In a cosmical state like this in which each individual not only felt himself to be a unit and a microcosmos, but also an indispensable part of a living organism, under the form of which the state was symbolized, its inhabitants, leading lives regulated by a calendar based on the phenomenon of circumpolar rotation, under a chief ruler entitled the “Four in One,” assisted by four sub-rulers, must indeed have felt that they “lived, moved and had their being” in the Teotl or Theos, imagined as the embodiment of the four elements. In this connection it is interesting to learn that “the animal” itself, of Plato, is considered by eminent authorities to have been the tetrad.
In Zuñi, where, at the present day, each individual feels himself identified with some part of the body of a quadruped, his clan totem, the conception of the state as “a living animal,” is an actual reality. Their pueblo moreover represents a 6+1=7, or a “seven in one,” the miniature counterpart of the far distant Ooraon village of Chota Nagpore and of the ancient archaic kingdoms of India, Persia, Babylonia, Egypt, Greece, Rome, etc. Anciently the Zuñis called themselves the Ashiwi, a name remarkably like that of the Ashvins, derived from the Akkadian ash=six.
I revert again here to the following landmarks, which may perhaps furnish a useful “working hypothesis” for future investigation. In Mexico the pyramids of Cholula and of Teotihuacan seem to render testimony of the, possibly consecutive, establishment of ideal states amongst tribes “capable of subjection” by Toltecas, or “Master-Builders,” who, according to their method, used the building of a great structure, requiring time and united labor, as a means of organizing a new community or colony. It may be that the period of their completion coincided with the establishment of the Calendar system, beginning with the number one.
In my Preliminary Note on the Ancient Mexican Calendar System (Stockholm 1894), I demonstrated how, by reconstructing the Calendar cycles, it was possible to determine exactly when the native system was adopted. According to my demonstration, which has now stood unchallenged for six years, a fresh year cycle began in 1507 A.D., with the year sign II Acatl and the day 2 cipactli. For a cycle to be associated with the number two it is obvious that it must have been preceded by a cycle ruled by number one, therefore it may be safely inferred that the cycle II Acatl that commenced in 1507 followed a cyclical period of 4×13=52×20=1840 [pg 530] years (p. [32]). Accordingly the date when the Mexican system was instituted in the form which existed at the time of the Conquest, may be fixed as corresponding to the year 467 of our era.
Considering that the Calendar system was, however, but one part of the machinery of government, was inseparable from the organization of tribes, classes and individuals, and that its institution signified the foundation of a state, it is remarkable to ascertain that, but 137 years previously, Constantine, in A.D. 330, had instituted the empire of New Rome, on precisely the same numerical basis as that of the Mexican Calendar, and divided it into 4 parts or prefectures, each subdivided into 13, yielding a total of 52 prefectures. Moreover, as far back as the institution of the Kleisthenean democracy, the Greeks had been familiar with an extremely intricate and close union of calendar and government system, such as existed in Babylonia-Assyria and, as I have shown, in ancient Mexico.
It is certainly suggestive that the period of 137 years, which elapsed between the establishment of New Rome on a partly revived and partly amended or remodelled plan, and the foundation of the great democracy of ancient Mexico at the date inferred, is unparalleled in the history of mankind for religious persecutions, carried on in Egypt, Greece and Rome, following upon three centuries marked by the growth and spread of Christianity and the persecution of its followers, the destruction of Jerusalem and the persecution of the Jews. It was in A.D. 379 that Theodosius, the Greek, proclaimed Christianity the religion of his empire and instituted a relentless persecution of the Arians and followers of the ancient Egyptian religion.
Under Arcadius, Emperor of the East (A.D. 395), the Anthromorphites, who affirmed that God was of human form, destroyed the greater number of their opponents. Under Marcianus (A.D. 451), Silco invaded Egypt with his Nubian followers and the Council of Chalcedon condemned the Monophysite doctrine of Eutyches. Later, under Justinian (A.D. 527), the Monophysites separated from the Melchites and chose their own patriarch, being afterwards called Copts.
It is impossible to close one's eyes to the fact that, during this period of persecution and massacre, imminent peril of death must have forced many a band of the priests and followers of the ancient Egyptian and other religions to seek safety in flight. The [pg 531] events which took place in Egypt between A.D. 379 and 451, culminating in Silco's invasion, must unquestionably have been deeply felt by the descendants of the ancient Phœnician, Carthaginian and Grecian exiles, fugitives and mercenaries who, during countless centuries, had founded colonies along the Libyan coast, and pushed migration further westward along the coast line. Migrations from these regions would doubtless have resulted in the remarkable combination of archaic star, fire-drill and socket worship found in Yucatan and Mexico, existing alongside of a highly developed and perfected philosophical scheme of social organization identical, in principle, with that which, in the Old World, constituted an ideal which was the result of centuries of experience and active intellectual life.
The present investigation, in which I have collected more material than it has been possible to present in this publication, brings out facts tending to show that, originally, both hemispheres were peopled from the North, and that, in antiquity, at intervals, an extremely limited intercourse was kept up between the Old and New Worlds. The obvious fact that navigation must have been seriously impeded by the interregnum of Polaris, lasting for many centuries, would explain a prolonged isolation of America anterior to the Christian era. Whereas the equatorial currents facilitated the voyage to America, the same favorable conditions did not accompany navigation in the same latitudes in a reverse direction, and this suggests the probability that few who set out for “the hidden land,” ever returned to the port whence they sailed. Investigation seems to reveal that influences, emanating from the most ancient centres of Old World civilization, reached sundered regions of America at different times, and that they could have been carried there by a seafaring and building race such as the Minyans, the Magas, the Phœnicians or their descendants.
If such were the case it would be reasonable to expect that, in America, traces of words associated with the archaic set of ideas would be found, and the same method of writing. Let us now refer with prudent reservations as to the possibility of their being accidental, to the striking resemblances which undoubtedly exist between certain names for God, Heaven, North, Middle, etc., in the languages of the most ancient civilizations of the Old World and the Maya and Nahuatl. For convenient reference and without detailed comment, these words are presented as Appendix [III].