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DEIFICATION OF THE ELEMENTS OF GROWTH

The elements of growth, in the mind of primitive man, are four in number, the earth, grain, rain, and solar heat, and it is not remarkable that all of these came to be regarded as deified powers, and were latterly personalized in anthropomorphic form. It does not appear that the sun was at first looked upon as an agency of growth. There is, indeed, proof that in early times he was not regarded as of any importance from a calendric point of view, and that the time and festival-counts were designed upon a lunar basis. It is not unlikely that, in a region where his torrid heat, if unaccompanied by rainfall, resulted in famine, he was at first regarded, if not unfavourably, at least with no special predilection. If this conclusion is correct, and we can afford to discount solar influence in the primitive Mexican cultus--or rather that adopted by the aboriginal peoples on embracing a settled agricultural existence--there remain to us the three elements of earth, grain, and rain from which to reconstruct the prototypes of the Mexican pantheon.

In Mexican myth the earth is represented as a monster known as cipactli, the pictures of which have given rise to the assumption that it is either a crocodile, a swordfish, or a dragon. We shall probably not err if we place it in the last category and see in it that great earth-monster common to the mythologies of many races, and which is most conveniently called the "earth-dragon." This sign cipactli became the first in the tonalamatl or Book of Fate, where it is connected with the creative deities and the Earth-mother, who was known by many names. Circumstances exist which seem to lend colour to the assumption that, as in other countries, the Mexican Earth-mother had at one time been regarded as forming the earth, the soil. At the terrible and picturesque festival of the Xalaquia , the sacrificed virgin was supposed to enrich and recruit with her blood the frame of the worn-out goddess, who had been, says Seler, "merged in the popular imagination with the all-nourisher, the all-begetter, the earth."

Perhaps the best evidence that the idea of the Earth-mother was associated with the conception of the earth-dragon is afforded by the colossal stone figure of Coatlicue, one of her manifestations, which once towered above the entrance to the temple of Uitzilopochtli in Mexico and is now housed in the Museo Na?ional in that city. In this figure, as in a similar if less massive statue from Tehuacan, the characteristics of the cipactli earth-animal obtrude themselves in a wealth of scale, claw, and tusk, which although frequently described as serpentine, is only partially so, and shows traces that more than one idea was in the mind of the artist who chiselled its symbolic intricacies. In the latter of these sculptures the appearance of ferocity is most marked and is accompanied by the same dragon-like claws on hands and feet. In the mythologies of many lands the Earth-mother is represented as ferocious, insatiable, as slaying those who take part in her amours, as a riotous and outrageous demon, unnatural and destructive in her lusts and appetites, and it would seem that her Mexican phase throws light upon the reasons for this savage wantonness. In the sculpture first alluded to, and in the carving on its base, we can perceive a close resemblance to the earth-monster of the Maya peoples, especially as represented in the carvings at Copan and in the Temple of the Cross at Palenque. These afford almost irrefragable proof of the correctness of the supposition regarding the fusion of the concepts of the earth-beast and the earth-mother which has been outlined.

The deification of the grain is so universal a phenomenon as to require but little explanation, especially in regard to a country where it formed the staple alimentary supply. It appears to have received divine honours in many districts in Mexico and to have been worshipped under a variety of names, but there was little difference between the characters of these several cults, and the absence of this is well exemplified by the readiness with which they amalgamated and the fusion of their central figures.

The deification of the rain, as apart from the idea of a mere rain-god, is perhaps a circumstance of more novelty to the student of Comparative Religion. Tlaloc, the god of rain or moisture, is one of the most striking examples of this process in any mythology. A god of great antiquity, his pluvial character is obvious and undoubted. But he is also the life-giver, the nourisher, who from his home in the green uplands of Tlalocan sends the vivifying rains to fill the deep fissures in the hard, cracked soil of the Valley of Anahuac. In the courtyard of his dwelling stood four jars of water, typifying the four different "kinds" of rainfall which corresponded to the four quarters of the heavens, and these were distributed by his progeny, the Tlaloqu?. There is the best evidence that the aspect of Tlaloc was evolved from the idea of the rain itself. His face is formed from the interlacings of two serpents, his face-paint is black and blue, or dirty yellow like the threatening cloud which holds the thunder-shower. The garments he wears are splashed with ulli rubber-gum, evidently intended to symbolize rain-spots. Indeed, his robe is called the anachxechilli or "dripping garment," and is frequently depicted as set with green gems to represent the sparkling raindrops. Few rain-gods, even the Vedic Indra himself, whom Tlaloc somewhat resembles, are so frankly symbolic of the moisture which falls from above. But his serpentine or dragon-like form renders it probable that, although he was regarded in later times as a personification of the rain, in earlier times he was looked upon as the "Water Provider," the great serpent or dragon which dwelt among the hills and which must be defeated by a hero or demi-god ere it will disgorge the floods which ensure the growth of vegetation.

EVIDENCE OF PRIMITIVE INFLUENCES

We may now examine the elements just described for traces of the early constituents of religion. The conception that the earth itself was a monster gifted with life is evidently the outcome of a belief in "animism" or "personalization," and merits little further notice because of its obvious character. Although the grain was also personalized, there are evidences of its "fetishtic" nature in early times. The great stone figure of Coatlicue already alluded to, besides affording evidence of the dragon-like character of the Earth-mother, exhibits many of the attributes of the primitive fetish manufactured from bundles of maize, large beans representing the eyes and pumpkin pips the teeth, while strips of paper form the mouth and labret. True, these early characteristics have been overlaid by the abounding symbolism of later and more complex ideas--the skin of the sacrificial victim, the serpent-heads, representing perhaps the spouting of that victim's blood from the severed trunk and the skirt of serpents with which myth credited the goddess--but in the clumsy amorphousness of this wondrously carven block we can readily perceive the outline of the maize-sheaves from which its idea was drawn. Indeed the ears and leaves of the maize-plant descend from underneath the skirt of serpents and decorate the knot which secures it behind.

"FETISH" ORIGIN OF GODS

More than one of the great gods exhibit the signs of fetishtic origin. Uitzilopochtli, the great tribal patron deity of the Aztec? of Mexico-Tenochtitlan, was described in tradition as leading them from the mythical northern country of Aztlan in the form of "a little bird." He is usually represented in the pictorial MSS., where his appearance is infrequent, as wearing a mantle made from humming-birds' feathers. Later legend spoke of him as the vindicator of his mother, a goddess of vegetation, and as slaying her detractors, his own half-brothers, while in historical times the whole business of war was arranged through the instrumentality of his oracular image and was carried out chiefly in view of the necessity for human sacrifice which characterized his especial cult. But if we examine the roots of the beliefs which cluster around him, we shall find much to convince us that he was, after the entrance of his people into the Valley of Anahuac, identified with the maguey plant, which forms so familiar an object in the Mexican landscape. Extended proof of this lowly origin will be found in the section which deals with the god.

Quite as humble are the beginnings of the god Tezcatlipoc?, perhaps the most universally dreaded among the Mexican deities. Regarding his precise significance nothing very definite has been arrived at by modern authorities. As will be shown later, the early significance of Tezcatlipoc? arises out of his connection with obsidian, which had an especial sanctity for the Mexicans.

ANIMAL GODS

In our gropings for the roots of the Mexican faith we must not fail to notice those elements which stand apart from agricultural religion and are eloquent of the concepts of a still earlier time. Agricultural theology is as old as agriculture, and no older. The food-supply of the savage prior to that period depends upon the successful conduct of the chase. His gods are therefore often precisely of the species of animal by hunting which he gains a livelihood, and which he frequently regards as placed at his disposal by a great eponymous beast-god of the same kind. Again, for some reason which has never been satisfactorily explained and for which no solution can be found at present, in view of the rather dubious nature of what is known as "totemism," primitive man adores, or in some manner exalts, certain animals on the flesh of which he does not live. But although gods evolved from animal shapes are frequently to be met with in the Mexican pantheon, I can recall no instance of the taboo of the flesh of any animal as an article of diet in Anahuac, or Mexico proper, although this may be found in the cultus of several of the tribes of the more outlying regions.

Uitzilopochtli has the characteristics of a humming-bird, and, indeed, all of the thirteen gods which governed the hours of the day are figured in the tonalamatl of the Aubin Collection with bird-disguises, and one of the thirteen heavens of the Mexicans is set apart for bird-gods, while certain other deities appear in animal forms. For example, Tepeyollotl is figured as a jaguar, Tlaloc and Quetzalcoatl have serpentine characteristics, Itzpapalotl is a butterfly-dragon, Tezcatlipoc? a spider, a jaguar, or a turkey, Mixcoatl takes deer shape, and so on. But some of these forms are probably symbolic rather than "totemic." The cult of Nagualism, a degraded post-Colombian form of the old religion, was insistent upon the connection of its votaries with an animal spirit or familiar from an early period of their lives--that is, to each individual a personal "totem" was assigned, precisely as is the case among many North American tribes at the present time and as among the Lacandone of Yucatan.

GROWTH OF THE RAIN-CULT

Enough has been said in view of the restricted nature of the evidence, to prove that Mexican religion passed through much the same primitive conditions as other faiths. Further evidence on this point will be adduced as the gods are severally described. We may now proceed to examine such proof as we possess of the onward and upward progress of the cult of rain and growth in Mexico. We may, perhaps, imagine the institution of tribal or village rain or grain fetishes, which in course of time would attain godhead by reason of popularity or supposed auspiciousness. The ministers of these would probably bear a strong resemblance to the medicine-men of North American Indian tribes. Warfare undoubtedly played a great part in the fortunes of these local cults. Thus, did the people of a certain tribal god triumph in feud or battle, his worship would almost certainly be enlarged in a territorial sense. But such a triumph would be a small incentive to further conquest when compared with the absolute necessity for war engendered by the holy law that captives must be obtained for purposes of sacrifice to the tribal deities.

THE NECESSITY FOR HUMAN SACRIFICE

The origins of the institution of human sacrifice in Mexico are obscure. Native mythology attributed its invention to a group of earth-goddesses headed by Teteo innan or Tlazolteotl, who in the Calendar year "eight-rabbit" came to the city of Tollan or Tula from the Huaxtec country and, summoning the captives whom they had taken in that land, said to them: "We want to couple the earth with you, we want to hold a feast with you, for till now no battle-offerings have been made with men."

This myth is, perhaps, aetiological, but it would seem to have some historical basis. Deeply rooted in the Mexican mind was the idea that unless the gods were abundantly refreshed with human blood they would perish of hunger and old age and would be unable to undertake their hypothetical labours in connection with the growth of the crops. Whence came this idea? Undoubtedly from that process of barbaric reasoning through which Mexican man had convinced himself that the amount of rainfall would be in ratio to the amount of blood shed sacrificially. Seler has indicated his belief in such a process of reasoning by stating that "the one was intended to draw down the other, the blood which was offered was intended to bring down the rain upon the fields." This, then, is the precise nature of the compact between Mexican man and his gods, Do ut des, "Give us rain, and we shall give you blood." Once this is understood the basic nature of Mexican religion becomes clear, and all the later additions of theology and priestly invention can be viewed as mere excrescences and ornaments upon the simple architecture of the temple of the rain-cult.

The evolution of a higher cultus is frequently identified with a more intimate acquaintance with the heavenly bodies, but it is not generally appreciated or understood by students of Comparative Religion that at least two different kinds of conception underlie the general idea. A luminary, sun, moon, or star, may be deified and achieve godhead by reason of striking natural characteristics, or, on the other hand, it may be identified with some god already known. Thus Mexican myth, as related to Sahagun by the natives, asserted that the gods met at Teotihuacan and told how two of their number, Nanahuatl and Tecciztecatl, sacrificed themselves by leaping into a great fire, becoming the sun and moon respectively. The remaining gods, sacrificing themselves also, "conferred life upon the stars," that is they became identified with the several stellar constellations, becoming known as the Centzon Mimixcoa and Centzon Uitznaua, or "Four hundred Northerners" and "Four hundred Southerners," as they occupied the sky on its northern or southern side.

Although this myth and a version of it current at Texcuco and given by Mendieta in his Historia Ecclesiastica both represent Nanahuatl as the sun-god, he was not so known in Mexican popular religion and priestly practice, and was indeed a form of the god Xolotl, a deity of obscure characteristics. Tecciztecatl certainly was regarded as the moon-god, but the solar luminary was known as Tonatiuh or Piltzintecutli. As has already been stated, there are sound reasons for the belief that the solar cult was a relatively late institution in Mexico, although in some parts of the country it may have flourished for generations before it became popular in Tenochtitlan. Slightly elaborating our former reasons for this statement, we may indicate: The name Tonatiuh appears in the myths of the origin of the sun as that of the luminary, but not of a god. The circumstance that Tonatiuh was regarded by the Mexicans as a "heaven," a Valhalla, to which the warriors slain in sacrifice betook themselves after death, and therefore represented a place of reward, a class of myth which is nearly always of comparatively late origin, and is the fruit of mature speculation. The fact that Tonatiuh was closely identified with the warrior caste and therefore with human sacrifice, which was a late introduction and the paramount reason for the existence of that caste. That the original Calendar was a lunar one. But these and other considerations will be dealt with more fully when we undertake the elucidation of the sun-god's characteristics.

The amalgamation of the solar cult and of the Quetzalcoatl cult with the rain-cult is not an isolated phenomenon in the world's religious history. The analogy of the fusion of the Osirian cult of Egypt with that of Ra will occur to everyone in this connection, and as the theology of the priests of the more aristocratic faith became in the event subsidiary in real importance to that of the far more popular Osirian worship, in the same manner the Quetzalcoatl cult, and in some measure the solar, were of much less real significance in Mexican life generally than the earlier popular belief. The solar worship seems to have successfully and naturally identified itself with the rain-cult, as also did the Quetzalcoatl religion. The myth which described Quetzalcoatl as the founder or inventor of the tonalamatl or Book of Fate probably records an effort on the part of his priesthood to identify their cult with the popular agricultural religion or to systematize or reduce to symbolic form an idea which until that time had probably existed in an uncertain and chaotic condition in the popular mind. For even if the tonalamatl were introduced from the Zapotec or Mixtec country or the Maya region, as is generally supposed, it required skilful arrangement to make it subserve the purposes of Aztec religion. The priesthood and cultus of Quetzalcoatl were widespread throughout Central America and Mexico, and its ministers appear to have adapted themselves with skill and patience to the conditions of the various regions to which they penetrated, the result of their labours never being quite the same in any two regions. It is remarkable, too, that, probably by reason of the superior erudition and ability of its priesthood, the caste of Quetzalcoatl held chief sway in Mexican ecclesiastical government. But a partial, though by no means complete, hostility to human sacrifice and ceremonial cannibalism, a grudging acquiescence in what it had, in all likelihood, denounced in earlier times, gave it in later days a somewhat aloof and separate character.

We must now glance briefly at such evidences as we possess of the distinct racial or cultural elements which assisted in the development of Mexican religion. Three such elements appear to be indicated. It would seem that from an early period a people of settled and agricultural habits occupied the Mexican Plateau. These were probably relatively aboriginal to the Toltecs and may have been of Otomi or Tarascan blood, and to them I would refer the original foundation of a rain-cult having Tlaloc as its principal deity. Tlaloc was unquestionably one of the most venerable gods of Mexico, indeed he is the only god who can be identified with certainty in the remains of pre-Nahuan date at Teotihuacan. Tradition spoke of the finding of an ancient idol representing him by the early Chichimec immigrants. At least five of the yearly festivals were celebrated in his honour, and ancient sculptured representations of him have been found in Tarascan territory, in Michoacan, Teotihuacan, Teotitlan, in the Zapotec country and in Guatemala, thus affording irrefragable testimony to his antiquity. Rather later than the culture which probably founded the rain-cult was the Toltec civilization, which regarded Quetzalcoatl as its chiefest divinity, and which probably was brought from the Huaxtec country. But the Toltec are said to have been of Nahua blood, and may have been composed of a Nahua populace and a Huaxtec or proto-Maya aristocracy. The later hordes of Nahua found these elements already settled upon the land, but brought with them a religion which, if it was destined to have a powerful effect upon the faith of the agricultural folk with whom they came into contact, was also to be quite as strongly influenced by it.

Reverting to the conditions prevailing in Mexico prior to the entry of the Chichimec Nahua, we may regard the rain-cult of the Tlaloc religion as in some measure resembling that of the Pueblo Indians of Northern Mexico and Arizona at the present time. The serpentine character of its principal deity, the appeal for rain which composes the basis of most of the prayers to him, provide strong proofs of such a similarity, and, as has been said, the antiquity of the rain religion is proved by the discovery of early sculptured forms and the facts adduced above. The Tlaloc religion had also been able in some degree to retain its own sacrificial customs, the drowning of victims being practised in addition to the Nahua method of slaughter on the stone of sacrifice. The date of the introduction of the religion of Quetzalcoatl is generally placed at the middle of the eighth century of our era, so that we are perhaps justified in assuming that the faith of the greater portion of Anahuac before that time had as its basis the rain-cult, as represented by Tlaloc.

The religious customs of those peoples who were relatively aboriginal to the Nahua support the theory of the predominance of the rain-cult in Mexico from a very early period, and Torquemada states that during seasons of drought the Otomi sought to propitiate the rain-gods by sacrificing a virgin on the top of a hill. Espinosa says that the Tarascans sacrificed snakes rather than human beings--possibly for the same reason as the Esquimaux beat their dogs during an eclipse, in order that the Great Dog which causes the undesirable phenomenon may desist, the Tarascans probably killing the reptiles in question in order that the Great Snake might relent and send rain. The towns about Chapala paid divine honours to the spirit of the adjacent lake. Late though these survivals may have been at the era of the Conquest, yet they seem to have enshrined the memory of an early rain-cult among the peoples with whom they were found, and many others could be adduced.

THE QUETZALCOATL CULT

The appearance of the Quetzalcoatl cult in Mexico, which would seem to have entered the country at some time about the middle of the eighth century, must have caused very considerable alterations in the simple and probably as yet uninfluenced rain religion which it found in occupancy. From whatever portion of the Isthmian tract it came, one thing regarding it is positively certain--that it introduced into Mexico the rudiments of the calendric computation evolved in Central America. In its phase as imported by the apostles of the Quetzalcoatl religion, it seems fairly certain that the tonalamatl was of the nature of a lunar time-count, and the probabilities are that its protagonists discovered on their arrival in Anahuac that a count similar in character was in use among the priesthood of the Tlaloc worshippers, who as an agricultural people could hardly have been without some such system of computation. The Quetzalcoatl faith, however, was manifestly of a considerably higher status than that which it encountered, as is obvious not only by the numerous and extraordinary traditions regarding the Toltec civilization, but the actual remains it has left. It is clear that, whether it found a calendar or time-count already existing, it placated aboriginal opinion by the amalgamation of the several festivals of the rain-god with its own. The fact that the day-signs of the Mexican calendar or tonalamatl are almost identical with those of the Maya tonalamatl is good proof that the former was developed from the latter; and if only a small proportion of Toltec deities find a place in its monthly festivals, that would seem to be due to the circumstance that later Nahua demands for the inclusion of their tribal deities were acceded to. We may, perhaps, imagine the early tonalamatl of the Quetzalcoatl missionaries to have been similar in form to that of the Maya--that is, it must have been almost wholly concerned with the festivals of deities of a purely agricultural kind.

But the religion of Quetzalcoatl, as observed in his Yucatec form of Kukulkan and his Guatemalan variant of Gucumatz, bore a close resemblance to that of Tlaloc. In Yucatan Quetzalcoatl was regarded by priests and people as the great rain-making priest, the god of moisture, whereas in Mexico he is merely the sweeper of the ways to the Tlaloc deities of rain. This is surely eloquent of the fact that the Tlaloc religion was not only of greater antiquity in Mexico, but that its ministers were disinclined to permit the deity of the new religion to adopt a status similar to that of their own god. With true priestly diplomacy, then, it would seem that they temporized by affording Quetzalcoatl a status as the great rain-making priest, a character which he retained to the last. Myth certainly alludes to Tlaloc as the supplanter of Quetzalcoatl in the affections of the goddess Chalchihuitlicue and as robbing the peaceful culture-hero of the maize-plant which he had discovered. This does not necessarily signify the defeat of an older religion by a more novel faith, but may relate to a successful defence by the more ancient cultus and its absorption of the other.

The theory of the amalgamation of the Tlaloc and Quetzalcoatl cults appears to me to be in some measure assisted by the circumstance that the devotees of both placed a high value upon minerals of a green colour. The word chalchihuitl , of such common occurrence in the works of the Spanish authors who wrote on Mexican affairs, must be taken as applying with equal force to jadeite, nephrite, turquoise, emerald, chlormelanite, green quartz, precious serpentine, or, indeed, any mineral of a green shade. A tradition existed that Quetzalcoatl brought the use and manipulation of jadeite into Mexico, but green was a salient hue in the insignia of Tlaloc, and the name of his consort Chalchihuitlicue is eloquent of his connection with the several kinds of stones which the Mexicans grouped under the name chalchihuitl. Whatever significance attached to the colour of these stones, apart from their nature as precious stones, whether or not they were symbolic of water or verdure, or metal, or of all of these agencies, which are regarded as so potent by primitive peoples, it is apparent that both cults employed them symbolically or pseudo-scientifically, and it therefore seems probable that each of these religions was originally connected with the worship of water, and therefore the influence associated with and contained in water, and that this belief would render their amalgamation a process of little difficulty.

If, however, such similarities eventually made for the union of the cults, traditions were not lacking regarding their early differences or hostilities. As has been said, myths survived into historical times, which stated that although Quetzalcoatl had succeeded in discovering maize, Tlaloc had stolen it from him and had also succeeded in alienating from him the affection of Chalchihuitlicue, who had originally been regarded as the wife of Quetzalcoatl. But these myths are undeniably of late origin. Quetzalcoatl's status as a celibate god or priest would scarcely allow his name to be connected with matrimony, and it is plain that Chalchihuitlicue, the water goddess, is in a sense merely a personification of the chalchihuitl stone, which was, perhaps, originally one of the symbols of the Quetzalcoatl cult and which later became personified in female form, thus giving rise to the myth in question. Nor do these tales necessarily prove the priority of the Quetzalcoatl cult, which was indeed regarded as responsible for practically all Mexican civilization and which would naturally be credited with the introduction of the use of the sacred stones.

THE CULT OF OBSIDIAN

But if the later Nahua immigrants also came to regard these chalchihuitl stones with reverence, at the period of their entrance to the Mexican plateau they paid devotion to a mineral of a very different kind. And this it is which helps us to regard their faith as differing entirely from those other faiths which already flourished in the land. The mineral with which their cult was so closely connected was obsidian, a vitreous natural glass found in the upper volcanic strata of Mexico and northern California, which flakes readily from the core by pressure and gains by mere fracture a razor-like edge of considerable penetrative power. The principal quarry of this volcanic glass was the mountain known as the Cerro de las Navajas near Timapan, and from this centre the itztli, by which name obsidian was known to the Mexicans, was widely distributed by barter over a very considerable area. There would seem to be proof that this mineral, so suitable for the purposes of the nomadic hunter, was anciently known far to the north of Mexico. The observations of Dr. G. M. Dawson in British Columbia satisfied him that trading intercourse was engaged in by the coast tribes with those of the interior along the Frazer River Valley and far to the south. From the remotest times embraced in their native traditions, the Bilqula of Dean Inlet have possessed a trade route by way of the Bella Coola River to the Tinn? country, along which trail broken implements and chips of obsidian have been found. Many of the routes in British Columbia have also yielded chips and flakes of obsidian, which, the Tinn? Indians stated, was obtained from a mountain near the headwaters of the Salmon River , formerly resorted to for the purpose of procuring the mineral. The Indian name of this mountain is Bece, which, Dr. Dawson suggested, is the same with the "Mexican" name for knife, itztli, an etymology which may be of Nahuatlac origin. Mr. T. C. Weston, of the Geological Survey, also noted in 1883 the finding of a flake of obsidian in connection with a layer of buffalo bones occurring in alluvium, and evidently of considerable antiquity, near Fort McLeod, Alberta. The nearest source of such a material is the Yellowstone Park region. The coast tribes of British Columbia have been traders for untold generations, exchanging oolactin oil for such material as they could make implements from, and there seems to be no doubt that the Mound-builders of Ohio, Wisconsin, and Kentucky were also acquainted with obsidian, which they could only have obtained by the process of barter. It was thus either to be found in the regions from which the Nahua are thought to have come, or else obtainable through the channels of trade.

If, then, it be granted that the Chichimec Nahua were acquainted with obsidian and its properties before their entrance upon the Plateau of Anahuac , sufficient time had elapsed for their development of a cult, which, at the era of the Conquest, exhibited traces of a very considerable antiquity. It was, naturally, as a hunting people that they employed weapons of obsidian. The herds of deer on the flesh of which they chiefly lived roamed the steppes, and proof abounds that the customs of the chase strongly influenced the religious ideas of the early Nahua. Certain of their gods, indeed, seem to have been developed from cervine forms, for among barbarous races the animal worshipped is that which provides the tribe with its staple food, or, more correctly, a great eponymous figure of that animal is adored--for example, the Great Deer, who sends the smaller deer to keep the savage in life. In like manner barbarous fisherfolk are wont to worship the Great Fish, which sends them its progeny or its subjects to serve as food. These deer gods or hunting gods in some way connected with the deer--Itzpapalotl, Itzcu?y?, Mixcoatl, Camaxtli--had also stellar or solar attributes. The deer was slain by the obsidian weapon, which, therefore, came to be regarded as the magical weapon, that by which food was procured. In the course of time it assumed a sacred significance, the hunting gods themselves came to wield it, and it was thought of as coming from the stars or the heavens where the gods dwelt, in precisely the same manner as flint arrowheads were regarded by the peasantry of Europe as "elf-arrows" or "thunder-stones"--that is, as something supernatural, falling from above.

But the obsidian itself became deified as Tezcatlipoc?. I have retained the full proof of this assertion for the section which treats of that god, and must here content myself with a summary of it. The whole cult of obsidian centred in the personality of Tezcatlipoc?. His idol was made of that stone, and in Codex Borbonicus his sandals are painted with the zigzag line of the obsidian snake. In his variant of Itztli he was the god of the sacrificial knife of obsidian, and in certain codices he is represented as having such a knife in place of a foot. From this stone, too, divinatory mirrors were made, one of which was held by the idols of Tezcatlipoc? and served as the mirror or scrying-stone in which he witnessed the doings of mankind. Obsidian, the great life-giver, food-getter, blood-provider, became identified in the form of this god with the cause or breath of life, which, in turn, was identified with the wind, and therefore it came to be classed among those magical stones which in some mysterious manner are considered capable of raising a tempest. In this manner Tezcatlipoc? came to be regarded as a god of wind, and has been identified with the Hurakan of the Quiches of Guatemala, from whose name the expression "hurricane" has been borrowed and who was probably introduced into Central America by the Nahua.

When the nomadic Chichimec adopted an agricultural condition, obsidian had doubtless been regarded as sacred for many generations. It was by virtue of this magical stone that the nourishment of the gods was maintained by the sacrifice of deer; but when the Chichimec came to embrace a more settled existence within an agricultural community where deer must certainly have been more scarce, the nourishment of the gods had necessarily to be maintained by other means. The manner in which this was effected is quite clear. Slaves and war-captives were sacrificed instead of beasts of the chase, and at the festival of Mixcoatl, the greatest of the Chichimec gods, women were sacrificed in the place of deer, and after being slain were carried down the steps of the teocalli, their wrists and ankles tied together precisely in the manner in which a deer is trussed by the hunter. The transition from deer-sacrifice to a human holocaust and from the hunting to the agricultural condition is well illustrated by an ancient hymn relating to the goddess Itzpapalotl , who was associated with Mixcoatl.

"O, she has become a goddess of the melon cactus, Our Mother Itzpapalotl, the obsidian butterfly. Her food is on the Nine Plains, She was nurtured on the hearts of deer, Our Mother, the earth-goddess."

The inference in these lines seems to be that whereas Itzpapalotl was formerly a goddess of the Chichimec nomads of the steppes, who sacrificed deer to her, she has now become the deity of the melon-cactus patch and an agricultural community. Her first human victim is also mentioned by Camargo, who states that the Chichimec, coming to the province of Tepeueuec, sacrificed a victim to her by shooting him with arrows. Itzpapalotl has more than one cervine attribute.

Mexican tradition makes it very plain that obsidian, because of its blood-procuring properties, came to be regarded as the source of all life, as the very principle of existence. Tonacaciuatl, the creative goddess, as we shall see, gave birth to an obsidian knife from which sprang sixteen hundred demigods who peopled the earth, and the infant which the goddess Ciuacoatl leaves in the cradle in the market-place undergoes metamorphosis into an obsidian knife. As the Codices show, grain is often pictured in the form of the obsidian knife of sacrifice. Just as in many myths, both in the Old World and the New, flint was regarded as the great fertilizer because of its supposed connection with the lightning, so was obsidian. Thus all the elements which go to make for growth and life were regarded as having a connection with this mineral, even the sun itself, as we shall see, being identified with the Mirror of Tezcatlipoc?. The idea that the sun could not live without human blood was a purely Nahua conception, arising out of an earlier belief that it must be nourished upon the blood of beasts. Of the transitional process abundant proof exists. The hunter's obsidian weapon which supplied the necessary pabulum became in turn the weapon of the warrior who procured victims for the holocaust, and the sacred knife of the priest who sacrificed them to the deity. Obsidian was thus chiefly the war weapon and the sacrificial weapon, but the traditions relating to it refer to practically all the offices of human art, industry, and activity generally.

Lest this hypothesis seem overstrained, analogies may be indicated. That which is initially sacred in a primitive cult frequently comes to have interrelations with the whole environment of its deities. Thus the worship of the oak by the Druids appears to have given an oak-like virtue to the oracular birds which dwelt in its branches, to the soil from which it grew, to the sky above it, to the priests who ministered to it and to the sacred implements they employed. The same may be said of the oak-cult of Zeus and the vine-cult of Dionysos. The numerous traditions which cluster round the ceremonial use of jade in China are eloquent of such a tendency. Thus trees, plants, animals, and natural objects are all in a manner identified and connected with the beautiful jade stone in its character as an imparter of vitality. Thus in the great worship of the gods whose cult was connected with obsidian, well-nigh everything with which it had interrelations came to partake of the nature of obsidian--grain, the earth, the atmosphere, the sun, the stars, the priesthood, blood, and rain.

The process by which this Nahua cult became amalgamated with those of Tlaloc and Quetzalcoatl seems fairly clear. Upon their settlement on the Plateau of Anahuac it is plain from the terms of certain myths that the Nahua did not regard the cult of Quetzalcoatl in any friendly manner. Tezcatlipoc? is spoken of as driving him from the country, and it is probable that to begin with a certain amount of persecution may have been inflicted upon his adherents. But the Nahua would undoubtedly come to recognize the value of the calendar system connected with his cult, and it is clear that they did so from the fact that we find included in it certain of their principal gods. The final process of amalgamation probably took place during the eleventh and twelfth centuries, for, as seen at the Conquest period, the union of the three great cults of Mexico must have occupied several centuries. Such a duration of time was necessary for the development of a homogeneous and involved symbolism, which was obviously based on a tacit recognition of the unity of the Mexican faith. Initial disparities seem to be indicated principally by ancient traditions, of which perhaps the most notable was that which spoke of the different heavens of the three original cults, the Tlalocan of the worshippers of Tlaloc, the Tlapallan or over-sea paradise of the Quetzalcoatl cult, and the Sun-house or Valhalla of the Nahua. A striking proof of the adjustment of the chronology of the three cults may perhaps be found in the myths which speak of the existence of several "suns" or ages prior to the historical era, the "rulers" or patrons of which were, according to the most trustworthy sources, Tezcatlipoc?, Quetzalcoatl, Tlaloc, and Chalchihuitlicue, goddess of the Tlaloc cult.

The attribution of higher and abstract qualities to the gods was probably of comparatively late origin. Especially is this to be observed in the case of Tezcatlipoc?, to whom, at the period of the Conquest, we find attributed such a bewildering array of qualities, both concrete and abstract, lofty and the reverse, as would seem to indicate that, had European influences failed to penetrate to Anahuac, his worship might have reached the monotheistic stage, and in time have overshadowed that of the other gods of the Mexican pantheon. Undoubtedly, too, the priesthood, and probably the nobility, fostered a more esoteric and loftier type of religion than was understood of the people, and good proof is forthcoming that theological questions of greater or less complexity had begun to exercise the minds of the hierarchy.

At the epoch of the Conquest it is abundantly clear that the Aztec? had succeeded in establishing their tribal cult, enriched with the beliefs of the peoples they had conquered, over a wide area. They had adopted into their pantheon such deities of the surrounding tribes as appealed to their imagination, or were too powerful to be ignored, and actually "imprisoned" many others of lesser puissance, whose idols were kept in confinement in a building within the precincts of the great temple at Mexico-Tenochtitlan.

Within the historical period but little radical difference existed between the several Mexican cults, which all appear to have been affected by a common influence. We observe, therefore, the phenomenon of certain early religious forms originating under common influences, separated for centuries and profoundly altered by immigrant forces, at length brought together again by the amalgamating powers of conquest under the influence of one central and paramount cult, only, when once more united, to find a common destruction at the hands of the ministers of an alien and invading faith.

At the period of the Conquest, then, we find the Mexican religion relatively homogeneous in character, with a widespread ascendancy, its provincial activities exhibiting differences of little more than local kind. Even in its most far-flung manifestations, indeed, it never showed such variations as permit us to say that the most dissimilar or distant variety of the cult entirely differed from the metropolitan exemplar. This being so, we are as fully justified in speaking of a Mexican religion as we are in alluding to an Italic or a Hellenic religion, and perhaps more so than in extending the analogy to Egypt, where anything like homogeneity in either theology or popular worship appears never to have been attained. We find, then, that the religion of ancient Mexico, as known at the Conquest period, was the outcome of later religious and ethical impulses brought to bear upon a simple rain-cult, which, judging from the atmospheric conditions essential to it, must have been indigenous to the country. Although the cults of its several deities still retained some measure of distinctiveness, all had long before been amalgamated in what was really a national faith. There are signs, too, that a fully developed pantheon had been evolved, which mirrored an elaborate social system in caste, rank, and guild, but the mythical material from which this might have been reconstructed is only partly available. We find, too, that practically every god in the Mexican hierarchy, whatever his original status, was in some manner connected with the rain-cult. Indeed, the rain-cult is the central and coalescing factor in Mexican religion, its nucleus and foundation. As might be expected, most of the deities of agricultural growth appear to be of either Toltec or alien origin. Thus, Chicomecoatl was Toltec, while Tlazolteotl, Xochiquetzal, Xilonen, Cinteotl, and Xipe were all alien deities of the older settled peoples, but what their relationship to the three great cults of Mexico may have been is not apparent. Most of these deities appear in the tonalamatl, so that their worship must have been adopted at a comparatively early date.

Students of religious phenomena not infrequently show distaste for the deeper consideration of the Mexican faith, not only because of the difficulties which beset the fuller study of this interesting phase of human belief in the eternal verities, but also, perhaps, because of the "diabolic" reputation which it has achieved, and the grisly horrors to which it is thought those who examine it must perforce accustom themselves. It is certainly not the most obviously prepossessing of the world's religions. Yet if a due allowance be made for the earnestness of its priests and people in the strict observance of a system the hereditary burden of which no one man or generation could hope to remove, and the religion of the Aztec? be viewed in a liberal and tolerant spirit, those who are sufficiently painstaking in their scrutiny of it will in time find themselves richly rewarded. Not only does it abound in valuable evidences for the enrichment of the study of religious science and tradition, but by degrees its astonishing beauty of colour and wealth of symbolic variety will appeal to the student with all the enchantment of discovery. The echoes of the sacred drum of serpent-skin reverberating from the lofty pyramid of Uitzilopochtli, and passing above the mysterious city of Tenochtitlan with all the majesty of Olympic thunder, will seem not less eloquent of the soul of a vanished faith than do the memories of the choral chants of Hellas. And if the recollection of the picturesque but terrible rites of this gifted, imaginative, and not undistinguished people harrows the feelings, does it not arouse in us that fatal consciousness of man's helplessness before the gods, which primitive religion invariably professes and which reason almost seems to uphold?

COSMOGONY

Accounts of the creation of the world and of man, even as handed down to us by those writers on Mexican mythology who had the best opportunities for collecting them, are prone to vagueness, and differ so materially one from another that we will probably not be in error if we impute their inconsistencies to a variety of local origins. As regards the agencies by whom the creation or reconstruction of the earth was accomplished, we are not in doubt, for certain passages in the Interpretative Codices find almost exact corroboration in the creation story contained in the Popol Vuh, the mythic book of the Quiche of Guatemala , as well as in similar works of Maya origin.

The interpreter of the Codex Telleriano-Remensis states that the god Tonacatecutli, "when it appeared good to him, breathed and divided the waters of the heavens and the earth, which at first were all confused together, and disposed them as they now are." Further, "he breathed and begot Quetzalcoatl, not by connection with a woman, but by his breath alone." The first of these deities, and his female counterpart Tonacaciuatl, are almost certainly spoken of in the Popol Vuh as "the serpents covered with green feathers," which, farther on in the Quiche work, are alluded to as Xpiyacoc and Xmucane, gods who are generally admitted to be the same as the Mexican Oxomoco and Cipactonal, who, again, are either identical with or closely connected with Tonacatecutli and his spouse. Quetzalcoatl, too, appears in the Popol Vuh as Gucumatz, a known Quiche equivalent or translation of his name, for as "wind" or "breath" he was also thought of as "spirit" or "life," and probably his fecundating efficacy as a water-bearing god was also taken into consideration. In the Sahagun MS. in the Academia de la Historia, Madrid, is a passage which reads when translated: "They say that he made, created, and formed us whose creatures we are, Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl, and he made the heaven, the sun, the earth." The Anales de Quauhtitlan or Codex Chimalpopca, too, relates how Quetzalcoatl created the four classes of humanity, the men of the four "suns" or periods of the world, and how men were made by him on the day "7 wind," and, as we shall see, the work of creation in detail is alluded to in the Historia de los Mexicanos por sus Pinturas, as effected by him and by Tezcatlipoc?. Lastly, we find in the Creative Council of the Quiche heaven, Hurakan, who is none other than Tezcatlipoc?, a deity closely connected with Quetzalcoatl in at least one Mexican creation myth.

Having thus satisfied ourselves regarding the creative personnel of the Mexican pantheon, and preserving further proof of the constructive character of certain of these deities until we come to discuss them individually, we may proceed to examine such myths as tell of the formation of the world. In the belief of the Mexicans the earth was not destined to receive its present inhabitants, although occupied by man-like beings, until it had undergone a series of cataclysms or partial destructions, regarding the precise incidence and even the number of which there is a marked difference of opinion on the part of the older authorities.

The interpreter of the Codex Vaticanus states that "in the first age" "water reigned until at last it destroyed the world.... This age, according to their computation, lasted 4,008 years, and on the occurrence of that great deluge they say that men were changed into fish, named Tlacamichin, which signifies men-fish." The second age, he tells us, lasted for 4,010 years and the world was ended by the force of violent winds, the catastrophe concluding by the transformation of men into apes. The third age endured for 4,801 years and ended in a universal fire, and in the fourth, which occupied 5,042 years, the human race, which had never ceased to transmit a few survivors from one of these epochs to the next, was almost destroyed by famine.

In his Historia Chichimeca Ixtlilxochitl calls the first of these epochs Atonatiuh , in which all men perished by a great inundation. The second epoch, Tlachitonatiuh , ended with violent earthquakes. In this age lived gigantic beings called Quinames. The third epoch was Ecatonatiuh, or "Sun of Wind," in which edifices, trees, and men were nearly all destroyed by hurricanes, those who remained being changed into creatures of an intelligence so low as to be almost indistinguishable from monkeys. The Texcucan chronicler does not furnish us with the name of the present age in his Historia, nor in his Relaciones, where, however, we receive fuller information regarding the first three epochs, which he succeeds in carelessly transposing, giving the third the second place.

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