American Hero-Myths: A Study in the Native Religions of the Western Continent

The impressions which natural occurrences make on minds of equal stages of culture are very much alike. The same thoughts are evoked, and the same expressions suggest themselves as appropriate to convey these thoughts in spoken language. This is often exhibited in the identity of expression between master-poets of the same generation, and between cotemporaneous thinkers in all branches of knowledge. Still more likely is it to occur in primitive and uncultivated conditions, where the most obvious forms of expression are at once adopted, and the resources of the mind are necessarily limited. This is a simple and reasonable explanation for the remarkable sameness which prevails in the mental products of the lower stages of civilization, and does away with the necessity of supposing a historic derivation one from the other or both from a common stock.

[Footnote 1 (#x1_x_1_i163): The writers from whom I have taken this myth are Nicolas Perrot, Mémoire sur les Meurs, Coustumes et Relligion des Sauvages de l'Amérique Septentrionale, written by an intelligent layman who lived among the natives from 1665 to 1699; and the various Relations des Jesuites, especially for the years 1667 and 1670.]

[Footnote 2 (#x1_x_1_i168): Mr. J. Hammond Trumbull has pointed out that in Algonkin the words for father, osh, mother, okas, and earth, ohke (Narraganset dialect), can all be derived, according to the regular rules of Algonkin grammar, from the same verbal root, signifying "to come out of, or from." (Note to Roger Williams' Key into the Language of America, p. 56). Thus the earth was, in their language, the parent of the race, and what more natural than that it should become so in the myth also?]

[Footnote 3 (#x1_x_1_i175): William Strachey, Historie of Travaile into Virginia, p. 98.]

[Footnote 4 (#x1_x_1_i177): Doctor Francisco de Avila, Narrative of the Errors and False Gods of the Indians of Huarochiri (1608). This interesting document has been partly translated by Mr. C.B. Markham, and published in one of the volumes of the Hackluyt Society's series.]

[Footnote 5 (#x1_x_1_i180): See H.R. Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, Vol. v, pp. 418, 419. Relations des Jesuites, 1634, p. 14, 1637, p. 46.]

[Footnote 6 (#x1_x_1_i181): In the Ojibway dialect of the Algonkins, the word for day, sky or heaven, is gijig. This same word as a verb means to be an adult, to be ripe (of fruits), to be finished, complete. Rev. Frederick Baraga, A Dictionary of the Olchipwe Language, Cincinnati, 1853. This seems to correspond with the statement in the myth.]

[Footnote 7 (#x1_x_1_i181): H.E. Schoolcraft, Algic Researches, vol. i, pp. 135, et seq.]

[Footnote 8 (#x1_x_1_i184): Brasseur de Bourbourg, Dissertation sur les Mythes de l'Antiquite Americaine, §vii.]

[Footnote 9 (#x1_x_1_i187): H.R. Schoolcraft, Algic Researches, Vol. i, p. 179, Vol. ii, p. 117. The word animikig in Ojibway means "it thunders and lightnings;" in their myths this tribe says that the West Wind is created by Animiki, the Thunder. (Ibid. Indian Tribes, Vol. v, p. 420.)]

[Footnote 10 (#x1_x_1_i187): When Father Buteux was among the Algonkins, in 1637, they explained to him the lightning as "a great serpent which the Manito vomits up." (Relation de la Nouvelle France, An. 1637, p. 53.) According to John Tanner, the symbol for the lightning in Ojibway pictography was a rattlesnake. (Narrative, p. 351.)]

[Footnote 11 (#x1_x_1_i189): This transformation is well set forth in Mr. Charles Francis Keary's Outlines of Primitive Belief Among the Indo-European Races (London, 1882), chaps, iv, vii. He observes: "The wind is a far more physical and less abstract conception than the sky or heaven; it is also a more variable phenomenon; and by reason of both these recommendations the wind-god superseded the older Dyâus. * * * Just as the chief god of Greece, having descended to be a divinity of storm, was not content to remain only that, but grew again to some likeness of the older Dyâus, so Odhinn came to absorb almost all the qualities which belong of right to a higher god. Yet he did this without putting off his proper nature. He was the heaven as well as the wind; he was the All-father, embracing all the earth and looking down upon mankind."]

[Footnote 12 (#x1_x_1_i190): H.R. Schoolcraft, Algic Researches, Vol. i, p. 216. Indian Tribes, Vol. v, p. 420.]

[Footnote 13 (#x1_x_1_i191): "Michabou, le Dieu des Eaux," etc. Charlevoix, Journal Historique, p. 281 (Paris, 1721).]

[Footnote 14 (#x1_x_1_i192): John Tanner, Narrative of Captivity and Adventure, p. 351. Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, Vol. v, p. 420, etc.]

[Footnote 15 (#x2_x_2_i0): Thomas Campanius (Holm), Description of the Province of New Sweden, book iii, ch. xi. Campanius does not give the name of the hero-god, but there can be no doubt that it was the "Great Hare."]

[Footnote 16 (#x2_x_2_i1): The sources from which I draw the elements of the Iroquois hero-myth of Ioskeha are mainly the following: Relations de la Nouvelle France, 1636, 1640, 1671, etc. Sagard, Histoire du Canada, pp. 451, 452 (Paris, 1636); David Cusick, Ancient History of the Six Nations, and manuscript material kindly furnished me by Horatio Hale, Esq., who has made a thorough study of the Iroquois history and dialects.]

[Footnote 17 (#x2_x_2_i14): Such epithets were common, in the Egyptian religion, to most of the gods of fertility. Amun, called in some of the inscriptions "the soul of Osiris," derives his name from the root men, to impregnate, to beget. In the Karnak inscriptions he is also termed "the husband of his mother." This, too, was the favorite appellation of Chem, who was a form of Horos. See Dr. C.P. Tiele, History of the Egyptian Religion, pp. 124, 146. 149, 150, etc.]

[Footnote 18 (#x2_x_2_i15): I have analyzed these words in a note to another work, and need not repeat the matter here, the less so, as I am not aware that the etymology has been questioned. See Myths of the New World, 2d Ed., p. 183, note.]

[Footnote 19 (#x2_x_2_i16): A careful analysis of this name is given by Father J.A. Cuoq, probably the best living authority on the Iroquois, in his Lexique de la Langue Iroquoise, p. 180 (Montreal, 1882). Here also the Iroquois followed precisely the line of thought of the ancient Egyptians. Shu, in the religion of Heliopolis, represented the cosmic light and warmth, the quickening, creative principle. It is he who, as it is stated in the inscriptions, "holds up the heavens," and he is depicted on the monuments as a man with uplifted arms who supports the vault of heaven, because it is the intermediate light that separates the earth from the sky. Shu was also god of the winds; in a passage of the Book of the Dead, he is made to say: "I am Shu, who drives the winds onward to the confines of heaven, to the confines of the earth, even to the confines of space." Again, like Ioskeha, Shu is said to have begotten himself in the womb of his mother, Nu or Nun, who was, like Ataensic, the goddess of water, the heavenly ocean, the primal sea. Tiele, History of the Egyptian Religion, pp. 84-86.]

[Footnote 20 (#x2_x_2_i17): Cuoq, Lexique de la Langue Iroquoise, p. 180, who gives a full analysis of the name.]

CHAPTER III.

THE HERO-GOD OF THE AZTEC TRIBES

§1. The Two Antagonists. (#x2_x_2_i55)

THE CONTEST OF QUETZALCOATL AND TEZCATLIPOCA–QUETZALCOATL THE LIGHT-GOD–DERIVATION OF HIS NAME–TITLES OF TEZCATLIPOCA–IDENTIFIED WITH DARKNESS, NIGHT AND GLOOM.

§2. Quetzalcoatl the God. (#x2_x_2_i78)

MYTH OF THE FOUR BROTHERS–THE FOUR SUNS AND THE ELEMENTAL CONFLICT–NAMES OF THE FOUR BROTHERS.

§3. Quetzalcoatl the Hero of Tula. (#x2_x_2_i108)

TULA THE CITY OF THE SUN–WHO WERE THE TOLTECS?–TLAPALLAN AND XALAC–THE BIRTH OF THE HERO-GOD–HIS VIRGIN MOTHER, CHIMALMATL–HIS MIRACULOUS CONCEPTION–AZTLAN, THE LAND OF SEVEN CAVES, AND COLHUACAN, THE BENDED MOUNT–THE MAID XOCHITL AND THE ROSE GARDEN OF THE GODS–QUETZALCOATL AS THE WHITE AND BEARDED STRANGER.

THE GLORY OF THE LORD OF TULA–THE SUBTLETY OF THE SORCERER, TEZCATLIPOCA–THE MAGIC MIRROR AND THE MYSTIC DRAUGHT–THE MYTH EXPLAINED–THE PROMISE OF REJUVENATION–THE TOVEYO AND THE MAIDEN–THE JUGGLERIES OF TEZCATLIPOCA–DEPARTURE OF QUETZALCOATL FROM TULA–QUETZALCOATL AT CHOLULA–HIS DEATH OR DEPARTURE–THE CELESTIAL GAME OF BALL AND TIGER SKIN–QUETZALCOATL AS THE PLANET VENUS.

§4. Quetzalcoatl as Lord of the Winds. (#x3_x_3_i122)

THE LORD OF THE FOUR WINDS–HIS SYMBOLS THE WHEEL OF THE WINDS, THE PENTAGON AND THE CROSS–CLOSE RELATION TO THE GODS OF RAIN AND WATERS–INVENTOR OF THE CALENDAR–GOD OF FERTILITY AND CONCEPTION–RECOMMENDS SEXUAL AUSTERITY–PHALLIC SYMBOLS–GOD OF MERCHANTS–THE PATRON OF THIEVES–HIS PICTOGRAPHIC REPRESENTATIONS.

§5. The Return of Quetzalcoatl. (#x3_x_3_i154)

HIS EXPECTED RE-APPEARANCE–THE ANXIETY OF MONTEZUMA–HIS ADDRESS TO CORTES–THE GENERAL EXPECTATION–EXPLANATION OF HIS PREDICTED RETURN.

I now turn from the wild hunting tribes who peopled the shores of the Great Lakes and the fastnesses of the northern forests to that cultivated race whose capital city was in the Valley of Mexico, and whose scattered colonies were found on the shores of both oceans from the mouths of the Rio Grande and the Gila, south, almost to the Isthmus of Panama. They are familiarly known as Aztecs or Mexicans, and the language common to them all was the Nahuatl, a word of their own, meaning "the pleasant sounding."

Their mythology has been preserved in greater fullness than that of any other American people, and for this reason I am enabled to set forth in ampler detail the elements of their hero-myth, which, indeed, may be taken as the most perfect type of those I have collected in this volume.

§1. The Two Antagonists.

The culture hero of the Aztecs was Quetzalcoatl, and the leading drama, the central myth, in all the extensive and intricate theology of the Nahuatl speaking tribes was his long contest with Tezcatlipoca, "a contest," observes an eminent Mexican antiquary, "which came to be the main element in the Nahuatl religion and the cause of its modifications, and which materially influenced the destinies of that race from its earliest epochs to the time of its destruction."[1] (#x3_x_3_i196)

The explanations which have been offered of this struggle have varied with the theories of the writers propounding them. It has been regarded as a simple historical fact; as a figure of speech to represent the struggle for supremacy between two races; as an astronomical statement referring to the relative positions of the planet Venus and the Moon; as a conflict between Christianity, introduced by Saint Thomas, and the native heathenism; and as having other meanings not less unsatisfactory or absurd.

Placing it side by side with other American hero-myths, we shall see that it presents essentially the same traits, and undoubtedly must be explained in the same manner. All of them are the transparent stories of a simple people, to express in intelligible terms the daily struggle that is ever going on between Day and Night, between Light and Darkness, between Storm and Sunshine.

Like all the heroes of light, Quetzalcoatl is identified with the East. He is born there, and arrives from there, and hence Las Casas and others speak of him as from Yucatan, or as landing on the shores of the Mexican Gulf from some unknown land. His day of birth was that called Ce Acatl, One Reed, and by this name he is often known. But this sign is that of the East in Aztec symbolism.[2] (#x3_x_3_i197) In a myth of the formation of the sun and moon, presented by Sahagun,[3] (#x3_x_3_i198) a voluntary victim springs into the sacrificial fire that the gods have built. They know that he will rise as the sun, but they do not know in what part of the horizon that will be. Some look one way, some another, but Quetzalcoatl watches steadily the East, and is the first to see and welcome the Orb of Light. He is fair in complexion, with abundant hair and a full beard, bordering on the red,[4] (#x3_x_3_i199) as are all the dawn heroes, and like them he was an instructor in the arts, and favored peace and mild laws.

His name is symbolic, and is capable of several equally fair renderings. The first part of it, quetzalli, means literally a large, handsome green feather, such as were very highly prized by the natives. Hence it came to mean, in an adjective sense, precious, beautiful, beloved, admirable. The bird from which these feathers were obtained was the quetzal-tototl (tototl, bird) and is called by ornithologists Trogon splendens.

The latter part of the name, coatl, has in Aztec three entirely different meanings. It means a guest, also twins, and lastly, as a syncopated form of cohuatl, a serpent. Metaphorically, cohuatl meant something mysterious, and hence a supernatural being, a god. Thus Montezuma, when he built a temple in the city of Mexico dedicated to the whole body of divinities, a regular Pantheon, named it Coatecalli, the House of the Serpent.[5] (#x3_x_3_i200)

Through these various meanings a good defence can be made of several different translations of the name, and probably it bore even to the natives different meanings at different times. I am inclined to believe that the original sense was that advocated by Becerra in the seventeenth century, and adopted by Veitia in the eighteenth, both competent Aztec scholars.[6] (#x3_x_3_i201) They translate Quetzalcoatl as "the admirable twin," and though their notion that this refers to Thomas Didymus, the Apostle, does not meet my views, I believe they were right in their etymology. The reference is to the duplicate nature of the Light-God as seen in the setting and rising sun, the sun of to-day and yesterday, the same yet different. This has its parallels in many other mythologies.[7] (#x3_x_3_i202)

The correctness of this supposition seems to be shown by a prevailing superstition among the Aztecs about twins, and which strikingly illustrates the uniformity of mythological conceptions throughout the world. All readers are familiar with the twins Romulus and Remus in Roman story, one of whom was fated to destroy their grandfather Amulius; with Edipus and Telephos, whose father Laios, was warned that his death would be by one of his children; with Theseus and Peirithoos, the former destined to cause the suicide of his father Aigeus; and with many more such myths. They can be traced, without room for doubt, back to simple expressions of the fact that the morning and the evening of the one day can only come when the previous day is past and gone; expressed figuratively by the statement that any one day must destroy its predecessor. This led to the stories of "the fatal children," which we find so frequent in Aryan mythology.[8] (#x4_x_4_i0)

The Aztecs were a coarse and bloody race, and carried out their superstitions without remorse. Based, no doubt, on this mythical expression of a natural occurrence, they had the belief that if twins were allowed to live, one or the other of them would kill and eat his father or mother; therefore, it was their custom when such were brought into the world to destroy one of them.[9] (#x4_x_4_i1)

We shall see that, as in Algonkin story Michabo strove to slay his father, the West Wind, so Quetzalcoatl was in constant warfare with his father, Tezcatlipoca-Camaxtli, the Spirit of Darkness. The effect of this oft-repeated myth on the minds of the superstitious natives was to lead them to the brutal child murder I have mentioned.

It was, however, natural that the more ordinary meaning, "the feathered or bird-serpent," should become popular, and in the picture writing some combination of the serpent with feathers or other part of a bird was often employed as the rebus of the name Quetzalcoatl.

He was also known by other names, as, like all the prominent gods in early mythologies, he had various titles according to the special attribute or function which was uppermost in the mind of the worshipper. One of these was Papachtic, He of the Flowing Locks, a word which the Spaniards shortened to Papa, and thought was akin to their title of the Pope. It is, however, a pure Nahuatl word,[10] (#x4_x_4_i2) and refers to the abundant hair with which he was always credited, and which, like his ample beard, was, in fact, the symbol of the sun's rays, the aureole or glory of light which surrounded his face.

His fair complexion was, as usual, significant of light. This association of ideas was so familiar among the Mexicans that at the time of an eclipse of the sun they sought out the whitest men and women they could find, and sacrificed them, in order to pacify the sun.[11] (#x4_x_4_i3)