2. The Mexican Tribes.—The seven principal tribes of Mexico, called collectively the Nahuatlacs, spoke dialects of the same language, and all alike had a tradition that their ancestors came from the north, and that the separate tribes came into Mexico at long intervals apart They arrived in the following order as to time: 1, Sochomilcos; 2, Chalcas; 3, Tepanecans; 4, Tescucans; 5, Tlatluicans; G, Tlascalans; 7, Aztecs or Mexicans. They settled in different parts of Mexico The Cholulans, Tepeacas, and Huexatsincos spoke dialects of the Nahuatlac language, and were severally subdivisions of one or the other preceding tribes. They had the same tradition of a northern origin. These several tribes were among the most prominent in Mexico at the period of Spanish discovery. Some of the tribes of Yucatan and Central America also had similar traditions of an original migration of their ancestors from the north.
Acosta, who visited Mexico in 1585, and whose work was published at Seville in 1589, states the order of the migration of the Mexican tribes as above given, and farther says that they "come from other far countries which lie toward the north, where now they have discovered a kingdom they oall New Mexico. There are two provinces in this country, the one called Aztlan, which is to say, a place of Herons [Cranes], and the other Teculhuacan, which signifies a land of such whose grandfathers were divine. The Navatalcas [Nahuatlacs] point their beginning and first territory in the figure of a cave, and say they came forth of seven caves to come and people the land of Mexico."[1] The same tradition, substantially, is given by
- ↑ The Natural and Moral History of the East and West Indies, London ed., 1604, Grimstone's Trans., pp. 497, 504.
ear grew out of it but six inches from the ground. Specimens of the ear we obtained showed that it was about five inches-long, with the kernel small and flinty. The ear is in four colors, white, red, yellow, and black, each being one or the other of these colors. In a few cases two colors were intermixed in the same ear. It seemed probable that this was the primitive maize of the American aborigines, from which all other varieties have been developed. A few cobs which we found at a cliff house on the Mancos River corresponded with the Conejos ear in size, and were probably the same variety. Afterwards at Taos I found the same ear in white, red, yellow, and black; the staple maize now cultivated at this pueblo, but much larger. I brought away several fine ears saved for seed. One black ear measured twelve inches in length, with twelve rows of kernels, while the white variety, both at Conejos and Taos, had each fourteen rows.
Finally, a dry country, neither excessively hot nor moist, like the San Juan region, would seem to be most favorable for the development and self-propagation of maize as well as plants until man appeared for their domestication. These are but speculations, but if they should prompt further investigations concerning the place of nativity of this wonderful cereal, which has been such an important factor in the advancement of the Indian family, and which is also destined to prove such a support to our own, these suggestions will not have been made in vain.
