The Stone of the Sun and the First Chapter of the History of Mexico/Marks of the Aztec civilization
HALF-FRONT OF THE BUILDING OF XOCHICALCO
Cycle of 65 Venus or 104 solar years. The double volute (new fire) bears the symbol of the tying of the (52) years, with four numeral marks. The other plumed serpent has the same glyph, harmonizing between both the cycle of 104 years.
THE FOUR CHRONOGRAPHIC CYCLES OF VENUS (QUETZALCÓATL)
Page 72 of the Borgian Codex.
traditions, and the chronology of that so long mysterious race. The so-called Aztec Calendar, which would better be called the Toltec Calendar, is the expression par excellence of the culture of the subjects of Huemántzin, worthy hieroglyph of the people who left to posterity renown of artistic and wise. Here could not be met a higher condensation of beauty and of genius! There is no necessity of a better argument to prove that that race, inventor of the astronomical religion and of the worship of the beautiful twin (Quetzalcóatl), who was in reality but the morning and the evening star, had a real existence and was not a myth as has been suggested. Here is, at last, basis for the first chapter of the uncertain and so many times discussed history of the aboriginal civilizations.
But we have to subject to a rigorous study the possibility certainly not weak, that the Aztecs have been the constructors. Before all, we ought to ask ourselves: Would it be possible that the subjects of Ilhuicamina or of Axayácatl would have worked with exquisite elegance and art a stone which contains the expression of the science and traditions of another people? Although remarkable, the case is not absurd, considering that it treated of the science, traditions, and calendar, fully admitted by the nation, which they considered as the fountain of all their culture. We yet preserve the Greek Zodiac in such wise that an Athenian of the time of Hipparchus, if he were to live again, would be astonished to see in plates and maps the conception of the heavens which his contemporaries had.
But it cannot be believed that the Aztecs would fall to leave some trace, some mark, some date peculiar to themselves in a work of such an extraordinary kind. If investigators do not succeed in discovering something characteristic, some datum definitely Aztec, it will have to be decidedly admitted that, encountered where the monolith was, the Mexi limited themselves to transporting it to Tenochtitlan, erecting it in a site adequate to its merit (and the Aubin Codex, in its first pages, narrates something which might lend support to the conjecture).
We have minutely examined the monument, and we shall honestly say what appears, without claiming certainty, in so difficult a point. That it expresses Toltec ideas and dates is for us indisputable; but it is possible to admit that the Tenochca should have engraved the same fundamental ideas upon a relief, adding some date of their own, and this is what we desire that the reader shall infer from our study, limiting ourselves to presenting the elements of the analysis. The account of Fray Diego Durán, invoked by Don Alfredo Chavero to demonstrate that this is the monument of Axayácatl, possesses much importance; but it does not command complete confidence, since it may refer to another stone. No one is ignorant of how many confusions have been produced in this direction, insistently calling, for example, a "sacrificial stone " a monument which has nothing of that character, or declaring another to be a "gladiatorial stone" which is totally dissimilar to one. There are reasons for admitting that the relief of the museum was the stone described by the friar; but until now it has not been proved, and we believe that Senor Chavero worked upon a contestable supposition.
Although the date inscribed in the frame corresponds to the date 1479, of the reign of Axayácatl, it corresponds also to the date 699 of the vulgar era, 5096 from the Creation of the world in the Toltec chronology; and as we read this last number in the figures that adorn the body of the serpents, and precisely the extreme triangles of the serpents indicate the frame with their tips, it would not be absurd to understand the thought of the artist in this mode: the stone commemorates the year 5096, which was 13-ácatl in the chronological series. Consulting the tables of the calendar of the Indians it is seen that in fact the year 699 was 13-ácatl.
Therefore the date with which we deal will not by itself alone decide the problem, since it gives occasion to two apparently legitimate interpretations. But we believe it possible to read, and actually without violence, a frankly Aztec date in the glyphs of the relief. Already we have said how it is met, counting one by one the ciphers stamped on the scales or divisions of the serpents. These divisions are 24; each one inclosing the glyph of fire, its value complete would amount to 52 years; but the half circle added to each scale indicates that only half is to be taken, that is to say, 26. This gives us 624 years; summing these to the 5,096 before read, we get the number 5,720. The number issues, so to say, from the body of the serpents, added to the actual elements those which their position shows are past. We might attribute their complete value to the scales: they represent in this manner 1,248 years which summed with the 416 of the little bars distributed in the bodies reaches precisely the number 1,664; but this is not the actual date, but the future end of the current age. When the artist engraved the half-circles, it is reasonable to assume that he had a definite purpose: his entire problem consisted in distributing the elements. We introduce nothing new or arbitrary into the calculation, except considering the scales on divisions of the serpents as indicative each of one xipoualli. This does not involve an absurd conjecture. The serpent is time, which grows by fixed periods; each part of its body represents without doubt a new period. What could this be except that symbolized in the tails of the emblematic beings, the cycle of 52 years? The native belief that serpents carry their age marked in this part of their body is well known.
The result has been the number 5,120 of the Indian chronology. Related to our calendar, starting from the year 5097, which we already know was the year 700 of the vulgar era, we find it to be 1323 of the Christian Era. The date not only belongs sharply to the Aztec history, but is in a certain sense the most important in its annals, since it was the date of the founding of Mexico. This the Icazbalceta Codex, commonly known as the Fuenleal, clearly affirms. Very natural that the Tenochca, whether they were of the time of Axayácatl or whatever other monarch, in putting upon the relief their chronological system (admitting the supposition) such as they had received it from the civilizing race, should desire to add to it the record of the foundation of their own metropolis, date memorable for them. If our reading is correct, the monument decides definitely a historic point, which has been bitterly discussed: Tenochtitlan was founded in the year which, with little variation, the Mendoza Codex, Chimalpahin, Clavijero, and the learned Orozco y Berra maintain.
No one is ignorant of how much historical writers have vacillated upon this point, Durán, the illustrious Don José F. Ramirez, and Chavero have decided upon 1318, upon the authority of the Anales de Cuauhtitlan; on their part, the Tira de Tepechpan, the Aubin and the Vatican codices lend their support to the date 1312, although the two first documents apparently declare the year 1364;[1] the cacique of Tlaxcala, Juan Ventura Zapata, inclined to 1321; Tezozómoc preferred 1326: and Sigüenza y Góngora, Vetancurt, and the Franciscan relations arrive at 1327, although Torquemada fixed 1341 and Enrico Martínez 1357. But the Mendoza Codex, Mendieta, Chimalpahin, Clavijero, and Don Manuel Orozco y Berra incline in favor of the years 1324 or 1325; and the said Codex Fuenleal, most important document, gives exactly 1323. The stone; unimpeachable text, demonstrates that, with very slight difference, these last find themselves in the certainty, at least so far as relates to the official date, as we might say the year in which they made the celebration of the event. This was the one always recorded in their annals by the Indians, who customarily made them fall upon the termination of a cycle.
Some other Aztec date ought to be found upon the relief. Persecuted and miserable as the Aztecs were at the time of the foundation of their city, the Mexicans were not in condition to work so grand a monument. And if they erected it later, it is clear that they would have desired to mark the date of the work. All peoples proceed in this way in a similar case.
Let us seek this date. Around the cylinder, over the projected part, there are 156 dots in a continuous series, which we may understand as so many other numerals. If we add them to the date 5720, we reach the 5876 of the native calendar. Singular fact! That year is precisely 1479 of our era, in which it is said that the emperor Axayácatl inaugurated a commemorative stone. From 1323, date of the foundation of Mexico, to 1479 precisely 156 years passed, the date of the commemoration being again a 13-ácatl. Is this merely a coincidence? Is the monolith of the museum then the stone of Axayácatl?
According to whether the procedure whereby we have found these last dates appears forced or legitimate, may be repudiated or accepted those which we suggest as Aztec marks; in any event, the dates directly expressed are of the Toltec chronology.
The reader will decide whether the 156 points may be interpreted as has been said. In any case, the monument expresses the Indian chronological system and cosmogony, the centuries of 104 years and the cycles of 416, the era of 1040 and that of 1664, begun, all these periods, with the character Ce técpatl and ended in 13-ácatl. Such a reading which is indisputable, suffices to constitute it, in the highest sense, the text par excellence which the aboriginal civilizations beve left us. We may add that it is the key of the great monuments, codices, and inscriptions before enigmatical: the Rosetta Stone of Mexican archaeology. It permits the inference that those fundamental concepts, everywhere distributed, were the common property of many primitive families, who received them from one civilizing people, trunk of the cultures anterior to the discovery of America.
Moreover, there is one kind of considerations relative to the date which we have supposed of the Aztecs which we ought not to omit. It is necessary to exhaust this aspect of the matter, because the fact that the stone embodies Toltec ideas is not irreconcilable with the fact that Mexicans were its constructors. We have said that many reasons exist for maintaining that the Mexicans were a later branch from the same trunk as the Toltecs. If we admit that artificers and astronomers of the time of Axayácatl are the constructors of the relief, it would be desirable to ascertain what circumstance might influence their minds to erect the monument at the time claimed. If it were found to be of especial interest, that in itself would strengthen the conjectures of those who incline to this thesis.
Let us recall the tradition that the ages of the world were measured in exact or very approximate terms by series of 416 years. We do not in any manner, think that the events accommodated themselves to this preoccupation; not we believe that the coincidence having been repeated two or three times with sensible approximation by accident, the natives were deeply impressed, and they themselves so arranged matters as to force the principal events of their history to coincide with the end of the sacred cycles. They undertook peregrinations, founded cities, elected their monarch in special years. There are many testimonies of this, especially in the annals of the Toltecs, a fact which has brought discords to those who could not explain to themselves, for example, that the kings all ruled for 52 years. It was because the public life was subordinated to the astronomico-religious beliefs. Their predilection for the year Ce técpatl was above all manifest: creation of the world, beginning of the Toltec monarchy, exodus from Aztlan, election of Acamapichtli, etc., etc. That people, learned as no other of antiquity, lived dependent upon the movement of the stars, adjusting all their acts to it; tendency, rooted so deeply, that this is really what is read in the stone of the museum: the destiny of the world is developed in periods of 104 and 416 years, directed by the two lords of heaven. Moreover, the tetranary conception ran through the totality of the ideas of the ancient Mexicans, manifesting itself continually, as Mrs. Nuttall's most learned book has demonstrated.
Singular fact, which must have profoundly impressed the imagination of the Mexicans! The Toltecs commencing their era in 5097, year 700 of the vulgar era, one great cycle (416 years) later Tula was destroyed and its inhabitants exterminated or dispersed. The able Clavijero gives to the event the dates of 1052: Brasseur de Bourbourg 1120, placing the death of the queen Xóchitl in 1103; other authors have indicated 1110 or 1070; the Anales de Cuauhtitlan mark one exact Indian century of difference, which is a reason for conjecture; but Chavero, exhausting the chronological analysis, fixes the date: it was in 1116, the year 5513 of the Indians. Here we repeat again that these slight discrepancies manifest the fundamental exactness of the data; at all events, if the event was hastened or retarded slightly, the aborigines in accordance with their custom, accommodated it in their annals to the great sacred cycles.
Ah well, the Aztecs themselves had commenced their peregrination about the year 1064 of our era (5460 of their calendar), a fact supported by Gama with data of the native writers Tezozómoc and Chimalpahin; Veytia, too, inclines to that date. There has been much discrepancy between authors with reference to this; but the monolith demonstrates that the date is correct, confirming incidentally the legitimacy of one of the most important documents of our archaeology, the Tira de la Peregrinación. In this codex, 183 years are counted from the time of exodus from Aztlan until the making of the new fire at the station of Chapultepec. The same appears in the Anaglifo or Codex Aubin, this precise accord between pieces completely independent corroborating the exactness of the date. The date named (that of the new fire kindled at Chapultepec) has been determined by Don Alfredo Chavero: the event took place about 1247; the beginning of the journey, 183 years earlier, was consequently in 1064, Ce técpatl. Well, from then to 1479 there passed just 416 years, if we include the one that served as starting-point. There results one grand cycle completed between the two events.
What stronger reason for the commemoration than that one of those grand periods at the end of which the natives awaited the destruction of the world had happily ended? It may he assumed that the stone was prepared in good season before so solemn a festival. A suggestive incident supports this supposition: according to Durán's account, the relic completed on the date inscribed in the tablet was not inaugurated until one or two years later. It is easy to think that Axayácatl would await the fulfilment of the prophecies, and until priests and people were convinced that no calamity occurred, when they resolved to celebrate the festival—the greatest that their annals record—in which they sacrificed an enormous number of victims as thank-offering to the gods who prolonged their existence.
There exists another date which seems interesting to us. The Tellerian-Remense Codex as well as the Vatican Codex 3738 have the year 1419 marked by a highly conventionalized arboreal design, which the commentators do not study and which we believe has not been interpreted. What can be the meaning of this elaborate tree located precisely with this date? Trees are usually the representation of cycles and grand periods, as may be seen in the Palenque tablet and in a multitude of codices. Perhaps it is then the symbol of the coxcaxíhuitl, the sacred cycle which had just then concluded. We will add that the Tira de Tepechpan has with the same year divisions which seem to mark the end and beginning of counts.
Lastly, omitting altogether any transcendental allusion, cosmogonic, mythical, or cyclical, the little bars of the body of the serpents, which terminate in the date of the tablet, give this most simple and perhaps incontrovertible reading: from the beginning of our history until the present year (13-ácatl) have passed 416 years.
In résumé, if the monolith was finished in 1419 as is inferred from the text of Durán, there can be no doubt as to the motive that inspired the work. We insist upon the fact that the stone agrees with the precious Tira del Museo, proving unimpeachably its authenticity. The race of Tenoch did not begin its march either in 648, or 820, or 902, or 1116, or 1160, or 1168, or in 1194, as Buelna, Durán, the Ramírez Codex, Clavijero, Humboldt, the Vatican Codex, Chavero, Garcia Cubas, and other authorities say; but in the year 1064. The learned Gama and Veytia are right; the notices of Chimalpahin are good. This writer declares that the first ceremony of the new fire was celebrated by the Aztecs at Acahualtzinco in 1091 and that 27 years before they had started from Aztlan, which would be 1064. The Tira del Museo places the beginning of the march in Ce técpatl, 27 years before the first new fire. The Codex Aubin, on its part, affirms that in 1507 the Aztecs completed the eighth century of their annals, kindling the new fire: and, in fact, from 1091 to 1507 there are eight periods of 52 years, which was the sacred Cycle of the Indians. This document also places the exodus 27 years before the first new fire.
The relief and the Tira del Museo then fix with apparent definiteness one of the most disputed and important dates of the history of ancient Mexico.[2] The Aztecs, in boats, sallied from a place which we will call Aztlan, Culhuacan, or what you please, in the year of 1064 of the Christian Era wandering for the space of 260 years, significant cycle, until founding the metropolis of what was later a proud empire. And this is a new proof that the city of Tenochtitlan was founded in 1323, since it is already known how the natives adjusted the capital events of their collective existence to the sacred periods; from which the tradition that they ever carried with them the sacred book, the Teoamoxtli, on their journeyings. The Teoamoxtli was the book of chronological reckoning, it was the tonalámatl, it was in fine the calendar. Perhaps they found the cactus (nochtli) a little earlier, in 1312; but they waited until the cycle should end before celebrating the event, giving the foundation as inaugurated.
It is not difficult to imagine now how events occurred. Four hundred and sixteen years had been completed since the adventurous tribe issued by water from a place the situation of which has not been convincingly determined, and that date finds them prosperous and increased as they never had anticipated. The year had passed by without a mishap. Nothing strange then that they should desire to solemnize the fact, fixing it indelibly in an enduring monument. In such ease, this ought to bear the date 1479, this is to say, 13-ácatl and 5,876 numerals. We see them there in fact:
5,096 + 624 + 156 = 5876.[3]
But there was another date which they awaited with misgiving. Counting from the creation of the world, or simply from the beginning of the Toltec era, from the year 5097 of their chronology, the destruction of Tula marks the end of a period of 416 years. Starting from this catastrophe, the new grand period had to finish in 5929, that is to say, in 1532 A.D. The subjects of Axayácatl found themselves in the year 5877 of their chronology: exactly one tying, one xiuhmolpia, was lacking for the feared date. Thirteen years before its completion, in 1519 of the vulgar era, after desolating the coasts of Yucatan and and Tabasco, a group of fierce and resolute adventurers disembarked near Sacrificios, who left a trail of blood and slaughter behind them. They came from the Orient, from the direction from which a mythical personage of their traditions, Ce Acatl, had prophesied his own return, in a year of his own name, to conquer the earth and take possession of it; to re-establish, in fine, his ancient kingdom. And the year in which such an extraordinary event took place was precisely the year Ce ácatl (1519). Would it be strange that Montezuma, great astronomer and priest, should see in these signs the clear fulfilment of prophecies and have a presentiment of the catastrophe destructive of his nation and his people? Could the Aztecs feel any confidence in an armed resistance against the inexorable fate decreed by their own deities? No, certainly, and they fought without hope of victory: for this, their last monarch proudly bore the name of “The Eagle who Falls.” Last representatives of an indomitable race, they truly desired to end with the dignity which corresponded to their past glory; and in the siege of Tenochtitlan, disheartened but stubborn, not weakening before the crushing weight of numbers, nor before famine, pestilence, and the cruel attacks of the enemies, nor before desertion and treason of compatriot races, nor before the fires of earth and the lightnings of heaven let loose upon them, they gave to the world an example of heroism greater than histories can record. If the ancient Mexicans had not been persuaded that their ruin was a thing determined from above, the phalanx of Cortez, in spite of its undaunted courage, would have been undone at the first vigorous assaults of the warriors of Cuauhtémoc!
- ↑ See our study, La fundación de Tenochtitlan.
- ↑ See our study, La fundación de Tenochtitlan.
- ↑ And at the same time it ought to mark the begining or their historic existence, commencing with the Toltecs, as is plainly evident in the three relations made by Doña Isabel Motecuhzoma, where the Toltec and Tenochca kings form one continuous series. And there appears the cipher 1,479—624—156=699, that is to say, 700, the initial year being counted. Or according to the Indian chronology (13-ácatl) 5,876—624—156=5,096 (Ce técpatl).