When the author of the Troano MS., speaks of the "Master of the land" par excellence, that is king Can deified, he pictures him sometimes with a human body, painted blue, and the head of a mastodon. On the façade of the building at Chichen Itza called by the nativesKuna, the house of God, to which Stephens, in his work on Yucatan, gives the name ofIglesia, is a tableau representing the worship of that great pachyderm, whose head, with its trunk, forms the principal ornament of the temples and palaces built by the members of king Can's family.
This tableau is composed of a face intended for that of the mastodon. Over the trunk and between the eyes formerly existed a human head, which has been destroyed by malignant hands. It wore a royal crown. This is still in place. On the front of it is a small portrait cut in the round of some very ancient personage. On each side of the head are square niches containing each two now headless statues, a male and a female; they are seated, not Indian fashion, squatting, but with the legs crossed and doubled under them, in a worshipingattitude. Each carries a symbol on their back; totem of the nation or tribe by which the mastodon was held sacred. Under these figures, are two trianglestriangles pointing upwardsemblems of offerings and worship in Mayax as in Egypt. So also was the other symbolhoneycombimage of a honey-comb, an oblation most grateful to the gods, since with the bark of the Balche tree, honey formed the principal ingredient ofBalche, that beverage so pleasing to their palate: the same that under the name of nectar,Hebeserved to the inhabitants of Olympus. It is theAmrita, still enjoyed, on the day of the full moon, by the gods, the manes and the saints, according to the Hindoos; although it was the cause of the war between the gods and the Titans, and is the origin of many sanguinary quarrels among the tribes of equatorial Africa even in our days.
These symbols leave no doubt as to the fact that the personages represented by the statues are in the act of worshiping the mastodon.
The corona of the upper cornice, that above the mastodon's head, is formed of a peculiar wavy adornment often met with in the ornamentation of the monuments erected by the Cans. Emblematic of the serpent, it is composed of two letters N juxtaposed, monogram of Canwavy lines. The corona of the lower cornice is made of two charactersspiral and stepsthat read in MayaAh ↄam, He of the throne—the monarch.
In Japan the seven members of the Can family, deified and figured by the same symbols as in Mayax, are worshiped to-day in the shrine of the palace at Tokio, dedicated to the goddess symbolized by a bird. This goddess calls to mind the goddessMooof the Mayas, or Isis of the Egyptians. In the upper part of the shrine, over and above all the other attendants who have wings and beaked noses, is seen an elephant couchant, the god of fire standing on his back. In the midst of the flames that surround him is the head of a bird. So in Chichen we see the followers of queen Moo, who, we are informed by the author of the Troano MS. became the goddess of fire, carrying her totem, a bird, in their head-gears.
The Japanese claim to be offspring of the gods, and produce two different genealogical tables in support of their assertion. These gods amounting toseven, are said to have reigned an almost incalculable number of years in the country; although they assert that these primitive gods were spiritual substances, incorporeal. They were succeeded byfiveterrestrial spirits, or deified heroes, after whom appeared the Japanese themselves.
Here again we have a reminiscence, as it were, of thetwelvegods, that the Egyptians toldHerodotus, had governed their country, an incalculable number of years, before the reign of Menes their first terrestrial king. These gods were converted by the Greeks into thetwelvedeities, dwellers of the Olympus. Thetwelveserpent heads, brought to light by me in December, 1883, from the center of the mausoleum of the high-pontiff Cay, at Chichen-Itza, are emblematic of thetwelverulers, who had reigned in Mayax in times anterior to the great cataclysm when Atlantis was submerged; whose portraits, with the signcimi, dead, adorn the east façade of the palace with the tableau of creation, showing that they existed in very early times. Of these rulers we again find a dim tradition in China in theTchi, also calledche-cull-tse—thetwelvechildren of the emperor of Heaven,Tien-Hoang, who had thebody of a serpent. Each of theseTchiare said to have lived eighteen thousand years, and to have reigned in times anterior toTi-hoang, sovereign of thecountry in the middle of the land.
From this short digression let us return to the worship of the mastodon which we find very prevalent in India in that of the elephantGanesha, the god of prudence, of wisdom, of letters, represented as ared coloredman with the head of an elephant. He is invoked by the Hindoos of all sects at the outset of any business. No one would dream of writing a letter or a book without previouslysaluting Ganesha. His image is seen at the crossing of the roads, oftentimes decorated with a garland of flowers, the offering of some pious devotee. Architects place it in the foundation of every edifice. It is sculptured or painted at the door of every house as a protection against evil; at one of the entrances of every Hindoo city, that is calledGanesha-pol, as well as in some conspicuous door of the palace. We have already seen that in the most ancient edifices of Mayax the mastodon's head with its trunk is the principal and most common ornament. Are these mere coincidences? The nameGanesha-polwould be according to the Maya language, thehead of Ganesha;pol, in Maya, being the head. If I wished to go further I might say that inGaneshawe have a dialectical pronounciation ofCan-ex, "the serpents." No deity in the Hindoo pantheon is so often addressed; and his titles are so numerous that like Osiris it might be namedMyrionymus"with ten thousand names."
So many are the legends accounting for the elephant head, it may be safely assumed that its origin is unknown. May not its worship have been introduced in India, with many other customs, that for instance of carrying the children astride on the hip; of printing an impression of the human hand, dipped in red liquid, on the walls of the temples and other sacred buildings bydevotees etc.; by colonists from Mayax where these customs prevailed, and the worship of the mastodon was widely spread if not general? This surmise assumes the semblance of probability when we consider that the body of Ganesha is painted red, the color characteristic of the American race, and the symbol of nobility of race among the Egyptians.
The elephant was not among the animals worshiped by them. They do not seem to have been much acquainted with it. But the imprint of the red hand, so commonly seen on the walls of the temples of Mayax and India, has never been observed in the temples of Egypt; neither did the Egyptian women carry their children astride on their hip, as do still those of India and Yucatan, although many other customs were common to the people of these countries. It is probable that the colonists from the "Lands of the West" who settled in the valley of the Nile, replaced the worship of the mastodon, which did not exist in the country, by that of the bull, the largest and most useful of their domestic animals; and that this was the origin of their veneration for the bull Apis, as those who were initiated into the mysteries of Osiris well knew, being told that Apis ought to be regarded as a fair and beautiful image of their soul.
From the remotest antiquity the serpent was held by every people in the greatest veneration asthe embodiment of divine wisdom. We have already said that Eusebius asserts that the Egyptians figured emblematicallyKneph, the Creator, as a serpent; and that the Maya learned priests represented the engendered, the ancestor of all beings, in the sculptures, protected within the coils of the serpent. Mr. Stanyland Wake, in his book on the origin of the serpent worship writes: "the student of mythology knows that certain ideas were associated by the people of antiquity with the serpent, and that it was the favorite symbol of peculiar deities; but why that animal rather than any other was chosen for that purpose is yet uncertain."
The late Mr. James Fergusson in his work on "Serpent and Tree Worship," a work so full of erudition and interesting researches, whilst he conclusively shows that these worships were common to all civilized and half civilized nations of antiquity, fails to indicate the country where they originated. All authors who have written on the subject, admit that their origin is still an impenetrable mystery; although they agree that they are so intimately connected as to make it impossible not to believe it must have been the same.
The limited scope of this book does not allow me to give the matter all the space it deserves. I will therefore content myself, with bringing forth such facts as will conclusively show, at least tounprejudiced minds, that the serpent and tree worship indeed originated on this "Western continent," and from the same cause; "the love of the country," from theamor-patriæ, still so firmly rooted in the heart of the aborigines, that it is difficult to induce them to leave the spot where they are born, even to better their condition. Everywhere on the Eastern continents serpent worship is connected with mythological narratives, metaphysical speculations, or astronomical conceptions, far above the intellectual and scientific attainments of the mass of people among whom it prevailed.
These were mere fictions invented by the priests and learned men, to conceal either the real facts, or may be, their own ignorance of them. Still, anxious to maintain the preponderance and power that knowledge gave them over the multitudes, and having to satisfy their curiosity, they imagined such explanations as best suited the notions current in their times and the ideas of the people.
In early days the serpent, emblem of Kneph, the Creator, was theagathodæmon, the good genius. It is still so regarded by the Chinese, who consider it one of their most beautiful symbols. Later, when it became emblematical ofSetor Typho, the slayer of Osiris, it was looked upon with horror, as the evil principle, the destroyer, the enemy of mankind. It has ever since continued to be so held bythe Jews, the Christians, the Mahometans, in fact by all peoples whose religious tenets are founded on the Bible. If the tree and serpent were worshiped throughout the Eastern continents from the shores of the Atlantic ocean to those of the Pacific, from Scandinavia to Egypt and the Asiatic peninsulæ, their worship was not less spread amongst the nations that inhabited the "Lands of the West." We find vestiges of it everywhere on the Western continent; from the banks of Brush creek, in Adams county, in the State of Ohio, where still exists, on the crest of a mound, the effigy of a great serpent 700 feet long, entirely similar to that discovered by Mr. John S. Phené in Glen Feechan, Argyleshire, in Scotland, to the ancient city of Tiahuanuco, whose ruins are 13,500 feet above the level of the Pacific on the shores of lake Titicaca, near the frontier of Bolivia, on the high plateau of the Andes. There is yet to be seen a very remarkable doorway formed out of a single monolith 13 feet 5 inches long, 7 feet high above the ground, and 18 inches thick. This monolith has attracted the attention of d'Orbigny and the other travelers who, like myself, have been struck with astonishment by the beauty of the sculptures that adorn its south-eastern façade. Mayas, no doubt, were the unknown builders of that great city; since in the sculptures mentioned, we find, as in thetemples of Japan, the totem of princeCoh, of his wife and sisterMoo, and of their father kingCan(serpent).
I will make here a short digression in order to describe these sculptures, that with the knowledge we possess to-day of the history of the founders of the principal ruined cities of Mayax, afford us another proof that the builders of that city of Tiahuanuco belonged to a then highly civilized nation, which sent colonists to the remotest parts of the earth, as the English do to-day, and to whose historical annals may be traced many of the primitive traditions of mankind. This city was already in ruins when Manco Capac laid the foundation of the Inca's empire, and had been constructed bygiants before the sun shone in heaven, as the natives said to the Spaniards when questioned as to its antiquity.
We have seen that the members of the family of kingCan, are still worshiped in the temples of Japan, as of old they were in those of Egypt; we now meet unimpeachable records of them, carved on very ancient monuments, on the shores of lake Titicaca, at the foot of the great glaciers of Sorata and Illimani, as we have found them in mythological lore of India and Greece. Will it be said that these are mere coincidences?
Lion-dog sculpture - not mentioned in the List of Illustrations
The front of this monolithic gate was once upon a time as highly polished as the material, trachite, will permit. The whole space above the doorway is divided into four bands about eight inches high. The lower band contains seventeen small heads, in low relief, adorned in a somewhat similar manner to that of the central figure.Sevenof these, those directly under that figure wear, like it, a badge that seems to be a plume composed ofthreefeathers. These small heads are separated bygrecqueshaving macaw's heads at their salient sides; thesegrecquesare the symbol of power and strength. In the ancient Maya and Egyptian alphabets thegrecqueis equivalent to our latin letter H.Ahis the Maya masculine article, and it conveys to the mind the idea of might and power; this, taken in connection with themacaw'shead, totem of Moo, the queen of Chichen, signifies the mighty, the powerful Moo.
The other bands are divided into squares of the same size, except in the center over the doorway, where there is a figure 32 by 21 inches.
Its head, the form of which is not only conventional, as its square eyes and mouth indicate, but likewise emblematical, consists ofthreesuperposed layers in the shape of escutcheons, the uppermost of which is sculptured so as to represent a human face. Thesethreeescutcheons as thethreefeathers of the plume that adorns it, thetriplethrone on which the figure seems to stand, thethreedots on each cheek,thethreeoblong squares on the breast-plate, thethreemacaw's heads at the extremities of thetriplesceptre it holds in its hands, are symbolical of thethreegreat western regions that the Egyptians designated by the generic name of "Lands of the West" and represented by the characterthree-pointed crownwhich is an image of the crown worn by some of the high chiefs in Mayax. That the central figure was meant to represent these countries, the signlong hollow rectangle, that stands in lieu of the mouth, indicates. It is the letterM, pronouncedMa, of the Maya and Egyptian ancient alphabets. It is the radical ofMayax, name of the Maya empire. ButMain Egypt as in Mayax, is a word that signifies land, country, and by extension universe; and in Mayax as in Egyptlong hollow rectangleis one of the signs for land.
Terra cotta heads from British Honduras
The head is surrounded by rays divided into groups of four; four on the top, four on each side, and four on the under part. Each ray is terminated by a circle with a dot in the centercircle with a dot in the middle, a sign very often met with on the monuments of Mayax; particularly on the trunk of the mastodon's heads. It is the first letter of the ancient Maya and Egyptian alphabets, and correspond to our letter A, the initial of the Maya wordAhau, king.
Sculptures on monolith gate at Tiahuanuco, Bolivia
This would indicate that the central figure was likewise symbolical of the kingpar excellence, ruler of the empire, whom the kneeling personages that surround it, are in the act of worshiping as shown, not only by their posture, but also by the signhanging fronds, carved on the neck of the macaw-headed figures, the followers of the queenMoo(macaw), which again in Mayax as in Egypt is the symbol of offering, worship, and adoration. The name of this great king we read in the four heads of leopards, terminating the rays at the upper angles, and those in the middle on each side of the escutcheon, and in the four rays of each group. Translating these symbols by means of the Maya language, we find thatCan Cohwas the name of the potentate; and that he was a member of theCanfamily, rulers of Mayax. This fact is indicated by the serpent heads at the lower angles of the escutcheon, those at the extremities of the breast-plate, the four oblong squares carved on the ribbons that support it, and the number of rays forming each group round the head.
In Mayafouriscan; but can also meansserpent, likewise power. Numberfouraccording to Pythagoras, was particularly connected with Mercury, theThothof the Egyptians, as the deity who imparted intellectual gifts to man. TheTetraktusor numberfour represented the mystic name of the Creative Power; and in later times it meantintellect,wisdom,all that is active. Pythagoras asks: "How do you count?" Mercury: "one, two, three, four." Pythagoras: "Do you not see that what are four to you are ten and our oath? those (1, 2, 3, 4,) added together, forming ten, and four containing every number within it." The four leopard heads are his totem,Kancoh, Cohbeing leopard. Further on, I will refer more in detail to these personages, and to the rôle they have played in the civilization of the world, having been, and being still, worshiped in many countries under different names. The peculiar shape of the sceptre held in the left hand of the figure, the upper part of which is bifurcated, each end terminating with the head of amacaw, totem of the queenMooof Chichen-Itza, sister and wife ofCoh, and its undulations, like those of a serpent in motion, seem intended as an emblem of the three great regions that composed the empire that is likewise portrayed in the three rows of kneeling winged personages. The upper portion of said sceptre is symbolical of the Western continent, divided into two great parts united by the Isthmus of Panama. The lower was meant to represent that extensive island that sunk beneath the waves of the Atlantic ocean, about 11,500 years ago.
The sceptre held in the right hand of the centralfigure being whole, would show that the entire country was governed by a potentate to whom the rulers of the seventeen nations, into which the empire was divided, paid homage and acknowledged as their suzerain. These seventeen divisions of the empire are indicated by the seventeen small heads sculptured on the lower band, and the seventeen signs of land that adorned the arms, the breastplate, and the ribbon from which it is suspended.
Of the small kneeling winged figures, those of the middle row are portrayed with the heads of macaws to signify that they are the particular adherents of queen Moo, that here, as in Mayax, carry her totem as a badge or sign of recognition; whilst the others have human heads, but wear on their crowns her totem, in token that they recognize her as theirsuzerain. All these figures are ornamented withtwelveserpents, arranged in groups ofthree, whilst the sash they carry across their body from the shoulder to the waist on the opposite side, terminates in a peculiar knot adorned with the four circles, that we have said stood for the wordAhau, that is king, indicating that their lord paramount is a member of theCan(serpent) dynasty. The whole tableau recalls vividly, that presented by the kneeling beaked nosed personages in attendance at the shrine of the bird deity at Kioto.
Mr. Angrand, the well known Frencharchæologist, finds, and with reason, a coincidence between these sculptures and those of Central America, having a corresponding symbolical significance. In them he sees the proof of the identity of origin, of the intimate relationship of the builders of Tiahuanuco and those of Palenque, Ocosingo, and Xochicalco. He might have added, and be nearer to the truth, those of the cities of Mayax, that were founded many centuries before those mentioned by him.
In Mayax, it is where, indeed, the image of the serpent, as a symbol, is most commonly met with. We see it on almost every edifice in every city. It is one of the favorite ornaments, especially at Chichen-Itza, of which place it seems to have been the particular protecting genius. There it is found everywhere. It guards the entrance of all public edifices. It is at the foot of their grand stairways, as if defending the ascent. The columns that support their porticos are representations of it. Its head forms the base, its body the shaft. The nobles and other personages of high rank wore adornments made in the shape of serpents. Chichen may indeed be called the "City of Serpents" par excellence. If we, therefore, wish to know the true meaning of the serpent as a symbol, if we desire to inquire as to the motives that led to its worship, it is necessary to question the learned priestsof that city; to consult the books in which the philosophers of Mayax have consigned their knowledge and their esoteric doctrines.
The origin of the "Serpent Worship" they tell us, can be traced to two apparently distinct causes. One, the esoteric, taught only to a few select of those initiated in the greater mysteries, is the homage to be tributed by the creature to the Creator. The other, the exoteric, inculcated on the uninitiated, was the love of the country, and the respect due by the subjects to their rulers, living images and vicars of the Deity on earth.
In order to comprehend the first, or esoteric, we must recall to mind that Eusebius says that the Egyptians represented emblematicallyKnephthe Creator, and the world also, under the figure of a serpent, which, Horapollo asserts, was of a blue color with yellow scales; but they fail to inform us as to what may have been their motives for thus symbolizing the First Cause; or from whom they had received this symbol, that was the same used by the Mayas. A clue to this mystery can no doubt be found in the cosmogonical notions prevalent among the ancient civilized nations; for, strange to say, they seem to have been alike with all. We read in theManava-dharma-sastrathat the visible universe in the beginning was nothing but darkness. Then the great, self-existing Powerdispelled that darkness, and appeared in all His splendor. He first produced the waters; and on them movedNarayanathe divine spirit.
Berosus, recounting the ancient legend of the creation according to the Chaldeans, says: "In the beginning all was darkness and water; and therein were generated monstrous animals and strange and peculiar forms.... A woman ruleth them all." Her name in Chaldee isThalath, in GreekThalassa(the sea), that is in MayaThallac(a thing without steadiness).
Genesis recounts that: "In the beginning the Earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep, and the spirit of God moved upon the face of the water. And God said, Let there be light and there was light."
InPrimander, that modern critics consider the most ancient and authentic of the first philosophical books of Egypt, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, in the dialogue betweenThothand Primander, the Supreme Intelligence, we read these words ofThoth. "I had then before my eyes a most prodigious spectacle. All things had resolved themselves into light. A marvellous, pleasing and seducing sight it was to contemplate. It filled me with delight. After a while a horrid shadow, which ended in oblique folds, and assumed a humid nature, agitated itself with terrific noise. From it escaped smoke withuproar, and a voice was heard above the din. It seemed as the voice of the light; and the verb came forth from that voice of light; that verb was carried upon the humid principle. Out of it came forth the fire pure and light, and rising, it was lost in the air that, spirit-like, occupies the intermediate space between the water and the fire. The earth and the water were so mixed that the surface of the Earth covered by the water appeared nowhere."
And in what are termed the modern Hermetic books, the origin of things is thus explained: "The principle of all things existing is God, and the intellect, and nature, and matter, and energy, and fate, andconclusion, andrenovation. For there were boundless darkness in the abyss, and water, and a subtile spirit, intellectual in power, existing in chaos. But the holy light broke forth, and the elements were produced from among the sand of a watery essence."
In thePopol-Vuh, the sacred book of the Quiches, we read: "This is the recital of how everything was without life, calm and silent, all was motionless and quiet; void was the immensity of the heavens; the face of the Earth did not manifest itself yet; only the tranquil sea was, and the space of the heavens. All was immobility and silence in the darkness, in the night; only the Creator, the Maker, the Dominator, the Serpent covered with feathers, they whoengender, they who create, were on the waters as an ever increasing light. They are surrounded by green and blue, their name is Gucumatz."
We have already said how the Maya sages have taken care to perpetuate their cosmogonical conceptions, by causing the narrative of the creation to be carved, in high relief, over the doorway of the east façade of the palace at Chichen-Itza, and that these conceptions were identical with those of the Hindoos and the Egyptians. It cannot be argued that this identity of ideas about the origin of things, arrived at by the wise men of India, Egypt, and Mayax, and expressed in as nearly the same words as the genius of the vernacular of these various countries admits, is purely accidental; or, that they have arrived separately at the same conclusions on the subject, without communicating one with the other. The notion and its explanation must have originated with one, and been taught to the others just as our modern scientific discoveries, or religious beliefs, are carried from country to country, even the most remote, and made known to their inhabitants. What should we think of the man who would pretend that the railway, electric telegraph, and many other of the latest inventions, instead of having originated in one particular country, nay, more, in the brain of a particular man, have sprung simultaneously among all the various nations which makeuse of them? Would not that man be regarded as a born idiot or a fit subject for a lunatic asylum? We can easily understand how these cosmogonical notions have passed from the Egyptians to the Chaldees or to the Hindoos orvice versa; but who brought them to the "Lands of the West" and when? Who can say they did not arise among the inhabitants of the "Western continent;" and were not conveyed by them to the other nations?
In my work "The Monuments of Mayax," I have shown how the legends accompanying the images of several of the Egyptian deities, when interpreted by means of the Maya language, point directly to Mayax as the birthplace of the Egyptian civilization. How the ancient Maya hieratic alphabet, discovered by me, is as near alike to the ancient hieratic alphabet of the Egyptians as two alphabets can possibly be, forcing upon us the conclusion that the Mayas and the Egyptians either learned the art of writing from the same masters, or that the Egyptians learned it from the Mayas. There is every reason to believe that the cosmogonical conceptions, so widely spread, originated with the Mayas, and were communicated by them to all the other nations among which we find their name.
An analysis of the tableau of creation, carved on the façade of the palace at Chichen-Itza, cannot fail,therefore, to prove interesting. In it we shall find a proof of the scientific attainments of its designers; and also the reason why the serpent came to be worshiped all over the Earth.
The philosophers of Mayax must have known that the waters cover the greatest part of the globe (about three fifths); and that water being a combination of gases (oxygen and hydrogen), the most subtile of fluids, must have been the first form of matter produced. This is why on each side and on the top of the tableau they placed the symbol of waterthree wavy lines; taking care to leave without it, at the upper part, a portion equal to two-fifths of its length. In the midst of the waters they represented the figure of an egg, that is a germ. Why an egg and not any other seed? Is it because their study of physiology had made them acquainted with the fact, that no being exists on Earth, but that is born from an egg? They represented the egg emitting rays. The rays of the light into which says Thoth, all things resolved themselves; that, says the Quiche, author of the Popol-Vuh, appeared on the water as an increasing brightness that bathed the Creator, thefeathered serpent, theKneph, as the Egyptians would name it, in green and azure. It is well to notice that the symbols of water terminate with the head of serpents; because they compared the waves of the ocean to the undulations of the serpent's body while in motion.
Bas-relief from Prince Coh's monument
For this reason the Mayas named the seaCanah, the great, the powerful serpent: and in the Troano MS., the sea is always designated by a serpent's head. This explains why the Quiches, the Mayas, the Egyptians, the Hindoos, represented the world, and, by extension, the maker of it, as a serpent. Thus it is that they placed a serpent within the egg, behind the creator to indicate that this symbol is the totem of the ancestor of all beings. And here we have one of the origins of the serpent worship: that is, the adoration of the Creator.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 1.
Fig. 2.
Fig. 2.
In Egypt the goddessUati, the genius of the lower country, is at times represented as a serpent with inflated breast, the body standing erect over a basket or sieve, the lower part resting against a figure resembling our numeral8. At times again, as a winged serpent, with inflated breast, wearing on its head a cap or crown of peculiar shape, that it is said to be the crown of lower Egypt. Why the Egyptians selected such symbols to represent the lower country, we are not informed; and it isdoubtful if the learned Egyptologists could explain the motive.
Now it is a most remarkable fact, that these are the very symbols used by the Maya hierogrammatists and artists to figure their own motherland, the Maya empire.
Plate XVII, part II. of Troano M.S.
The author of the Troano MS., sometimes pictures Mayax as a serpent with an inflated breast (Plate. XVII., Part II.), at other times as a serpent with part of the body bent in the shape of the Yucatan peninsula,[2]and the artists who executed thepaintings in the funereal chamber of PrinceCoh, typified the country as a winged serpent, with the back painted green, the belly yellow, wearing a blue crown on the head, its tail ending with a peculiar dart resembling in general contour the southern continent of America.
This is not the place to give minute explanations of these symbols which I have considered in another work, I simply wish to consign here such facts as cannot be attributed altogether to hazard. So the peculiar twist against which rests the body of the serpent, emblem of the lower country, is exactly the same that forms the symbolused in the Troano MS., to represent the gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean sea, whose waters bathe thepeninsula of Yucatan, that seems as if standing erect between them as the serpent in the Egyptian sign.
Head dress of mother Earth
As to the sieve, it is called, by the natives of that country,Mayab. Mayab was, in past ages, one of the names of the peninsula. The crown of Lower EgyptEgyption crown, is precisely that worn by certain chieftains, whose portraits we see in the bas-reliefs at Chichen-Itza. There the peak was worn in front; in Egypt at the back: may be as a mark of respect on the part of the Egyptians toward their mother country, to signify that as the child, Egypt must stand behind its parent, as it is customary for children to do among the aborigines of Yucatan.
Since the Egyptians and the Mayas used identical signs as symbols of the country in which they lived, may it not be inferred that the same cause prompted their selection? We must not lose sight of the fact that the winged serpents introduced into the paintings of Egypt, are merely emblematic representations connected with the mysterious rites of the dead, and the mode of being in Amenti; that is, in the "Lands of the West" where the souls of the departed were supposed to return and exist, after being liberated from their mortal body.
Bas-relief from Prince Coh's monument
In early daysUatiorMati, the country of Mayax, was one of the divinities, worshiped by the settlers on the banks of the Nile; and the asp, not any other snake, played a conspicuous part in the religious mysteries, and was universally honored.
Here, again, we may ask why? What possible relation can exist between the asp and the country; between the asp and the office of king or the attributes of Deity? Still it was the badge of royalty, worn as an ornament on the head-dress of kings and gods. Is the selection of the asp as a mark of distinction to be ascribed to a mere whim? May not that predilection be assigned to the fact that, when angry, it dilates its breast; and when in that condition it recalled to the minds of the colonists, the geographical contours of the land of their forefathers in the West, and the way it was represented in the books, from which they had studied in their childhood? If we look at a map of the Western continent, it will be easy to perceive that the contours of Central America—that is the Maya empire of old—figure a serpent with an inflated breast, in a position similar to that of theemblem of lower Egypt (Figs. 1 and 2, p.115.), the head being the peninsula of Yucatan, anciently the seat of the government; and that the southern continent would be the dart of its tail, as pictured by the Maya artists. The green color of its back, the verdant, tropical forests that cover the land; the yellow belly, the internal volcanic fires, that cause the surface to wriggle like a serpent; the blue crown on its head, the blue canopy of heaven above; the wings, the smoke of the volcanoes; the fins, the high peaks of the chain of mountains that traverses the country from north to south, part of the Cordilleras, that are as the backbone of the continent.
Map of the Maya Empire
The intense love of their country is one of themost striking characteristics of the aborigines to the present day. That love may be said to amount to fanaticism. In it we find another origin of the serpent worship, emblem of the motherland.
In the Serpent mantra, in theAytareya Brahmana, a passage speaks of the Earth as theSarpa Rajni, the queen of the serpents, and the mother of all that moves, still worshiped by the Nayas, dwellers in the valley of Cashmere.
In Mayax the primitive rulers derived their titleCan(serpent) from the shape of the contours of their empire, as the priests of the sun received theirs from the nameKinof that luminary. Their emblem however, was not a winged serpent, with a dart at the end of the tail, but a rattlesnake covered with feathers; image of the feathered mantle used by the king, the high-pontiff, and other high dignitaries, as ceremonial dress. This feathered rattlesnake adorns the walls of the royal mansions. It is seen at Uxmal, on the east façade of the west wing of kingCan'spalace and at other places. After their death these rulers, images of Deity on earth, received the honors of apotheosis. They became gods and goddesses and were worshiped as such. In Assyria the symbol of the winged serpent was replaced by that of the winged circle, emblem of Asshur, the supreme deity of the Assyrians; and this symbol isseldom found in the sculptures except in immediate connection with the monarch. It seems to be also closely related with the sacred or symbolical tree.
Here again, is another origin of "Serpent Worship," in that of the kings of Mayax under the symbol of the "feathered serpent." One of the names for rattlesnake, in Maya, isAhau-Can, the royal serpent. In the sculptures the king is often represented by this emblem withsevenrattles at the end of the tail; seven having been the number of the members of kingCan'sfamily. In Egypt the kings and queens were honored as gods after their death. In Greece and other countries, the heroes were deified and worshiped as divinities.
From all antiquity and by all nations, the tree and serpent worship have been so closely identified, as to guarantee the inference that their origin is the same, although it seems difficult to comprehend what possible analogy may exist between them, without a knowledge of the place where they originated, of the people that first instituted it, of their traditions and peculiar notions. Many learned students have published the results of their researches on the subject. None, however, has yet assigned a birthplace to the tree or serpent worship.
The late Mr. James Fergusson tells us that he is inclined to believe that it was in "the mud ofthe lower Euphrates, among a people of Turanian origin, and spread thence to every country of the old world." This is truly indefinite. Then comes the query: what about the tree and serpent worship among the inhabitants of the Western continent? For they also had their sacred trees; and with them as with the natives of the Eastern world, the tree was symbolical of eternal life.
The oak tree was dedicated toBaal, the chief god of the Phœnicians and other eastern nations. Under it the Druids performed their most sacred rites in honor ofŒseus, the Supreme Being. The ash was venerated by the Scandinavians. The inhabitants of the island of Delos believe the gigantic palm tree to be the favorite production of Latona. The people of Samos, Athens, Dodona, Arcadia, worshiped in sacred groves, as those of Canaan. In India the worship of the tree is of very ancient date, as in the island of Ceylon: in the courtyard of every monastery a bo-tree (ficus Indicus) is planted. Nowhere, however, do we find the origin of that worship mentioned.
Mr. Fergusson advises us to look to the Egyptians, these being the most ancient civilized people, for an explanation of it, averring that it undoubtedly prevailed among them before the multifarious Theban pantheon was elaborated. In Egypt the tamarisk was the holy tree chosen toovershadow the supposed sepulchre of Osiris, the king of Amenti. Theperseawas sacred to Athor, the regent of the West, often identified with Isis. The sycamore was consecrated to Nut, mother of Isis and Osiris, frequently represented in the paintings of the tombs, standing in its branches, pouring from a vase, a liquid which the soul of the departed, under the form of a bird with a human head, catches in his hands. It is the water of eternal life. So the trees were particularly sacred to the deities connected with Amenti, that is, to the deified kings and queens from the "Lands of the West."
We are told that the sacred tree was an emblem found in frequent association with the "winged circle" in Assyria. As this symbol is always met with in immediate connection with the monarchs, it would seem that the worship of the tree bears a close relation to, if it is not typical of, that of the deified heroes and kings.
To understand the relationship between the tree, the winged serpent or "circle" and the "monarchs" it is again necessary to consult the annals left carved in stone or written in their books by the wise men of Mayax. From them we learn that the Mayas held certain trees sacred, Landa, Cogolludo, and other early writers tell us that, even as far down as the time of the Spanish conquest, the aborigines believed in the immortality of the soul, that would be rewarded or punished in the life beyond the grave, for its deeds whilst in the body.
Yaxche, sacred tree of the Mayas
Their reward was to consist in dwelling in a delectable place, where pain was unknown, where there would be an abundance of delicious food, which they would enjoy, with eternal repose, in the cool shade beneath the evergreen and spreading branches of theyaxché(ceiba tree), which is found planted, even to-day, in front of the main entrance of the churches, throughout Yucatan and Central America. Sometimes the churches are built in the midst of groves of ceiba trees, that in some localities are replaced by the gigantic palm tree (Palma real).
The Maya empire was of old, according to the author of the Troano MS., figured as a tree, planted in the continent known to-day as South America, its principal branch being formed by the Yucatecan peninsula. (See map, page120.) Here we have the key to the origin of the tree worship, and its intimate relation to the winged serpent and the king. It is again the worship of the country symbolized by a tree, as it also was by a serpent, or by the Ruler. Thus we find a natural explanation of the tradition current among the ancient nations, that theTREEpar excellence, the tree of life, that is of civilization, of knowledge, was placed in the middle of the land, of the garden, of the primitive country (Mayax) of the race; the empire of the Mayas being placedbetween the two great continents, North and South America, forming the "Lands of the West."[3]