120 



AZTEC CALENDAR. 



the ruin lasted for thirteen years. The next age and sun endured 

 364 years or 7 cycles, and terminated in the year 1 Tecpatl on the 

 day 4 Ehecatl, when hurricanes and rain desolated the globe and 

 men were metamorphosed into monkeys. The third age continued 

 for 312 years, or 6 cycles, when fire or earthquakes rent the earth 

 and human beings were converted into owls in the year 1 Tecpatl, 

 on the day 4 Quiahuitl ; — while the fourth age or sun lasted but 

 for a single cycle of 52 years, and the world was destroyed by a 

 flood, which either drowned the people or changed them into 

 fishes, in the year 1 Calli, on the day 4 Atl. The four epochs of 

 destruction are precisely the days typified by the hieroglyphics in 

 the four parallelograms A, B, C and D. 



It will be seen by adding the several periods together that the 

 Aztecs counted 1469 years from the creation of the world to the 

 flood ; yet there is an incongruity in this imaginary antediluvian 

 history. If the fourth age had lasted only 52 years, it would have 

 terminated in the year 1 Tecpatl instead of 1 Calli. Bustamante, 

 the publisher and annotator of Gama, states that some authorities 

 contend for only three antecedent periods, and that the present age 

 is expected to end by fire. But Mr. Gallatin alleges that the 

 four ages and five suns have been generally adopted, and are sus- 

 tained by the ancient Aztec paintings contained in the Codex 

 Vaticanus, plates 7 to 10. Like most of the Mexican antiquities, 

 this branch of the Chronology is admitted to be exceedingly ob- 

 scure, for it is asserted in the Appendix to Mr. Gallatin's essay that 

 the hieroglyphics annexed to these paintings, may be interpreted 

 as giving to the four ages respectively the duration of either 682, 

 530, 576, and 582, or of 5206, 2010, 4404, and 4008 years. 



" This would appear to be purely mythological, but the fact that 

 all these imaginary antediluvian periods consist of a certain number 

 of cycles, shows that this fable was invented subsequent to the time 

 when the Mexicans had attained a knowledge of cycles, years and 

 of the approximate length of the solar year. It seems, therefore, 

 probable that the mythological representation is in some way con- 

 nected with celestial phenomena, and it is accordingly, found that 

 the days designated in the parallelograms A and C, as 4 Ocelotl, 

 and 4 Quiahuitl, correspond respectively, ( on the assumption that 

 the first year of the cycle corresponds with the 31st of December, ) 

 with the 13th of May and 17th of July, old style, or 22d of May 

 and 26th of July, new style. And these two days 22d of May and 

 26th of July, are those, according to Gama, of the transit of the sun 

 by the zenith of the city of Mexico, which, by the observations of 



