The ambition of the native rulers to increase their dominions by encroachments upon their neighbors' territory was probably the cause of most wars among the Maya nations; but raids were also undertaken occasionally, with no other object than that of obtaining victims for sacrifice. In the consultations preceding the declaration of war the priesthood had much to say, and played a prominent part in the accompanying ceremonies. In Salvador the high-priest with four subordinates decided on the war by drawing of lots and by various other sorceries, and even gave directions how the campaign was to be carried on. The high-priest was generally on the ground, in charge of certain idols, when an important battle was to be fought. Supplies were carried, in Yucatan at least, on the backs of women, and the want of adequate means of transportation is given as one reason why the Maya wars were usually of short duration. The Nicaraguan soldier, as Oviedo states, regarded a calabash of water and a supply of the herb yaat already mentioned, as the most indispensable of his supplies. Respecting their ceremonies before giving battle we only know that on one occasion in Yucatan they brought a brazier of burning perfume which they placed before the Spanish forces, with the intimation that an attack would be made as soon as the fire went out; and also that Alvarado noticed in Guatemala the sacrifice of a woman and a bitch as a preliminary of battle.
All fought bravely, with no apparent fear of death, endeavoring to capture the enemy alive, rather than to kill them, and at the same time to avoid being captured themselves by the sacrifice of life if necessary. In most nations it was deemed important to terrify the enemy by shouting, clanging of drums, sticks, and shells, and blowing of whistles. The armies of Yucatan are said to have exhibited somewhat better order in their military movements than those of other nations. They formed their forces into two wings, placing in the centre a squadron to guard the captain and high-priest. The Nicaraguans fought desperately until their leader fell, but then they always ran away. He who from cowardice failed to do his duty on the battle-field was by the Nicaraguan code disgraced, abused, insulted, stripped of his weapons, and discharged from the service, but was not often put to death. As has been stated in a preceding chapter treason and desertion were everywhere punished with death. All booty except captives belonged to the taker, and to return from a campaign without spoil was deemed a dishonor.
PIPILE WAR FESTIVAL.
Captives, if of noble blood or high rank, were sacrificed to the gods, and were rarely ransomed. The captor of a noble prisoner received high honors, but was punished if he accepted a ransom, the penalty being death in Nicaragua. The heads of the sacrificed captives were in Yucatan suspended in the branches of the trees, as memorials of victory, a separate tree being set apart for each hostile province. The bones, as Landa tells us, were kept by the captors, the jaw-bone being worn on the arm, as an ornament. We read of no actual torture of prisoners, but the Cakchiquels danced about the victim to be sacrificed, and loaded him with insults. Among the Pipiles it was left to the priests to decide whether the sacrifice should be in honor of a god or goddess; if the former, the festival lasted, according to Palacio, fifteen days; the captives were obliged to march in procession through the town, and one was sacrificed each day; if the feast was dedicated to a deity of the gentler sex, five days of festivities and blood sufficed. Prisoners of plebeian blood were enslaved, or only sacrificed when victims of higher rank were lacking. They were probably the property of the captors. At the close of a campaign in which no captives were taken, the Nicaraguan captains went together to the altar, and there wept ceremonial tears of sorrow for their want of success. The authorities record no details of the methods by which peace was ratified; the Yucatecs, however, according to Cogolludo, expressed to the Spaniards a desire for a suspension of hostilities, by throwing away their weapons, and by kissing their fingers, after touching them to the ground.[1095]
CHAPTER XXIV.
MAYA ARTS, CALENDAR, AND HIEROGLYPHICS.
Scarcity of Information—Use of Metals—Gold and Precious Stones—Implements of Stone—Sculpture—Pottery—Manufacture of Cloth—Dyeing—System of Numeration—Maya Calendar in Yucatan—Days, Weeks, Months, and Years—Indictions and Katunes—Perez' System Of Ahau Katunes—Statements of Landa and Cogolludo—Intercalary Days and Years—Days and Months in Guatemala, Chiapas, and Soconusco—Maya Hieroglyphic System—Testimony of Early Writers on the Use of Picture-Writing—Destruction of Documents—Specimens which have Survived—The Dresden Codex—Manuscript Troano—Tablets of Palenque, Copan, and Yucatan—Bishop Landa's Key—Brasseur de Bourbourg's Interpretation.
Our knowledge of Maya arts and manufactures, so far as it depends on the statements of the early Spanish writers is very slight, and may be expressed in few words; especially as most of these arts seem to have been very nearly identical with those of the Nahuas, although many of them, at the time of the Conquest at least, were not carried to so high a grade of perfection as in the north. Some branches of mechanical art have indeed left material relics, which, examined in modern times, have extended our knowledge on the subject very far beyond what may be gleaned from sixteenth-century observations. But a volume of this work is set apart for the consideration of material relics with numerous illustrative plates, and although the temptation to use both information and plates from modern sources is particularly strong in some of the topics of this chapter and the following, a regard for the symmetry of the work, and the necessity of avoiding all repetition, cause me to confine myself here almost exclusively to the old authors, as I have done in describing the Nahua arts.
KNOWLEDGE OF METALS.
Iron was not known to the Mayas, and it is not quite certain that copper was mined or worked by them. The boat so often mentioned as having been met by Columbus off the coast, and supposed to have come from Yucatan, had on board crucibles for melting copper, and a large number of copper hatchets. Similar hatchets together with bells, ornaments, and spear and arrow points of the same metal were seen at various points, and were doubtless used to a considerable extent throughout Yucatan, Chiapas, and Guatemala. But there are no metallic deposits on the peninsula, and the copper instruments used there, or at least the material, must have been brought from the north, as it is indeed stated by several authors that they were. No metallic relics whatever have been found among the ruins of Yucatan, and only very few in other Maya regions. Copper implements are not mentioned by the early visitors to Nicaragua, and although that country abounds in ore of a variety easily worked, yet there is no evidence that it was used, and Squier's statement that the Nicaraguans were skillful workers in this metal, probably rests on no stronger basis than the reported discovery of a copper mask at Ometepec. Godoi speaks of copper in Chiapas, and also of a metallic composition called cacao!