36 



HISTORY OF MEXICO. 



of rank, and great warriors, they endeavoured to pre- 

 ferve with the ikin and beard and hair entire, which ferv- 

 ed only to render more frightful thofe trophies of their 

 barbarous fuperftition. The number of heads preferved 

 in this and fuch other buildings is fo great, that fome of 

 the Spanifh conquerors took the trouble of reckoning up 

 thofe upon the fteps of this building, and upon the files 

 betwixt the beams, and found them amount to one hun- 

 dred and thirty-fix thoufand (e). They who wifli for a 

 more minute detail of the buildings within the wall of 

 the great temple, may read the relation of Sahagun in 

 Torquemada, and the defcription of the feventy-eight 

 edifices there by Dr. Hernandez, in the Natural Hiftory 

 of Nieremberg. 



Befides thefe temples there were others fcattered in 

 different quarters of the city. Some authors make the 

 number of temples in that capital (comprehending, as 

 may be imagined, even the fmalleft) amount to two 

 thoufand ; and that of the towers to three hundred and 

 fixty, but we do not know that any one ever actually 

 counted them. There can be no doubt, however, that 

 they were very numerous, and among them feven or 

 eight diftinguifhable for their fize ; but that of TJate- 

 lolco, confecrated like wife to Hukzilopochtli, rofe above 

 them all. 



Out of the capital, the moft celebrated were thofe of 

 Tezcuco, Cholula, and Teotihuacan. Bernal Diaz, 

 who had the curiofity to number the fteps of their ftairs, 

 fays, that the temple of Tezcuco had one hundred and 

 feventeen, and that of Cholula one hundred and twenty. 

 We do not know whether that famous temple of Tezcuco 



was 



(e) Andrea de Tapia, an officer belonging to Cortes, and one of them who 

 counted the Ikulls, gave this information to Gomara the hiftorian, according to 

 his own teftimony in cap. lxxxii. of his Hiftory of Mexico. 



