Observations on a Collection of 261 



Fig. 16 has some resemblance to the engraved Assyrian 

 seals, or, as they are sometimes called, " Chaldean " cylinders. 

 It is a perforated cylindrical piece of heavy, opaque stone, of 

 a dark sea-green color (nephrite ?), two inches long by an inch 

 and one-tenth in diameter. In a kind of oval, or what Egyptian 

 scholars would call a cartouche, is presented the profile of some 



Fig. 16. 

 Engraved stone cylinder from Yucatan. 



divinity (the Maya god of Death?), with the eye closed and 

 the tongue depending from the corner of the mouth. Some- 

 thing like claws, engraved on a projection of the cylinder,, 

 start out from the cartouche on the left side. The whole is 

 boldly and sharply cut, and highly polished. This relic was 

 obtained from the island of Flores, the ancient Tayasal, in the 

 lake of Itza or Peten, in Yucatan. Among the things found 

 by the conqueror of the Itzaes, Ursua, in the temples which he 

 destroyed in the island in 1697, he mentions " an idol of eme- 

 rald a span long, which," says the chronicler, " he appropriated 

 to himself." 



It may be observed of the figure engraved on this stone, that 

 to speak, among American nations, was the verbal as well as 

 symbolical expression of life or being, as is to see or to breathe, 

 or to eat, among other nations in various parts of the world. 

 The projecting tongue in the sculptured and painted American 

 idols and figures denotes the living god or man ; he who can 



