The Tezcucans (or Acolhuans) belonged to the same race as the Aztecs, whom they greatly surpassed in knowledge and social refinement. Nezahualcoyotl, a wise monarch of the Tezcucans, abhorred human sacrifices, and erected a large temple which he dedicated to “The unknown god, the cause of causes.” This edifice had a tower nine stories high, on the top of which were placed a number of musical instruments of various kinds which were used to summon the worshippers to prayer. Respecting these instruments especial mention is made of a sonorous metal which was struck with a mallet. This is stated in a historical essay written by Ixtlilxochitl, a native of Mexico and of royal descent, who lived in the beginning of the seventeenth century, and who may be supposed to have been familiar with the musical practices of his countrymen. But whether the sonorous metal alluded to was a gong or a bell is not clear from the vague record transmitted to us. That the bell was known to the Peruvians appears to be no longer doubtful, since a small copper specimen has been found in one of the old Peruvian tombs. This interesting relic is now deposited in the museum at Lima. M. de Castelnau has published a drawing of it, which is here reproduced. The Peruvians called their bells chanrares; it remains questionable whether this name did not designate rather the so-called horse bells, which were certainly known to the Mexicans who called them yotl. It is noteworthy that these yotl are found figured in the picture-writings representing the various objects which the Aztecs used to pay as tribute to their sovereigns. The collection of Mexican antiquities in the British museum contains a cluster of yotl-bells. Being nearly round, they closely resemble the Schellen which the Germans are in the habit of affixing to their horses, particularly in the winter when they are driving their noiseless sledges.
Again, in south America sonorous stones are not unknown, and were used in olden time for musical purposes. The traveller G. T. Vigne saw among the Indian antiquities preserved in the town of Cuzco, in Peru, “a musical instrument of green sonorous stone, about a foot long, and an inch and a half wide, flat-sided, pointed at both ends, and arched at the back, where it was about a quarter of an inch thick, whence it diminished to an edge, like the blade of a knife.... In the middle of the back was a small hole, through which a piece of string was passed; and when suspended and struck by any hard substance a singularly musical note was produced.” Humboldt mentions the Amazon-stone, which on being struck by any hard substance yields a metallic sound. It was formerly cut by the American Indians into very thin plates, perforated in the centre and suspended by a string. These plates were remarkably sonorous. This kind of stone is not, as might be conjectured from its name, found exclusively near the Amazon. The name was given to it as well as to the river by the first European visitors to America, in allusion to the female warriors respecting whom strange stories are told. The natives pretending, according to an ancient tradition, that the stone came from the country of “Women without husbands,” or “Women living alone.”
As regards the ancient stringed instruments of the American Indians our information is indeed but scanty. Clavigero says that the Mexicans were entirely unacquainted with stringed instruments: a statement the correctness of which is questionable, considering the stage of civilization to which these people had attained. At any rate, we generally find one or other kind of such instruments with nations whose intellectual progress and social condition are decidedly inferior. The Aztecs had many claims to the character of a civilized community and (as before said) the Tezcucans were even more advanced in the cultivation of the arts and sciences than the Aztecs. “The best histories,” Prescott observes, “the best poems, the best code of laws, the purest dialect, were all allowed to be Tezcucan. The Aztecs rivalled their neighbours in splendour of living, and even in the magnificence of their structures. They displayed a pomp and ostentatious pageantry, truly Asiatic.” Unfortunately historians are sometimes not sufficiently discerning in their communications respecting musical questions. J. Ranking, in describing the grandeur of the establishment maintained by Montezuma, says that during the repasts of this monarch “there was music of fiddle, flute, snail-shell, a kettle-drum, and other strange instruments.” But as this writer does not indicate the source whence he drew his information respecting Montezuma’s orchestra including the fiddle, the assertion deserves scarcely a passing notice.
The Peruvians possessed a stringed instrument, called tinya, which was provided with five or seven strings. To conjecture from the unsatisfactory account of it transmitted to us, the tinya appears to have been a kind of guitar. Considering the fragility of the materials of which such instruments are generally constructed, it is perhaps not surprising that we do not meet with any specimens of them in the museums of American antiquities.
A few remarks will not be out of place here referring to the musical performances of the ancient Indians; since an acquaintance with the nature of the performances is likely to afford additional assistance in appreciating the characteristics of the instruments. In Peru, where the military system was carefully organised, each division of the army had its trumpeters, called cqueppacamayo, and its drummers, called huancarcamayo. When the Inca returned with his troops victorious from battle his first act was to repair to the temple of the Sun in order to offer up thanksgiving; and after the conclusion of this ceremony the people celebrated the event with festivities, of which music and dancing constituted a principal part. Musical performances appear to have been considered indispensable on occasions of public celebrations; and frequent mention is made of them by historians who have described the festivals annually observed by the Peruvians.
About the month of October the Peruvians celebrated a solemn feast in honour of the dead, at which ceremony they executed lugubrious songs and plaintive instrumental music. Compositions of a similar character were performed on occasion of the decease of a monarch. As soon as it was made known to the people that their Inca had been “called home to the mansions of his father the sun” they prepared to celebrate his obsequies with becoming solemnity. Prescott, in his graphic description of these observances, says: “At stated intervals, for a year, the people assembled to renew the expressions of their sorrow; processions were made displaying the banner of the departed monarch; bards and minstrels were appointed to chronicle his achievements, and their songs continued to be rehearsed at high festivals in the presence of the reigning monarch,—thus stimulating the living by the glorious example of the dead.” The Peruvians had also particular agricultural songs, which they were in the habit of singing while engaged in tilling the lands of the Inca; a duty which devolved upon the whole nation. The subject of these songs, or rather hymns, referred especially to the noble deeds and glorious achievements of the Inca and his dynasty. While thus singing, the labourers regulated their work to the rhythm of the music, thereby ensuring a pleasant excitement and a stimulant in their occupation, like soldiers regulating their steps to the music of the military band. These hymns pleased the Spanish invaders so greatly that they not only adopted several of them but also composed some in a similar form and style. This appears, however, to have been the case rather with the poetry than with the music.
The name of the Peruvian elegiac songs was haravi. Some tunes of these songs, pronounced to be genuine specimens, have been published in recent works; but their genuineness is questionable. At all events they must have been much tampered with, as they exhibit exactly the form of the Spanish bolero. Even allowing that the melodies of these compositions have been derived from Peruvian harivaris, it is impossible to determine with any degree of certainty how much in them has been retained of the original tunes, and how much has been supplied besides the harmony, which is entirely an addition of the European arranger. The Peruvians had minstrels, called haravecs (i.e., “inventors”), whose occupation it was to compose and to recite the haravis.
The Mexicans possessed a class of songs which served as a record of historical events. Furthermore they had war-songs, love-songs, and other secular vocal compositions, as well as sacred chants, in the practice of which boys were instructed by the priests in order that they might assist in the musical performances of the temple. It appertained to the office of the priests to burn incense, and to perform music in the temple at stated times of the day. The commencement of the religious observances which took place regularly at sunrise, at mid-day, at sunset, and at midnight, was announced by signals blown on trumpets and pipes. Persons of high position retained in their service professional musicians whose duty it was to compose ballads, and to perform vocal music with instrumental accompaniment. The nobles themselves, and occasionally even the monarch, not unfrequently delighted in composing ballads and odes.
Especially to be noticed is the institution termed “Council of music,” which the wise monarch Nezahualcoyotl founded in Tezcuco. This institution was not intended exclusively for promoting the cultivation of music; its aim comprised the advancement of various arts, and of sciences such as history, astronomy, &c. In fact, it was an academy for general education. Probably no better evidence could be cited testifying to the remarkable intellectual attainments of the Mexican Indians before the discovery of America than this council of music. Although in some respects it appears to have resembled the board of music of the Chinese, it was planned on a more enlightened and more comprehensive principle. The Chinese “board of music,” called Yo Poo, is an office connected with the Lé Poo or “board of rites,” established by the imperial government at Peking. The principal object of the board of rites is to regulate the ceremonies on occasions of sacrifices offered to the gods; of festivals and certain court solemnities; of military reviews; of presentations, congratulations, marriages, deaths, burials,—in short, concerning almost every possible event in social and public life.