Page:Vol 3 History of Mexico by H H Bancroft.djvu/274

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
254
CORN RIOT IN THE CAPITAL.

232, cites the Imperio Chichimeco, as Del Origin de los Indios Mexicanos; the Fenix del Occidente, as De la predicacion de Santo Tomas Apostol, these and the Ciclografia Mexicana and Mitologia Mexicana being the only works of Sigüenza mentioned. The most definite information we have of these works is from his friends and companions, Sebastian de Guzman y Córdoba, and Vetancurt.

Guzman, in the preface to Sigüenza's Libra Astronomica, which he published, says of the Año Mexicano, 'this book, though not large in body, has a gigantic soul, and Don Cárlos only could have given it being.' It is a treatise on the Mexican system of chronology. Beginning with the deluge, by comparing the occurrences of eclipses and other events as recorded by both Aztecs and the nations of the old world, the historical epochs of the former were adjusted to the chronology of the latter. The Ciclografia Mexicana, also a manuscript, and devoted to the same subject, is cited by Nicolás Antonio, Pinelo, and other bibliographers as a distinct work, but I am disposed to regard it with Beristain as another title of the same work. The Imperio Chichimeco, according to Guzman, was a history of the different nations composing the Chichimec empire, their customs, religion, and political and military institutions; the knowledge of their system of chronology enabling the author to correct the errors of previous writers. The Fenix del Occidente, to which in modern times has also been given the title of Fenix de la America, was an attempt to prove that the apostle Saint Thomas had preached in New Spain, by identifying him with Quetzalcoatl. Vetancurt, writing between 1692 and 1698, mentions the Geneologia de los Emperadores Mexicanos. Del Origen de los Indios Mexicanos, an account of the origin of the Toltecs, is mentioned by Vetancurt and Nicolás Antonio among Sigüenza's manuscripts, and the latter also cites the Mitologia Mexicana, or the Mexican gods compared with those of the ancient Romans, Greeks, and Egyptians, whose existence some authors are inclined to doubt, believing that the mythology of Torquemada is confounded with the Anotaciones críticas, á las obras de Bernal Diaz del Castillo y de Fr. Juan de Torquemada, another manuscript by Sigüenza. Several other manuscripts on religion, politics, science, and biography are mentioned by the various bibliographers, the most complete list being given by Beristain, in his Bib. Hisp. Amer., 160 et seq. Pinelo, Epitome, ii. 581 et seq., gives the extensive list of Sigüenza 's printed and manuscript works, but it is far from complete, and the list of manuscripts is taken wholly from Vetancurt and Nicolás Antonio. Among the other authorities who give lists more or less complete, chiefly compilations or copies of the foregoing, are Ortiz, Mex. Indep. y Libre, 192-7; Museo Mex., ii. 471-9; Gallo, Hombres Ilus., ii. 351-52; Zamacois, Hist. Méj., V. 490-1. Of all these valuable manuscripts but few now remain, and those are exeeedingly rare. In the preface to his Parayso Occidental, p. xiv, Sigüenza laments the want of means to publish his works, and fears that they will die with him, a fear which was in part realized. At his death, which occurred at Mexico City August 22, 1700, he left to the Jesuits, besides his library, twenty-eight volumes of manuscripts. At the expulsion of this order in 1767 they were transferred to the university of Mexico, where but some eight or nine volumes existed about the beginning of the present century. Among the manuscripts which have survived the inexcusable neglect