We know that the worship of the sun was general with all the American tribes, and if at Tikal we call him the god of one particular race, it is owing to the details which surround him; both pyramids, temples, inscriptions, figures, and emblems particularise him, and give us the right to connect him with the religion of the Uplands and call him Toltec.
We have other panels consisting of scattered pieces collected in various monuments. Some of the inscriptions are in perfect condition, and furnish important analogies. One is a human profile, like the sculptured figures on the great monoliths at Copan; another has fine inscriptions and a characteristic tiger’s head, whilst below is a figure of the usual type and dress sitting on a throne admirably carved. These reliefs are in the Trocadéro.
To sum up, Tikal is a town which belongs to the Toltec civilisation, the march of which we have followed from their first homes to Ocosingo, Lorillard, and Tikal in Yucatan, where they met, both in the south and north of Guatemala, the first branch, but Tikal being farthest from the starting-point must necessarily be younger than the cities already described; to us, however, it is one of the most important epochs in this original civilisation, inasmuch as it is an intermediary station, a place whence the race branched off, a fact which solves questions and clears up events not hitherto understood.
From Tikal the civilising column advanced towards the north of the peninsula. Material proofs of this exist in the cities ranged on its line of march, for instance, Nohbeccan, seen by Ursua, and also in the historical data, which the reader may see in our chapter on Chichen-Itza.
The uniform expression of the faces in these bas-reliefs is generally calm and pleasant, as at Palenque, where we pointed out that after the almost total extermination of their race, the Toltecs ceased to be a warlike nation and became missionaries of civilisation, bringing the population around them into submission by their persuasive preaching, like the priests of Buddha in India and Java, adopting the language of their disciples, and building marvellous temples in honour of the gods they preached. The bas-reliefs at Palenque, Lorillard, and Tikal tell this story very plainly.
The arrival of the Toltecs in the south of Yucatan is thus placed beyond a doubt; but the explanation given of the abandonment of Chichen by its inhabitants is highly unsatisfactory. That exodus, produced by secondary causes, was determined by the still living tradition that establishments had been formed by their ancestors in the south of the peninsula, and that Tikal, which at that time was perhaps still standing, formed the chief centre. It is more than probable that the caciques of Chichen had kept up some intercourse with one of the cradles of their family, and when they set their face in that direction, it was but an instinctive yearning to return to Peten. To the same Toltec branch is clue also the colonisation and civilisation of the north of Guatemala, Tikal being the central point, whence some directed their march north, whilst others went south.
If we are to believe the priest of Quiché, “he saw at Coban a great city which filled him with astonishment.” We have heard nothing of such a place, nor has any other traveller; but if we follow the affiliation, it is highly probable that Coban was a station of the Tikal-Toltec branch, which from this point went east, where they founded Copan and Quirigua in the province of Chiquimula. Copan was standing at the Conquest, as well as Utatlan, Atitlan, Xelahu, Patinamit, and several other Guatemalec cities, which were destroyed by Alvarado. Copan was forced to yield after a desperate struggle to Hernandez de Chaves, one of his lieutenants (1530), and Juarros tells us that Fuentes visited it in 1700, when “the Great Circus still remained entire.”
We follow Stephens[179] in the description and illustration of these monuments, and find that the most remarkable are monolith idols, which are only the development of the stelæ and monoliths at Tikal, and that the inscriptions, bas-reliefs, and idols are like those of the places we have already described, except that they seem to us to belong to a later period, contrary to Stephens, who assigned an original civilisation to them. But Stephens began at the wrong end when he made Copan the first scene of his investigations, and that accounts for his want of insight in not having perceived that these monuments were the outcome of an old civilisation. Later, his better informed judgment enabled him to grapple with the difficulties, and arrive at the truth. We claim but to be his disciple.
The first drawing is a finely sculptured head, which he calls a king; but this bearded man, whose head is locked in a huge serpent’s jaw, whose head-dress consists of wreathed serpents, or a Guatemalec turban, is a personification of Quetzalcoatl, and though the type is somewhat changed the attributes are unmistakable.
We have no reliable description of the monuments at Copan; but from what Stephens says of them, they seem to differ from those we have explored. Juarros’ description of Santa Cruz del Quiché, Utatlan, and other Guatemalto-Toltec centres, recalls Mexican cities, which may well be, since they were situated also on plateaux, and must necessarily have had a different appearance from those of the warm regions.