Essays of an Americanist / I. Ethnologic and Archæologic. II. Mythology and Folk Lore. III. Graphic Systems and Literature. IV. Linguistic.

by Daniel G. Brinton

[208]. Orozco y Berra, Historia Antigua de Mexico, (Mexico, 1880). The Atlas to this work contains a large number of proposed identifications of hieroglyphics. See also by the same writer, Ensayo de Descifracion Geroglifica in the Anales del Museo Nacional, tom. II. Much of this is founded on Ramirez’s studies, who, however, by his own admission, knew little or nothing of the Nahuatl language (as he states in his introduction to the Codex Chimalpopoca or Anales de Quauhtitlan). Dr. Peñafiel’s praiseworthy collection is entitled Catalogo Alfabetico de los nombres de Lugares pertenecientes al Idioma Nahuatl, Estudio Jeroglifico. (Mexico, 1885.)

[209]. This paper was originally read before the American Philosophical Society in October, 1886, and was published in their Proceedings.

[210]. The following elements occur in the old Egyptian writing:

1. Ideographic.—(a) Pictures or ikonographs.

(b) Symbols.

(c) Determinatives.

2. Phonetic.—(a) Words.

(b) Syllables.

(c) Letters.

[211]. See M. A. Lower, Curiosities of Heraldry, Chap. vi (London, 1845). An appropriate motto of one of these bearings was: “Non verbis sed rebus loquimur.”