XL] THE AMERICAN ABORIGINES. 411 



and in which they could but masquerade after their own savage 

 fashion. 



It has to be remembered that the Aztecs were but one branch 

 of the Nahuatlan family, whose affinities Buschmann 1 has traced 

 northwards to the rude Shoshonean aborigines who roamed from 

 the present States of Montana, Idaho, and Oregon down into 

 Utah, Texas, and California. Possibly to this Shoshonean stock 

 belonged the barbaric hordes who overthrew the civilization 

 which flourished on the Anahuac (Mexican) tableland about the 

 6th century A.D. and is associated with the ruins of Tula and 

 Cholula. In any case it seems now clear that the so-called 

 "Toltecs," the "Pyramid-builders," founders of this earliest Central 

 American culture, were not Nahuatlans but Huaxtecans, who 

 thence migrated southwards and formed fresh settlements in 

 Guatemala and Yucatan. 



After their withdrawal barbarism would appear to have re- 

 sumed its sway in Anahuac, where it was later 



J Chichimec 



represented by the rude Chichimec tribes merged and Aztec 



, .... , , i- / i Empires. 



in a loose political system which was dignified in 



the local traditions by the name of the " Chichimec Empire.' 7 



In all probability these Chichimecs were true Nahuas 2 , whose 



1 Spuren der Aztek. Sfrac/ie, 1859, passim. 



- "Chiefly of the Nahuatl race'' (De Nadaillac, p. 279). It should, how- 

 ever, be noted that under this general and abusive name of "Dogs" (Chichi, 

 dog) were comprised a large number of savage tribes Otomis, Fames, Pintos, 

 etc. who are described as wandering about naked or wearing only the skins 

 of beasts, living in caves or rock-shelters, armed with bows, slings, and clubs, 

 constantly at war amongst themselves or with the surrounding peoples, eating 

 raw flesh, drinking the blood of their captives or treating them with unheard-of 

 cruelty, altogether a horror and terror to all the more civilised communities. 

 "Chichimec Empire" may therefore be taken merely as a euphemistic expres- 

 sion for the reign of barbarism raised up on the ruins of the early Toltec 

 (Totonac or Huaxtecan) civilization. Yet it has its dynasties and dates and 

 legendary sequence of events, and we are told by the veracious native historian, 

 Ixtlilxochitl, himself of royal lineage, that Xolotl, founder of the empire, had 

 under orders 3,202,000 men and women, that his decisive victory over the 

 Toltecs took place in 1015, that he assumed the title of "Chichimecatl 

 Tecuhti," Great Chief of the Chichimecs, and that after a succession of revolts, 

 wars, conspiracies, and revolutions, Maxtla, last of the dynasty, was over- 

 thrown in 1431 by the Aztecs and their allies. 



