Lewis Spence

“ When the sun advanced above the horizon the sacrifice was at its height. But for the crackling of the flames and the murmur of a babbling stream on its way down the hill to join the river below, the silence had hitherto been unbroken. As the sun rose the Incas marched slowly round the burning mass, plucking the wool from the scorched carcase, and chanting monotonously: "O Creator, Sun and Thunder, be for ever young! Multiply the people; let them ever be in peace!" ”

“ At last they arrived at a mountain which they called Hacavitz, after one of their deities, and here they remained, for it had been foretold that here they should see the sun. At last the luminary appeared. Men and beasts went wild with delight, although his beams were by no means strong, and he appeared more like a reflection in a mirror than the strong sun of later days whose fiery beams speedily sucked up the blood of victims on the altar. As he showed his face the three tribal gods of the Kiche were turned into stone, as were the gods or totems connected with the wild animals. ”

“ The interior displayed an ornate richness which impressed even the Spaniards, who had seen the wealth of many lands and Oriental kingdoms, and the gold-lust must have swelled within their hearts at sight of the great altar, behind which was a huge plate of the shining metal engraved with the features of the sun-god. The surface of this plate was enriched by a thousand gems, the scintillation of which was, according to eye-witnesses, almost insupportable. Around this dazzling sphere were seated the mummified corpses of the Inca kings, each on his throne, with sceptre in hand. ”

“ We witness in the Maya mythology a dualism almost as complete as that of ancient Persia—the conflict between light and darkness. Opposing each other we behold on the one hand the deities of the sun, the gods of warmth and light, of civilisation and the joy of life, and on the other the deities of darksome death, of night, gloom, and fear. ”

“ Hun-Apu looked around him, and espying a great peak pointed toward it. "Do you think you could overthrow that mountain?" he asked.
"Without the least difficulty," replied Cabrakan, with a great laugh. "Let us go toward it."
"But first you must eat," said Hun-Apu. "You have had no food since morning, and so great a feat can hardly be accomplished fasting."
The giant smacked his lips. "You are right," he said, with a hungry look. Cabrakan was one of those people who are always hungry. "But what have you to give me?"
"We have nothing with us," said Hun-Apu. ”

“ But in the perusal of the myths and beliefs of Mexico and Peru we are also struck with the strangeness and remoteness alike of their subject-matter and the type of thought which they present. The result of centuries of isolation is evident in a profound contrast of "atmosphere." It seems almost as if we stood for a space upon the dim shores of another planet, spectators of the doings of a race of whose modes of thought and feeling we were entirely ignorant. ”

“ As has been said, the nucleus of Maya power and culture is probably to be found in that part of Chiapas which slopes down from the steep Cordilleras. Here the ruined sites of Palenque, Piedras Negras, and Ocosingo are eloquent of that opulence of imagination and loftiness of conception which go hand in hand with an advanced culture. The temples and palaces of this region bear the stamp of a dignity and consciousness of metropolitan power which are scarcely to be mistaken, so broad, so free is their architectural conception, so full to overflowing the display of the desire to surpass. ”

“ Time passed, and the first men of the Kiche race grew old. Visions came to them, in which they were exhorted by the gods to render human sacrifices, and in order to obey the divine injunctions they raided the neighbouring lands, the folk of which made a spirited resistance. But in a great battle the Kiche were miraculously assisted by a horde of wasps and hornets, which flew in the faces of their foes, stinging and blinding them, so that they could not wield weapon nor see to make any effective resistance. ”

“ A nopal plant had sprung from an earth-filled crevice in this rude altar, and upon this the royal eagle alluded to in the former account had alighted, grasping the serpent in his talons. Beholding in this a good omen, and urged by a supernatural impulse which he could not explain, a priest of high rank dived into a pool close at hand, where he found himself face to face with Tlaloc, the god of waters. After an interview with the deity the priest obtained permission from him to found a city on the site, from the humble beginnings of which arose the metropolis of Mexico-Tenochtitlan. ”

“ As in the Yucatan of to-day, where the wretched henequen-picker leads the life of a veritable slave, a crushing system of helotage obtained. The Cocomes made heavy demands upon the Tutul Xius, who in their turn sweated the hapless folk under their sway past the bounds of human endurance. As in all tottering civilisations, the feeling of responsibility among the upper classes became dormant, and they abandoned themselves to the pleasures of life without thought of the morrow. Morality ceased to be regarded as a virtue, and rottenness was at the core of Maya life. ”

“ In repeating this he is joined by the people, until at length a terrible clamour is raised, and augmented in proportion as the sick man becomes still fainter and fainter, to the end that it may reach his ears. When all the charms are unavailing, and death approaches, the mohane leaps from his hammock, and betakes himself to flight, amid the multitude of sticks, stones, and clods of earth which are showered on him. ”

“ The gods were placated or refreshed by the slaughter of the human victim, on whose still living breast a fire of wood was kindled by friction, the heart and body being consumed by the flames so lighted. As the planets of hope crossed the zenith loud acclamations resounded from the people, and the domestic hearths, which had been left cold and dead, were rekindled from the sacred fire which had consumed the sacrifice. Mankind was safe for another period. ”

“ At the risk of repetition it is essential to point out that civilisation, which was a newly acquired thing with the Nahua peoples, was not so with the Maya. They were indisputably an older race, possessing institutions which bore the marks of generations of use, whereas the Nahua had only too obviously just entered into their heritage of law and order. When we first catch sight of the Maya kingdoms they are in the process of disintegration. Such strong young blood as the virile folk of Anahuac possessed did not flow in the veins of the people of Yucatan and Guatemala. ”

“ The American Indian is grave and taciturn. If there is one thing he fears and dislikes more than another it is ridicule. To his austere and haughty spirit it appears as something derogatory to his dignity, a slur upon his manhood. The hero-brothers had not been long in Xibalba when they discovered that it was the intention of the Lords of Hades to fool them and subject them to every species of indignity. After crossing a river of blood, they came to the palace of the Lords of Xibalba, where they espied two seated figures in front of them. ”

“ We are aware that the people who reared them entered into religious and perhaps philosophical considerations their interpretations of which place them upon a level with the most enlightened races of antiquity; but we have only stepped upon the margin of Maya history. What dread secrets, what scenes of orgic splendour have those carven walls witnessed? What solemn priestly conclave, what magnificence of rite, what marvels of initiation, have these forest temples known? These things we shall never learn. ”

“ IF the civilisation of ancient Peru did not achieve the standard of general culture reached by the Mexicans and Maya, it did not fall far short of the attainment of these peoples. But the degrading despotism under which the peasantry groaned in Inca times, and the brutal and sanguinary tyranny of the Apu-Ccapac Incas, make the rulers of Mexico at their worst appear as enlightened when compared with the Peruvian governing classes. ”

“ In North American Indian myths we find the Father Sky brooding upon the Mother Earth, just as in early Greek creation-story we see the elements uniting, the firmament impregnating the soil and rendering it fruitful. To the savage mind the growth of crops and vegetation proceeds as much from the sky as from the earth. Untutored man beholds the fecundation of the soil by rain, and, seeing in everything the expression of an individual and personal impulse, regards the genesis of vegetable growth as analogous to human origin. ”

“ The sun was regarded by the Nahua, and indeed by all the Mexican and Central American peoples, as the supreme deity, or rather the principal source of subsistence and life. He was always alluded to as the teotl, the god, and his worship formed as it were a background to that of all the other gods. His Mexican name, Ipalnemohuani (He by whom Men Live) shows that the Mexicans regarded him as the primal source of being, and the heart, the symbol of life, was looked upon as his special sacrifice. ”

“ That he is a death-god there can be no doubt, but of his name we are ignorant. He is probably identical with the Aztec god of death and hell, Mictlan, and is perhaps one of those Lords of Death and Hell who invite the heroes to the celebrated game of ball in the Kiche Popol Vuh, and hold them prisoners in their gloomy realm.
God B is the deity who appears most frequently in the manuscripts. He has a long, truncated nose, like that of a tapir, and we find in him every sign of a god of the elements. ”

“ His exalted position in the Mexican pantheon seems to have won for him especial reverence as a god of fate and fortune. The place he took as the head of the Nahua pantheon brought him many attributes which were quite foreign to his original character. Fear and a desire to exalt their tutelar deity will impel the devotees of a powerful god to credit him with any or every quality, so that there is nothing remarkable in the spectacle of the heaping of every possible attribute, human or divine, upon Tezcatlipoca when we recall the supreme position he occupied in Mexican mythology. ”

“ The Kukulcan of the Maya has more the attributes of a thunder-god. In the tropical climate of Yucatan and Guatemala the sun at midday appears to draw the clouds around it in serpentine shapes. From these emanate thunder and lightning and the fertilising rain, so that Kukulcan would appear to have appealed to the Maya more as a god of the sky who wielded the thunderbolts than a god of the atmosphere proper like Quetzalcoatl, though several of the stelæ in Yucatan represent Kukulcan as he is portrayed in Mexico, with wind issuing from his mouth. ”

“ The features of the Aztecs as represented in the various Mexican paintings are typically Indian, and argue a northern origin. The race was, and is, of average height, and the skin is of a dark brown hue. The Mexican is grave, taciturn, and melancholic, with a deeply rooted love of the mysterious, slow to anger, yet almost inhuman in the violence of his passions when aroused. He is usually gifted with a logical mind, quickness of apprehension, and an ability to regard the subtle side of things with great nicety. ”

“ Those who rose at sunrise to prepare food for the day held up to him on his appearance the hearts of animals they had slain for cooking, and even the hearts of the victims to Tezcatlipoca and Huitzilopochtli were first held up to the sun, as if he had a primary right to the sacrifice, before being cast into the bowl of copal which lay at the feet of the idol. It was supposed that the luminary rejoiced in offerings of blood, and that it constituted the only food which would render him sufficiently vigorous to undertake his daily journey through the heavens. ”

“ OUR knowledge of the mythology of the Maya is by no means so full and comprehensive as in the case of Mexican mythology. Traditions are few and obscure, and the hieroglyphic matter is closed to us. But one great mine of Maya-Kiche mythology exists which furnishes us with much information regarding Kiche cosmogony and pseudo-history, with here and there an interesting allusion to the various deities of the Kiche pantheon. This is the Popol Vuh, a volume in which a little real history is mingled with much mythology. ”

“ The emperor begged him to become a Mexican citizen, but he replied that on no account would he prove a traitor to his country. Montezuma then once more offered him his liberty, but he strenuously refused to return to Tlascala, having undergone the disgrace of defeat and capture. He begged Montezuma to terminate his unhappy existence by sacrificing him to the gods, thus ending the dishonour he felt in living on after having undergone defeat, and at the same time fulfilling the highest aspiration of his life—to die the death of a warrior on the stone of combat. ”

“ The older and more cultured people who had preceded them probably spoke a more polished dialect of the same language, but its influence had evidently but little effect upon the rude Chichimecs and Aztecs. The Mexican tongue, like most American languages, belongs to the "incorporative" type, the genius of which is to unite all the related words in a sentence into one conglomerate term or word, merging the separate words of which it is composed one into another by altering their forms, and so welding them together as to express the whole in one word. ”

“ Just at that moment a large bird passed overhead, and Hun-Apu and Xbalanque raised their blow-pipes to their mouths. The darts sped swiftly upward, and both of them struck the bird, which came tumbling down through the air, falling at the feet of Cabrakan.
"Wonderful, wonderful!" cried the giant.
"You are clever fellows indeed," and, seizing the dead bird, he was going to eat it raw when Hun-Apu stopped him.
"Wait a moment," said he. "It will be much nicer when cooked," and, rubbing two sticks together, he ordered Xbalanque to gather some dry wood, so that a fire was soon blazing. ”

“ It was imagined that the prototype of each variety of fish dwelt in the upper world, just as many tribes of North American Indians believe that the eponymous ancestors of certain animals dwell at the four points of the compass or in the sky above them. This great fish-god engendered the others of his species, and sent them into the waters of the deep that they might exist there until taken for the use of man. Birds, too, had their eponymous counterparts among the stars, as had animals. ”

“ These eight persons were the ancestors of the Kiche only, after which were created the forerunners of the other peoples. At this time there was no sun, and comparative darkness lay over the face of the earth. Men knew not the art of worship, but blindly lifted their eyes to heaven and prayed the Creator to send them quiet lives and the light of day. But no sun came, and dispeace entered their hearts. So they journeyed to a place called Tulan-Zuiva (The Seven Caves) —practically the same as Chicomoztoc in the Aztec myth—and there gods were vouchsafed to them. ”