It is a noticeable fact that as we proceed south we find the mounds generally larger and more symmetrical than those in more northern latitudes. It would seem that the people who constructed those in British America, in moving southward, (for we strongly suspect that this people originally crossed Behring's Strait from Asia,) improved in their style of building, and, on arriving at the Ohio River, had so far improved as to be able to construct those interesting works at Marietta, Moundville, and other points in that region. It was not till about the time they reached the Ohio Valley that they manufactured pottery. In that valley, and thence to Mexico, fragments of earthen ware are very common; and in the mounds entire vessels are not unfrequently found. Upon reaching Mexico, the mounds are seen to be still further improved in size and form, and specimens of ancient pottery are more abundant. The great mound or pyramid at Cholula, which is a fair type of the mounds in Mexico, is fourteen hundred and twenty-three feet square at the base, and one hundred and seventy-seven feet high, being larger than the celebrated pyramids of Egypt. This immense structure is said to have been built by the Toltecs, a people who, according to tradition, as communicated to the Spaniards, entered Mexico from the North in the year A.D. 648, and established their capital on the northern confines of the great valley of Mexico, at Tula, the remains of which city were visible, and a record made of them, at the time of the Conquest by Cortés.
This people were said to have possessed a good knowledge of agriculture, and were well instructed in many useful mechanic arts. They mixed gold and copper, and were experts in working these metals. For a period of four hundred years they occupied the territory of Mexico or Anahuac; but secession, and the attendant evils of war, pestilence, and famine, greatly reduced their numbers, and the race disappeared from the land to give place to their successors, the Aztecs, who also emigrated from the North. Remnants of the Toltec race are said to have migrated still farther south, and to have spread over Central America; and the remarkable correspondence of dates inclines us to the belief that the famous Manco Capac, whom the Peruvians worshipped as the founder of their empire, may have been a wanderer from that once happy, but then unfortunate people. The useful arts, which he made known to the semi-barbarous people among whom he settled, instead of originating in the great luminary of the day, and being brought to earth by a "child of the Sun," as they were taught, are far more likely to have been cultivated by the Toltecs in the days of their prosperity, and, on the dissolution of their government, transmitted by those who, fearing the result, had fled and taken refuge with the credulous Peruvians. Whether the stupendous ruins of temples found at Mitla, Palenque, and Uxmal were the work of the Toltecs or the Aztecs, is immaterial. It is sufficient for the purposes of this paper to show that a people inhabited Mexico prior to and at the time of the Conquest, who were far in advance of the roving tribes of Indians that subsisted in the more northern and eastern portions of North America.
At the time of the conquests of Mexico and Peru, numerous cities were found in those countries, and magnificent temples and palaces abounded, some of which were richly decorated with massive images of solid gold, others ornamented with fantastic and sometimes hideous figures carved out of the solid rock. But what is remarkable, no iron implements were used, nor did the inhabitants have the least knowledge of its use, notwithstanding iron ore was plentifully distributed through the country in which they lives. Not a trace of iron has ever been found in those grand ruins of Yucatan visited by Stephens and Catherwood; nor do the ruins of the holy city, Cuzco, give evidence that implements of iron were used in its construction. But the people of these countries were acquainted with many of the metals, and the Spanish invaders found numerous silver, tin, and copper mines that had been worked by them. All the deep, winding galleries of these mines were driven without the aid of iron, steel, or gunpowder. It is said that an alloy of tin and copper was used for their edge-tools; and with the aid of a silicious sand or dust, they were enabled to cut and polish amethysts, emeralds, porphyry, and other hard substances. With these implements the elaborate carving in the stone temples of Palenque and the other ruined cities of Central America was executed. The great calendar-stone, which in 1790 was disinterred in the city of Mexico, was nicely wrought out of a block of dark porphyry, that is estimated to have weighed fifty tons, and must have been transported several leagues; for the nearest point where porphyry of that character is found is upon the shores of Lake Chalco, many miles distant from the city of Mexico. In the absence of iron, some tough metal would be in requisition for the tools and machinery necessary in the execution and removal of such a gigantic and elaborate work. In many abandoned quarries in Mexico and Central America unfinished blocks of granite and porphyry are found, which are supposed to have been the work of the Toltecs, and abandoned by them at the time of the invasion of the fierce Aztec. Assuming this to be the fact, we can readily conceive why the half-raised mass of copper in the Minnesota Mine should also be abandoned; for a people suddenly scattered as the Toltecs were—so suddenly as to leave temples half finished, and blocks of stone half hewn—would have no further use for copper tools; and hence the raw material would no longer have a value. In the abandoned quarries near Mitla, amid fragments of pillars and architraves and half-finished blocks of granite, copper axes, chisels, and wedges were found in abundance; but the same inordinate love of money that prompted adventurers to flock to Chiriqui, a few years since, to rob the ancient burying-grounds of their golden idols, induced others to search the old quarries and mines of Mexico and Central America, and take from them any relics that were intrinsically valuable.
In Mexico, the mounds were built so that their summits were visible from every portion of the surrounding city, in order that the inhabitants might continually have in view the sacred fires that were ever kept burning on each side of the sacrificial altar. The same is strikingly true of the mounds at the West; for they are invariably placed so that their summits occupy a commanding position,—a circumstance that has induced many to suppose them to have been built for military purposes, and to have served as watch-towers. But when we reflect that the attacks of savage or half-civilized peoples are usually made in the night-time, we shall hardly suppose these structures were raised for any such purpose. The Pyramid of Cholula is composed of alternate layers of brick and clay, or possibly of burnt and unburnt brick; and others in Mexico are built of unburnt brick. Many of the mounds in the West are of clay,—perhaps of unburnt brick,—in situations where clay is not so abundant as other earths.
I recollect visiting Circleville, Ohio, when it was really a Circle-ville. An octagonal court-house stood upon an ancient mound, and the dwellings and stores were built upon an ancient circular wall of earth that encompassed an area around the mound. South of this circular inclosure, and joining it, was a square inclosure of several acres, surrounded by a wall about ten feet high. What is remarkable, this square wall—and we presume the same is true also of the mound and circular wall—was built of clay, perhaps of unburnt brick, that must have been transported a considerable distance; for no clay exists upon that alluvial bottom, and the nearest point where it is found is three fourths of a mile distant, across a considerable creek. On a subsequent visit to this place, I found the people using the clay from the wall of the square inclosure for making brick, and streets had been cut across the circular inclosure, so that the city is no longer entitled to the name of Circleville. In many instances, the ruined cities of Central America have inclosures resembling those at Circleville, surrounding the Teocallis, or sacred temples, which almost invariably stand upon mounds, or, as they are commonly called, pyramids.
With these many points of resemblance, the conclusion is irresistible, that the mounds of the West were but the germs of the more symmetrical pyramids of Mexico and Central America, and that the people who constructed them were, in intelligence and civilization, far in advance of the roving tribes of North American Indians who inhabited the country at the time of its discovery.
If it be true, as tradition informs us, that the Toltecs were a cultivated race, even more advanced than the Aztecs who occupied Mexico at the time of the Conquest, we may reasonably suppose that a metal so valuable to them as copper would be in great demand, and that mines of it, even at a remote distance, would be worked by a people, the construction of whose religious temples and royal palaces, and, it would seem, their nationality even, depended upon its possession.
Other evidence might be adduced to show that the extensive mining-pits on the shores of Lake Superior were not the work of the indolent and untutored race of Indians who now inhabit that region, nor of their ancestors, but of a people comparatively well acquainted with the mechanic arts. Our article, however, has already extended beyond the limits contemplated. I therefore leave the subject, with the hope that the few hints here thrown out may awaken other and abler minds to its investigation.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] See Col. Whittlesey's Report, Vol. XIII. Smithsonian Contributions.