219 



resent the injury done them by a people, who 

 struck them with terror by such an excess of 

 ferocity. The immolated victim is placed 

 among the Azteck divinities, under the name 

 of Teteionan*, mother of the gods, or Tocitzin, 

 our grandmother* ; a divinity which we must not 

 confound with Eve, or the serpent-woman, call- 

 ed Tonantzin. 



In the Old Continent, wherever we find traces 

 of human sacrifices, their origin is lost in the 

 night of time. The history of the Mexicans, 

 on the contrary, has handed down to us the 

 narrative of events, which have given a fero- 

 cious and sanguinary character to the worship 

 of a people, among whom animals and first 

 fruits were the only primitive offerings. I have 

 thought fit to relate these traditions, undoubted- 

 ly founded on historical truth : intimately con- 

 nected with the study of the manners, and the 

 moral improvement of our species, they appear 

 to me more interesting, than the puerile tales 

 of the Hindoos respecting the numerous in- 

 carnations of their divinities. I shall not how- 

 ever decide the question, whether the sacrifice 

 of the four Xochimilcks was really the first 

 offered to the god Mexitli: or whether the 

 Aztecks had not preserved some old tradition, 

 according to which they imagined, that the god 



* Clavigero, vol. 1, p, 166, 168, 172 ; vol. 2, p. 22. 



