Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 7.djvu/834

 INDIAKS

756

INDIANS

Key into the Language of America (London, 1643) in Rhode Island Hist. Soc. Colls., I (Providence, 1829); Wisconsin Hist. Soc. Colls. (15 vols., Madison, 1855-1900); Yarrow, Mortuary Customs of the North Am. Inds. in First Rept. Bur. Am. Eth. (Washington, 1881).

Mexico, Central America, and West Indies. — Between the Rio Grande and the Isthmus of I'anama was a large numl)er of tribes, constituting some twenty-five Unguistic stocks, and representing cx-ery degree of culture from the lowest savagery to a fairly advanced civilization. Lowest of all were the tribes of the California peninsula, with the Seri of Tiburon Island. Of somewhat higher grade, but still savages, were the dwellers in the low coast-lands of Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica. The Tarimiari, Tepe- huan, Huichol, and others of the northern sierras were about on a level with our own Pueblo tribes, while the Aztecs, Totonac, Tarasco, Zapotec, and Mistec, the Maya, Kiche, and Cakchiquel, of the central regions, might almost be considered civilized nations, count- ing their citizens by hundreds of thousands, with agriculture and all the common industrial arts, a well- developed architecture, an established and orderly government, and a voluminous hieroglyphic litera- ture.

As in the United States, the general direction of migration seems to have been from north to south, excepting for the tribes of Chibchan stock, an off- shoot from the main body in Colombia. The cele- brated Aztec, whose tribes occupied the valley of Mexico and its immediate environs, had a definite tradition of northern origin, and linguistic evidence shows them to have been closely cognate to the Pima and Shoshoni, while their culture was borrowed from the earlier and much more cultured, but less warlike, nations which they had overpowered .some five cen- turies before their own conquest by Cortes in 1519. The empire which they had built up comprisetl many tribes of diverse stocks, held together only by the superior force of the conciueror, and easily disinte- grated under the assaults of the Spaniards. The native civilizations, however, have left their permanent stamp upon both Mexico and Central America.

In general characteristics, the cultures of the several civilized nations were very similar. Agriculture was the basic industry and dependence; moimtain-terrac- ing, canal irrigation, and even floating lake-gardens, being all utilized to meet the necessities of a swarming population. Stone, and more particularly obsidian, was still the chief material for ordinary implements, but they had discovered the art of bronze-casting, and were expert designers in gold. The working of iron — the master metal — was practically unknown upon the American Continent. They were neatly clothed in cotton garments of various colours. Tlieir pottery, especially that of the Tarasco, was beautiful both in design and manufacture, with glazed surface and inlay of precious metal. Their public architecture included magnificent temples and pyramids, of cut and polished stone set in mortar and covered with hieroglyphic inscriptions. The ruined cities of the Maya of Yucatan — Mayapan, Uxmal, and Chich^-n- Itzd, with scores of others, all occupied at the time of the conquest with such older ruins as Teotihuacan, and Copan, and Mitla — rival the great remains of classical antiquity.

The social and political organization seems to have been based upon the family group. There was a system of public education in which boys were taught military science, writing, and religious ritual, while girls were instructed in morals and domestic arts. Each civilized nation had an elaborate calendar system, that of the Maya proper being the most intricate, with cycles of 20, 52, and 2G0 years. The religious systems were characterized by the number and magnificence of their ceremonials, with armies of priests and priestesses, processions, feasts, and

sacrifices, and by the general bloody tenor of their rituals, especially among the Aztec, who yearly sacrificed thousands of captives to their gods, the bodies of the victims being afterwards eaten by the priests or by the original captors. The Maya religion, like the people, appears to have been of milder charac- ter, although still admitting human sacrifice. In all these nations the king was of absolute authority. Whole libraries of native literature existed, chiefly of ritual content, written in iconomatic or hieroglyphic characters upon paper of maguey fibre. Of those which have escaped the fanaticism of the first con- querors some of the most noted (Aztec) are exempli- fied in Lord Kingsborough's great work. Of the Maya nations the most valuable literary monument is the "Popol Vuh" of the Kich6 of Gviatemala, trans- lated by the Abb(5 Brasseur de Bourbourg. For a comprehensive view of these native civilizations our best authorities are Gomara and Herrera, of the earlier period, with Prescott and Hubert II. Ban- croft of our own time. In spite of the exterminating wars of the conquest and the subsequent awful op- pression uniler the slave system, the descendants of the aboriginal races — largely Christianized and assimi- lated to Spanish forms — still constitute the great bulk of the population between the Rio Grande and the Isthmus.

The ruder coast tribes of Central America present no very distinguishing cult\iral features, subsisting by a limited agriculture, supplemented by hunting and fishing, without arts, monuments, or ni.story of importance. The Ulva of Honduras practised head- flattening. The Carib of the same region were forced immigrants from the Antilles.

Practically the whole of the West Indies was occu- pied l>y tribes of two linguistic .stocks, the earlier of Arawakan origin, the more recent being Cariban in- vaders from the northern coast of South America. The Arawakan aborigines were about in the cultural status of our own Gulf tribes, subsisting chiefly by agriculture and practising the simpler arts, but unfitted by their peaceful habit to withstand the inroads of the predatory (^'arib, whose very name is synonjTnous with "cannibal". Under the awful cruelties of their Spanish conquerors and taskmasters they were virtually exterminated within two genera- tions of the discovery (see Auawaks).

As commonly recognized, the linguistic stocks represented in Mexico, Central America, and the West Indies were about twenty-five in number, as given below, those marked with an asterisk being also extra-limital: *Athapascan (Chihuahua etc.); *Cari- ban (Honduras and islands); Chiapanecan (Chihua- hua, Nicaragua, Costa Rica); *Chibchan (Panama); Chinantecan (Oaxaca) ; Huavean fOaxaca) ; Lon- can (Honduras); Maratinian, or Tamaulipecan (Ta- maulipas); Matagalpan (Nicaragua); Mayan (Yuca- tan, Tabasco, Chiapas, Guatemala); Mosquitan (Honduras); *Nahuatlan Shoshonian (Mexico, etc.); Olivean (Tamaulipas); Otomian (Guerrero, etc.); duras); Serian (Sonora); Subtiaban (Nicaragua); Tarascan (Michoacan) ; Tequistlatecan (Oaxaca, Guerrero); Totonacan (Vera Cruz); Ulvan (Nicara- gua etc.); Waikurian (California); Xanambrian (Tamaulipas) ; Xicaquan (Honduras); Xincan (Guate- mala); *Yuman (California).
 * Pakawan, or Coahuiltecan (Coahuila); Payan (Hon-

Alegre. Historiu de la Compai'iia de Jesus en Nueva Espafia (3 vols., Alexifo. 1.S41): B.Xgert, Kaehrichten von der ameri- kanischen Halbinsel Califomien (Mannheim. 1773), tr., innom-

Flete, Ratt, .-Xboriqines of Lower California in Rept. Hmithson. nstn. (Wa.shitigton. 1S63): H. H. Bancroft, Hist, of Mexico (6 vols., San Francisro, 1886-88): Idem, Hist, of the North Mexican Slates and Texas (2 vols., San Francisco, 1886-89); Idem, Hist, of Central America (3 vols., San Francisco, 1.S86-7); Bande- lier. Art of War of the Ancient Mexicans (Peabody Mus., Cam- bridcp, 1877); Idem, Distrihulion of Lands and Customs of Inheritance (.Mexico) (CamhridKe. 1878); lDEM,.SoctVi/ Organiza- tion of the Ancient Mexicans (Cambridge, 1879); Bard (Squier), Waikna: the Mosquito Shore (New York, 1855); Bottdrini,