Page:The American Indian.djvu/281

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CHIBCHA AREA
229

and tin; a gold wire technique from which filigree work was derived; fine feather mosaics by the glue method for which large aviaries were maintained; work in obsidian and jadeite highly developed, cutting tools, mirrors, and ornaments; stone mosaic ornaments; finely woven cloth of cotton and agave with excellent dyes; fair potters; books on parchment and on maguey paper; an organized priesthood in whose hands were education and higher knowledge; literature was cultivated; separate schools for girls and boys maintained; children of a social class only, educated; a calendar system derived from the Maya, and an elaborate religious system in which sacrifices were prominent; rituals recited in the temples for regular parts of each day and night and almost constant sacrificing of quails, rabbits and flowers; at certain human sacrifices some of the flesh was ceremonially eaten.

Just how far north and south the full series of Aztec traits was diffused cannot be stated, but for many years preceding the landing of Cortez they had been subjecting tribe after tribe and forcing upon them their own culture. The efficiency and character of their political system has been presented with great clearness by Bandelier.[1] To the north, beyond the Tarascan were the Otomi, by tradition the forerunners of the Aztec, but in later times, at least, less typical. Still further north we meet the Pima-speaking tribes, Huichol, Cora, Mayo, Yaqui, etc., whose culture is clearly intermediate to that of the Aztec and the Pueblo area. Just what the relative values may have been in the past will doubtless be revealed by future research.

Immediately to the south were the Mixes, Zoque, Chaponec, etc., some of which appear in early Spanish writings as wild savage cannibals, but their later docile appearance discredits these old accounts. Yet we may be certain that they were of less culture than the Aztec or truly intermediate.

SOUTH AMERICAN CULTURE AREAS

11. The Chibcha Area. On the southern frontier of the old Maya territory we meet such peoples as the Lenca and Xicaque of less intense culture, but still manifesting many of the funda-

  1. Bandelier, 1878. I; 1879. I.