MEXICAN HISTORY AND ARCHAEOLOGY. ? 



descried " an eagle grasping in his claw a writhing serpent, and resting on a cactus 

 which sprang from a rock in the Lake of Tezcoco. This had been designated 

 by the Aztec oracles as the spot where the tribe should settle, after its long and 

 weary migration; and, accordingly, the city of Tenochtitlan was founded on the 

 sacred rock, and, like another Venice, rose from the bosom of the placid waters. 



" It was nearly a hundred years after the founding of the city, and in the begin- 

 ning of the fifteenth century, that the Tepanecs attacked the Tezcocan monarchy. 

 The Tezcocans and the Aztecs united to put down the spoiler, and, as a recompense 

 for the important services of the allies, the supreme dominion of the territory of 

 the Tezcocans was transferred to the Aztecs. The Tezcocan sovereigns thus became, 

 in a measure, mediatized princes of the Mexican throne ; and the two states, together 

 with the neighboring small state of Tlacopan, south of Lake Chalco, formed an 

 offensive and defensive league, which was sustained with unwavering fidelity through- 

 out the wars of the succeeding century. The bold allies united in the spirit of 

 conquest and plunder which characterizes a rude, martial people, as soon as they 

 are surrounded by the necessaries and comforts of life in their own country, or 

 whenever the increase of population begins to require a vent through which it may 

 expend those energies which would explode in civil war, if pent up within so small 

 a realm as the Valley of Mexico. Accordingly, we find that the sway of these 

 tribes, which had but just nestled among the rocks and marshes of the lakes, was 

 quickly spread beyond the mountains that hemmed in the valley. The Aztec arms 

 were triumphant throughout all the plains that swept down towards the Atlantic 

 and Pacific, and penetrated, as is alleged by some authorities, even to Guatemala 

 and Nicaragua." 1 



Large, however, as was this dominion of the Aztecs and their allies, it must be 

 recollected that their territorial power did not cover the entire region which was 

 known subsequently as New Spain or Mexico. In addition to the tribes or states 

 I have mentioned in this notice, as constituting the nucleus of the empire at the 

 period of the conquest, there were numerous other aboriginal powers, among which 

 the Cholulans and Tlascalans were the most eminent. Besides these, there were, 

 on territory now comprehended within the Mexican Republic, the Tarascos, who 

 inhabited Michoacan, an independent sovereignty; the barbarous Ottomies; the 

 Olmecs; the Xilancas; the Mistecas; and the Zapotecs. The Aztec arms had 

 recently subdued the region of Oajaca, and the last-named tribe, with all its civil- 

 ization, had submitted to Ahuitzotl. 2 



There was something, doubtless, in the geographical position and geological 

 structure of this remarkable region, that assisted in making it the seat of empire. 

 History shows that colonial offshoots are modified by climatic change. The great 



1 Mexico : Aztec, Spanish, and Republican, I, 96. 



2 As an illustration of the uncertainty of the early aboriginal history of Mexican tribes and nations, 

 and especially of their chronology, I annex the following tables of their emigrations from the north, 

 and of the duration of the reigns of Mexican sovereigns. They were compiled by Mr. Gallatin from a 

 comparison of Ixtlilxochitl, Sahagun, Veytia, Clavigero, the Mendoza collection of ancient picture 

 writings, the Codex Tellurianus, and Acosta, and inserted in the 1st vol. of our Ethnological Society's 

 Transactions, p. 162. The tables will be found on the next page. 



