The Maya Chronicles | Page 4

the most civilized of any found on the American continent.
Copan, Uxmal and Palenque are names which at once evoke the most
earnest interest in the mind of every one who has ever been attracted to
the subject of the archæology of the New World. This race, moreover,
possessed an abundant literature, preserved in written books, in
characters which were in some degree phonetic. Enough of these
remain to whet, though not to satisfy, the curiosity of the student.
The total number of Indians of pure blood speaking the Maya proper
may be estimated as nearly or quite 200,000, most of them in the
political limits of the department of Yucatan; to these should be added
nearly 100,000 of mixed blood, or of European descent, who use the
tongue in daily life.[19-1] For it forms one of the rare examples of
American languages possessing vitality enough not only to maintain its
own ground, but actually to force itself on European settlers and
supplant their native speech. It is no uncommon occurrence in Yucatan,
says Dr. Berendt, to find whole families of pure white blood who do
not know one word of Spanish, using the Maya exclusively. It has even
intruded on literature, and one finds it interlarded in books published in

Merida, very much as lady novelists drop into French in their
imaginative effusions.[20-1]
The number speaking the different dialects of the stock are roughly
estimated at half a million, which is probably below the mark.
§ 3. Origin of the Maya Tribes.
The Mayas did not claim to be autochthones. Their legends referred to
their arrival by the sea from the East, in remote times, under the
leadership of Itzamna, their hero-god, and also to a less numerous,
immigration from the west, from Mexico, which was connected with
the history of another hero-god, Kukul Càn.
The first of these appears to be wholly mythical, and but a repetition of
the story found among so many American tribes, that their ancestors
came from the distant Orient. I have elsewhere explained this to be but
a solar or light myth.[20-2]
The second tradition deserves more attention from the historian, as it is
supported by some of their chronicles and by the testimony of several
of the most intelligent natives of the period of the conquest, which I
present on a later page of this volume.
It cannot be denied that the Mayas, the Kiches and the Cakchiquels, in
their most venerable traditions, claimed to have migrated from the
north or west, from some part of the present country of Mexico.
These traditions receive additional importance from the presence on the
shores of the Mexican Gulf, on the waters of the river Panuco, north of
Vera Cruz, of a prominent branch of the Maya family, the Huastecs.
The idea suggests itself that these were the rearguard of a great
migration of the Maya family from the north toward the south.
Support is given to this by their dialect, which is most closely akin to
that of the Tzendals of Tabasco, the nearest Maya race to the south of
them, and also by very ancient traditions of the Aztecs.

It is noteworthy that these two partially civilized races, the Mayas and
the Aztecs, though differing radically in language, had legends which
claimed a community of origin in some indefinitely remote past. We
find these on the Maya side narrated in the sacred book of the Kiches,
the Popol Vuh, in the Cakchiquel Records of Tecpan Atitlan, and in
various pure Maya sources which I bring forward in this volume. The
Aztec traditions refer to the Huastecs, and a brief analysis of them will
not be out of place.
At a very remote period the Mexicans, under their leader Mecitl, from
whom they took their name, arrived in boats at the mouth of the river
Panuco, at the place called Panotlan, which name means "where one
arrives by sea." With them were the Olmecs under their leader
Olmecatl, the Huastecs, under their leader Huastecatl, the Mixtecs and
others. They journeyed together and in friendship southward, down the
coast, quite to the volcanoes of Guatemala, thence to Tamoanchan,
which is described as the terrestial[TN-1] paradise, and afterwards,
some of them at least, northward and eastward, toward the shores of the
Gulf.
On this journey the intoxicating beverage made from the maguey,
called octli by the Aztecs, cii by the Mayas, and pulque by the
Spaniards, was invented by a woman whose name was Mayauel, in
which we can scarcely err in recognizing the national appellation
Maya.[23-1] Furthermore, the invention is closely related to the history
of the Huastecs. Their leader, alone of all the chieftains, drank to excess,
and in his drunkenness threw aside his garments and displayed his
nakedness. When he grew sober, fear and shame