338 



AX AISTALYSIS OF THK 



his mark among the ancient signs that attracted his attention, as a modern tourist 

 might scratch his name upon a slab of Egyptian hieroglyphics. 



Tliis marking of new signs over and among older ones must always remain a 

 confusing element to the student of inscriptions. Man is inherently a scrawler and 

 something among his attempts at artistic outlines must be attributed to that 

 same desire which marks certain uncultured persons who cannot resist the tendency 

 to carve rude figures, or write their name at noted localities. 



In the Dresden Codex we have a sequence of the squatting human figure (Fig. 

 IGG) unlike anything yet seen. 



Fig. 1G6. 



Squatting Anthropoids, of Aztec desijJii. 



The difficulties attending the study of the human figure are very great. We 

 will present two of the more prominent of these. What is to prevent, for example, 

 some of the outlines marked by the produced vertical axis representing a tailed 

 quadruped ? (Fig. 1G7.) 



Fig. 167. 



This is not a little puzzling, particularly since we are informed of the value 

 attached to the reptilian batrachian forms in Anahuac chronology. While acknowl- 

 edo-ino- the sua-ffcstiveness of the ijroduced vertical, we nevertheless find the figures 

 of quadru])eds to be such as @ of Pallas. Thus proving the absence of quadru- 

 pedal type comparable to an anthropoid type, and also that although it is not 

 impossible that the produced vertical line may at times mean "tail," it is wot probable 

 that it meant anything of the kind. 



* Kiugsborourgli Coll. (Codex Vaticensis.) 

 f BoUaert, I. c. 

 X Pallas, I. c. 



