VII. brought home. To thofe fimple annals he trufts BOOK for renown, and foothes himself with hope that by their means he fhall receive praise from the warriors of future times'. COMPARED With thofe awkward effays of their favage countrymen, the paintings of the Mexicans may be confidered as works of compofition and defign. They were not acquainted, it is true, with any other method of recording tranfactions, than that of delineating the objects which they wished to reprefent. But they could exhibit a more complex feries of events in progreffive order, and describe, by a proper difpofition of figures, the occurrences of a king's reign from his acceffion to his death; the progrefs of an infant's education from its birth until it attain to the years of maturity; the different recompences and marks of diftinction conferred upon warriors, in proportion to the exploits which they had performed. Some fingular fpecimens of this picture-writing have been preserved, which are justly confidered as the most curious monuments of art brought from the New World. The most valuable of thefe was published by Purchas in fixty-fix plates. It is divided into f Sir W. Johnson Philof. Tranfact. vol. lxiii. p. 143. Mem. dela Hontan. ii. 191. Lafitau Mœurs de Sauv. ii. 43 BOOK three parts. The first contains the hiftory of VII. the Mexican empire under its ten monarchs. The fecond is a tribute-roll, representing what each conquered town paid into the royal treasury. The third is a code of their inftitutions, domeftic, political, and military. Another fpecimen of Mexican painting has been published in thirtytwo plates, by the present archbishop of Toledo. To both are annexed a full explanation of what the figures were intended to reprefent, which was obtained by the Spaniards from. Indians well acquainted with their own arts. The style of painting in all these is the fame. They represent things, not words. They exhibit images to the eye, not ideas to the understanding. They may, therefore, be confidered as the earliest and most imperfect essay of men in their progress towards discovering the art of writing. The defects in this mode of recording tranfactions must have been early felt. To paint every occurrence was, from its nature, a very tedious operation; and as affairs became more complicated, and events multiplied in any fociety, its annals must have fwelled to an enormous bulk. Befides this, no objects could be delineated but those of sense; the conceptions of the mind had no corporeal form, and as long as picture-writing could not convey an idea of these, it must have been a very imperfect art. The neceffity of improving VII. it must have roufed and fharpened invention, BOOK and the human mind holding the fame courfe in the New World as in the Old, might have advanced by the fame fucceffive steps, first, from an actual picture to the plain hieroglyphic; next, to the allegorical fymbol; then to the arbitrary character; until, at length, an alphabet of letters was discovered, capable of expreffing all the various combinations of found employed in fpeech. In the paintings of the Mexicans we, accordingly, perceive, that this progress was begun among them. Upon an attentive infpection of the plates, which I have mentioned, we may observe some approach to the plain or fimple hieroglyphic, where fome principal part or circumftance in the fubject is made to ftand for the whole. In the annals of their kings, publifhed by Purchas, the towns conquered by each are uniformly represented in the fame manner by a rude delineation of a house; but in order to point out the particular towns which fubmitted to their victorious arms, peculiar emblems, fometimes natural objects, and fometimes artificial figures, are employed. In the tribute-roll published by the archbishop of Toledo, the house, which was properly the picture of the town, is omitted, and the emblem alone is employed to reprefent it. The Mexicans feem even to have made fome advances beyond this, towards VOL. III. X VII. BOOK towards the ufe of the more figurative and fanciful hieroglyphic. In order to defcribe a monarch, who had enlarged his dominions by force of arms, they painted a target ornamented with darts, and placed it between him and those towns which he fubdued. But it is only in one inftance, the notation of numbers, that we difcern any attempt to exhibit ideas which had no corporeal form. The Mexican painters had invented artificial marks, or figns of convention, for this purpose. By means of these, they computed the years of their kings' reigns, as well as the amount of tribute to be paid into the royal treasury. The figure of a circle reprefented unit, and in small numbers, the computation was made by repeating it. Larger numbers were expreffed by a peculiar mark, and they had fuch as denoted all integral numbers, from twenty to eight thousand. The fhort duration of their empire prevented the Mexicans from advancing farther in that long courfe which conducts men from the labour of delineating real objects, to the fimplicity and ease of alphabetic writing. Their records, notwithstanding some dawn of such ideas as might have led to a more perfect style, can be confidered as little more than a fpecies of picture-writing, fo far improved as to mark their fuperiority over the favage tribes of America; but ftill fo defective, as to prove that they VII. they had not proceeded far beyond the firft ftage BOOK in that progrefs which must be completed before any people can be ranked among polished nations 3. THEIR mode of computing time may be confidered as a more decifive evidence of their progress in improvement. They divided their year into eighteen months, each confifting of twenty days, amounting in all to three hundred and fixty. But as they obferved that the courfe of the fun was not completed in that time, they added five days to the year. Thefe, which were properly intercalary days, they termed fupernumerary or waste; and as they did not belong to any month, no work was done, and no facred rite performed on them; they were devoted wholly to feftivity and pastime". This near approach to philofophical accuracy is a remarkable proof that the Mexicans had bestowed fome attention upon inquiries and fpeculations, to which men in a very rude state never turn their thoughts *. See NOTE XXXV. SUCH h Acofta, lib. vi. c. 2. The Mexican mode of computing time, and every other particular relating to their chronology, have been confiderably elucidated by M. Clavigero, Vol. I. 288; Vol. II. X 2 Their mode of comput ing time. 1 |