Indian slaves. Aguilar stated that only he and another Spaniard named Gonzalo Guerrero, were then alive. Most of his companions had been sacrificed to the gods, but some had died, and two women who were with them had perished from misery and the severity of the labour of grinding maize. Guerrero had married an Indian woman and followed the native customs. He had been tattoed, his ears were pierced and his lips were turned down.[106] Aguilar had become acquainted with the Maya language, and was afterwards employed by Cortes as an interpreter. Guerrero remained in Yucatan with the Indians.

Upon a review of the facts ascertained by the conquerors in the sixteenth century in Mexico and Guatemala, and by the Franciscan and Dominican missionaries in Yucatan and Chiapas, together with the researches made since that time by archæologists and explorers, it appears to be possible to form certain conclusions. The architectural and mechanical knowledge, and the advance towards writing characters, forming calendars and reckoning time by astronomical observations must have been reached within a period of less than four centuries. It is therefore probable that the priests of the Toltecs became acquainted with their arts and sciences not long after they had left North America and had migrated to the regions around Téotihuacan in the direction of the shores of the Gulf of Mexico. In what manner and under what circumstances their knowledge was obtained, is a problem which requires to be given a careful investigation.

• • • • •

In an Aztec or Toltec manuscript which forms part of the collection of ancient Mexican codices placed in the library of the Vatican, there is a representation of a cacique making an offering to a rattlesnake.

The manner of propitiation resembles the methods of sacrificing to this Manito which were followed by the Dakotas (see p. 170). The head dress of the cacique which consists of plumed feathers is similar to that worn by the chiefs of that race, and is placed in the same position as the feathers of Rocky Bear (illustration, chapter viii).

The rattlesnake appears to have been the Totem of the Toltecs and is the chief emblem at Uxmal and Chichen Itza.

It is thought that a serpent is represented upon the central stone of the tablet of the cross at Palenque and as the god to whom the temple is dedicated was named Bird-Serpent (Quetzal-Coatl), it is probable that the sculptors delineated the symbol in a manner that was intelligible to the Quichés.

Upon an examination of the illustration of the centre tablet, which is an exact reproduction from a photograph of the original stone (see frontispiece), these symbols may perhaps be traced. I may here venture to express the opinion that the Toltecs may have been the tribe that once dwelt in that part of Ohio to the west of the river Scioto, where is still to be seen the Totem of the serpent.

The illustration of the propitiation to the serpent is taken from a part of the Mexican manuscript represented in Humboldt’s “Vues des Cordilléres.”