116 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



creation of the world to the birth of Chrift, five thoufand 

 one hundred and ninety-nine years, which is exa^lly the 

 computation of the Roman calendar. 



Whatever may be in thefe things mentioned by Bo- 

 turini, upon/vhich I leave the prudent reader to form his 

 own judgment, there cannot be a doubt, with thofe who 

 have fludied the hiftory of that people, that the Tolte- 

 cas had a clear and diftinfl: knowledge of the univerfal 

 deluge, of the confufion of tongues, and of the difperlion 

 of the people ; and even pretended to give the names of 

 their firfl anceftors who were divided from the reft of 

 the families upon that univerfal difperfion. It is equally 

 certain, as we ftiall fliew in another place, however in- 

 credible it may appear to the critics of Europe, who arc 

 accuftomed to look upon the Americans as all equally 

 barbarous, that the Mexicans and all the other civilized 

 nations of Anahuac regulated their civil year according 

 to the folar, by means of the intercalary days, in the fame 

 manner as the Romans did after the Julian arrange- 

 ment ; and that this accuracy was owing to the Ikill of 

 the Toltecas. Their religion was idolatrous, and they 

 appear by their hiftory to have been the inventors of the 

 greateft part of the mythology of the Mexicans, but we 

 do not know that they pra^lifed thofe barbarous and 

 bloody facrifices which became afterwards fo common 

 among the other nations. 



The Tezcucan hiftorians believed the Toltecas the au- 

 thors of that famous idol, reprefenting the god of water, 

 placed on mount Tlaloc^ of which v/e ftiall fpeak hereaf- 

 ter. It is certain that they built in honour of their be- 

 loved god ^etzalcoatl^ the higheft pyramid of Cholula, 

 and probably alfo thofe famous ones of Teotihuacan in 

 honour of the fun and moon, which are ftill in exiftence, 



though 



