Until recently only twenty-four major examples of mosaic-work had come to light and been placed on record by printed description and illustration. Of these twenty-three are in Europe. The other specimen was found a few years ago in a cave in Honduras, and for some time was exhibited in the National Museum at Washington, but later came into the possession of the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation. The twenty-three known specimens in Europe were probably all sent to the Old World by Cortés or his companions.

Some years ago an Indian found a deposit of ceremonial objects of wood, incrusted with mosaic-work, in a cave in the mountains of the Mixteca region of the State of Puebla. These specimens, seventeen in number, are now exhibited in the Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation. The chief object of this monograph is to describe and illustrate this unique collection.

We are also now enabled to record and illustrate, through the courtesy of the officials of the Peabody Museum, Harvard University, four other objects decorated with mosaic-work. These were found in the sacred cenote at the ruins of Chichen Itza, Yucatan, and are now exhibited in the Central American hall of the Museum mentioned. This brings the number of known specimens to forty-five, of which twenty-two are in the United States, and twenty-three in Europe. These specimens are now preserved in the following museums:

British Museum, London, nine specimens.
Prehistoric and Ethnographic Museum, Rome, five specimens.
Ethnographical Museum, Berlin, three specimens.
State Natural History Museum, Vienna, three specimens.
National Museum, Copenhagen, two specimens.
Museum, Gotha, one specimen.
Museum of the American Indian, Heye Foundation, New York, eighteen specimens.
Peabody Museum, Cambridge, four specimens.

In this census are not included the minor objects with mosaic decoration, which we will also describe. Of the forty-five pieces enumerated, all but three are of wood; two are human skulls, and one a human femur. As the European specimens have hitherto been described, and in some instances their history traced to the middle of the sixteenth century, it will be necessary only to refer the student to these studies, note of which will be found in the bibliography at the close of this volume. In the present study we have assembled photographs or drawings of all of these major specimens, as well as of nearly all the minor pieces, and drawings of some of the mosaic objects represented in color in the codices. Our pictorial record is therefore practically complete.

Minor Examples

The use of mosaic incrustation in the decoration of stone idols is illustrated in pl. II. This stone figure, 3 feet 10 inches high, came from Cozcatlan, district of Tehuacan, Puebla, and is now preserved in the National Museum of Mexico. It represents the goddess Coatlicue, mother of Huitzilopochtli, the Aztecan war god. The Sahagun manuscript in the Real Palacio, Madrid, represents this deity with a rattlesnake girdle around the waist; held in the right hand is a staff in the form of a rattlesnake with the head downward, and having depending feathers projecting from the rattles, which are opposite the face of the figure. Above the deity is the caption “Yztac ciuatl coatlicue.” This statue, together with another, of colossal size, also in the Museo Nacional of Mexico, has often been denominated Teoyamiqui, and again at times it has been called Mictecacihuatl. The turquois decoration is still preserved in the statue illustrated, in the incrustation of the circular ear-ornaments and in the discs of mosaic in each cheek. The teeth are made of white shell; the inner part of the mouth is of red shell; the nose is inlaid with white shell. There are traces of incrustation around the eyes, but this mosaic feature is practically destroyed. In the breast is set a circular mirror of iron pyrites. Around the upper part of the forehead are small holes which probably at one time contained stone or shell inlays. A poorly colored representation of this idol has been published by Brocklehurst, with the title “Teoyamiqui, goddess of death.”[75]

PL. XVI

MASK OF WOOD, MOSAIC DECORATION MISSING