The ornaments that cover these walls are
remarkable in more than one sense. They are not only inscriptions
in the Maya language, written in characters identical with, and
having the same meaning and value as those carved on the temples
of Egypt; but among them are symbols known to have belonged to
the ancient sacred mysteries of the Egyptians, and to modern Free
Masonry. In August 1880, among the debris, at the foot of the
mound just described, I found pieces of what once had been the
statue of a priest. The part of the statue, from the waist to
the knee, particularly attracted my attention. Over his dress
the personage wore an apron with an extended hand, as seen in
the adjoining illustration. A symbol that will easily be recognized
by members of the Masonic fraternity.
[41] We must not forget that Plato informs us that the priests of Egypt assured Solon, when he visited them 600 years before the Christian era, that all communications between their people and the inhabitants of the " Lands of the West " had been interrupted for 9,000 years, in consequence of the great cataclysms, during which, in one night, the large island of Atlantis disappeared, submerged under the waves of the ocean. Are we not then right if we surmise that the monuments of Mayax existed 11,500 years ago, and that mysteries, similar to those of Egypt, were celebrated in them! To support that belief we have the symbols already mentioned as existing in the chambers, the construction of the chambers themselves, the sculptures carved on the cornice that surrounds the sanctuary, representing cross bones and skeletons, with arms and hands uplifted, tokens that many of the Masons again cannot fail to recognize; besides other emblems that I will endeavor to explain, which exist on the walls of the residence of the priests, an edifice adjoining that temple. This may be considered the oldest known edifice in the world consecrated to secret rites and ceremonies; and its builders the founders of the sacred mysteries, that were transported from Mayax to India, Chaldea, Egypt, Etruria, by colonists or missionaries.
What the ceremonies of initiation were among the [42] Mayas, it is dfficult to surmise at present, all their books, except four that still exist, having been destroyed by the monks who came with the Spanish adventurers, or soon after the conquest.
But they must have been similar o the rites of initiationi practised by the Quiches, a branch of the at Nibalba, a place in the heart of the mountains of Guatemala. We learn from the Popol-Vah, sacred book of the Quiches, that the applicants for initiation to the mysteries were made to cross two rivers one of mud, the other of blood, before they reached the four roads that led to the place where the priests awaited them. The crossing of the rivers was full of dangers that were to be avoided. Then they had to journey along the four roads, the white, the red, the green and the black, that led to where the council, composed of twelve veiled priests, and a wooden statue dressed and wearing, ornaments as the priests, awaited them. When in presence of the council, they were told to salute the King; and the wooden statue was pointed out to them. This was to try their discernment. Then they had to salute each individual, giving his name or title without being told; after which they were asked to sit oil a certain seat. If, forgetting the respect due to the august assembly, they sat as invited, they soon had reason to regret their want of good breeding and proper preparation, for the seat, made [43] of stone, was burning hot. Having modestly declined the invitation, they were conducted to the " Dark house," where they had to pass the night, and submit to the second trial. Guards were placed all round, to prevent the candidates from holding intercourse with the outer world. Then a lighted torch of pine wood and a cigar were given to each. These were not to be extinguished. Still they had to be returned whole at sunrise, when the officer in charge of the house came to demand them. Woe to him who allowed his torch and cigar to get consumed! Terrible chastisements, death, even, awaited him.
Having passed through this second trial successfully, the third was to be suffered in the "House of Spears. " There, they had to produce four pots of certain rare flowers, without communicating with any one outside, or bringing them at the time of their coming; and had also to defend themselves, during a whole night, against the attacks of the best spearmen, selected for the purpose, one for each candidate. Coming out victorious at dawn, they were judged worthy of the fourth trial. This consisted in being shut for a whole night in the " Ice house, " where the cold was intense. They had to prevent themselves from being overcome by the cold and frozen to death.
The fifth ordeal was not less terrible. It consisted [44] in passing a night in company with wild tigers, in the "Tiger house," exposed to be torn to pieces, or devoured alive, by the ferocious animals. Emerging safe from the den, they had to submit to their sixth trial in the "Fiery house," This was a burning where they had to remain from sunset to sunrise. Coming out unscorched, they were ready for the seventh trial, said to be the most severe of all, in the " House of the bats." The sacred book tells us it was the house of Camazotz, the " God of the bats," full of death-dealing weapons, where the God himself, coining from on high, appeared to the candidate and beheaded them, if off their guard.
Do not these initiations vividly recall
to mind what Henoch said he saw in his visions? That blazing house
of crystal, burning hot and icy cold-that place, where were the
bow of fire, the quiver of arrows, the sword of fire that other
where he had to cross the babbling stream, and the river of fire
and those extremities of the Earth full of all kinds of huge beasts
and birds or the habitation where appeared ono of great glory
sitting upon the orb of the slut - and, lastly, does not the tamarind
tree in the midst of the earth, that he was told was the Tree
of Knowledge, find its simile in the calabash tree, inn the middle
of the road where those of Xibalba placed the head of Hunhun Ahpu,
after sacrificing him for having failed to support the first trial
of [45] the initiation ? Even the title 
Hach-mac, "the true, the very man," of the high priest
in Mayax, that we see over the bust of High Pontiff, prince Cay
Canchi, son of King Can at Uxmal, recalls that of the chief of
the Magi at Babylon.
These were the awful ordeals that the candidates for initiation into the sacred mysteries had to pass through in Xibalba. Do they not seem an exact counterpart of what happened, in a milder form at the initiation into the Eleusinian mysteries? and also the greater mysteries of Egypt, from which these were copied? Does not the recital of what the candidates to the mysteries in Xibalba were required to know, before being admitted, in order to distinguish the wooden statue pointed out to them as the King from the veiled Brothers; to avoid seating themselves on a burning hot stone seat; to keep lighted the torch and cigar and prevent them from being consumed; to produce the flowers asked from them while isolated from the world in a guarded chamber; to defend themselves from the attacks of dexterous spearmen; to protect themselves against the intense cold of the "Icehouse;" to remain unhurt amidst wild tigers; or unscorched in the middle of a burning furnace; recall to mind the wonderful similar feats said to be performed by the Mahatmas, the Brothers in India, and of several of the passages of the book of Daniel, who had been initiated to the [46] mysteries of the ChaIdeans or Magi which, according to Eubulus, were divided into three classes or genera, the highest being the most learned?
Will it be said that the mysteries were imported from Egypt or Chaldea or India, or Phoenicia to America? Then I will ask when? By whom? What facts can be adduced to sustain such assertion? Why should the with which the priest at the conclusion of the ceremonies in the Eleusinian mysteries, and the Brahmins at the end of their religious ceremonies, dismiss the assistants, be Maya instead of Greek or Sanscrit words? Is it not probable that the dismissal continued to be uttered in the language of those who first instituted and taught the core monies and rites of the mysteries to the others? That sacred mysteries have existed in America from tunes immemorial, there can be no doubt. Even setting aside the proofs of their existence, that we gather from the monuments of Uxmal, and the description of the trials of initiation related in the sacred book of the Quiches, we find vestiges of them in various other countries of the Western Continent.
Garcilasso de la Vega informs us that in Peru, it was illicit for any one not belonging to the nobility to acquire learning. There again, as in Egypt, in Chaldea, Etruria, India, Mayax, science was the privilege of the priests and kings. The sacerdotal class held the pre-eminence. Sacerdotal orders were [47] conferred only upon young men who had given proofs of sufficiency for such important office; and before they could be received into the Society of the Amautas or wise men, which was considered a great honor, they had to submit to very severe ordeals. The rites and ceremonies of initiation were imported in Peru by the ancestors of Manco Capac, the founder of the Inca dynasty, who were colonists from Central America, as we learn from an unpublished MS., written by a Jesuit father, Rev. Anello Oliva, at the beginning of the year 1631, in Lima; and now in the library of the British Museum in London. The name Quichua, of the general language of Peru, points directly to the Quiches as the branch of the Maya nation that carried civilization to that country.
If from South America we go to New Mexico, there we find the Zunis, and other Pueblo Indians. Having preserved their independence by shaking off at an early period the yoke of the Spaniards, they have been little influenced, if at all, by the civilization of the Europeans, and live today as their ancestors did many centuries back; preserving with great care, not only the purity of their language, which they teach their children to speak correctly, but their customs, traditions, and ancient religious rites and observances.
Mr. Frank Cushing, who was commissioned by [48] the Smithsonian Institution, at Washington, to make a study of their customs and manners, has been adopted by the tribe, and has now become one of their most influential chiefs. Among the many interesting things discovered by him, not the least is the existence of twelve sacred orders, with their priests, their initiations, their sacred rites, as carefully guarded as the secrets of the ancient sacred mysteries to which they bear great resemblance. He has been initiated into many of them, having had to submit to ordeals almost as severe as those of Xibalba from which no doubt they are derived, having been brought among them by Maya colonists and afterward Nahualt invaders. The Nahualts invaded and for a long time held sway over Mexico and some of the northern portions of Central America. The aborigines of those countries at last expelled them from their territories, when they scattered in all directions, about the end of the XIII century A.D. Some reached as far north as the gulf of California and Arizona. The Yaqui Indians, neighbors of the May s, and who inhabit the countries watered by the rivers Yaqui and Mayo in Sonora, are descendants of a Nahualt tribe, from which in all probability, the adjoining nations, the inhabitants of the seven cities of Cibola, the Zurns among them, learned many of their religious practices; and the institution [49] of the twelve sacred orders, that recall the twelve priests who presided at the initiation into the sacred mysteries at Xibalba.
Seeking for the origin of the institution of the sacred mysteries, of which Masonry seems to be the great-grandchild, following their vestiges from country to country, we have been brought over the vast expanse of the blue sea, to this western continent, to these mysterious " Lands of the West " where the souls of all good men, the Egyptians believed, dwelt among the blessed. It is, therefore, in that country, where Osiris was said to reign supreme, that we may expect to find the true signification of the symbols held sacred by the initiates in all countries, in all times, and which have reached us, through the long vista of ages, still surrounded by the veil, well-nigh impenetrable, of mystery woven round them by their inventors. My long researches among the ruins of the ancient temples and palaces of the Mayas, have been rewarded by learning at the fountain-head the esoteric meaning of some at least of the symbols, the interpretation of which, has puzzled many a wise head-the origin of the mystification and symbolism of the numbers 3, 5, and 7.
Whoever has read history knows that in all nations, civilized as well as uncivilized, from the remotest antiquity, the priests have claimed learning as the privilege of their caste, bestowed upon them [50] by special favor of the Ruling Spirit of the universe. For this reason they have zealously kept from the gaze or other men their intellectual treasures, and surrounded them with the veil of mystery. They have carefully hid all their discoveries, scientific or artistic under the cover of symbols, reserving their esoteric or secret meaning for the initiated; giving to the people only such exoteric or public explanation of them as best suited their purpose. They put into practice the principle, that "It was necessary to keep the discoveries of the philosophers in the works of art or nature from those unworthy of knowing them," enunciated by the erudite and celebrated English monk Roger Bacon, one of the most learned men of his is time, who was confined during many years in a prison cell by his ignorant brethren on account it of his great erudition. This same principle is yet closely adhered to by the Brahmins, the Buddhist priests of Thibet, the Adepts of India, and I might add the Jesuits among the Christians, althrough they are very inferior in knowledge to the others; the secrecy they have observed for centuries, and do still observe, being their best guarantee of power and honor.
Judging from the numerous devices and emblems that formed the ornamentation of the temples and palaces in the ancient ruined cities of Yucatan, the priests of Mayax seem to have been as addicted to [51] symbology as their congeners in India, Egypt, Chaldea and other countries. Among these devices and symbols, several belong clearly to their sacred mysteries.
The study of the relics of ancient Maya civilization has made manifest to my mind the source of many of the primitive traditions of mankind, which have reached us through the sacred books of the Hindoos, the Chaldeans, the Egyptians, and the Jews. These, having received them from both the Chaldees and the Egyptians, have consigned the relation in the Pentateuch, a book long attributed to Moses, but now believed by Matthew Henry and other cornmentators, who pride themselves upon their orthodoxy, to have been written in times subsequent to the foundation of the Hebrew monarchy. Might it not be possible that, in Mayax also, could be found the origin of the mystification of the numbers 3, 5, and 7, regarded as mystic by all civilized nations of antiquity all over the earth?
Surely this mystification must have originated with one of these nations and been carried to the others either by colonists, missionaries, or travelers. It is not admissible, or even presumable, that the same idea and mysticism has been attached to these numbers by all these different peoples without being communicated from one to another. Such abstruse speculations respecting the ontological properties of [52] numbers can not be ascribed to the first workings of the human mind ill its incipient steps toward intellectual development. In its awakening, human intellect, still unable to the causes of the natural phenomena that take place, as everyday occurrences, in the material existence of man, does not soar in the elevated regions of metaphysics or of philosophical and abstract theories. Do we not see, even in our midst, that men who live in ignorauce ascribe the manifestations of the powers of nature to unseen, mighty beings, of whom they continually stand in awe; to whom they tribute homage, and address, prayers filled with the superstitious fears that these fancies of their untutored imagination inspire in them? Abstract conceptions, numerical combinations, metaphysical speculations, philosophical hypothesis, are productions of highly cultivated in, of minds accustomed to reason on causes and effects, to deduce things unseen from things seen.
The mysticism with which these numbers have been invested, their symbolization in the sacred mysteries, must have had its origin in material causes, palpable to physical senses, the memory of which became lost in the course of ages, altered by being transported among peoples living far away from the nation that conceived the idea, by passing from mouth to to mouth, in the secrecy of initiations, [53] generation after generation. The idea of a sole and omnipotent Deity, who created all things, seems to have been the universal belief in early ages, among all the nations that had reached a high degree of civilization. This was the doctrine of the Egyptian priests. They called the Divine Intelligence Kneph, and placed him above and apart from the Triads. Damascius, an eclectic philosopher, who taught in the schools of Athens, about the year 526 of the Christian era, in his "Treatise on Principles," says that "they asserted nothing of the first principle of all things, but celebrated it as a thrice unknown darkness, transcending all intellectual perception." Proclus, platonic philosopher, director of the school of Athens in 450 after Christ, says: "the Demiurgos or Creator is triple, and the three intellects are the three kings, he who exists, he who possesses, he who beholds. These three intellects, therefore, he supposes to be the Demiurge; the same as the three kings of Plato, and as the three whom Orpheus celebrates under the names of Phaenes, Ouranos, and Kronos, kings of the great "Saturnian continent," in the Atlantic ocean.
In Chaldea, the twin sister of Egypt, daughter of Poseidon, king of the " Lands beyond the sea " and Lybia, we find that notwithstanding the apparent polytheistic character which, from the earliest times, religion had assumed, it was possible for the priests [54] regulated the indenturing of Apprentices. Masters were not permitted to more than a certain number of apprentices. No member was allowed to undersell another member. There were judicious, regulations for the settlement of disputes. the ordinances forbade speaking disrespectfully of the Company; the striking or insulting of a brother member; the violating of regulations for clothing or dress; the employment of men who were not "free" of the Company, etc. All of these regulation will be found copied in the Old Constitutions of the Operative Masons, a fact which proves conclusively that they were originally a Company following the general usages of other Companies, whether Trade or Craft.
To sum the matter up briefly, "so far as heraldry throws a light on history, the English Speculative Masons have to the present day claimed to deduce their origin from the Operative Masons who were incorporated as a Company in the 15th century. They claimed to be their heirs, and according to the law of heraldry assumed their arms." (1)
(1 Mackey and Singleton. "Hist. Freemasonry." Vol. iii.)
"In all them the old Operative Guilds of Free Masons have continued their work without changing the secrecy of their have their Lodges in London, Norfolk, derbyshire, Holyhead, Leicester, York, Dunham, Berwick, and elsewhere * * * Of late they seem to have become discusted with the vain pretensions of Modern Speculative Freemasonry, and, under authority of the three co-equal Grand Master Masons of the South and North, have to some little extent relaxed the secrecy of their proceedings; though the greater part of their memebers are utterly averse to anything whatever being made public.
[55] Possibly in time these restrictions will be further modified to the advantage of the Speculative System of 1513, for many parts are quite incomprehensible, even learned Free Masons, without the technical part which only the Guilds of the Free Masons can supply." (2)
(2 John Yarker. "Arcane Schools.")
The traditions of the ancient Masonic Guilds are not to be despised. The actual guild of York is said to hive claimed to date from A. D. 79 in the time of Agricola. There is a Carpenter's Guild which claimed to date [56] temporary of Confucius, who wrote the Tao-te-King, a book reputed very profound, said more than five hundred years before Christ: "That reason, Tao, produced one. That one produced two, that both produced three; and that three had produced all things." All early writers who have given an account, of the of the ancient Peruvians, tell us that they worshiped a mighty unseen being who they believed had created all things, for which reason they call him Pacha camac. He, being incomprehensible, they did not represent under any shape or figure, although they raised a magnificent temple in his honor on the sea coast that rivaled in wealth and splendor those dedicated to the Sun at Titicaca and Cuzeo. We are also informed that He stood at the head of a trinity composed of Himself Pacha-camac-Con and Uiracocha.
ln this conception of a Supreme Being, Creator of all things, we see reflected the teachings of the vuh Sacred hook of the Quiches, in which we read, " that all that exist,; is the work of Tzakol-the Creator-who by his will caused the Universe to spring into existence, and whose names are Biota the maker-Alom-the engenderer-Qaholom-He who gives being. The fact that the same doctrine of a Supreme Deity composed of three parts distinct from each other, yet forming one, was universally prevalent [57] among the civilized nations of America, Asia and the Egyptians, naturally leads to the inference that at some time or other, communications and relations more or less intimate have existed between them. They must, then, have imparted their traditions, metaphysical speculations, and intellectual attainments one to another.
In fact, all historians agree with Philostratus and admit that commercial intercourse did exist between Egypt and India. Nay more, Eusebius asserts that in the reign of Memnon, king of Ethiopia, a body of Ethiopians from the countries about the Indus river migrated and settled in the valley of the Nile. And the many Chinese bottles, with inscriptions in that language, found in the tombs of Thebes, prove, beyond the least doubt, that communications have existed between the inhabitants of China and the Egyptians in times very remote, as is conjectured from the inferior quality of the bottles, that some seem to believe were manufactured before the art of making objects of porcelain reached the high degree of perfection to which it attained afterward.
On the other hand, the vase with Chinese inscriptions found by Dr. Schliemann in the lowest stratum of his excavations at Hissarlik, inscriptions that were partly deciphered by the eminent indianist Mr. Emile Burnouf and afterward thoroughly interpreted by the great Chinese scholar Fi-Fangpao, when [58] ambassador at Berlin, and proved to mention the fact of the vase having contained samples of Chinese gauze, show that active commercial intercourse was carried on by the Chinese with Greece and Asia Minor ever before the siege of Troy.
These concerning the Triune God have come down through the vista of ages, to the present day, preserved in the works of the philosophers, .and are still held sacred by many among Christians and Brahmins. But we do not learn from their scared books where, when or how said doctrine originated. Whatever may have been the source from which it sprang, it is certain that the priests and learned men of Egypt, Chaldea, India, or China, if they still knew the true history of its origin at the time they wrote, kept it a profound secret, and imparted it only to a few select among those initiated in the sacred mysteries.
We need not seek for information among the fathers of the Christian Church, for they are as silent as till tomb on the subject. They admitted into their tenets the notion of a Triune God as taught by the pagan philosophers, and appropriated it, as they have many other of their teachings and theories, without knowing, without inquiring, concerning their origin. The councils pronounced them revelations from on high; unfathomable mysteries not to be investigated; and imposed them as dogmas, to be [59] implicitly believed, with blind faith, as they are to-day, by the followers of the Romish Church. Through their adherents the idea of the three persons in the Godhead has found its way into Free Masonry, and on the columns that adorn the temple, in the working of one of the degrees, we read these inscriptions: " In the name of the holy and indivisible Trinity; " and further down, " We have the happiness to dwell in the pacific unity of the sacred numbers.
To those initiated to the lesser mysteries the doctrine was presented under the garb of the complicated metaphysical speculations with which it has reached us. Such explanations of the symbolical nature of the mystic numbers were given to them so as to make it well-nigh impossible to obtain a fair understanding of their purport. By the perusal of the extracts just quoted it is easy to see that all the reasonings concerning the mystic value of number 3 and its relations to a Supreme Deity are mere fancies of the imagination, vague speculations, fallacious cavils; meaningless for practical and inquiring minds. So far as explaining the nature of the Deity all philosophers agree in admitting that it transcends the intelligence of man since man is finite; and what is finite will never be able to comprehend that which is infinite.
Some of the Greek philosophers reflected in their [60] teachings, as well as in their writings, the doctrines they had lea rued trout their teachers, the priests of Heliopolis, Memphis and Thebes. Front them we may gather a glimmer of dim light pointing toward the origin of the symbolization of the numbers. We have said that Poclus asserts that the three component parts of the triple deity were three intellects or Three Kings-a fact corroborated by Plato, who also had been admitted to the mysteries, and by who celebrated these three Kings, in the ceremonies instituted by him, that Herodotus says were identical with the Egyptian mysteries.
Pythagorean, who had received his knowledge of the numbers and their meaning from the Egyptians, taught his disciples that God was number and harmony. He caused them to honor numbers and geometrical diagrams with the names of the gods. The Egyptians likened nature to the equilateral triangle most perfect and beautiful of all triangles; and wording to Servius, assigned the perfect number 3 to the great God.
The Chaldees symbolized the Eusoph or great light, by an equilateral triangle; and in the Sri-Santara or cosmogonical diagram of the Hindoos, which has served as model for many of their temples, the nameless, the great. Aum that dwells in the infinite, is figured as an equilateral triangle. The Egyptians held the equilateral triangle as the symbol of "Nature" [61] beautiful and fruitful. In the hieroglyphs it was the emblem of worship. We see, over the main altar, in all the ancient Catholic churches, the representation of an equilateral triangle containing the all-seeing eye of Osiris, as Symbol of Deity. The same emblem is familiar also to those who visit masonic lodges as one under which is figured the "Great Architect of the Universe."
If from those countries that we have been accustomed to consider as the "Old World," and guided by the three words of dismissal used by the Brahmins, and the officiating priests of Eleusis, at the closing of their religious ceremonies, words we have shown to belong to the Maya language, we carry our inquiries into the "Lands of the West," there again we will find that the triangle was also symbolical among the Mayas and their neighbors.
We see it in the position of the three semispheres carved, as already said, at each end of the northern chamber of the building above the sanctuary at Uxmal. We next meet with it in the triangular arches that form the ceilings of the apartments in all the temples and palaces, in fact in all the edifices of Mayas, as well as in those of Palenque and other localities of Central America.
The general plan of these edifices is the same everywhere; not because they were built by the same architects, or at the same period, but because [62] their construction was in accordance with certain teachings pertaining to the mysteries. In all the buildings, whatever their size, the ground plan was in the shape of an oblong square |_____| , that is of their letter M, pronounced Ma. Ma is the contraction of mam, the ancestor, as they denominated the Earth, and by extension the Universe. Ma is also the radical of Ma-yax, the name of the Yucatan peninsula in ancient times, whose shape, no doubt, suggested that of the letter M, both to the Mayas and to the Egyptians. In fact, in Egypt and in Mayax, the figure |_____| in the hieroglyphs, stands for Earth and Universe. It will be noticed by examining their plans, that this was also the shape of' the apartments in the temples and palaces of Chaldea, of Egypt and Greece; that of the tombs of the Etruscans; hence, no doubt, was assigned to the masonic lodges in our days.
The triangular ceiling in those countries, and there is no reason for doubting that it was the same in the "Lands of the West," was symbolical of the Triune God, the Ruling Spirit of the Universe, supposed to reside in the heavens, above all things. (This accounts for the constellations of the firmament being represented on the ceilings).
According to Zoroaster, He is the fire, the sun, the light; that the later Platonists have described as power, intellect, soul, or spirit; and the ancient [63] theologians, who invoked the sun in their mysteries, according to Macrobius, as power of the world, light of the world, spirit of the world; that Plutarch gives as intelligence, matter, kosmos, beauty, order, the world; of these three he says, " universal nature may be considered to be made up, and there is reason to conclude that the Egyptians were wont to liken this nature to what they called the most beautiful and perfect triangle."
It will be noticed that the geometrical
figure formed at the ends of each of these apartments, by the
lines of the ceilings, sides,
and floor, is a pentagon, symbol of the mystic number 5 whose
name, penta, in Greek also conveys the idea of Universe; whilst
Ho in Maya, meaning 5, is also the radical of Hool, the head,
hence the Deity.
Then, lastly, the number of planes forming the rooms-the two of the ceilings, the two of the sides, the two of the ends, and that of the floor-seven in all, shows conclusively not only why the builders adopted the triangular arch instead of the circular, but also that the plan of their buildings was conceived in strict adherence to the mystic numbers 3, 5, 7, or their multiples, as we see by the height of the pyramids; the number of courses of the stones forming the walls; that of the terraces on which the temples stood; that of the degrees of the stairs by which they were reached.
[64] Only two edifices of different construction have been found among the ancient cities of the Mayas. One, now completely having been shattered by a thunderbolt in 1848, was in Mayapan. That place according to Bishop in the year 1446 of the Christian era, by the lords and nobles of the country, to put an end to the dynasty of the Cocomes that governed with tyrannical rule. The other, still standing, although much injured by the action of time and vegetation, is to be in the most ancient city of Chicken. These buildings were consecrated to the study of astronmy; no doubt also to the performance of certain religious ceremonies connected with the worship of the sun, moon, and other celestial bodies. They were, circular; their ground plan formed three concentric circles representing the Zodiac, and their vertical section, in its general outlines, conveys to the mind that, in their inward or esoteric construction, placed before the eyes of the masses yet hidden from them, the architect wished to represent the figure of the mastodon, which was venerated by the people as image of Deity on Earth; probably because his pachyderm was the largest and most powerful creature that, lived in the land.
Among the ornaments which beautified one of the seven turrets that adorned the south facade of the north wing of the ancient palace of King CAN, [65] and were dedicated to each of the seven members composing his family, on that set apart to commemorate the name of his eldest son Cay (Fish), the high pontiff, are seen these symbols:
My knowledge of the symbols and sacred characters used by the learned priests of Mayax, in the mural inscriptions and ornaments of their temples and palaces, enables me to understand their exoteric meaning. The first (Fig. 1) is composed of an equilateral triangle with the apex downward, through it passes a ribbon tied in a knot. The triangle seems here to represent the whole country, the "Lands of the West," composed of three great continents, " North and South America," of today, and "the great island," called Atlantis by Plato, that disappeared in the midst of' an awful cataclysm, under the waves of the ocean, as described by the author of the Troano MS., who thus confirms the account of it given by the priests of Egypt, to Solon. The ribbon tied in a knot would indicate that [66] the initiates, to whom the esoteric explanation of the symbol had been imparted, were bound to each other, to secrecy and to their oath. Its hidden meaning may have been that the equilateral triangle represented Deity ever watchful, always creating Nature which we move, and live and have our being, in which all things rebound.
The second emblem (Fig. 2) seems to have belonged more particularly to the highest degree of the sacred mysteries, since we find it among other symbols sculptured on the slabs that formed the external casing f the mausoleum raised to the memory of the high pontiff Cay. This second emblem is also a ribbon, tied up so as to form three loops, each occupying one angle of an oblong square, image of the Universe; the fourth angle being adorned with fiat folds, that are emblematic of Mayax the seat or head of the government, so arranged as to form the steps- 5 in number-of a throne. This accounts for their being placed at the upper angle. The three round loops are symbolical of the three great parts composing the "Lands of the West," that the Greek mythologists figured by the trident of Poseidon, their god of the sea. As to the sign (·), in Mayax as in Egypt, it was meant to represent the sun. It was placed in the middle of the square simply to signify that as the sun was the centre of the universe, the vivifying soul of all things, so his [67] representative the "Child of the Sun," the high priest, was the light that illumined the secrets of the sacred mysteries by his wisdom; and whose knowledge made him the fit ruler of the country. (·) Is also the first letter of the Maya and Egyptian alphabets, corresponding to our Latin letter A, initial of Ah, maya masculine article, denoting strength, power -Ah being likewise the first syllable of the word Ahau King.
We know as yet too little of the religious tenets of the ancient priesthood of Mayax, to venture upon an explanation. All we can assert positively is that number 7 was the particular appendage of the third degree of the mysteries. It was considered as endowed with great potentiality; was as Pythagoras says, the vehicle of life, containing soul and body.
What motives may have induced the founders of the mysteries in Mayax to select the numbers 3, 5, 7, as symbols of the various degrees into which they divided them, we can at present only surmise. It is probable that certain natural causes, or the commemoration of important events which had taken place in the life of the nation, or in that of the family of the founders of the dynasty that governed it, suggested their adoption. The fact is that the seven members of that family were collectively symbolized by the emblem of the Ah-ac-Chapat or Seven Headed Serpent. It is difficult to [68] prognosticate if we shall ever obtain an insight into the secret teachings of the even if we had access to their for it is to be presumed that they did not confide them to the papyrus of their books.
Lamda, in his "Relation of the things of Yucatan "The sons or the nearest relatives succeeded to the high priest in his dignity; with him was the key of their sciences, and in that they most concerned because it was the priests -who gave advice to the lords and answered their queries. . . . . It was the priest who nominated the priests for cities or villages which had none, examined them as to the porficiency in sciences and ceremonies. He entrusted to them the things of their office, and bade them give good example to the people. The priests employed themselves in the service of the temple and in teaching their divers sciences, particularly how to write the books that contained them They taught the sons of the other priests and the younger sons of the princes who were sent to in their childhood if they saw them inclined for that profession."
In order to understand the explanation of the possible orgin of the mystification of the numbers 3, 5, and 7, it is necessary to know something of the people among whom it seems to have originated.
If we start from the months of the Mississippi River and travel due south, across the Gulf of [69] Mexico, at a distance of exactly four hundred and eighty miles, we come to the northern coast of the Yucatecan Peninsula. Its north-easternmost point, Cape Catoche, is one hundred and twenty miles from Cape San Antonio, the western end of the island of Cuba. Yucatan divides the Gulf of Mexico from the Caribbean Sea. It is comprised between the 17° 30' and 21° 50' of latitude north, and the 88° and 91° of longitude west from the Greenwich meridian. Its length is, therefore, 260 miles from north to south, and its breadth 180 miles from east to west. The whole country is a fossiliferous limestone formation, elevated a few feet only above the sea; its maximum height in the interior being about 70 feet. Although its rocky surface, bare for the most part, is, in places only, covered with a few inches of tillable loam, formed by the detritus of the stones and the decomposition of vegetable matter, its soil is of surprising, fertility.
The whole country is now covered with well-nigh impenetrable forest. A bird's eye view of it from the top of one of the lofty pyramids, that seem like light-houses in the midst of that ocean of foliage, impresses the beholder with the idea that he is looking on an immense sea of verdure having for boundary the horizon, and whose billows come to die, with gentle murmur, at the foot of the monument on which he stands. Not a hill, not a hillock even, [70] breaks the monotony of the landscape, which is only relieved by clusters of palm trees that loom here and there, as islets, above the dead green level.
Anciently, this country, now well nigh depopulated, was thickly peopled by a highly civilized nation, if we ate to judge by the great number of large cities whose ruins exist scattered in the midst of the forests throughout the country, and by the stupendous edifices, once upon a time temples of the gods, or palaces of the kings and priests, whose walls are covered with inscriptions, bas-reliefs, and other interesting sculptures that equal in beauty of design and masterly execution those of Egypt and Babylon.
The author of the Troano MS.--a very ancient treatise on geology, one of the four known books which escaped destruction at the hands of Bishop Landa and other fanatical Catholic monks who the Spanish invaders, when, after a struggle of twenty years, they at last, in 1541, became masters of the country tells us that anciently the peginsula was called Mayax; that is, the primitive land, the terra firma. It gave its name to the whole empire of the Mayas, that comprised all the countries known to-day as Central America, from the isthmus of Darien on the south, to that of Tehuantepec on the north. The site of the government was at Uxmal; but the great emporium of [71] their arts and sciences, the heart, consequently, of that marvellous civilization, was at Chichen-Itza; that became a vast metropolis. In its temples pilgrims from all parts came to worship, and even offer their own persons as a sacrifice to the Almighty, by throwing themselves into the sacred well from which the city took its name. There also came the wise men from afar, to consult the H-Menes, learned priests, whose college still exists. Among these foreigners, were bearded men whose features vividly recall those of the Assyrians of old, and the Afghans of today.
From Chichen this great civilization seems to have extended its influence to the remotest parts of the Earth, and to have exercised its controlling power among far distant and heterogeneous nations. The fact is, that we meet with the name Maya in many countries of Asia, Africa, Europe, as well as of America, and always with the meaning of wisdom and power attached to it. Wherever we find it, there also are found vestiges of the language, of the customs, of the religion, of the cosmogonical and historical traditions of the people of Mayax. Many of these traditions have been recorded in the sacred books of various nations and have come to be regarded as the primitive history of mankind. To quote a few instances. The creation of the world, according to their conceptions, is sculptured, and [72] forms an interesting tabeau over the door-way, on the east facade of the palace at Chicken-Itza.
It might serve as illustration for the relation of of the creation, as we read of it at the beginning of the first chapter of the Manava Dharma Sastra, or ordinances of Menu; says the indianist, H. T. Colebrooke, about 1300 before the Claristian era, and from other and more ancient works of the Brahmins. Said relation however, by the narrative of the myth the Egyptians as told by Eusebius in his work Erangelical Preparations.
Effectively, in the tableau we see represented numinous egg emitting rays, and floating in the midst of the waters where it had been deposited by the Supreme Intelligence. In that egg is seated the Creator, his body painted blue, his loins surrounded by a girdle; he holds holds a sceptre in his left hand; his head is adorned with a plume of feathers; he is surrounded by a e serpent, symbol of the Universe.
Porphyrius, speaking of Jupiter, the Creator in the Orphie mysteries, says, " the philosophers, that is, is the initated, represented him as a man, seated, alluding to his immutable essence; the upper part of the body naked, because it is in its upper portions (in the skies) that the Universe is seen most uncovered; clothed from the waist below because the terrestrial things are those most hidden from view. [73] He holds a sceptre in his left hand because the heart is on that side, and the heart is the seat of understanding that regulates all the actions of man. " And again, " the Egyptians call Kneph the intelligence, or creative power. (Kneph, or be it Kaneh, seems a cognate of can-hel, a Maya word the meaning of which is serpent (dragon); they say that this god threw from his mouth an egg in which was produced another god called Phtha, (Thah is another Maya word, it means the worker -hence the Maker, the, Creator); and Eusebius asserts, " That they represented Kneph, or the Efficient Cause, as a man of a blue color, with a girdle round his loins, a sceptre in his hand, a crown on his head, adorned with plume of feathers; and that emblematically they figured him under the form of a serpent."
Will any one with common sense pretend that these conceptions concerning the Creator, we find not only identical, but expressed in like manner and With he same symbols, by the philosophers of India, of Egypt, and of Mayax, are mere coincidences? If they are not the result of hazard, they must have been conceived by the wise men of one of these countries, that, no doubt, in which the civilization was the oldest, and communicated to others; these, in tore, taught them to their neighbors, as we know the, Egyptians did to the Greeks.
[74] Again, we read in Genesis that at a very early period in man's history, a certain man murdered his brother through Jealousy. jealousy. The victim we are told was named his murderer Cain.
No doubt the writer of the book simply repeated the story lie had learned from the Egyptian priests, concerning the murder of Osiris (in whose honor the mysteries were instituted), by his brother Set, through jealousy; making such alterations in his narration as not to divulge the secrets he had sworn to keep.
If any of those initiated to the higher mysteries were still acquainted with the true history of the murder, they kept it a profound secret; and only gave of it such exoteric explanations as best suited then- purpose. Very little can be learned from the ancient historians. Herodotus always excuses himself from speaking on the subject; although he asserts he is well acquainted with what pertained to the mysteries: and what we gather from the book of Plutarch, de Iside et Osiride, is a version invented to satisfy the initiates of the lower degrees. In it Osiris is represented as having become the culture hero of Egypt. After ascending the throne, having taught his subjects the arts of civilization, he undertook an expedition from Egypt, in order to visit and dispense the same benefits to the different countries of the world. He left his wife and sister Isis in [75] charge of the affairs of the kingdom which she administered aided by the counsels of her friend and preceptor Thoth. Isis, being extremely vigilant, Set, her other brother, had no opportunity for making innovations in the government. Still he desired to sit on the throne. After the return of Osiris, he conspired against him and persuaded seventy-two other persons to join with him in the conspiracy, together with a certain queen of Ethiopia named Aso who happened to be in Egypt at the time. He invited his unsuspecting brother to a banquet, and caused a beautiful chest to be brought into the banqueting-room. It was much admired by all. He then, as if in jest, offered to give it to the person it fitted best. All tried getting into it one after another, but it did not fit any as well as Osiris when he in turn laid himself down in it. Then Set, aided by the conspirators, closed the lid and fastened it on the outside with nails.
This story of a brother being slain at the request of another brother, through jealousy, is also related in Valmiki's ancient Sanscrit poem, the "Ramayana." We are not informed by the author from where he obtained it; but the victim was called BALI, and MAYA is represented as being his enemy. The recital of this event being identical with that archived in the sculptures and mural paintings still existing on the walls of certain edifices at Chichen-Itza, and [76] with the account of it recorded in the second part of the Troano would seem to indicate that the relation of the fratricide was brought to India by some Maya travelers or missionary; or maybe by the colonists from Mayax that Valamiki tells us took possession of and settled, in very remote ages, in the countries, at the south of the Inido-Chinese peninsula, known today as Dekkan. They, of course, brought to their law home with the language and customs, the civilization, traditions, and folk-lore from the mother country. Among these the tradition that, in very ancient times, the son of one of their primitive rulers murdered his brother through jealousy, in order to possess himself of his wife, with whom he had fallen in love, and of the reins of the government.
ln the inflated style of the Hindoo poets Vaimiki recounts the murder of Bali. The story is as follows. There were two princes named Bali and Sougriva, sons of a king of the Monkey nation. After the death of their father, Bali the eldest was called to the throne, being elected sole monarch and supreme lord by the people. A terrible feud had orginated between Bali and Maya on account of a woman they both coveted. Maya challenged Bali to mortal combat and allured him into an ambush. Bali not returning after a time was believed to have succumbed, and his brother Sougriva ascended the [77] throne. Bali returned however, and finding his brother installed in his place accused him of treason in the council of the nobles and before the people. He charged him with causing the news of his death to be circulated in order to usurp the reins of the government. Then he banished him from court, sent him adrift without means, depriving him of his home, his wife and his social position.
Sougriva met Rama; besought his help to avenge his wrongs. Having received his promise to kill Bali, strong in the protection of such an ally, he challenged his brother to mortal combat, although he knew that alone, he was not a match for him. During the encounter that ensued, Rama who was present, seeing that Sougriva was being badly beaten, sent an arrow through the breast of Bali and killed him. The last word of that prince to his slayer who was standing by him, were: "What glory dost thou expect to reap from the death thou hast given me whilst I was not even looking toward thee? Hidden thou hast wounded me in a cowardly manner while my attention was engrossed in that duel." And so Bali was treacherously slain.
We learn from the sculptures and mural paintings that adorn the walls of the palaces at Chichen-Itza and Uxmal that king Can (Serpent) the founder, or maybe the restorer, of these ancient cities, had three sons whose names were Cay (Fish), Aac (Turtle), [78] and Cola (Leopard), and two daughters, Moo (Macaw), and Nicle (Flower).
It was the law among the Mayas that the youngest of the brothers should marry the eldest of the sisters to insure the legitimate and divine descent of the royal family. This Same custom of princes of royal blood marrying their sisters existed among the Egyptians from the earliest days, and it became in after times general; such alliance being considered tcrtuoale. It also prevailed with the Ethiopians,, the Greeks, reeks, those of Mesopotamia in the time of the patriarchts, the Peruvians, and many other nations. Prince Colt was a brave and successful warrior ; at the head of his followers, whom he had often led to victory, he had conquered many nations and greatly added to the glory and extent of the Maya empire. being the youngest of the brothers, he was the one who had to marry Moo, the eldest of the sisters. She, on her part, loved him dearly and was proud of his exploits. After the death of King Can, their father, the country was parcelled among his children. Moo became the queen of Chicken, and many of the lords swore allegiance to her. After her death she received the honors of apotheosis; became the goddess of fire, and was worshiped in a magnificent temple, built on the summit of a high and very extensive pyramid whose ruins are still to be seen iii the city of Izamal.
[79] Aac, the second son of king Can, was also in love with her. To his lot had fallen the ancient metropolis Uxmal, "the three times rebuilt." His headless and legless statue is still to be seen over the main entrance on the facade of the palace known as the "House of the Governor, " at that place. The flayed bodies of his two brothers and his eldest sister are at his feet ; their heads hang from the belt round his waist : and the ruins of his private residence, ornamented with turtles, his totem-yet exist at the northwest corner of the second of the three terraces on which the palace is built. The law of the land and her own predilection for Coh were insurmountable barriers that prevented Aac from marrying Moo. He was not a warrior but a courtier. He spent his life in idleness amidst pleasures and frivolities. Still he was envious of the fame won by his younger brother; jealous of him because of the love of the people, and still more of that of his sister and wife. He allowed his evil passions to gain the mastery over his better feelings. He incited a, conspiration against the friends of his childhood, with the object of killing his own brother, to obtain forcible possession of the sister he so much coveted, seize the reins of the government, and become the supreme lord of the whole empire.
In the carvings on the wooden lintels over the entrance of Coh's funereal chamber, in the paintings [80] that adorn its walls, and in which that part of the life of the personages concerned n these events is portrayed, Aac is represented full of wrath, holding three spears in his band, engaged in a terrible altercation with Coh. from the sculptures that adorned his mausoleum we learn that he was murdered treacherously by being stabbed with a spear three times in the back; and the author of the Troano, MS. in giving an account of that murder and its consequences, has recorded this fact and illustrated it in the first section of plate xiv., in the second part of his work. [When I disinterred his statue, I found in , an urn his heart, partially cremated, and the flint head of the spear with which he was slain.] In one of the tableaux of the mural paintings the body of Coh, surrounded by his wife, his sister Nicle, his children and his mother, is being prepared for cremation; the heart and other viscera having been extracted to be preserved in urns. A similar custom prevailed among the Egyptians of high rank whose bodies were embalmed according to the most expensive process. The internal parts of the body having been removed, were cleansed, embalmed in spices and various substances, then deposited in four vases that were placed in the tomb with the coffin.
At the death of Coh the whole country became involved in a civil war. The conspirators, partisans of Aac, striving to seize the reins of the government, [81] the friends of Prince Coh fighting to avenge his death and in defense of their queen. The goddess of war favored at times one party, then the other. Aac, in order to obtain the preponderance, had recourse to diplomacy. He renewed his suit for the hand of his sister. He sent messengers to her, with a present of fruits, begging her to accept his love now that she was free. The scene is vividly pictured in the mural paintings.
Queen Moo is represented seated in her house situated in the middle of a garden. At her feet, but outside of the house to indicate that she does not accept it, is a basket full of oranges. Her extended left hand shows that she declines to listen to the messenger who stands before, her in an entreating posture, and that she scorns the love of Aac who is seen on a lower plane, making an obeisance. Over his head is a serpent, typical of his name, Can, looking as lovingly as a serpent can be made to look, at a Macaw perched on the top of a tree and above the figure of the queen whose totem it is. The tree is guarded by a monkey in a threatening attitude. This monkey here, as in Egypt the cynocephalus, is the emblem of the preceptor of Moo, symbol therefor of wisdom.
This tableau is most interesting and significant, since in it we have a natural explanation of the myth of the temptation of the woman by the serpent. Here we have the garden, the woman, the [82] temptor, and the fruit. "The story of this family incident passing from mouth to mouth, from generation to generation, from country to country, has become disfigured probably by peoples that did not hold woman in its high esteem, or did not honor her as much as the Mayas did. Perhaps, also, an old misanthropical bachelor, hater of the fair sex, wrote a distorted account of the tradition out of spite at having been jilted by his lady-love, and his version was by the author of Genesis, if he himself did not make the alteration. The fact is that lie author of the Troano MS.--(Plate xvii., part sccond) as the artist who painted the scene just described-asserts that she refused to listen to Aac's entreaties, in consequence of which the civil war continued. At last Moo and her followers succumbed. She fell into the hands of Aac who, after ill-treating her, she having fled, put to death Cay the high pontiff, his elder brother, who had sided with the queen of Chichen, with right and justice. In token of his victory, Aac caused his statue--the feet resting on the flayed bodies of his kin, their heads being suspended from his belt to be placed over the main entrance of the royal palace at Uxmal, where, as I have said, its remains may bo seen today.
I may add here in explanation of the tableau of the scene in the garden, that the present of a basket [83] of oranges was the offer of marriage made by Aac to Moo. It is usual with the aborigines of Yucatan, that yet retain many of the customs of their forefathers, when a young man wishes to propose marriage to a girl to send by a friend as a present, a fruit, or flower, or sweetmeat. The acceptance of the present is the sign that the proposal of the suitor is admitted, and from that moment they are betrothed; whilst the refusal of the present means that he is rejected. A similar custom exists in Japan. When a young lady expects a proposal of marriage a convenient flower-pot is placed in a handy position on the window-sill. The lover plants a flower in it. If next morning the flower is watered he can present himself to his lady-love knowing that he is welcome. If on the contrary, the flower has been uprooted and thrown on the side-walk, he well understands he is not wanted.
The family name of the kings of Mayax was Can (serpent) as Khan is still the title of the Kings of Tartary and Burmah, and of the governor of provinces in Persia, Afghanistan and other countries in Central Asia. Can was therefore the family name of Aac. The meaning of the writer of Genesis when he says that the serpent spoke to the woman and seduced her with a fruit is now easily understood.
The account of the fratricide in Genesis, in the Ramayana, or in the papyri of Egypt, is nothing [84] more or less, with a slight variance, than the story of the feuds of king Call's children. This story, treasured by the priests of Egypt and India, consigned in their sacred book and poems, has been handed down to us among the primitive traditions of mankind.
Nowhere, except in Mayax, do we find it as forming part of the history of the nation. Nowhere, except in Mayax, do we find the portraits of the actors in the tragedy. There, we not only see their portraits carved in bas-reliefs, on stone or wood, or their marble statues in the round, or represented in the mural pintings that adorn the walls of the funereal chamber built to the memory of the victim, but we discover the ornaments they wore, the weapons they used, nay, more, their mortal remains.
The following is the certificate of Charles O. Thompson, Principal and Professor of Chemistry at the Worcester Free Institute, who made the chemical analysis of part of the cremated remains found in the stone urn that was near the chest of the statue that occupied the centre of the mausoleum raised to the memory of the famous warrior Coh, twenty feet below the upper plane of the monument.
WORCESTER, Mass., Sept. 25, 1880.
"Stephen Salisbury, Jr., Esq., submits
an un
"known solid for qualitative examination.
"Under microscope it presents a certain compact
"ness and horny aspect characteristic of animal
[85] "matter which has been charred in a close vessel,
"it loses 9 per cent. when dried at 100° and 9 per
"cent. more by combustion. After calcination,
"a dross and residue remains which contains 3 per
"cent. fenic oxide, a little alumina and much silica.
"Warm water exposed to action of residue shows
"traces of potash and soda.
"These results are consistent with the theory that
"the mass was once part of a human body which
"has been burned with some fuel."
"CHARLES O. THOMPSON"
There is a fact certainly worthy of notice, and this is that the names of the personages mentioned in the various accounts of the fratricide are precisely identical, or are words having the same signification. May not that he regarded as unimpeachable proof that they all refer to the same event?
No one who has any knowledge of philology will ever deny that A-bel-A-bal-Bal-i-Balain are identical words.
A, contraction of Alz, is the Maya masculine article, the. Bal is the radical of Balam. Balam is for the superstitious aborigines, even today, the yumil Kaax-the "Lord of the fields" the "Leopard" which they also call Coh. The totem of the victim of Aac is the leopard: and it is so represented in the bas-reliefs and sculptures.
In Egypt, the spotted skin of the leopard, usually without the head, but sometimes with it, was [86] always suspended near the images and statues of Osiris. The skin of a leopard was worn as a mantle over the ceremonial dress of his priests. Besides, when represented as King of the Amenti - of the " West"--- the symbol of Osiris was always a crouch ing leopard with an open eye over it.
We must not lose sight of the fact that the leopard's skin worn by Nimrod and Bacchus was a sacred appendage to the Mysteries. It was used in the Eleusiniann as well as in the Egyptian mysteries instituted in honor of Osiris. It is mentioned in the earliest speculations by the Brahmins on the meaning of their sacrificial prayers the Aytareya Brahmaruz, and is used in the agnishtoma the initiation rites of the Soma mysteries. When the neophyte is to be born again lie is covered with a "leopard skin," out of which he emerges as from his mother's womb. A leopard skin is worn by the African warriors, who are so fortunate as to possess one, as a charm to render them invulnerable to spears according to the French traveler Paul du Chaillu. It would seem as if the manner in which Coh met his death, by being stabbed with a spear, had been known [87] to their ancestors, and that they imagined that wearing his totem would save them from being wounded with the same kind of weapon used in killing hini. That the inhabitants of Africa had communications with those of the Western Continent there can be no doubt, since populations of black people existed on the isthmus of Panama and other localities at the time of the first arrival of the Spaniards; besides their pictures can be seen in the mural paintings at Chichen.
As to the name Osir, or be it Ozil, it would seem to be a nickname given to Colt on account of the great love his sisters, and the people in general, professed for him. Ozil is a Maya verb that means to desire vehemently. He, therefore, who was very much desired dearly beloved.
Osiers in Egypt, Abel in Chaldea, Bali in India, are myths. Coh, in Mayax, is a reality-a warrior whose mausoleum I have opened; whose weapons and jade ornaments are in my possession; whose heart I have found, and a piece of which was analyzed by Professor Thompson; whose statue, with his name inscribed on the tablets occupying the place of the ears, I have unearthed. This is now in the National Museum in the City of Mexico, one of the most precious relics in that institution, having been robbed from me, by force of arms, by the Mexican authorities.
[88] Isis was the wile and sister of Osiris. The word Isis may simply be a dialoctical mode of pronouncing the Maya word join (idzin) the younger sister. Her headgear, as a goddess, was a vulture. That bird was her totem and the peculiar type of maternity. Isis was often called the great mother-goddess Mau; a word certainly as suggestive of the name Moo, sister and wife of Coh and queen of Chichen, as the vulture is of the Macaw. It must not be forgotten that one of the titles of Isis was the royal wife and sister.
[89] Authors, who of course know nothing of the facts in the ancient history of Mayax, revealed to me by the sculptures and the mural paintings of the temples and palaces of the Mayas, and contained in the pages of the Troano MS., do not believe that Osiris and his sister Isis were deified persons who had lived on earth, but fabulous beings, whose history was founded on metaphysical speculations, and adapted to certain phenomena of nature. But the primitive rulers of the Mayas, whose history is an exact counterpart of that of the children of Seb and Nut, were deified after their death and worshiped as gods of the elements. My object is not here to enter into long explanations on these historical disclosures. I refer the reader who wishes to know more of the subject to my work, "The Monuments of Mayax and their Historical Teachings."
As to the names Cain, Set, Sougriva, Aac, they all convey the idea of something belonging to or having affinity with water.
Cain, by apocope, gives Cay, the Maya word for "fish."
Set is a cognate word of the Maya 7e, to ill-treat with blows. Can a name be more appropriate to designate one who has killed his brother with three thrusts of his spear; and his sister by kicking her to death, as Aac is represented doing by the author of the Troano MS.?
[90] Set, after being treated with the same honor as the other members of the family of Seb, came to be regarded as the Evil principle and was called Nubti, that is, according to the Maya language, the adversary, front nup adversary and ti for. He also was the Sun God, the enemy of the serpent. Here again we have a most singular resemblance, to say the least. Aac, in the sculptures of Mayax, is always pictured surrounded by the sun as his protecting genius: while the serpent, emblem of the country, always shields Coh and his sister-wife within its folds. The escutcheon of the city of Uxmal shows that the title of that metropolis was the "Land of the Sun." It the bas-reliefs of the queen's chamber at Chichen, the followers of Aac are seen to render homage to the Sun; the friends of Moo to the serpent. So in Mayax as in Egypt, the Sun and the Serpent were inimical. In Egypt this enmity was a myth in Mayax a dire reality.
The hippopotamus and the crocodile were emblems of Set which says "that at Hermopolis there "was a statue of Set, which was a hippopotamus " with a hawk upon its back fighting with a serpent." Both the hippopotamus and the crocodile are amphibious animals, having consequently much affinity with water.
Aac, in Maya, is the name for the turtle, also an amphibious animal.
[ 91] The name Sougriva, of the brother of Bali, is a word composed of three Maya primitives, zuc, lib, ha, zuc, quiet, tranquil; lib, to ascend, and ha, water "He who tranquilly rises on the water" as the turtle does.
The universal deluge is another tradition of the early days that was credited by certain civilized nations of antiquity.
The Egyptian priests who, from times immemorial, had kept in the archives of the temples a faithful account of all events worthy of being remembered, derided the Greek philosophers when they spoke of the deluge of Deucalion and the destruction of the human race. Their answer was that as they had been preserved from it the inundation could not have been universal; they even added that the Hellenes were childish in attaching so much importance to that event, as there had been several other local catastrophes resembling it. They told Solon that the greatest cataclysm on record in their books was that during which Atlantis disappeared under the waves of the ocean, in one day and night, in consequence of violent earthquakes and volcanic eruptions; that from that time all communications between their people and the inhabitants of the " Lands of the West " had become interrupted; the occurrence having taken place 9,000 years before his visit to Egypt.
[92] An account of that fearful event was also preserved by the learned men of Mayax who give of it a description identical with that given by the Egyptians. Nearly all the nations living on the western continent have kept the tradition of it, but they do not pretend that all mankind was destroyed.
In Mayax the learned priests caused a relation of it to be carved in intaglio on the stone that forms the lintel over the interior doorway in the rooms on the south side of their college. The building is known to this day by the name of Akab-aib, the dark, or terrible writing.
The author of the Troano MS., a work, I
have already said, on geology, dedicates several pages at the
beginning of the second part to the recital of that fearful cataclysm,
and the phenomena which then took place. This leaves no longer
room for doubting that a large continent existed in the middle
of the Atlantic ocean, and which was destroyed within the memory
of man; and that the narrative by Plato of the submersion of Atlantis
is, in the main, correct. The Maya author represents the lost
land by the figure of a black man with red lips, which would imply
that it was mostly inhabited by a race of black men. In this case,
the presence of blackskinned populations on the Western continent,
anterior to the advent of the Spaniards, would be easily accounted
for. The Mayas like the [93] Egyptians represented the world as
an old man. Plutarch says they called East the face, North the
right side, South the left side; this conception has reached our
days, only we reckon the East as the right hand, West the left,
North the face.
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