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Show 226 DISSF.RT. II. -~ , H I S T 0 R y 0 F M E X I C 0. t h ey con1r.u 1t e d om1· ued to fipeak of them ' as their knowledge of them was but little and obfcure. , With refpeCt to the time pf their ar.ri:al in Anahu~c, Torquemada r. • b k Ill of his hiftory that 1t happened m the year 700 1ays, m oo · ' . of the vulg.tr era; but from wpat he_ writes in hC?ok I. It appears to have happened in 648. Boturini makes tl:e~n one century more ~ncicnt, as he believed that in 66o Ixtlalouechahuac,· t~e f~cond kmg of that nation, was reigning in Tula. FroJ? theu p1Cl:ures. we k w that they left Huehuetlapallan in the year I Tecpatl; that, aPr~r having travelled one I hundred and fo~r' years, • they fettled _·in trollantzinco, and then in Tula.; and that t~cu· monarchy commencmg in the year VII Acatllafted three hundred and eighty-four years. After comparing thefe epochs of the Toltecas with thofe of the Chet;bemecas, ~heir fucceffors, we are perfuaded that the departure of the former from Huehuetlapallan happened in 544, and that their monarc_hy.b.egan in the •year 667. Whoever will trace back towards that. ttme, th~ feries of Mexican years contrafted with Chriftian years, fet forth! at the end of our firft v9lume, will· find th year 544 of the vulgar era to have been I Tecpatl, and the year 667 to have in like manner been VIi .Acatl. There. is n0 reaf0n .t'0 anticipate thefe epochs, nor can they be poftponed without confounding thofe of other later nations. That monarchy having begun then in 667, and lafted three hundred imd eighty:..four years~ the end of it, and ruin of the Toltecas, ought io be fixed i1t the year ~oo 5 r. Between the ruin of the Toltec~s · and the arrival of tlfe €hel·hemecas) ' ' 'torquemad:i aUows but nine· years; this interval· is tO'o fmall, becaufe the Ched1eme~as found, as the fa'me authdr fays, the edifices of. the 'Tohecas rn ruins;. •and it' is improbable· that ·they would ·have·gone to ruin in only nine yeats. Befides·, we ca:nnot fix the beginnitlg of the Chechemecan monarchy in that century, without·increafrrrg the number or their kings> or prolonging theiT lives immoderately, as Tor~ quemada has done. Who· can· believe' that Xolotl reigned ·a hondred and thirteen ,Years, 1ahd lived two hundred?- That Nopaltzirr · 1is .ior1 lived one hun.dred ani feventy; that Techotlala:, his great gre~t grundion, fuould reign one hundred and four; and TezozomoC', hi.s tt· fce!l dant, fuould reign in Azcapozalco one hundred and fh.fy, or uue hurr-dred H I S T 0 R Y 0 F 'M E X I C 0. dr d and eighty years? It is true, that a man of robull: confritution,a. Oifted by fohriety of life, and fo mild a clime as that of Mexico, might . arrive at fo advanced an age; and ' in that country there are not a very few examples 9f men who have prolonged their life beyond the regular time pre[cribcd to mortals. Calmecahua, one of the Tlafcalan capt:iins who affifted the Spani nn.ls in the conquefi: of Mexico, lived one hundred and thirty years. Pedro Nieto, a Jcfuit, died .in the year I 5.)6 at the age of one hundred and thirty-two years. Di:go Ordonez, a Francifcan, died in Sombrerete ngtd one hundred and -fevcn tecn (m}, making preachings to the people until the laft month of his life. Vie could make a long catalogue of thofc who in the ·two centuries pafl: have exceeded on~ hundred years of life in thefe countries. Particularly among the Indians thc:rc are not a few who reach ninety aod one h!!ndred years, pre[crving to old age their hair bhck, their teeth fi rm. and their countenance frcih ; but as there have been fo very few who 1ince. the, twenty-third century of the world have prolonged their lives; to one hundred and fifty years, that they are regarded as prodigies, we cannot aifent to the ·extravagant chronology of Torquemada, fupported only perhaps on the evidence of [orne painting or hiftory of the. Tezcucans, anc) p;1rticularly a.s that author himfclf confeiles ·that that nation kept no account of years. We believe, however, without hefitatiqn, that· the arrival. of the Chechcmecas in Anahuac happened in the twelfth century, and probably towards the year r I 70. Eight years had fcarcely elapfed after Xolotl, the firil: Chechemecan king; was eftablilhed in Tenajuca,· when new people 'rHved there, cdn. ductcd, as ,we have already. faicl, by fix chiefs! We do ~ot doubt , 11 r • that theft;: new people were the fix tribes of the Xochlmiloas, Te-pai1ecas, Colh~1as, Chalchefc, Tlahl..\icas, arid Tla,fcalans, feparated from the Mexicans in Chicomoztoc, and arrived 'in the vale ·of Mexico not ~l·ll at once, but .in the order ~nd difiance t>f time we have mentioned. ' I\ i~ ~~r~~ n ~hat 1Wh~n ' the Ac9lhuas 'ai·rived ; few years fter, they fo~md the c~tY. of Azcapozalco already found d by the Tepanecas, ah£1 : jl ' J I ' ' ' '1 1 I I Cothua~an hY, the · Colhuas. It is known b'elides, that thefe tribes (;arne to that country after the Chechemccas, as their ai·tival .happened ' •'' ' ... .. • J I ' • (m) Dicgd:Ovdone; livocj in, religion 01)0 hunclr9 lUld four r9rs . np~ in the , r\efl\lpq~ at· n}al~ u'}\yty·fiJ~1 1tn h,i» lnft pre;\ch:ng h: took lcnvc pf the .peo~rc Jt ?o,lll l.i'rercte 'With tth6ro words mot. ~01\1 I •1 13onum certnmen ccrtavl, ~urfum Hnfummat''l &to;'~ J j IJ NJ l ): I IJ J J G g a .in 227 DISSI£RT. It. ~ |