The edifice No. 7 is undoubtedly a tennis-court, for it answers exactly the description given by historians of such structures; moreover, I found one of the rings still in place. Veytia is wrong, therefore, in crediting the Mexicans with the invention of the game; were it so we should not have found a tennis-court at Chichen-Itza. Mendieta[56] relates how Tezacatlipoca came down from his celestial abode on a spider’s ladder, and how in his long peregrinations on earth he visited Tula, brought thither by his jealousy of Quetzalcoatl, whom he challenged to play tennis; but the latter turning into a tiger discomfited him utterly. The spectators were so terrified that they fled, and in the tumult which ensued many were drowned in the river flowing close by.
This tradition shows plainly that tennis existed in the remote period of Quetzalcoatl’s rule at Tula; that the game was of Toltec origin, that the court was on the hill, since the spectators in their precipitancy to run away were drowned, that Quetzalcoatl was a good tennis-player, and that the expression, “he was turned into a tiger,” is merely honorific, applied to him on the spot for having sent his ball through the ring. This passage also explains the tiger frieze over the tennis-court at Chichen-Itza.
The Toltecs had public granaries which were opened to the people in time of famine. A passage in Cuauhtitlan seems to indicate that the resistance they opposed to a grasping and bloodthirsty priesthood, was one of the chief causes of their downfall.[57] “Under the mild rule of Quetzalcoatl, demons tried in vain to persuade him to allow men born at Tula to be sacrificed. As for himself, his offerings were birds, serpents, and butterflies he had captured in the valley.”
The Toltecs were peaceful, their organisation was feudal and aristocratic, indicative of conquest, yet their government was paternal. Besides the great feudatory lords, they had military orders and titles, which were bestowed on distinguished soldiers for services in the field or the council, and finally the celebrated order of the Tecuhtlis, which was divided in sub-orders of the “tiger,” the “lion,” the “eagle,” and other animals, each having its peculiar privileges. The initiatory ceremonies resembled somewhat those attending our knights of the Middle Ages, and may interest the reader.
At the nomination of a candidate, all the tecuhtlis assembled in the house of the new knight, whence they set out in a body for the temple, where the high priest, at the request of the neophyte, perforated his nose and ears with a pointed tiger’s bone, or an eagle’s claw, inserting in the holes thus made twigs, which were changed every day for larger ones, until the healing of the wound; pronouncing the while invocations to the gods that they would give the novice the courage of the lion, the swiftness of the deer, etc.; followed by a speech in which he was reminded that he who aspires to the dignity of a tecuhtli, must be ready to perform the duties of his new office. He was henceforth to be distinguished by greater meekness, patience, forbearance, and moderation in all things, together with submission to the laws. After this speech, he was deprived of his rich garments, and dressed in a coarse tunic; the only articles of furniture allowed him were a common mat and a low stool. He was besmeared with a black preparation, and only broke his fast once in twenty-four hours with a tortilla and a small quantity of water. Meanwhile the priests and tecuhtlis came in turns to feast before the novice, and make his fast more intolerable, heaping insults and injurious epithets upon the man who stood meekly before them; jostling and pointing their fingers jeeringly at him. At night he was only allowed to sleep a few minutes at a time; and if overcome by sleep, his guardians pricked him with the thorn of the maguey.
“At the expiration of sixty days the new knight, accompanied by friends and relatives, repaired to some temple of his own district, where he was received by the whole order of tecuhtlis, ranged in two rows on each side of the temple, from the main altar down to the entrance. He advanced alone, bowing right and left to each tecuhtli, until he reached the idol, where the mean garments he had worn so long were taken off by the oldest tecuhtli, his hair bound up in a knot on the top of his head with a red string; whilst a wreath, having a medallion with his motto graven on it, circled his brow. He was next clad in rich and fine apparel, ornamented and delicately embroidered; in his hands he received arrows and a bow; balls of gold were inserted in his ears and nostrils, and a precious stone, the distinctive badge of his order, hung from his lower lip. The ceremony ended with another discourse to the effect that the neophyte should aim at being liberal, just, free from arrogance, and willing to devote his life to the service of his country and his gods.”[58]
The Toltecs paid great attention to the instruction of youth. Texcuco possessed schools of art, in which the broad principles laid down by their forefathers were doubtless remembered, differing from those of the Aztecs, whose exaggerated religiosity caused them to leave the education of children entirely in the hands of the priests. That the latter were less influential with the Toltecs seems indicated in the following passage: “Among the various sumptuous edifices at Utatlan was the college, having a staff of seventy teachers, and five or six thousand pupils, who were educated at the public expense.”[59] The truth of this account is borne out by the fact that the city was only destroyed in 1524 by Alvarado, so that the early missionaries had ample opportunity given them to collect materials for a trustworthy history.
