Page:Stone of the Sun.djvu/47

 721, an insignificant discrepancy. Motilinia comes much nearer, giving the date 694. M. Remí Siméon, very competent in these matters, says that in 690 the Toltecs established the state which was to last more than four centuries, and we read it also in the Anales de Cuauhtitlan and in Gómara. The assertion of this chronicler is of particular precision: "Counting from then [the beginning of the historic period among the Indians] until the end of 1552, their sun [age] has 858 years.” But it must not be forgotten that, according to the tables, only the year 700 was Ce técpatl, and Ixtlilxóchitl has told us that in that Ce técpatl the meeting occurred. The illustrious Orozco y Berra, whose scrupulousness in comparison of data and submitting the very last document to rigorous analysis, is proverbial, states precisely the two most important dates 4993 and 5097, a fact that lends irrefrangible value to our inferences; thus he himself points out in the Anales that of 700 and admits that of 694, giving it for the beginning of the epoch.

They celebrated at its time the famous assembly which left so deep a trace in their traditions, which all the chroniclers mention: there was narrated the history of the world; the calendar was arranged, based upon the cycles of 52 and 104 years, through the interlocking of the thirteens and the twenties (the tonalámatl); and it is probable that the astrologers also indicated the end of the era beginning, and which calculations, experience, and the tetranary concept had naturally to fix in periods of 416 years. All this, finally, was condensed in indestructible characters of basalt.

What strangeness then was there in seeing there stamped the four ages of the world’s history although only three had passed? Veytia says, alluding to the Toltecs, that “ the future ages will be equal to the past.” Therefore their duration appears to be indicated on the relief with the four numerals inclosed in each rectangle, and of which we have not yet treated. Now one conjecture regarding their significance offers itself to us: each one of these represents a great cycle of 416 years and between them all 1,664, exact length of the three periods gone by. It may be said that the stone confirms with mathematical exactness the chronology of Ixtlilxóchitl, followed by Boturini and Veytia; the interpretations of the Codex Vaticanus, imagined by Humboldt and admitted in great part by Chavero and other authors, who give to the native cosmogony about 18,000 years existence for the world, fall to the ground. The basalt, unimpeachable text of the Nahoan cosmogony, and chronology, proves that Ixtlilxóchitl was very