139 



in a very distant country, north of Mexico. 

 Near the fourteenth head is written the name of 

 Vitznahuatl. If this prince were the same per- 

 son with a king of Huexotla, whom the Mexican 

 historians name also Vitznahuatl, and who lived 

 about the year 1430, the genealogy of the family 

 of Azcapozalco would go back to the year 1010 

 of our era, in reckoning only thirty years for 

 each generation. But how then can we explain 

 the ten following generations, as the drawing 

 appears to have been made towards the end of 

 the sixteenth century ? Neither shall I decide 

 why the year 1565 is marked between the names 

 of the two princes, Anahuacatzin and Quauh- 

 temotzin. We know, that the last of these 

 names is that of the unfortunate Azteck king, 

 whom Gomara falsely names Quahutimoc ; and 

 who, by order of Cortez, was hung up by the feet 

 in 1521, as is proved by a very valuable hiero- 

 glyphical history, preserved in the Convent of 

 San Felipe Neri, at Mexico*. But how could 

 this king, nephew of Montezuma, figure in 

 the family of the lords or tlatoanis of Azcapo- 

 zalco ? 



It is certain, that, when the last of these 

 princes ordered the genealogical painting of his 

 ancestors to be composed, his father and grand- 

 father were still living. This circumstance is 



* See my Political Essay on New-Spain, p. 185. 



