MANUSCRIPTS OF MEXICO — SPINDEN 443 



nent families and arrange the persons composing them into as many 

 as 10 generations. The problem is considerably aided by the dates, 

 but numerous discrepancies must be admitted. The point is that in 

 a great number of cases there is parallelism in the different codices 

 and other supporting evidence. 



The threshold is safely reached with Four Crocodile, also called 

 Blood-drinking Eagle, and his wife, One Death or Sun Fan. Their 

 establishment is at Sun Blount. The pictured name, Blood-drinking 

 Eagle, is doubtless a reference to human sacrifice made to the eagle 

 either as a messenger of the sun or as the patron of a war cult. 

 Perliaps we may identify this Four Crocodile, Blood-drinking Eagle, 

 with that Four Crocodile who is named as the first cacique of the 

 Mixtec town of Tlilantongo.^^ Unfortunately space does not allow 

 us to pursue such collateral identifications or even to discuss the 

 problems of towns and tribes. We limit ourselves at this time to 

 examining the pictographic and hieroglyphic record in the codices as 

 self-sufHcient. 



Four Crocodile and One Death stand at the beginning of the 

 record in both the Vienna and Bodley codices, and in the Zouche 

 we see the two individuals at Sun Mount on page 21 in a preamble to 

 an historical succession of rulers starting on page 23 with the mar- 

 riage of their granddaughter Five Reed to an old warrior named 

 Eight Wind. The eldest child of Four Crocodile and One Death 

 is given in the Vienna manuscript as One Eagle and in the Bodley 

 manuscript as One Vulture, but in both cases the given name is the 

 same, namely. Jewelled Incense or Incense Star. 



Probably these histories start with the resumption of autonomy 

 by native aristocracies after the dissolution of the Toltec empire 

 on or about A.D. 1220. Immediately we are in a welter of per- 

 sons advancing the interests of this town or that, arranging 

 dynastic marriages, engaging in holy or unholy wars, passing 

 through the vicissitudes of chance and character. Several contem- 

 poraries of Four Crocodile and One Death occupy ruling posi- 

 tions of importance including a man named Four Rabbit, who 

 marries the daughter of Four Crocodile. Their children are the 

 daughters. Five Reed and Ten Crocodile and a son named Twelve 

 Lizard. The seat of Four Rabbit was Riven Hill, and it seems that 

 his two daughters made advantageous marriages and moved to the 

 capitals of their husbands. The son married Twelve Vulture, a 

 lady of Sun Mount, and we have already seen the fate which 

 befell them (fig. 7, above). 



Lady Five Reed marries Eight Wind, an old man previously 

 married to a certain Lady Ten Deer. The eldest son of the second 



" See Caso, Alfonso, Las estelas Zapotecas, p. 72, Mexico, 1928. 



