In order to form a clear idea of the Aztec system of picture-writing, it will be well to consider first the general principles of hieroglyphic development, which are remarkably uniform and simple, and which may best be illustrated by our own language, supposing it, for convenience, to be only a spoken tongue.
It is evident that the first attempt at expressing ideas with the brush, pencil, or knife, would be the representation of visible objects by pictures as accurately drawn as possible; a house, man, bird, or flower are drawn true to the life in all their details. But very soon, if a frequent repetition of the pictures were needed, a desire to save labor would prompt the artist to simplify his drawing, making only the lines necessary to show that a house, man, etc., were meant,—a retrograde movement artistically considered, but intellectually the first step towards an alphabet. The representation of actions and conditions, such as a house on fire, a dead man, a flying bird, or a red flower would naturally follow.
The three grades of development mentioned belong to what may be termed representative picture-writing. It is to be noted that this writing has no relation to language; that is, the signs represent only visible objects and actions without reference to the words by which the objects are named or the actions expressed in our language. The pictures would have the same meaning to a Frenchman or German as to the painter.
The next higher phase of the art is known as symbolic picture-writing. It springs from the need that would soon be experienced of some method by which to express abstract qualities or invisible objects. The symbolic system is closely analogous in its earlier stages to the representative, as when the act of swimming is symbolized by a fish, a journey by a succession of footprints, night by a black square, light by an eye, power by a hand, the connection between the picture and the idea to be expressed being more or less obvious. Such a connection, real or imaginary, must always be supposed to have existed originally, since it is not likely that purely arbitrary symbols would be adopted, but nearly all the symbols would be practically arbitrary and meaningless to a would-be interpreter ignorant of the circumstances which originated their signification.
We have seen that the symbolic and representative stages of development are in many respects very like one to the other, and there are many hieroglyphic methods between the two, which it is very difficult to assign altogether to either. For instance, when a large painted heart expresses the name of a chief 'Big Heart;' or when a peculiarly formed nose is painted to represent the man to whom it belongs; or when the outlines of the house, man, bird, or flower already mentioned are so very much simplified as to lose all their apparent resemblance to the objects represented. It is also to be noted that the symbolic writing, as well as the representative, is entirely independent of language.
REPRESENTATIVE AND SYMBOLIC WRITING.
Picture-writing of the two classes described has been practiced more or less, probably, by every savage tribe. By its aid records of events, such as tribal migrations, and the warlike achievements of noted chiefs, may be and doubtless have been made intelligible to those for whose perusal they were intended. But the key to such hieroglyphics is the actual acquaintance of the nation with each character and symbol, and it cannot long survive the practice of the art. In only two ways can the meaning of such records be preserved,—the study of the art while actually in use by a people of superior culture, or its development into a hieroglyphic system of a higher grade. Neither of these conditions were fulfilled in the case of our Wild Tribes, but both were so to some extent, as we shall see, in the case of the Civilized Nations. Throughout the Pacific States rock-carvings and painted devices will be noted in a subsequent volume of this work; most of them doubtless had a meaning to their authors, although many may be attributed to the characteristic common to savages and children of whiling away time by tracing unmeaning sketches from fancy. All are meaningless now and must ever remain so. Full of meaning to the generation whose work they were, they served to keep alive in the following generation the memory of some distinguished warrior, or some element of aboriginal worship, but to the third generation they became nothing but objects of superstitious wonder. Even after coming into contact with Europeans the savage often indicates by an arrow and other figures carved on a forest-tree the number of an enemy and the direction they have taken, or leaves some other equally simple representative record.
The next and most important step in hieroglyphic development is taken when a phonetic element is introduced; when the pictures come into a relation, not before attained, with sounds or spoken language; when a picture of the human form signifies man, not homme or hombre; a painted house, house, not casa or maison. Of this phonetic picture-writing in its simplest form, the illustrated rebuses—children's hieroglyphics—present a familiar example; as when charity is written by drawing in succession a chair, an eye, and a chest of tea, 'chair-eye-tea.' In pronouncing the whole word thus written, the sounds of the words represented by the pictures are used without the slightest reference to their meaning. To the Frenchman the same pictures 'chaise-œil-thé' would have no meaning.
In the example given the whole name of each word pictured is pronounced, but the number of words that could be produced by such combinations is limited, and the first improvement of the system would perhaps be to pronounce only the leading syllable or sound of the pictured word, and then charity might be painted 'cha (pel)-ri (ng)-tee (th).' By this system the same word might be written in a great many ways, and the next natural improvement would be the conventional adoption of certain easily pictured words to represent certain sounds, as 'hat,' 'hand,' or 'ham,' for the sound ha, or simply the aspirated h. The next development would be effected by simplifying the outlines of the numerous pictures employed, which have now become too complicated and bulky for rapid writing. For a time this process of simplification would still leave a rude resemblance to the original picture; but at last the resemblance would become very faint, or only imaginary, and perhaps some arbitrary signs would be added—in other words, a phonetic alphabet would be invented, the highest degree of perfection yet achieved in this direction.
To recapitulate briefly: picture-writing may be divided, according to the successive stages of its development, into three classes, representative, symbolic, and phonetic, no one of which except the last in its highest or alphabetic, and the first in its rudest, state, would be used alone by any people, but rather all would be employed together. In the representative stage a