Innumerable are the legends of 'white Indians'—the 'white Panis,'[10] dwelling south of the Missouri, the 'Blanco Barbus, or white Indians with beards,' the Boroanes, the Guatosos of Costa Rica, the Malapoques in Brazil, the Guaranies in Paraguay, the Guiacas of Guiana, the Scheries of La Plata—but modern anthropology scarcely bears out the stories of the 'whiteness' of these tribes. On a similar footing are the travellers' tales concerning the existence of Indian Jews—to prove which Lord Kingsborough squandered a fortune and compiled a work on Mexican antiquities the parallel of which has not been known in the entire history of bibliography.[11]
More convincing are the Mexican and Peruvian legends concerning the appearance of white and bearded culture-bringers. These legends are, it must be admitted, shadowy enough, but are so persistent and resemble each other so closely as to give some grounds for the supposition that at some period in the history of Mexico or Peru a member or members of the 'Caucasian' race may have stumbled into these civilisations through the accidents of shipwreck. But it is exceedingly dangerous to premise anything of the sort; and, as has been said before, the influence of such wanderers could only have been infinitesimal.
Enough, then, has been said to show that the origins of the religions of Mexico and Peru could not have been of any other than an indigenous nature. Their evolution took place wholly upon American soil, and if resemblances appear in their systems to the mythologies or religions of Asia, they are explicable by that law now so well known to anthropologists and students of comparative religion, that, given similar circumstances, and similar environments, the evolution of the religious beliefs of widely separated peoples will proceed upon similar lines.
SHORT BIBLIOGRAPHY
Mexican Mythology
(Those authorities marked with an asterisk are also applicable to the subject of Peruvian Mythology).
Sahagun, Historia General de las Cosas de Nueva España. (English translation edited for the Hakluyt Society by Clements R. Markham in 1880.)
Torquemada, Los veynte y un libros Rituales y Monarchia Yndiana.