The Mexican Zodiac. 7 



account of the great comets, especially the one of 1489. 

 They also had a system of constellations, and were acquainted 

 with four of the planets, including Venus. Gama describes an 

 arrangement of three masses of stone at Chapultepuc, so 

 arranged as to indicate east and west, and to show by 

 shadows the exact time of the rising and setting of the sun at 

 the period of the equinoxes and solstices, and the true mid-day 

 during the year. In a late examination of the Pyramid of 

 Xochichalco, or Hill of Flowers, an apartment was discovered, 

 having a hole in its roof leading up to the summit of the 

 pyramid, and so placed that it permitted the sun's rays to 

 enter, and to fall, as tradition says, upon an altar at the exact 

 date of the sun's crossing the tropics. 



In Central America, the Eed race constructed calendars 

 bearing considerable resemblance to those of the Mexican, 

 and in New Granada the Muisca natives engraved calendars 

 on polished stone, usually in a pentagonal form, and their 

 priests made lunar observations to regulate the division of 

 time, their year consisting of twenty lunar months. Many 

 details concerning them and kindred subjects will be found in 

 my work on South American antiquities.* In Quito the 

 Caranes conquered the ancient Quitus about 1000 a.d., and 

 their chiefs, known as the Scyris, erected stone columns, 

 which were used to observe the solstices, and regulate the 

 solar year. They are said to have had twelve pilasters placed 

 round their chief temple, serving as so many gnomons, to 

 show the first day of each of their twelve months. These 

 were most probably their own invention, and existed before 

 their conquest by the later Incas of Peru. In Chile, the 

 Araucanos distinguished planets from stars, took note of 

 solstices and equinoxes, and grouped the stars into con- 

 stellations. Their year was solar, consisting of 365 days. 

 They also had a lunar year of twelve moons of thirty days 

 each. 



The Peruvians do not seem to have made as much progress 

 in astronomy as the Mexicans ; but their mechanical arrange- 

 ments were highly curious. Eight cylindrical towers were 

 erected to the east, and eight to the west of Cuzco. Each 

 series of eight consisted of six large towers, in a straight line, 

 with two smaller ones in the centre. The lines of towers were 

 north and south, so that an observer stationed, say in the west 

 group, could, by looking through the spaces, observe the sun 

 rise between the opposite spaces between the towers of the 

 east group. Some writers say there were twelve towers 



* Antiquarian, Ethnological, and other ^Researches in New Granada, etc., 

 by Wm. Bollaert. Triibner and Co. 



