The Calixtlahuaca Roman Figurine: Evidence of Transoceanic travel to Mesoamerica.

Summarized version of a paper presented by Romeo H. Hristov and Santiago Genovés T. at the 66th Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archaeology in New Orleans, LA, April 22, 2001)

From the early sixteenth century until the present many hypotheses of Pre-Columbian transoceanic contacts have been discussed (Sorenson and Raish 1996). With the only exception of the well-established Medieval Norse contacts with North American Indians (McGee 1984) all of the mentioned hypotheses share a common critical weakness: the lack of support in direct archaeological evidence, that is, genuine Old Word objects found in Pre-Columbian archaeological contexts (Willey 1985: 358). During the XIX and XX centuries some more or less reliable finds of such objects were reported from Mesoamerica; however, until the present time none of them have been accepted as incontrovertible evidence of inter-hemispheric contact before 1492.     

Among the mentioned data one of the most trustworthy is a small terracotta head of supposed Roman origin found in Mexico (García Payón 1961, 1979: 205-206; Heine-Geldern 1961; see Figure 1). The figurine was discovered in 1933 during the excavation of a burial offering in the Pre-Hispanic settlement of Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca, located nearly forty miles NW of Mexico City (Figure 2).

      The offering was placed under three intact floors of a pyramidal structure and, besides the head, includes different objects of gold, copper, turquoise, rock crystal, jet, bone, shell and pottery. Although the burial itself was dated between 1476-1510 A.D. Ernst Boehringer, an eminent classical archaeologist, has argued that the head is a Roman work from the II-III century A.D. The considerable discrepancy of more than one thousand years between the figurine and the other artifacts in the offering has raised certain suspicions about the reliability of the find, and therefore it was not generally accepted as evidence of transoceanic contacts in the 34th International Congress of Americanists (Vienna, 1960).
      In 1995 FS Archaeömetrie in the University of Heidelberg, Germany performed a thermoluminescence (TL) age test of the piece which established its age limits between IX century B.C. and the middle XIII century A.D. (Schaaf and Wagner 2001, Hristov and Genovés 2001). This result clears up the doubts of Colonial manufacture of the artifact, and makes the hypothesis of Roman origin –among other possibilities- applicable. The identification of the head as Roman work from the II-III century A.D. has been further confirmed by Bernard Andreae, a director emeritus of the German Institute of Archaeology in Rome, Italy. According to Andreae

“[the head] is without any doubt Roman, and the lab analysis has confirmed that it is ancient. The stylistic examination tells us more precisely that it is a Roman work from around the II century A.D., and the hairstyle and the shape of the beard present the typical traits of the Severian emperors period [193-235 A.D.], exactly in the ‘fashion’ of the epoch.” (Andreae cited in Domenici 2000: 29).

      On the other hand, an examination of the field notes of the archaeologist in charge of the excavation as well as the site itself have not revealed, in either case, signs of possible disturbances of the context (Hristov and Genovés 1999). During the last three decades over a dozen references concerning re-use of small Olmec artifacts in the Classical (III-IX centuries A.D.) or the Postclassical (X-XV centuries A.D.) contexts have been published, which give sufficient credibility to the appearance of a piece from the II-III century A.D. in context of the late XV century A.D (Navarrete 1982). Especially suggestive in this respect is the discovery of a small Olmec mask from the early first millennia B.C. inside a XV century A.D. burial offering in the Great Temple of Mexico-Tenochtitlán (Matos 1979). Furthermore, the recent discovery of a Roman trade post dated from the I B.C. to III A.D. centuries in the Lanzarote island, Canary Archipelago (Atoche Peña 1995) suggest a possible relationship of the Roman find from Mexico to some trans-Atlantic voyage (perhaps accidental) that may have happened during that period.

Discussion

      During the past decade the publications of Hristov and Genovés (1999, 2001) on the apparently Roman head from Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca has generated a publicity in sixteen languages, considerable amount of polemic and not a little confusion. The six main objections against the reliability of the evidence have been summarized by Michael E. Smith, a professor of archaeology in the Arizona State University:
http://www.public.asu.edu/~mesmith9/tval/RomanFigurine.html

      The first one is that “… [the head] may be a hoax. This could be a Roman figurine, but it was planted at the site, or in the laboratory, by a student or colleague of the excavator. The late Dr. John Paddock, a leading Mesoamerican scholar, used to tell classes at the Universidad de las Américas that the object was planted as a joke by Hugo Moedano, a student who worked at the site. Many archaeologists in Mexico have heard this story and they tend to believe it. I have checked with people who knew García Payón and some who knew Moedano, and I have been unable to confirm or reject this suggestion. Hristov and Genovés neglect to mention Paddock’s ideas in their article.” 
      Actually this situation has been addressed thoughtfully in Hristov and Genovés (2001), as well in a paper read at April 22, 2001 during the 66th Annual Meeting of the Society of American Archaeology in New Orleans, Louisiana. Michael E. Smith was present at the reading of the paper in the SAA meeting, and he also cites Hristov and Genovés’ article in his web page. Therefore, to claim that “Hristov and Genovés neglect to mention Paddock’s ideas …” seems, to put it mildly, paradoxical. Notwithstanding, for the sake of clarity the principal points from Hristov and Genovés (2001) are recapitulated below.
      The possibility of recent intrusion of the head was suggested by Paul Schmidt (an archaeologist in the Instituto de Investigaciones Antropológicas-UNAM in Mexico City) in a letter to the Editorial Office of Ancient Mesoamerica from March 6, 2000 which deserves an extensive quotation:

      “The citing of the unpublished TL date without the authors’ (Schaaf and Wagner) permission reflects Hristov’s well known unethical approach to life. We had plenty of problems with him while he was here as Santiago’s protégé. Later we have heard about his alleged academic affiliation with SMU based on a library card which was apparently revoked when SMU discovered he was using them as academic affiliation (check on this to confirm because my knowledge is a rumor from a letter in Aztlan).
      ………………………………………………………………………………………………….
      When Hristov was here, two or three years ago, he approached me to read the first draft of the article. At that time I told him something the old-timers know: A typical student prank; the figurine was planted in Don Pepe’s [José Garcia Payón’s] dig, the saying goes, by Hugo Moedano. Don Pepe took it so seriously that no one had the heart to tell him it was a joke. This I remember having been told by John Paddock, and others of the older generation –Jaime Litvak for example- had heard this. Hristov refused to check out the story; he told me he had not encountered a published reference to this anywhere!
      Taking into consideration Hristov’s known unethical behavior and the obvious controversy which would result from the publication, I find it extremely hard to believe that two of the three serious and professional referees (and in this case perhaps five should have been consulted) would support the article. Consider that a preliminary version of the article was published in Arqueología Mexicana, causing Jaime Litvak to resign from the editorial board.”

      Schmidt’s enthusiastic but misinformed assessment of my “well known unethical approach to life“ and his peculiar mind-set toward the topic of the pre-Columbian transoceanic voyages are irrelevant for the present debate; however, the factual inaccuracies in his claims that “Hristov refused to check out the story; he told me he had not encountered a published reference to this anywhere“ are a different matter, and will be argued in continuation.
      In late 1996 Schmidt informed Hristov that “everybody knows that the head is Colonial” and García-Payón was not present during the excavation, so surely somebody had “planted’ it as a joke. Neither the thermoluminescence (TL) age limits, nor the excavation report supports the suspicion of Colonial manufacture and/or intrusion of the artifact into the apparently pre-Hispanic archaeological context. In 1997 Hristov personally asked Fernando García Payón, José García Payón’s son, if he knew something about the first objection. His response was that during the 1960s his father frequently was asked if he was present during the excavation, and he always assured them that he had been.

      In 1998 Hristov asked Schmidt again if he could remember the source of his information about the “planting” of the head, and Schmidt informed him that he “believed to have heard from John Paddock that Hugo Moedano planted the head”. By that time both Paddock and Moedano had passed away. Therefore, the only option was to ask some of the well-known Mexican scholars of the older generation. None of them had ever heard such a story, neither from Hugo Moedano nor from John Paddock (Román Piña Chán, Angel García Cook, Luis Torres Montes, Carlos C. Navarrete, and Jorge V. Angulo, personal communication to Romeo Hristov 1998). At that point the further investigation of the allegation was stopped, but in 2000 Romeo Hristov asked Fernando García Payón if he knew something about a possible “planting” of the artifact by Hugo Moedano. His response was that Hugo Moedano “…had never been present during the excavation,” and this was just “nonsense.”
      There is one more point to be made before concluding this comment. In the only work on the Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca’s head published during his lifetime García Payón (1961: 2) notes that the figurine was brought personally by Ignacio Bernal (an eminent Mexican archaeologist and then sub-director of the National Institute of Anthropology and History) at the XXXIV International Congress of Americanists in Vienna, 1960. John Paddock was a student of Ignacio Bernal in the Mexico City College, his assistant during the excavation of Yagul (Oaxaca) in the mid-50s, and in 1966 they published an important work together titled Ancient Oaxaca: discoveries in Mexican archeology and history (Stanford: Stanford University Press); therefore, it is hard to believe that Bernal was not also warned by Paddock about the “planting” of the figurine and, if he was, to be unconcerned with it. Yet Bernal never mentioned about such possibility, neither during the congress debates nor in the paragraph on García Payón’s excavation in Calixtlahuaca published nearly two decades later in the Historia de la Arqueología en México (Bernal 1979: 167). Such silence about the alleged “planting” of the head seems even more puzzling in the two remarkably well-researched, and highly critical articles on the topic of the pre-Columbian transoceanic voyages published after García Payón’s note by another leading Mexican archaeologist and close friend of Paddock, Alfonso Caso (Caso 1964, 1965). The pathetic line of reasoning in Schmidt’s letter that “Don Pepe [José Garcia Payón] took it so seriously that no one had the heart to tell him it was a joke“ is, in my judgment, unconvincing in extreme.       The second objection is that “This may be a Roman figurine, but it was introduced into the Calixtlahuaca artifact collections, after excavation, through error. García Payón did not take extensive notes on his fieldwork, and it is entirely possible that extraneous objects may have been introduced into the collections after excavation. The collection of artifacts from Calixtlahuaca, now curated in the Museo de Antropología in Toluca, includes numerous donations of ceramic vessels from other sites, added to the collections after excavation (see: Smith, Michael E., Jennifer Wharton and Melissa McCarron, Las ofrendas de Calixtlahuaca. Expresión Antropológica (in press, 2002) Perhaps the Roman figurine can be explained in a similar fashion.”
      Smith’s observation regarding inadequacies in the cataloguing of donated ceramic vessels is perfectly correct. However, to deduce from it that “García Payón did not take extensive notes on his fieldwork …” or that the head may have been introduced into the collections “… after excavation, through error” would be misleading. Whatever omissions (or mistakes) in registering the provenance of donated artifacts may have been made, none of them ever have been cited by García Payón as discovered during his excavations in Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca. On the other hand, both the location and the context where the head was discovered were meticulously described and accompanied with a photo of the excavation, plan of the two burials and eight plates with photographs or drawings of the associated artifacts (García Payón 1979: 206). 
      At third place, Smith points out that “This may be a Roman figurine, but it was introduced to Calixtlahuaca in the early days of the Spanish colonial period. It may have been brought from Europe to Mexico by a Spaniard, and it found its way into a Terminal Postclassic/Early Colonial offering at Calixtlahuaca. It is not possible to tell, from the contents or context, whether the offering dates to the period before the Spanish conquest of Mexico or from the early Spanish colonial period. My continuing analyses of these materials may shed light on this issue in the future.” 
      During the past half century several embarrassing situations with Old World artifacts of supposed pre-Columbian importation that turned out to be of colonial or recent manufacture have been reported (Hristov and Genovés 2005; Epstein 1980: 9-10; and Andrews Wyllys IV and Boggs 1967, among others); hence, the legitimacy of such concern with the Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca’s find scarcely can be disputed. The three main possibilities in this regard are briefly addressed below:
      Firstly, although the burial itself seems to be pre-Columbian, the figurine nevertheless may have been deposited within the offering by a Spaniard (or any other European) during the early Colonial period. No direct evidence exist to support such a possibility, but it is least hinted at by the widespread practice of looting pre-Columbian tombs during the Conquest and in the early Colonial period (Bernal 1979: 40-41). Yet if the burial was disturbed and an ancient Roman figurine deposited, by whatever reason, nothing is more unlikely than the gold artifacts in the offering (Garcia Payón 1979: 205-206) to be left intact.
      Secondly, if the burial is assumed to be from the early Colonial period it is perfectly credible that the figurine was obtained by the Matlatzincas after 1518 and included in the offering with the rest of artifacts. In such a case the traces of intrusion through the three superimposed floors under which the offering was deposited would have been easily detectable, especially if we bear in mind that the settlement of Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca was abandoned after its conquest by the Aztecs in 1510, and any repair is unlikely to have been carried out due to the disuse of the structure. Nevertheless in the reasonably detailed report of the excavation (García Payón 1979: 204-206) there is no mention at all of alterations to the floors under which the burial was deposited.
      Thirdly, the head could have been imported into the New World by some European visitor between 1492-1510, and somehow to have found its way to Central Mexico. In this regard it must be reminded that during the mentioned lapse of time the Matlatzincas were under Aztec domain, so the artifact would have come to the Toluca Valley most probably through the Aztec “pochtecas”, but in any case with Aztec knowledge. In this context, however, the lack of the slightest reference about any encounter of the Aztecs or any of their vassals with Europeans is inexplicable in the otherwise detailed and reasonably reliable late historical tradition in Nahuatl. The mentioned silence makes the proposed idea highly improbable if one bears in mind: (1) the deep religious and political meaning of the Aztec belief that bearded foreigners coming westward from the Atlantic would conquer and destroy their kingdom and, (2) how fast Moctecuhzoma II was informed about the Spaniards arrival in Veracruz in 1518, and the great impact of this event among the Aztec rulers.
      Another objection raised by Smith is that “this is a post-Roman European Christian figurine, introduced to Calixtlahuaca in the early days of the Spanish colonial period. This was the initial professional reaction upon García Payón’s publication of the object in 1960. I have yet to be convinced that the figurine really is Roman in origin – no one has shown illustrations of known Roman figurines next to this object. Could it be a post-Roman Christian figure? More research is needed. Arguments that this figurine is Roman in origin need to back that notion up with more than vague statements that “Professor so-and-so says that it looks Roman.” 
      To begin with, it must be stressed that the term “post-Roman European Christian figurine” is both imprecise and misguiding about the assumed chronology of the piece. The fact is that the initial professional reaction was that the figurine is a Colonial object (that is, manufactured anywhere between the early XVI to the early XIX century, either in New Spain or Europe), and was catalogued as such in the National Museum of Anthropology in Mexico City.
      The identification of the piece as Roman work from the II-III century AD is based mainly on the stylistic analysis done by two specialists in Classical archaeology and art (Ernst Boehringer and Bernard Andreae) although some limited support to the suggested chronology is also provided by the TL age test. Its remarkable realism and physical embodiments of personality clearly set it apart from the early Christian portraits types, but are common in the Roman male busts from the mentioned period (Figure 3). Personally, I think that there are very narrow limits to the possibility of tracing the exact place of origin and the cultural background of the figurine. However, in broad outlines its close stylistic similarities with two small Punic terracotta masks (Figures 4 and 5) at least offer a hint that its origin was most likely somewhere in the Levant or Hispania rather than the Italian Peninsula.
      The next objection is regarding the ”… problems with the thermoluminescence dates reported by Hristov and Genoves. The physicists who ran the dates have objected to the way the dates are described by Hristov and Genoves (Wagner, Günther, letter to New Scientist April 8, 2000 (no. 2233), pp. 64-65). This is discussed in the following articles:
Schaaf, Peter and Günther A. Wagner (2001) Comments on “Mesoamerican Evidence of Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Contacts” by Hristov and Genovés. Ancient Mesoamerica 12:79-82.
Hristov, Romeo H. and Santiago Genovés T. (2001) Reply to Peter Schaaf and Günther A. Wagner’s “Comments on ‘Mesoamerican Evidence of Pre-Columbian Transoceanic Contacts'”. Ancient Mesoamerica 12:83-86. 
      For those unfamiliar with the two cited articles, the principal aspects of the so-called “problems with the thermoluminescence dates” are summarized below. In early 1995 Romeo H. Hristov was provided with a copy of the FS Archaeömetrie TL age test report which indicated the manufacture of the Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca’s head as no later than the beggining of the Christian era [View the TL report]. In 1996 the age limits of the find were calculated by Peter G. Schaaf at 1780± 400 B.P. (184 B.C.-616 A.D.), and cited as such in Hristov and Genovés (1999). Notwithstanding, when the article was in print, Schaaf and Wagner, anticipating the heated controversy that the find may generate, decided to shift to the most conservative calculation of the thermoluminescence age limits, that is 870 B.C.- 1270 A.D.
      As already discussed in the previous pages, the corrected TL age limits once again made the assumption of Colonial origin of the figurine untenable and support, although with less certainty, the hypothesis of Roman origin of the figurine.
      Smith’s last objection is regarding the alleged “problems with the archaeological context of the “Roman figurine”. The “Roman figurine” supposedly excavated at Calixtlahuaca was not documented using standard archaeological procedures. Excavator José García Payón did not publish professionally adequate descriptions of any of his excavations at the site. After his death, two posthumous reports were issued (García Payón 1979; 1981), but these contain very little specific information on the excavations or individual contexts. The “Roman figurine” cannot be considered well documented according to the normal standards of archaeological practice. If one compares García Payón’s publications with any of the excavation reports listed below, the contrast is obvious. The following kinds of documentation—standard for professional archaeological fieldwork in the twentieth century—are lacking for Calixtlahuaca:

1. Photographs of the process of excavation.
2. Photographs of the object in situ.
3. Photographs of the offering said to have yielded the figurine.
4. Plan maps of the excavation, the object in situ, or the offering.
5. Profile drawings showing the stratigraphic context of the figurine or the offering.
6. Detailed descriptions of the course of excavation (there is a brief summary)
7. Descriptions of the excavator’s reconstruction of the processes of construction and deposition of the structure and offering.
8. Illustrations of the figurine, the offering, or the associated objects, made at the time of excavation.
9. Catalog entries for the figurine or any of the finds from Calixtlahuaca.
10. Laboratory or museum records showing the presence of the figurine and associated objects from the time of excavation. 

      These problems of data reporting affect more than just the “Roman figurine” from Calixtlahuaca. The lack of documentation applies to nearly all of the finds from García Payón’s fieldwork. While these problems do not invalidate the “Roman figurine” as a potentially valid Precolumbian find, their implication is that it is impossible today to reconstruct the archaeological context of the find. It certainly cannot be claimed that this find is “well documented” or that it comes from “a good archaeological context.” The excavation of the “Roman figurine” fails to meet even the minimum standards of archaeological reporting.
 One might be tempted to suggest that such reporting standards were lower in the 1930s than they are today, and thus it may be unfair to criticize García Payón on these grounds. While archaeological documentation and publishing standards certainly are much higher today, other archaeologists working in central Mexico in the 1920s and 1930s—Mexicans, North Americans, and Europeans—provided adequate documentation of their fieldwork and finds that meets the standards listed above. The following examples support this claim:

Anonymous
1935 Tenayuca: estudio arqueológico de la pirámide de este lugar. Departamento de Monumentos de la Secretaría de Educación Públic, Talleres Gráficos del Museo Nacional de Antropología, Historia y Etnografía, Mexico City.
Bernal, Ignacio
1979 A History of Mexican Archaeology: The Vanished Civilizations of Middle America. Thames and Hudson, New York.
García Payón, José
1979 La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas: etnología y arqueología (textos de la segunda parte), edited by Wanda Tommasi de Magrelli and Leonardo Manrique Castañeda, vol. 30. Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México, Toluca.
1981 La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas: etnología y arqueología (tablas, planos e ilustraciones de la segunda parte), edited by Wanda Tommasi de Magrelli and Leonardo Manrique Castañeda, vol. 31. Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México, Toluca.
Linné, Sigvald
1934 Archaeological Researches at Teotihuacan, Mexico. Publication, vol. 1. Ethnographic Museum of Sweden, Stockholm.
Vaillant, George C.
1930 Excavations at Zacatenco. Anthropological Papers, vol. 32, no. 1. American Museum of Natural History, New York.
1931 Excavations at Ticoman. Anthropological Papers, vol. 32, no. 2. American Museum of Natural History, New York. 

      In sum, Smith basically asserts that (1) “…José García Payón did not publish professionally adequate descriptions of any of his excavations at the site”, and (2)”the excavation of the ‘Roman figurine’ fails to meet even the minimum standards of archaeological reporting”. This opinion is not only highly subjective, but it also is not free of inaccuracies.
      To begin, it should be stressed that José García Payón was one of the most erudite and respected Mexican archaeologists from the mid-XX century. As discussed above, several aspects of his interpretative work in Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca indeed are outdated (for example, the assumed use of some architectural structures and the ceramic classification), and there is a lot left to be desired about the catalogue entries of the artifacts. Without doubt these are not negligible problems, but they also are among the most common ones in the Mesoamerican archaeological research from the first half of XX century (Bernal 1979: 154-188, cf. endnote 1) . When discussing the mentioned aspects of García Payón’s work, a paragraph in Bernal (1979: 162) on Vaillant’s research in Zacatenco and Ticoman (see Smith’s sixth and the seventh bibliographical references), half of which is discussion on its chronological errors, merits consideration as well.
      Furthermore, Smith is suggesting that “… other archaeologists working in central Mexico in the 1920s and 1930s—Mexicans, North Americans, and Europeans—provided [more] adequate documentation of their fieldwork and finds that meets the [ten] standards listed above”. From the seven bibliographical references cited as examples two are the 2nd and the 3rd volumes of García Payón’s work on Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca, and the third is the previously referred A History of Mexican Archaeology… by Ignacio Bernal, which chapter VIII offers an concise review of the Mexican archaeology between 1910-1950. The remaining four works cannot be dealt with adequately in brief compass, but any careful revision of them will not fail to reveal tree important issues: first, none of them (including the untypically “modern” work of Linné) fulfills in every single detail even the first eight of the ten requests in Smith’s list; second, that there is considerable variations between them in the amount and the sophistication of technical details in the excavation accounts and third, although Linné and Vaillant’s publications are indeed more systematic and detailed, their technical aspects are basically no different from García Payón’s work. 
      Once this issue is addressed, the opinions of Wanda Tomassi de Magrelli (archaeologist) and Leonardo Manrique Castañeda (linguist), who revised and prepared García Payón’s manuscript for the publication of the 2nd, the 3rd and the 4th volumes of the research in Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca deserves to be cited:

When working with it [García Payón’s manuscript of the excavation in Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca], we realized that, notwithstanding of its venerable age, it is extraordinarily actual because the exploration was extremely careful and the [excavation] techniques very close to the used today …” (Tomassi and Manrique 1979: XXI).

      It already has been mentioned that the excavation of the two burials where the Roman figurine was discovered have been documented with a photo of the excavation, plan of the two burials and eight plates with photographs and drawings of each one of the associated twenty-off artifacts; this record was also completed with two pages of reasonably detailed accounting of the excavation (García Payón 1979: 205-206, see endnote 2). Therefore, it seems all peculiar (and to me, inexplicable) how Smith has arrived at the conclusion that the excavation “fails to meet even the minimum standards of archaeological reporting.”

Conclusions

      As final remarks it is worthwhile to emphasize, once again, that in its fundamental aspects such as domestic plants and animals, knowledge and use of metals, writhing and language systems, and religious beliefs, among others, the Old and the New World civilizations until the early sixteenth century were firmly different and, consequently, independent from each other (Hristov 1998: 237; Hristov and Genovés 1998: 52-53; Hristov and Genovés 2001:85). However, there are also some data of various kinds and levels of credibility that suggest the existence of a few sporadic, most probably accidental, transoceanic voyages before Columbus, which apparently had very limited -if any- cultural and biological impact. The find of an apparently Roman head in Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca, Mexico, seems to support the occurrence of one such voyage across the middle Atlantic, possibly somewhere in the first centuries of the Christian era.
      On the other hand, notwithstanding that the Canary Islands were discovered around 1334 A.D., the highly probable contacts between the ancient Mediterranean world and the Canaries were confirmed for first time only a decade and half ago. In 1987 a Roman trade post dated between the first century B.C. and the third century A.D. was discovered in the Lanzarote island (Atoche Peña et al. 1995), and the continuing archaeological research has proved in 2006 that not only the Romans but also the Punic seafarers reached the archipelago no later than the fourth century B.C. (Atoche Peña et al. 2009). The implications of these discoveries in the discussion of the possible Pre-Columbian Trans-Atlantic contacts are obvious, and it is not entirely unreasonable to expect in the near future that systematical archaeological studies in the Caribbean, Mexico, Central America and Brazil may provide more -and more conclusive- data related to some isolated cases of trans-Atlantic voyages before 1492.
—————————————–
1 This and the following citations are based on the Spanish language edition of Bernal’s book, which is included in the list of References.

2 Most of the photos, drawings and plans from the excavation were prepared for publication as 4th volume of García Payón’s work on Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca; regretfully, the manuscript and all field notes of García Payón were lost during the earthquake in Mexico City in 1985 (Hristov and Genovés 1999: 210) . Notwithstanding several previously published photos, plans and two descriptions of the excavation and the context where the head was found (García Payón 1961: 1-2; 1979: 205-206) provide sufficient base for assessment of the find.

References

Andrews Wyllys IV, Edward and Stanley Boggs
1967 An African Art Object in Apparently Early Archaeological Context in El Salvador: A Caveat to the Diffusionist. Ethnos 1-4: 18-25

Atoche Peña, Pablo, Juan Paz Peralta, Maria Ramírez Rodríguez y Maria Ortíz Palomar
1995 Evidencias arqueólogicas del mundo romano en Lanzarote, islas Canarias. Servicio de Publicaciones del Exmo. Cabildo Insular de Lanzarote, Arrecife

Atoche Peña, Maria Angeles Ramírez Rodríguez, JoséDomingo Torres Plaza and Sergio Pérez González
2009 Excavaciones arqueológicas en el yacimiento de Buenavista (Tiagua, Lanzarote): primera campaña 2006, Canarias Arqueológica (Segunda época). III (17): 9-52

Bernal, Ignacio
1979 Historia de la Arqueología en México. México: Editorial Porrúa, S. A.

Caso, Alfonso
1964 Relations between the Old and the New Worlds: A Note on Methodology, Actas y Memorias del XXXV Congreso Internacional de Americanistas (México, D.F., 1962), 1: 55-71. México: Editorial Libros de México S. A. de C. V.

1965 Semejanzas de diseño que no indican contactos culturales, Cuadernos Americanos. 143(6): 147-152

Domenici, Viviano
2000 Il parere dell archaeologo Bernard Andreae: ha i tratti tipici dell arte del secondo secolo dopo Cristo. Non mi stupisce che siano arrivati in America, Corriere della Sera. February 27, 2000, p. 29

Epstein, Jeremiah. F. 1980. Pre-Columbian Old World Coins in America: An Examination of the Evidence. Current Anthropology 21 (1): 1-12

García Payón, José
1936 La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas. Primera parte. México: Secretaría de Educación Pública

1961 Una cabecita de barro, de extraña fisonomía, Boletín INAH. 6: 1-2

1979 La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas. Segunda parte. México: Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México

1981 La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas. Tablas, planos e ilustraciones de la segunda parte. México: Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México

Heine-Geldern, Robert
1961 Ein römischer Fund aus dem vorkolumbischen Mexiko, Anzeiger der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaft. Philosophisch-Historische Klasse. 98 (16):117-119

Hristov, Romeo
1998 Reseña de John L. Sorenson and Martin H. Raish Pre-Columbian Contacts with the Americas across the oceans. An annotated bibliography, Cuadernos Americanos (Nueva Epoca). 68 (2): 237-239

Hristov, Romeo and Santiago Genovés
2005 The “Phoenician” head from Las Balsas, Mexico, Antiquity. Vo.79, No 304, http://www.antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/hristov/index.html

1998 Viajes transatlánticos antes de Colón. Arqueología Mexicana VI (33): 48-53

1999 Mesoamerican evidence of Pre-Columbian transoceanic contacts. Ancient Mesoamerica.10 (2): 207-213

2001 Reply to Peter Schaaf, Peter and Günther A. Wagner’s “Comments on ‘Mesoamerican evidence of Pre-Columbian transoceanic contacts’”, Ancient Mesoamerica. 12 (2): 83-85

Matos, Eduardo
1979 Una máscara olmeca en el Templo Mayor de Tenochtitlán, Anales de Antropología. XVI: 11-19

McGee, Robert
1984 Contact between Native North Americans and medieval Norse: A Review of the evidence, American Antiquity. 49 (1): 4-26

Navarrete, Carlos
1982 Acotación bibliográica sobre dos notas olmecas, Revista Mexicana de Estudios Antropológicos. XXVIII: 159-173

Tomassi, Wanda and Leonardo Manrique
1979 Presentación, in La zona arqueológica de Tecaxic-Calixtlahuaca y los matlatzincas. Segunda parte, by José García Payón. México: Biblioteca Enciclopédica del Estado de México, p. XXI-XXIII

Schaaf, Peter and Günther Wagner
2001 Comments on the “Mesoamerican evidence of Pre-Columbian transoceanic contacts” by Hristov and Genovés in Ancient Mesoamerica 10:207-213, 1999, Ancient Mesoamerica. 12 (1): 79-81

Sorenson, John and Martin Raish
1996 Pre-Columbian contacts with the Americas across the oceans. An Annotated Bibliography. Provo: Research Press

Willey, Gordon
1985 Some continuing problems in the New World culture history, American Antiquity. 50 (2): 357-363

Questions, Answers and Random LDS Apologetic & Theological Musings

Expansion Theory.

(write a brief overview here)

Preparatory Gospel Model (for understanding humanistic aspects of the restoration)

Summarize Oahspe and how higher heavens do not commune with individuals who are not representing a cohesive group of inquisitive believers. Quote the law of one and rule of squares concerning ‘the call’. Basically make an argument about how the early church was not created by god or the Lord per se… but a few individuals (both on earth & heaven) trying in their own humanistic way to ‘lay the foundations’ of an organization that will have power to ‘make the call’ at the end of the times of the gentiles.

Things like Polygamy, 116 pages of the Book of Mormon and all the foibles of early Church leaders seem humanistic… because they are! They are …

Old World DNA in America & The Book of Mormon

Mounting DNA evidence from Donald Yates DNA consultants, DNA testing company.

Introduction

DNA evidence for the plausibility of pre-Columbian transoceanic contact and the Book of Mormon is Mounting as the science progresses.

By looking at allele marker mutations instead of just haplogroups (which are more often diluted out of small gene pools in a few dozen generations of mixing) DNA consultants, a Colorado DNA testing company specializing in integrating genetic and genealogical information into customized personal ancestry reports. Started by Donald Yates, the company is one of the few with scientists & researchers actively exploring the pre-Columbian diffusionism theory and thus actively testing for and publishing any data that might support such views.

Newly released DNA data from remote indigenous tribes of Oaxaca show unexplainable markers from Egypt, Pheonicians and even Armenia and Tonga.

Genetic Ties Between Oaxaca, Egypt, Armenia & Tonga

Their research has found specific markers in Oaxacan Zapotec native populations which genetically tie these groups to various places around the globe which match well with the Book of Mormon Continental model. Specifically locations intricately related to ancient Jewish populations such as Egypt, Cyprus and Armenia (see Jewish connections here). One of the most surprising locations the following genetic markers pointed to, was Tonga (Along with Samoa, Tong has been long held by LDS people as somehow related to the final lost voyage of Hagoth and his people.)

[Create map illustration here with all locations/dna listed below, and native groups from wiki language map.]

The allele THO1=7 is a very common Native American marker. It is found at high frequencies among all Oaxaca Indigenous peoples. It is worldwide in distribution, highest in the Middle East, specifically Egyptian populations.

The Triqui, a pocket of 30,000 people who live in a mountainous region in the southwestern part of the state called La Mixteca Baja, have the second private allele noted by the study. This is a value of *5.3 for the TH01 locus. While unknown in other Indian groups, this marker is of high frequency in the Iberian Peninsula. Its no. 2 match is Scotland. That it crops up among the Mixtec seems to be related to ancient visitations by Atlantic facing cultures. Its distribution is similar to what the Rare Genes from History panel calls the Odin Gene.[2]

The third private allele is perhaps the most interesting. Defined as an STR of 6.3 on THO1, it is peculiar to the Zapotecs of the Isthmus of Tehuanteco in Mexico but found elsewhere only in Tonga and Armenia! Thus, Zapotecs share origins with Pacific Islanders and Armenians. Could this be a trace of the ancient Sea Peoples? There is a persistent sign of the same type of distribution in the Helen Gene, which crops up in the Mixtecs, Chihuahua Indians, Cherokee and Shawnee. Our description as part of the Rare Genes from History panel bears being quoted in this regard:

This rare autosomal lineage marker was carried in ancient times all over the Mediterranean and survives in many island populations today. Notable appearances are  in Cyprus, the Balearic Islands and the British Isles. The rough center of diffusion is ancient Troy, site of one of the world’s oldest civilizations and longest wars. Top matches today are Cyprus, Greece and Italy. Models of history associate the Helen gene with Greeks (often called Hellenes), Italians, Turks, and Sephardic Jews.

(dnaconsultants.com, ‘Indians from India in Ancient Mexico’)

[TH01 is a widely used STR marker in forensic DNA analysis due to its high degree of polymorphism (variation) between individuals. This polymorphism allows for individual identification by comparing the number of repeats (alleles) at the TH01 locus.While TH01 can provide information about potential ancestry, it’s not a definitive indicator of a person’s exact origin or a primary tool for determining genetic ancestry. It’s often used in conjunction with other STR markers and population-specific databases to refine the analysis and provide a more complete picture. ]

AlleleDetected inPoints toward
D3S1548=12Triqui [Mixteca Baja] (n=37)India, Sub-Saharan Africa
D5S8181=5All Oaxaca indigenousA big Sub-Saharan Africa marker, found almost nowhere else
D8=9Chontal [Maya] (n=29), Creek Indians, U.S./Mexico – DieguenosIndia, including Lepcha, highest in world is India Meitei (n=105)
D18S51=10Huave [Tehuantepec, lit. “Sea People”] (n=29), Zapoteco del Valle (n=40)India is match nos. 1-3, 13-15, 20 etc.
D21S11=27Huave [Pacific side, Tehuantepec, lit. “Sea Peoples”] (n=29)Sub-Saharan Africa, rare in New World
D21S11=34.2Tarahumara Indians (Chihuahua), Nootka (Canada), Creek IndiansIndia – Paraiyar (n=21), India – Tanjore Kallar (n=101)
FGA=29Mazateco (n=31), Triqui (n=37)Ancient Egypt, no. 1 is Egyptian Copts – Adaima (n=100)
THO1=5Zoque [means lit. Sea Folk][i] (n=35)Distributed thinly all over world, except Sub-Saharan Africa
Thuya GeneReaches 45% frequency in Amuzgo (n=30)Egypt, Africa, absent in India, Asia
THO1=8, 8.3Scattered low in Oaxaqueño IndiansSub-Saharan Africa, 36% of Namibians
vWA=10[ii]Zoque (n=35)Lepcha (n=48) is no. 1, Other India = nos. 2, 3, 4 etc.
(Table from dnaconsultants.com, ‘Indians from India in Ancient Mexico’)

Note, that I believe that the Scottish DNA is coming from Mulekite of the people who in my model came through Scotland and merged with the people of Zarahemla.

It was also predominately allele mutation frequency research that has lent solid evidence of early Polynesian colonization of central and south America. Something long suggested by the diffusion of pre-Columbian sweet potatoes in both locations. You can read more about this debated topic in these articles from the Smithsonian Science Education Center, from Alexander Ioannidis, now famous 2020 article in Nature, and many articles like this one by Skoglund et al. from Pub Med Central.

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Understanding Why Jewish Global Colonies Have Weak ‘Jewish’ DNA Markers

Several known Jewish global colonies in Ethiopia (Beta Israel), Western Africa (Sahelian Jews), India (Bene Israel) and China (Kaifeng Jews) all show very week ‘Jewish’ DNA markers. In fact their DNA is 99% local. Which helps us see that in looking for evidence of unknown ancient Jewish colonies, the DNA evidence we should be looking for, would likely also be very subtle.

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Limited Genetic Evidence of Romans in Britain

While the Romans ruled Britain for centuries, studies suggest limited genetic evidence of their presence in modern Britain’s population. This is partly due to the relatively small number of Romans who settled in Britain and the greater genetic impact of later migrations like the Anglo-Saxons.

Studies analyzing DNA samples from across the UK have found that the Roman, Viking, and Norman occupations left little lasting genetic impact on the population. (See the article here and the Cambridge genetic study here)

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Genetic Evidence for Medieval Central Asian Colonization of America?

DNA experts such as Harvard Educated professor Nathaniel Jeanson is another example of a well educated DNA expert who is able to deviate from the mainstream narrative guarded against by the gatekeepers of most institutions and explore more fringe-science (and even young-earth) ideas concerning the ancient colonization of America by assorted ancient peoples. He has found evidence in both DNA evidence and linguistics of migrations of Turkik people from central Asia at the time of the Huns and Mongols into North America from 300-1100 AD. He has several videos where he presents his evidence of migration.


The Ashkenazi Mutation in Colorado Indians

Another genetic mutation widely known as Jewish marker labeled 185delAG BRCA1 has been found in various locations around the world. Evidence which would suggest to LDS researchers, or those open to pre-Columbian global colonization, is explained away by modern geneticist as “parallel random mutation.” In other words, the EXACT same mutation randomly arose in multiple parts of the world. BRCA1 is a known marker coinciding with increased risk for breast cancer seen in high numbers among Ashkenazi Jews, Iraqis, Kuchin-Indians, Syrians, and populations of Turkey, Iran, and Tunisia. But it’s also strangely found in Colorado Indians, Malaysians, and Hispanics. Two articles in the European Journal of Human Genetics detail the occurrence of these mutations in Colorado and around the World (see Laitman, et al, and Mullineaux et al)

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Jewish DNA in Mexicans, Latinos and all Hispanics

Another poorly known genetic fact is that up 25% of Latinos & Mexicans have Jewish DNA. And its actually fairly difficult to date the arrival of that DNA into the population. However, because of the predominate notions of DNA evolution and New World migration across the Baring Land bridge during the last ice age, when Jewish DNA markers are found in any give population (such as the Colorado natives mentioned in the article above), it is simply assumed that the DNA came from POST-conquest (post 1517) European colonization, even though the truth is that in order to prove that, a complete line of skeletal DNA is needed from the archaeological record. (Which is rarely available). In fact many of the DNA markers that are utilized from the archeological record are actually of tenuous provenance–such as the Kennewick man of which we’ll speak more about shortly)

Most of the ‘Jewish’ DNA found in Latinos is in the form of haplogroup R1. Wikipedia can help readers understand that Haplogroup R1 is the second most common Y-DNA haplogroup found among Indigenous Americans after Y-DNA haplogroup Q.

Because it is so pervasive, initially there was debate about the origin of haplogroup R1b in Native Americans. Two early studies suggested that this haplogroup could have been one of the founding Siberian lineages of Native Americans, however this is now considered unlikely, because the R1b lineages commonly found in Native Americans are in most cases identical to those in western Europeans, and its highest concentration is found among a variety of culturally unaffiliated tribes, in eastern North America.

R1 (M173) is found predominantly in North American groups like the Ojibwe (50-79%), Seminole (50%), Sioux (50%), Cherokee (47%), Dogrib (40%) and Tohono O’odham (Papago) (38%). Its highest frequency is found in northeastern North America, and declines in frequency from east to west. In southwestern Native American tribes the frequency of this haplogroup is as low as 4%.   [General Mexican population = 25%, Pueblo/Hidalgo Otomi Hñähñús (62.3%), Hidalgo Nahuas (15.9%), and Tepehuas (11.6%)] (wikipedia: Genetic history of the Indigenous peoples of the Americas. Gomez, 2021).

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An LDS Geneticist Discusses DNA & The Book of Mormon

A good starting point for understanding the provenance issue in human genetics is the serious of Interview of well known LDS geneticist Hug Perez, the below video is only part one is a several part series, so be sure to watch them all.

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Many ethnic Tepehua and Hñähñú Otomi speaking peoples from around the regions of Hidalgo and Puebla share J1 & J2 Middle Eastern DNA.

Haplogroup J1 & J2 are another genetic marker prevalent among both Jews and Mexicans. Modern researchers tend to assume this variation arrived into Mexican populations through postcolonial Sphardic or Spanish Jews. 

Quite a few ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern civilisations flourished in territories where J2 lineages were preponderant. This is the case of the Hattians, the Hurrians, the Etruscans, the Minoans, the Greeks, the Phoenicians (and their Carthaginian offshoot), the Israelites, and to a lower extent also the Romans, the Assyrians and the Persians. All the great seafaring civilisations from the middle Bronze Age to the Iron Age were dominated by J2 men.

Distribution of J Haplogroup DNA, common in modern Mexicans. See Jayne Ekins 2021.

Outside the Caucasus, the highest frequencies of J2 are observed in Cyprus (37%), Crete (34%), northern Iraq (28%), Lebanon (26%), Turkey (24%, with peaks of 30% in the Marmara region and in central Anatolia), Greece (23%), Central Italy (23%), Sicily (23%), South Italy (21.5%), and Albania (19.5%), as well as among Jewish people (19 to 25%).

The Phoenicians, Jews, Greeks and Romans all contributed to the presence of J2a in Iberia. The particularly strong frequency of J2a and other Near Eastern haplogroups (J1, E1b1b, T) in the south of the Iberian peninsula, suggest that the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians played a more decisive role than other peoples. This makes sense considering that they were the first to arrive, founded the greatest number of cities (including Gadir/Cadiz, Iberia’s oldest city), and their settlements match almost exactly the zone where J2 is found at a higher frequency in southern Andalusia.

Is it possible any of the J DNA in modern Latinos dates from pre-colonial populations? Until more researchers allow themselves to consider the possibility and actually test for these markers (without reassigning them to ‘new’ groups) we’ll never know.

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Does Haplogroup X prove Middle-East Diffusionism?

Perhaps, but not necessarily. The problem with Haplogroup X2a as a marker for Lehite migration both its diffusion are and pre-Book of Mormon skeletons like the Kennewick Man. Note on the map of haplogroup diffusion area that it is FAR more pervasive north of the Great Lakes then in the areas that most Book of Mormon models would put Lehites. Especially in Heartland Model’s we would expect to see the greatest ‘Near-East’ Lehite DNA in the core areas where Lehites landed and mixed such as Florida (landing site), the Ohio Valley or Nauvoo area. Instead we find it associated with the Northern Great Lakes and Algic speaking tribes spoken of by Nathaniel Jeanson. This doesn’t seem to fit what we’d expect, and is worse than the Jewish markers we see in Cherokee groups (who DID live in areas thought to contain Lehite people in the Heartland and Continental models).

However, perhaps the biggest problem with using haplogroup X as evidence for Book of Mormon diffusion is the Kennewick man. A native American skeleton found on the banks of the Columbia River near Kennewick Washington which had primary Y-DNA haplogroups of Q-M3 and his mitochondrial DNA of X2a, and yet the skeleton dated to 8500 BP! The ONLY way X2a could POSSIBLY be associated with Lehite DNA is if the radiocarbon date of Kennewick man was contaminated by the carbonate rich waters of the Columbia river and soils which he was buried in.

This IS a possibility given that other skeletons attributed to that age do not seem to have similar DNA. For instance, Anzick-1 belongs to the Haplogroup D4h3a & Q-L54*(xM3). Similarly, the Peñon III Woman skull from the Valley of Mexico doesn’t appear to have xM3 DNA. So in a Book of Mormon context, it might be that haplogroup X2a comes from Jaredite populations (using the Jaredite as Clovis model), OR the Clovis aged skeletons used to date this mutation are incorrect.

Worldwide distribution of Mitochondrial Haplogroup X2. © Stephen Oppenheimer, Bruce Bradley and Dennis Stanford, 2014. from Solutrean hypothesis: genetics, the mammoth in the room

Remember that X is one of the rarest mitochondrial haplogroups in terms of frequency, yet one of the most widespread geographically. It is found throughout Europe, North Africa, the Near/Middle East, in most of Central Asia, parts of North Asia, and among Native North Americans (X2a). X is currently divided in four top branches (X1, X2, X3 and X4). 99% of Europeans belong to X2, which is further divided in 15 subclades (X2a to X2o). The most common subclades in Europe are X2b and X2c.

The highest frequencies of X have been observed among the Druzes of Lebanon (15%), among the Abkhazians of Georgia (10%), on the island of Orkney (7%) in northern Scotland, in Lombardy (6%), and in most ethnic groups of the North Caucasus (4-5%). Note THESE ARE THE SAME DISTRIBUTIONS AS THE OAXACA THO1 ALLIELS FOUND BY DNACONSULTANTS.COM!

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DNA Consultants Cherokee Study

In 2008 DNA Consultants, Inc. initiated comprehensive DNA testing of the Cherokees living on the Qualla Reservation in western North Carolina. The North Carolina Cherokees were chosen because after 180 years in the west, Oklahoma Cherokees are so thoroughly mixed with other ethnic groups, that any DNA test marker obtained would be meaningless.

The laboratory immediately stumbled into a scientific hornet’s nest when the results were issued on a press release in April 2010. 2 That Cherokee princess in someone’s genealogy was most likely a Middle Eastern or North African princess. Its scientists have labeled the Cherokees not as Native Americans, but as a Middle Eastern-North African population. The implication is that they are indeed, the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel. DNA Consultants, has now tested a much larger population on the North Carolina Reservation and gotten similar results.   The Cherokees seem to be the people that Brent Kennedy thought the Melungeons were.

The Cherokees tested had high levels of DNA test markers associated with the Berbers, native Egyptians, Turks, Lebanese, Hebrews and Mesopotamians. Genetically, they are more Jewish than the typical American Jew of European ancestry. So-called “full-blooded” Cherokees had high levels of European DNA and a trace of Asiatic (Native American) DNA. 80 Some “card-carrying” Cherokees had almost no Asiatic DNA. The European DNA contained a much higher level of DNA test markers associated with the Iberian Peninsula that was typical of Caucasian Americans. The level of haplogroup T in the Cherokee (26.9%) approximated the percentage for Egypt (25%), one of the only lands where T attains a major position among the various mitochondrial lineages. The lab claims that their skin color and facial features are primarily Semitic in origin, not Native American. (be sure to read the Full Article containing details on statistical bias at this link)

Questions To Ask:

-why did you take a special interest in Oaxaca and the Zapotecs?
-what are the main references for the story of rhoda, the kings there, and the septamarian kingdom?

Site Explorer

Comalcalco

Church and Municipal Palace in the city of Comalcalco, Tabasco

Comalcalco is a city located in Comalcalco Municipality about 45 miles (60 km) northwest of Villahermosa in the Mexican state of Tabasco. Near the city is the Pre-Columbian Maya archaeological site of Comalcalco. The literal English translation of "Comalcalco" is "In the house of the comals". A comal is a pan used to prepare food.

Demography

The present-day city of Comalcalco reported a 2020 census population of 43,035 inhabitants, while the municipality of which it serves as municipal seat had a population of 214,877. The city is the third most populous community in the state of Tabasco, behind Villahermosa and Cárdenas. The municipality, which has an area of 723.19 km2 (279.225 sq mi), includes many smaller outlying communities, the largest of which are Tecolutilla, Chichicapa, Cupilco, Villa Aldama, Gobernadores, Tomas Garrido and Miguel Hidalgo.

Church in Cupilco, Comalcalco.

Archeological site

The site of Comalcalco, whose coordinates are 18°16′N 93°10′W, is notable for two characteristics. First, it is the westernmost known Maya settlement. Second, and due to a dearth of locally available limestone (the primary material used in architectural construction), the city's buildings were made from fired-clay bricks held together with mortar made from oyster shells. The use of bricks at Comalcalco was unique among Maya sites, and many of them are decorated with iconography and/or glyphs. Important architectural features include the northern plaza and two pyramids, the Gran Acropolis and the Acropolis Este.

Economy

Comalcalco has fertile soil. Large amounts of tropical products are grown. Corn and beans and vegetables are also cultivated. Cocoa is the largest harvest in Comalcalco. Comalcalco produces 20% of the cocoa harvested in the state of Tabasco. Also coconut, pepper, avocado and some tropical fruits are important in some zones. Livestock raising, even though it is not widely practiced, is of high quality, most ranchers have their farms just sideout of Comalcalco, away from urban development.

Comalcalco produces 5% of the total extracted petroleum in the state of Tabasco.

Public market in the center of Comalcalco.

History

In 1820, the river Mezcalapa was drying up, and many of the families made residence in the middle of the river on an island. The Government of the State of Tabasco; consisting of Juan Mariano Sale, Antonio Solana and Fausto Gordillo, and all members of the congress; established a town in October, and named it San Isidro de Comalcalco. The decree was published by Mr. Marcelino Margalli, governor of the state and Jose Mariano Troncoso, who was secretary of the state. The town is located in the Comalcalco municipalities, and on November 14 of 1834 the first local government was created.

References

18°16′48.29″N 93°12′6.31″W / 18.2800806°N 93.2017528°W / 18.2800806; -93.2017528

    North America Prehistory Summary & Timeline

    Maize was domesticated during the Archaic period, before 4300 BC, but it took a long time to trigger changes commonly associated with agriculture: sedentism and pottery.

    The First Agricultural Communities

    Use of pottery marks the beginning of the Preclassic at 2500 BC. A later, but important, Preclassic innovation was the prismatic obsidian blade beginning c. 1500 BC.

    The first permanent agricultural communities appeared around 1600 BC; small clusters of wattle and daub houses surrounded by gardens, such as at San José Mogote (Oaxaca), where larger structures had specialized communal purposes. Some rare items hint at wealth differences but no large residences or elaborate burials mark social differentiation. Raiding and warfare were present even in early times. Similar communities, such as Chalcatzingo, were simultaneously established in the central Mexican highlands, including the Basin of Mexico. Farming communities did not appear in the tropical Maya lowlands until about 1000 BC; elsewhere in the lowlands, they appeared by about 1600 BC, some large and socially complex.

    The ethno-linguistic affiliations of some early Preclassic peoples remain controversial, while others are more clear.

    THE OLMECS (EARLY TO MIDDLE PRECLASSIC)

    Debate over the dating of Olmec remains occurred until after World War II, when the advent of radiocarbon dating placed the culture between 1200 and 400 BC, predating other civilizations. Olmec influences were widespread during the Middle Preclassic (1000-400 BC) or Early Horizon.

    San Lorenzo and La Venta

    Archaeologists agree that Olmec polities lay in the Gulf Coast lowlands, such as San Lorenzo (c. 1200-900 BC), where elite residence, ceremonial ponds, and spectacular offerings are found, as well as colossal basalt heads and monuments. Many imports came to the site from across Mesoamerica.

    San Lorenzo’s decline c. 1000-900 BC coincided with the rise of La Venta, which contained an earthen pyramid, colossal heads, stelae, and rectangular thrones. Monuments saw frequent renovations, and rituals include deliberate burial of serpentine slabs arranged to depict supernatural beings. Rich infant burials provide early evidence for inherited rank.

    Around these centers lie smaller sites, some with earthen structures and carved monuments, clearly the hinterland of San Lorenzo and La Venta. Other Olmec capitals have not yet been well-investigated.

    The Olmecs as a “Mother Culture”?

    Archaeologists are divided about whether Olmec polities were true states or chiefdoms, and if centers were urban places or chiefly centers. Fueling this controversy is disagreement about the nature and implications of “Olmec” art and symbolism. Some manifestations (i.e. colossal stone heads) are confined to the Gulf Coast. Others are scattered throughout Mesoamerica. Some believe the Olmecs were the “Mother Culture” of later Mesoamerican civilization. Others argue that they were one of many societies that independently evolved complex institutions while trading goods and symbols.

    Either way, Olmec sites display core Mesoamerican cultural traditions, large centers with monumental architecture and sculpture, and the ball game, by the end of the Middle Preclassic, c. 400 BC.

    Warfare was also present. Olmec monuments show weapons and militaristic scenes, and a burial at El Portón (Guatemala), c. 500 BC, included trophy heads and sacrificial victims.

    West Mexican Polities

    In western Mexico between about 1500 BC and 400 AD, distinctive hierarchically organized societies using vertical shaft tombs emerged in Colima, Nayarit, and Jalisco. Most sites lack monumental buildings, monuments, and calendrical signs, but had possible contact with South America, on the basis of metallurgy and ceramic forms.

    Mortuary goods include complex models of houses, rituals, ball games, musical performances, and people being carried in litters, perhaps indicating elite rivalry. By the beginning of the Late Preclassic, tombs were deemphasized and architectural complexes with concentric circular layouts were constructed, called the Teuchitlan cultural tradition, lasting until AD 600-900.

    LATE PRECLASSIC MESOAMERICA

    The Late Preclassic period (400 BC-AD 250) saw the first florescence of the Lowland Maya, signaled by ubiquitous red-slipped Chicanel pottery. Population in the Basin of Mexico more than doubled; large polities with impressive centers became common. Monte Albán in Oaxaca and Teotihuacán in the Basin of Mexico were the earliest true cities.

    Calendars and Writing

    Olmec objects display signs that anticipate mathematical or written symbols; calendrical glyphs appear slightly later. The Long Count originated in the Late Preclassic; the earliest use, at Tres Zapotes, corresponds to 31 BC. The 260-day ritual and the 365-day solar calendars are older; an example of the former at San José Mogote may date before c. 600-500 BC; bar and dot numerals at Monte Albán may date to 500-400 BC. The solar calendar probably also dates to the Epi-Olmec.

    Writing originated more than once in Mesoamerica, associated with the Nahua, Maya, Mixe-Zoque, Mixtec, and Zapotec languages. Mesoamerican writing can be difficult to understand, as some glyphs are pictographs, others whole words or syllables.

    Glyphs were carved or painted on stone monuments and buildings, and appear on ceramics, jewelry, bones, and shell objects and probably on long-disintegrated wood and cloth. Long texts were painted in accordion-fold books called codices. Surviving codices are late, so other inscriptions are used to trace writing’s origins.

    Kings, Courts, and Cities

    Writing, calendars, and monumental art are strongly related to Late Preclassic kingship and the Classic period emergence of urban centers and territorial states. The Maya lowlands provide carved monuments with royal portraits and dated inscriptions such as the early Hauberg Stela (AD 197), on which king Bone Rabbit is associated with the rain god, autosacrifice, agricultural fertility, world renewal, and human sacrifice, all important in later Maya rule and warfare. Such monuments increase after AD 250, marking the transition to the Classic period.

    Classic Maya monuments frequently include accounts of past royal events, names, and titles. Combined with archaeological evidence, royal genealogies and origins, such as Tikal’s, can be understood.

    Much about early kingship can be traced through “royal” burials; more is revealed at Nakbé (c. 400-200 BC) and El Mirador (200 BC – AD 150), where astonishing levels of construction occurred and carvings show gorgeously attired figures, accompanied by glyphs at El Mirador by around 200 BC. The smaller, contemporary centers of Lamanai and Cerros (Belize) are probably also seats of early kings: temple sculpture and inscriptions anticipate later royal iconography. The scale and complexity of these sites suggests centralization and labor organization.

    Warfare and conflict extend far back in time. Defensive walls appear at El Mirador, and Late Preclassic fortifications lie at Becán (Campeche). There is osteological evidence for the ritual sacrifice of war captives featured in Classic Maya art, and trophy heads and severed bodies are portrayed on the Hauberg Stela. Mass sacrifices are found at Cuello (Belize).

    The origins of lowland Maya kingship might be seen at Epi-Olmec Kaminaljuyu (Guatemala), where Late Preclassic burials contain costly offerings and sacrificial victims.

    Monte Albán. San José Mogote was largely abandoned by around 500 BC. Some of its buildings were burned, perhaps by enemies from nearby polities. Newly built defensive systems appear simultaneously in the southern valley. Such competition stimulated the sudden founding c. 500 BC of the Zapotec city of Monte Albán on a previously uninhabited mesa in the central valley; among its first monuments was the Danzante warrior frieze. By 200 BC its hillsides housed over 17,000 people, while the summit contained complex elite residences and carved, dated stelae. Smaller settlements clustered nearby; more distant sites were fortified.

    Between 200 BC and AD 100 the mesa was leveled and a ball court, 20 temples, palace-like residences, and elite chamber-tombs were built; 41,000 people occupied 518 settlements with several size-levels, a pattern often associated with territorial states. Impressive outlying communities were administrative centers under Monte Albán’s control.

    Monte Albán controlled distant areas as well. Over 40 “conquest slabs” associated with Building J in the great plaza are carved with place glyphs, perhaps distant conquered polities. A state was clearly present by the late Preclassic.

    Teotihuacán. The Basin of Mexico contained an extensive lake system and fertile soils. Farmers colonized the high, cold region at about 1600 BC. About 10,000 people in small communities lived there by around 1200 BC. At the end of the Early “Olmec” Horizon c. 400 BC, 80,000 people lived in five or six large polities whose capitals contained mounds, such as Cuicuilco, with its distinctive circular pyramid, in the moist southwestern Basin. Few lived in the drier northeastern Teotihuacán Valley, but between 300 and 100 BC it was heavily colonized, and Teotihuacán emerged as a huge urban center with 20,000 to 40,000 people. A century later 60,000 people lived there. Volcanic eruptions had destroyed the southern and eastern Basin and Cuicuilco; displaced people may have migrated to Teotihuacán. Two major obsidian deposits lay in or near Teotihuacán, including widely traded Pachuca obsidian.

    Teotihuacán was the largest city in the New World, construction started early in the 1st millennium AD and continued for 350 years, including the pyramids of the Sun and Moon. In contrast to Oaxaca, few settlements lay outside the city. The city depended on a huge irrigation system fed by springs and seasonal streams within a day’s walk. The much-later Aztecs regarded the city as sacred.

    THE CLASSIC PERIOD: TEOTIHUACáN AND ITS NEIGHBORS

    During its initial Early Classic rise, Teotihuacán governed a region of about 25,000 sq. km (9653 sq. miles) with roughly 500,000-750,000 inhabitants. But between the 4th and 6th century AD the city’s influence reached far beyond central Mexico. Archaeologists call this the Middle Horizon, which coincides with Teotihuacán’s mature urban phase. With a population of 125,000, many apartment compounds display economic specialization, such as manufacture of obsidian objects, ceramics, grinding stones, shell objects, jewelry, and probably materials that left no traces. These may have been traded in the Great Compound, the city’s principle market.

    Sherds of Maya Chicanel pottery appear in the city, and people from western Mexico, the Gulf Coast, and the Valley of Oaxaca visited and lived in special residential enclaves in the city. Some were artisans, others merchants. The so-called Merchants Barrio has the highest concentration of foreign pottery, and round storehouse buildings. Murals at the Tetitla compound show many exotic influences, and it was perhaps used by visiting elites.

    The lack of inscriptions means that the ethnicity of the Teotihuacános is unknown, and little is known of its social and political structure. Teotihuacán art is late and does not emphasize royalty, as Classic Maya art does.

    Elaborate tombs were not found at Teotihuacán until the 1990s. Under the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent lay at least one major tomb, with 40 sacrificial victims; many other sacrificed men with weapons and war regalia, along with some women, lay beneath and around the pyramid. Bone isotope signatures reveal that most were from distant places. As they were not captives, this indicates that Teotihuacán’s warriors were recruited from a broad realm.

    Since 2000, other rich burials dating to AD 150-350 have been found at the Pyramid of the Moon, perhaps indicating powerful rulers or early kingship, although most excavated individuals were sacrifices. Around AD 250, the Feathered Serpent tomb was publicly looted, stripped of sculpture, and built over, signaling internal troubles. A new regime emphasized more collective and impersonal leadership. Administrative facilities, probably combined with palatial residences, may have been housed in the Ciudadela, perhaps the original royal compound. William Sanders thinks it later shifted to a nearby walled area called the Street of the Dead Complex.

    Teotihuacan’s Wider Influence: The Middle Horizon

    Stelae at Tikal (Guatemala), 1000 km (620 miles) from Teotihuacán, record that on January 15, AD 378, a lord named Siyaj K’ak arrived. The same day, Tikal’s king died or disappeared. Siyaj K’ak had origins from or connections to Teotihuacán. His name is recorded at other centers, suggesting widespread prestige and influence.

    The following year, the son of one of Siyaj K’ak’s entourage was enthroned as Tikal’s king. Fifty years later, Copán’s dynastic founder also arrived as an outsider with connections to Teotihuacán. Long before, around AD 250-300, Teotihuacán Pachuca obsidian was used in burials at Altun Ha (Belize), and Becán’s fortifications from the late Preclassic period may have resulted from trouble with Teotihuacán. Central Mexican iconography became important to Maya architects who incorporated Teotihuacán forms at Acanceh and Chunchucmil (Yucatán).

    Great lords were buried with Teotihuacán-style offerings at Kaminaljuyu (Guatemala) which controlled the El Chayal obsidian source supplying the Maya lowlands. Around AD 400-550, a Teotihuacán-style “acropolis” was built there.

    Teotihuacán-style pottery and architecture also appeared c. AD 350-400 at Matacapan (Gulf Coast), founded as a Teotihuacán enclave. Pachuca obsidian and imported Teotihuacán vessels (and local imitations) show up at Monte Albán between AD 200 and 600, tomb paintings have Teotihuacán motifs, and carved monuments depict visiting Teotihuacán notables; Teotihuacán may have conquered Monte Albán. Only west Mexico’s Teuchitlan Tradition polities escaped Teotihuacan’s influence.

    Around AD 400-450, Alta Vista in northwest Mexico constructed buildings with Teotihuacán architectural elements, along with a new innovation: skull racks displayed sacrificial victims. Teotihuacános may have migrated there. Around AD 850 principal buildings were burned and demolished; scattered human remains indicate violence.

    Few archaeologists believe that Teotihuacán had a conquest empire. Quasi-military intrusions as at Tikal, Kaminaljuyu and Becán may reflect displaced or out-of-favor noble factions seeking new areas to establish themselves. Trade and commerce increased interregional connections, perhaps involving professional merchants. Outright colonization, such as in the Gulf Coast seems likely, and cultural emulation may be responsible for the adoption of dress, weapons, political and military imagery, and ritual. Teotihuacán might have been an impressive and mythologized pilgrimage center.

    Cholula, Cantona, and the Teuchitlan Cultural Tradition – Independent Polities?

    Cholula, with 30,000-40,000 people, was much smaller than Teotihuacan, but its main pyramid became the largest structure in the New World. Architecturally similar to Teotihuacán, in other ways Cholula remained culturally distinct until Spanish conquest. Cantona, established by AD 100, was a Classic center east of Teotihuacán. It lay in badlands, but fertile valleys and obsidian sources were nearby. With workshops, 25 ball courts, plazas and elite residences, 90,000 people may have lived there between AD 600 to 900, as Teotihuacán declined.

    Cantona had a distinctive ceramic tradition and had few architectural connections to Teotihuacán. Other than ball courts, it lacks monumental sculpture or symbolism of ritual or political power, but was well situated to dominate highland-Gulf Coast trade, probably in obsidian. Agave, for fiber and the alcoholic drink pulque, grew well there. Cantona may have been established by El Tajin as a seasonal workplace.

    Teuchitlan sites also remained distinctive. Between AD 400 and 700, local polities with impressive centers and elaborate shaft tombs were active, each with different ceramic, figurine, and tomb styles. The largest sites contained monumental circular buildings and sets of ball courts. One area had thousands of residential compounds interspersed with obsidian, ceramic, shell, and stone workshops. Around AD 600 a regional metallurgical tradition began to develop. Agricultural drained fields and canals prefigured the chinampas of the Aztec.

    The Demise of Teotihuacán

    Teotihuacán collapsed amid violence, as deliberate burning and destruction occurred at temples along the Street of the Dead, in the Ciudadela, and elsewhere. No nearby polities were strong enough to conquer, nor are invading foreigners apparent. Internal, factional conflict is more plausible; at least two earlier internal crises occurred: in c. AD 250, the city’s layout was reorganized, and later the Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent was openly looted and despoiled.

    It was long thought that collapse occurred around AD 700-750, making it a likely trigger for the collapse of Classic Maya society, but we now know that Teotihuacán’s power peaking c. AD 250-500, with destruction and burning c. AD 500-550 based on magnetic dating. Teotihuacán’s reputation persisted long after, and some 30,000-40,000 people continued to live in a city-state around the old ceremonial core until the 16th century.

    EPICLASSIC MESOAMERICA

    Monte Albán was too weak to fill the political vacuum created by Teotihuacán’s collapse. Instead, a series of local polities rose during the Epiclassic period, a term only used west of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and dated there to AD 600-900. Cantona prospered, as did El Tajin on the Gulf Coast, perhaps its trading partner. Closer to Teotihuacán, Cacaxtla developed a palace-like complex protected by a dry moat. Nearby lay a ceremonial complex called Xochitecatl. Together they dominated the Puebla-Tlaxcala Valley between AD 650 and 900. Polychrome murals depict military confrontations between groups with central highland costumes and regalia, others have Maya characteristics. Cholula was probably defeated by Cacaxtla, but still survived as an urban center.

    Xochicalco, contemporary with Cacaxtla, had large architectural complexes built on five hills, with earthworks, ramparts, and terraces for defense. Despite poor agricultural conditions, 10,000 to 15,000 people lived on the hillsides, producing crafts and trading. Carvings on the Pyramid of the Plumed Serpent show warriors and toponyms of towns paying tribute to Xochicalco, and stelae record names of kings. Around AD 900 the site was suddenly and violently destroyed.

    At the northern boundary of Mesoamerica lies La Quemada, another hilltop center of Epiclassic date. Small but complex, its terraces, residential complexes, temples, palaces, and ball courts, were protected by a defensive wall. Cut, broken, and burned human bones indicate display of human skeletons as war trophies.

    None of Teothihuacan’s successor states was strong enough to reestablish Classic-type order and prosperity. Only Tula, founded after AD 700 some 80 km (50 miles) northwest of Teothihuacan came close.

    THE CLASSIC MAYA

    The early sophistication at Nakbé, El Mirador, and Tikal took hold in the southern lowlands after a widespread Late Preclassic crisis. Royal and ritual texts inscribed on altars and stelae chart a network of interacting kingdoms; Yucatán developed in somewhat different ways.

    Early Classic (AD 250-600) inscriptions and less abundant Late Classic texts are retrospective, describing earlier times. By the early 6th century AD, Tikal led a coalition at odds with an alliance led by Calakmul. The period is called the “Hiatus” due to related population decline and political crisis. Piedras Negras and Tikal did not raise royal monuments for much of the 6th and 7th centuries AD. Caracol and Copán continued to prosper, so crisis was not universal. Maya society was reorganized; monuments after AD 600 presented kings in highly personalized ways, with new titles, and increasingly emphasized warfare.

    Late Classic Maya society, between AD 700 and 800, is documented through 15,000 texts. Combined with architecture and art, rulers and lords, gods and ancestors, dynasties, polities, toponyms, births, deaths, accessions, wars, rituals, and alliances are well known. The linear Long Count, used everywhere, gives chronological context.

    Unfortunately, Maya inscriptions are not ubiquitous, are mostly late, and say little about the lives of common people. The Late Classic phase began as Teotihuacán declined, which did not disrupt Maya culture.

    Kingdoms and Capitals The southern Maya lowlands were never politically unified, and during Late Classic times 45-50 kingdoms are indicated by emblem glyphs. These kingdoms varied greatly in age, size, material culture, and political and social arrangements. Yet shared Maya traditions united them, reinforced by trade, alliances, intermarriage, rituals and religious beliefs.

    Each kingdom focused on a central precinct dominated by large masonry pyramid-temples, the palatial residences of kings and lords, public plazas with altars and stelae, and ball courts. Over time, elaborate tombs were built, such as the tomb of K’inich Janaab’ Pakal, the 7th-century king of Palenque.

    Radiating out from the royal and ceremonial cores were commoner households, dispersed and gradually merging with rural households that formed 80-99 percent of the population, different from the highly concentrated urbanism at Teotihuacán and Monte Albán. Maya centers, with some exceptions, often lacked urban multi-functionality, and were mainly courtly and ritual places. Some kings occasionally dominated lesser ones through alliance, conquest, or patronage. Polities of hundreds of thousands of people may have been fragilely patched together by superpowers such as Tikal or Calakmul.

    Maya Society Maya social and political organization was hierarchical and centered on the royal families who bore the ancient ajaw title. Maya kings were sacrosanct, custodians of mysterious “god bundles,” and had sacred duties, in which they impersonated gods, ensured cosmic stability and agricultural fertility. Some, like Pakal, were regarded as divine and deceased royal ancestors exerted powerful influences over the living.

    Succession was through the royal patriline, but women could serve as regents or occasionally as queens in their own right. Kings were expected to be warriors; monuments describe capture and sacrifice of enemies. Other royal males were sometimes artisans who made stelae and precious objects, and probably oversaw writing and calendrical lore.

    Exalted lords and officials (some royal relatives) had bestowed or inherited titles such as sajal or aj k’uhuun: ‘subordinate ruler’ and royal ‘provisioner.’ Women sometimes bore these titles as well. Living in palatial residences, elites attended court and served governmental and ritual functions.

    Commoners, the bulk of whom were farmers, paid taxes in kind or labor, probably served in war, and lived in modest households, some practicing swidden agriculture, others more intensive systems with terraces and drained fields.

    Warfare was constant, in contrast to an old theory that the Maya were a uniquely peaceful civilization. War was waged for territorial expansion, sacrificial victims, tribute, vengeance, status, and eliminating enemies. No polity or coalition was powerful enough to unite the Maya lowlands.

    By the late 8th century AD populations reached unprecedented densities, and spectacular building projects were initiated. Underlying stresses soon led to a collapse of Maya civilization.

    POSTCLASSIC MESOAMERICA

    Before radiocarbon dating, Maya Long Counts appeared to indicate crisis between AD 800 and 1000, extrapolated to provide dates for a “Mesoamerican Postclassic” when societies were supposedly unsophisticated, warlike and “decadent.” We now know this is erroneous. There was no sudden florescence and decline across Mesoamerica. Teotihuacán and Monte Albán lost power centuries before the Maya, and Postclassic societies were extraordinary civilizations. Oral histories, indigenous books, and Europeans descriptions provide excellent documentation.

    The Rise of the Toltecs

    The mythic Tollan of the Aztecs was inhabited by the Toltecs, accomplished artisans and agriculturalists, wise in medicine and calendrical lore. They supposedly lived harmoniously under their ruler Ce Acatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl. Their principal god, also called Quetzalcoatl, required only butterflies as sacrifice. Tollan finally fell, the myths said, when Quetzalcoatl and his followers were tricked by evil servants of the god Tezcatlipoca, fleeing to distant lands in the direction of the rising sun.

    The real Tollan, Tula, lies just outside the Basin of Mexico northwest of Teotihuacán, where rivers provide irrigation. In Classic times Teotihuacán colonists there produced lime for plaster. Around AD 700, civic structures appeared and artifacts indicate that Tula was founded by migrating Tolteca-Chichimeca peoples. Tula matured into a huge city between AD 900 and 1200, with a population of 60,000 that fused central Mexican, Gulf Coast, and northern influences. Nahuatl was probably spoken there.

    City households were multi-roomed adobe structures around a courtyard, housing several nuclear families. As at Teotihuacán, there were many workshops. Tula was supported by outlying rural communities.

    Pyramids, ball courts, and colonnaded halls, showing architectural similarities with Teotihuacán, were decorated with jaguars and deities, and supporting pillars carved as warrior figures, each named by undeciphered glyphs resembling later Aztec writing. During Tula’s hegemony, trade with the Pacific, the Gulf of Mexico, Casas Grandes in North American Mexico, and even Central America occurred. Toltec trading colonies have been found as far south as El Salvador.

    Tula dominated sizable territories; the whole Basin of Mexico, and possibly tributary client states in northern Mesoamerica. Tula’s principal rival was probably Cholula. Sometime around AD 1150-1200 Tula violently collapsed, indicated by burning and looting of principle buildings. Many people continued to live in the region and a reoccupied urban zone was later subject to the Aztecs.

    THE POSTCLASSIC MAYA

    The Puuc Florescence. Maya polities in the northern Yucatán weathered and even benefited from the southern Maya collapse. Early in the 8th century AD, population expansion occurred in the fertile Puuc region and new, sophisticated water storage technology combated aridity. Sayil, Kabah, Labna, and Uxmal display distinctive Puuc architecture: columns and complicated mosaic sculptures of gods, humans, and geometric designs, exemplified at the House of the Governor and the Nunnery at Uxmal. By AD 875-900, Uxmal gained political ascendancy.

    Puuc prosperity was short-lived; the centers collapsed, their hinterlands heavily depopulated c. AD 1000 or a little later. Migrants to the northern Yucatán plains created Puuc-type settlements where the next regional power soon appeared.

    Chichén Itzá and Mayapan. Chichén Itzá was the greatest Postclassic capital, rising during the 8th century AD in northern Yucatán near a huge cenote that became a pilgrimage center. Features of the site are the Castillo Pyramid, the Monjas Palace, and a gigantic ball court. Many buildings show Puuc or Toltec architectural affinities. Indigenous histories say that the Itzá founders were succeeded by Mexican migrants led by Kukulkan, meaning “Feathered Serpent” in Maya. Inevitably, this became associated with the myth of Quetzalcoatl’s expulsion from Tula.

    Chichén Itzá’s inscriptions and dates are confined to the 9th century AD. Warrior and sacrifice imagery abounds, related to conflicts with other Puuc centers. After AD 900, Chichén Itzá eclipsed rival Coba, and Mexican influences proliferated. For several centuries it was a state capital and mercantile emporium trading in salt and other commodities. Around AD 1200 or 1250, Chichén Itzá declined although remaining a pilgrimage center even after the Spaniards arrived; one Itzá faction fled south and founded the last of the Maya kingdoms.

    Power shifted to Mayapan, founded by the Cocom family. Its main buildings are small and shabby compared to Chichén Itzá but over 4000 residences (perhaps 12,000 people) were crowded within, including many elites and their retainers. Conflicting Maya accounts say Mayapan fell c. AD 1441, amid drought, famine, and a rebellion of Xiu lords against the Cocom lineage. Burning is evident, and Mayapan was abandoned before the Spaniards arrived.

    MESOAMERICA DISCOVERED: WHAT THE SPANIARDS FOUND

    In 1519 Hernan Cortés sailed with a small fleet to Yucatán after two previous expeditions reported impressive native cultures there. Best known for conquest of the Aztec, Cortés also left accounts of the 16th-century Maya.

    The Maya of the Early 16th Century

    After Chichén Itzá and Mayapan fell, hundreds of small polities emerged, ruled by hereditary leaders called batabs, each with a few thousand subjects. Fragile alliances united batabs of the same lineage, but war was common among and within batabships, as noble families (i.e. Xiu and Cocom) were traditional enemies. Some petty kingdoms may have ruled 60,000 people.

    Despite lack of integration, these societies were complex, and retained Classic patterns, with large towns, temple pyramids, public plazas, elaborate houses, rituals, books, and calendars. Nobles were supported by taxes and engaged in long-distance trade. Most people grew maize, fished, or produced salt. Slaves were war captives or debtors. After skirmishing with the Maya, Cortés moved on to confront the Aztecs.

    The Aztecs and the Late Horizon: History and Myth

    16th-century people believed their ancestors had migrated to the Basin of Mexico from the northern fringes of Mesoamerica, beginning when Tula collapsed, or earlier, linked to climatic change and political instability. Among those people were Aztec ancestors, who were Nahuatl speakers called Chichimec. Some were described as savage hunter-gatherers, others as farmers who played the ball game and built temples, and others were sophisticated refugees from the Toltec kingdom. Some archaeologists think these wanderings first introduced Nahua speakers into the Basin of Mexico. Others think migration accounts were “reconstructed history,” made up later to justify events. If glyphs recently detected at Teotihuacán turn out be Nahuatl, this will be strengthened.

    None would have called themselves Aztecs; they called themselves Mexica-Tenochca (the founders of Tenochtitlán), Acolhua, Tepaneca, or Chalca. Others came from a mythical homeland called Aztlan (thus the label “Aztecs”). One band, the Mexica, eventually were driven as despised refugees (or led by their god) onto small islands in Lake Texcoco, surrounded by enemy polities. Here, in AD 1325 the Mexica founded their capital, Tenochtitlán.

    At the end of the 14th century, several dozen warring city-states lay in the Basin of Mexico. The Mexica-Tenochca enlisted as mercenaries with the powerful Tepanecs, receiving a share of tribute. They elected a king, who married into an exalted dynasty descended from the Toltecs. In response to a falling out in AD 1428, the Mexica, aided by the Texcoco and Tlacopan states, overthrew the Tepanec. The Mexica king Itzcoatl and his followers became dominant and powerful, promoting the Mexica tribal god. At this juncture, by their own account, they burned their ancient books and proceeded to write “true” history, setting the stage for the empire under the Triple Alliance of Tenochtitlán, Texcoco, and Tlacopan for 91 years. This short interval is called the Late Horizon.

    The Aztec Empire in 1519 By 1519 the Aztec empire dominated 400 previously independent polities over an area of about 200,000 sq. km (77,220 sq. miles), including the Gulf Coast, the Valley of Oaxaca, parts of western Mexico, and the Pacific coast of Guatemala, with subjects numbering between 6 and 10 million people, 1 to 1.5 million in the Basin of Mexico. Terracing, irrigation systems, and artificially drained fields made it a productive agrarian region.

    The empire was assembled through intimidation, alliance, and conquest. Conquered polities were grouped into 38 tributary provinces, from which tribute of all kinds flowed, enriching Tenochtitlan’s rulers, who dominated the Triple Alliance. Other provinces joined the empire as military allies, paying only nominal tribute. Such allies were necessary as moving and feeding large armies without effective transport was difficult, and powerful enemies remained.

    The Aztec’s greatest enemies were the Tarascans of western Mexico, who by 1519 controlled 1,500,000 people from their capital of Tzintzuntzan on the shores of Lake Patzcuaro, a small but highly centralized state. Tarascan warriors inflicted heavy defeats on Aztec armies.

    The Tlaxcallan confederation, east of the Basin of Mexico, were culturally similar to the Aztecs but retained their independence, ultimately supporting the Spaniards.

    Complaisant local rulers were left in place, and their offspring married into the royal families of Tenochtitlán, Texcoco, and Tlacopan. Sometimes local dynasties were replaced with royal governors, their lands absorbed by the rulers. Elsewhere, the Aztecs ruled cheaply through intimidation and tax collection. Yet in some 20 places (i.e. the Valley of Oaxaca and the Tarascan frontier), imperial governors and garrisons were necessary. Punitive measures were sometimes used locally and core populations were sometimes resettled in frontier posts.

    Aztec Society. Each city-state (altepetl) in the Basin of Mexico shared language, diet, technology, religion, customs, and political organization. One or more hereditary king (tlatoani) ruled each altepetl. Kings, their families, and nobles (collectively called pipiltin), benefited from the tribute of empire. Polygyny increased the noble class, necessitating further resources and conquests. Nobles received land as a reward for service. After special education, the pipiltin monopolized political, religious and military offices, and participated in court life in the capital.

    Commoners paid taxes to their own tlatoani and his overlord. Most were farmers or artisans, living in neighborhoods with their own leaders, schools, and temples, contributing corvée labor and serving in the army. Commoner warriors occasionally achieved quasi-noble rank. Talented artisans also had high prestige. The pochteca, or professional merchants, led trading expeditions, becoming rich and enjoying upward social mobility.

    The mayeque were tied to the estates of kings and nobles, paying taxes only to their immediate lords. Many, originally free, became serfs through conquest. At the bottom were the tlacotin, who owed service through debt or criminal acts. They could own property and buy freedom, and their children were born free. They were not poorly treated, though malcontents could be sold or sacrificed.

    The Spanish Conquest

    In 1519, the Mexica Emperor Motecezuma II was attempting to annex the stratified and warlike highland Maya, when a new and unexpected threat appeared in the form of Hernan Cortés and his 500 men. By coincidence, they arrived on the day that Aztec diviners prophesied the return of Quetzalcoatl. Cortés marched inland seeking the riches he had heard of. The Tlaxcallans initially resisted, but realized the newcomers could be used against their hated Aztec enemies. Accompanied by indigenous allies, Cortés entered Tenochtitlán, where Motecezuma received them, but was soon placed under Spanish “house arrest.”

    Eventually, Motecezuma was killed during fighting in 1520, after Spanish desecration of the main temple. The allies of Tenochtitlán fell away, most damagingly, Texcoco, a former imperial partner. After months of fierce fighting, the Spaniards destroyed Tenochtitlán in 1521.

    Most of Mesoamerica was in Spanish hands by 1550, but the Itzá Maya held out for another 150 years until 1697.

    Subsistence species
    maize
    beans
    agave
    amaranth
    chia
    blue-green algae
    deer, rabbits, quail

    Languages
    Nahua
    Mixe-Zoque
    Mayan
    Mixtec
    Zapotec

    Ancient/Historic people
    Hernan Cortés
    Bone Rabbit
    Siyaj K’ak
    K’inich Janaab’ Pakal
    Ce Acatl Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl
    Kukulkan
    Cocom lineage
    Xiu lineage
    Itzcoatl
    Motecezuma II

    Deities
    Quetzalcoatl
    Tezcatlipoca

    Periods, Phases, Horizons
    Preclassic (Formative) 2500 BC-AD 250
    Early Preclassic period 2500-1000 BC
    Middle Preclassic period 1000-400 BC
    Late Preclassic period 400 BC-AD 250
    Early Classic period AD 250-600
    Late Classic period AD 600-800
    Terminal Classic period AD 800-1000
    Early Postclassic period AD 1000-1250
    Late Postclassic period AD 1250-1519
    Olmec 1200-400 BC
    Early Horizon
    Epi-Olmec period
    Teotihuacán
    Middle Horizon
    Western Mexican polities 1500 BC- AD 400 (Colima, Nayarit, Jalisco)
    Cholula, Cantona, and Teuchtitlan

    Cultures
    Mixtec
    Zapotec
    Maya
    Puuc culture
    Early Classic “Hiatus”
    Toltec
    Chichimec
    Mexica-Tenochca
    Acolhua
    Tepaneca
    Chalca
    Aztlan
    Late Horizon
    Aztec
    State of Texcoco
    State of Tlacopan
    Tarascans
    Tlaxcallan confederation
    Quiché and Cakchiquel Maya kingdoms
    Itzá Maya of northern Guatemala

    Important Sites
    San Jose Mogote (Oaxaca)
    Chalcatzingo (Central Mexican Highlands)
    Tres Zapotes (Mexican Gulf Coast)
    La Venta (Mexican Gulf Coast)
    San Lorenzo (Mexican Gulf Coast)
    El Portón (Guatemala)
    Monte Albán (Oaxaca)
    Teotihuacán (Basin of Mexico)
    Kaminaljuyu (Guatemala)
    Tikal (Guatemala)
    Nakbé (Guatemala)
    El Mirador (Guatemala)
    Lamanai (Belize)
    Cerros (Belize)
    Cuello (Belize)
    Becán (Campeche)
    Dainzu (Oaxaca)
    Cuicuilco (Basin of Mexico)
    Teotihuacán (Teotihuacán Valley, Basin of Mexico)
    Tula (Basin of Mexico)
    Copán (Southern Lowlands)
    El Peru (Guatemala)
    Altun Ha (Belize)
    Acanceh (Yucatán)
    Chunchucmil (Yucatán)
    Matacapan (Tuxtla Mountains, Gulf Coast)
    Alta Vista (northwest Mexico)
    El Tajin (Gulf Coast)
    Cantona (Central Mexican Highlands)
    Cholula (Central Mexican Highlands)
    Cacaxtla (Central Mexican Highlands)
    Xochitecatl (Central Mexican Highlands)
    Xochicalco (Central Mexican Highlands)
    La Quemada (northern Mexico)
    Calakmul (Southern Lowlands)
    Piedras Negras (Southern Lowlands)
    Caracol (Southern Lowlands)
    Palenque (Southern Lowlands)
    Quirigua (Southern Lowlands)
    Yaxchilan (Southern Lowlands)
    Bonampak (Southern Lowlands)
    Tula (fringe of the Basin of Mexico)
    Casas Grandes (northern Mexico)
    Sayil (northern Yucatán)
    Kabah (northern Yucatán)
    Labna (northern Yucatán)
    Uxmal (northern Yucatán)
    Chichén Itzá (northern Yucatán plain)
    Coba (northeastern Yucatán)
    Mayapan (northern Yucatán plain)
    Tenochtitlán (Basin of Mexico)
    State of Texcoco (Basin of Mexico)
    State of Tlacopan (Basin of Mexico)
    Tzintzuntzan (Patzcuaro Basin)
    Nojpeten (Guatamala)

    Artifacts, features, buildings, structures
    Olmec
    Red Palace
    El Manati
    colossal stone heads
    buried serpentine slab patterns, stelae
    pyrite mirrors, obsidian
    blue-green jade carvings
    huge rectangular thrones
    basalt column tombs

    Maya
    red-slipped Chicanel pottery
    the Hauberg Stele (AD 197)
    defensive walls at El Mirador
    earthworks at Becán
    El Chayal obsidian source
    urban central ceremonial/elite precinct
    “god bundles.”
    Puuc architectural mosaic sculptures of gods, humans, and geometric
    the House of the Governor and the Nunnery (Uxmal)
    Chichen Itza – cenote, the Castillo Pyramid, the Monjas Palace, Puuc and Toltec architectural affinities

    Zapotec
    Danzante warrior frieze
    “conquest slabs” in Building J
    skull racks

    Teotihuacán
    Street of the Dead
    Pyramids of the Sun and the Moon
    apartment compounds
    Great Compound
    Merchants Barrio
    Tetitla compound
    Pyramid of the Feathered Serpent
    Ciudadela
    Pachuca obsidian
    skull racks

    Central Mexican polities
    Teuchtitlan shaft tombs, monumental circular buildings
    Xochitecatl polychrome murals
    Xochicalco – Pyramid of the Plumed Serpent

    Toltec
    warrior figure pillars

    Ixtlilxochitl’s Toltec History (Obras Historicos)

    English translation from the Works of Ixtlilxochitl (1610).

    Read Ixtlilxochitl & Evidence for the Book of Mormon in Mesoamerican Codices for more detail and introductory information on Ixtlilxochitl and his writing’s relationship to the Book of Mormon. See “Notes” at the end for important notes on likely date corrections.

    The first published Spanish version of Ixtlilxochitl's Aztec History from 1848 Kingsborough's Antiquities of Mexico.  And a quick and dirty google translation of it here.
    The 2nd Spanish version of Ixtlilxochitl's 'Obras Historicas', compiled by Alfredo Chavero in 1891, book here. 
    Footnotes partly by John Pratt from his page here. Chapters section from first major published English translation (2000) book here.
    
    The section below begins on page 21 of the Chavero found here and 321 of Kingsborough here.
    A list of other codices which tell many of the same stories can be found here.

    First Account: Creation of the World.

    Buy the Book Here!

    1:1. A history of the events in New Spain [central Mexico] including many things regarding the knowledge and accomplishments of the Tultecas from the creation of the world to its destruction, and up to the arrival of the third inhabitants called Chichimecas, and on up to the arrival of the Spanish, taken from the original history of New Spain.

    1:2. The creation of the world and things pertaining thereto, including the origin of man. The omniscience of God and what He has revealed to the Tultecas.

    1:3. The Tultecas had a knowledge of the creation of the world by Tloque Nahuaque, including the planets, mountains, animals, etc. They also knew about how God created a man and a woman from whence all mankind descended and multiplied. They recorded many other events that are not included in this account, inasmuch as the same events are recorded by other nations in the world.

    1:4. The records indicate that the world was created in the year 1 FLINT, and the period of time from the creation to the flood is called Atonatiuh, which means the age of the sun of water because the world was destroyed by the flood. And it is recorded in the Tulteca history that this period or first world, as they called it, lasted for 1,716 years, after which time great lightning and storms from the heavens destroyed mankind, and everything in the earth was covered by water including the highest mountain called Caxtolmolictli, which is 15 cubits high.

    1:5. To this they recorded other events, such as how, after the flood, a few people who had escaped the destruction inside a Toptlipetlacalli, which interpreted means an enclosed ark, began again to multiply upon the earth.

    1:6. After the earth began again to be populated, they built a Zacualli very high and strong, which means the very high tower, to protect themselves against a second destruction of the world.

    1:7. As time elapsed, their language became confounded, such that they did not understand one another; and they were scattered to all parts of the world.

    1:8. The Tultecas [Olmecs], consisting of seven men and their wives, were able to understand one another, and they came to this land, having first crossed many lands and waters, living in caves and passing through great tribulations. Upon their arrival here, they discovered that it was a very good and fertile land.

    1:9. It has been reported that they wandered for 104 years in different parts of the land until they settled in Huehue Tlapallan, their homeland. This was in the year 1 FLINT and 520 years had elapsed since the flood, which represent five venus centuries.

    1:10. And 1,715 [1,716?, see v. 1:13] years after the flood, the people were destroyed by a very great hurricane that carried away trees, rocks, houses, and large buildings. Many men and women escaped the storm by hiding in caves and other places where the great hurricane could not reach them.

    1:11. After a short period of time, they left the caves to see how much damage had taken place in the land. They discovered that it was populated and covered with monkeys that had been driven by the winds, as they had been in darkness all this time without being able to see the sun or the moon.

    1:12. From this event, the saying came about that men had turned into monkeys. This period became known as the second period, or the second world, called Ehecatonatiuh, which means sun of wind. After the destruction, men began again to rebuild and to multiply upon the face of the land.

    1:13. In the year 8 RABBIT, which was 1,347 years after the second calamity and 4,779 years since the creation of the world [correct if second calamity was in 1 FLINT, 1,716 years after Flood], it is recorded in their history that the sun stood still one natural day without moving, and a myth evolved wherein a mosquito saw the sun suspended in the air in a pensive mood and said, “Lord of the world, why are you standing still and why are you in such deep thought? Why are you not doing the work you are supposed to do? Do you want to destroy the world as before?” And the mosquito said many other things to the sun, but the sun still did not move. The mosquito then stung the sun on the leg, and seeing that his leg had been stung, the sun began again to move along its course as before.

    65 Venus cycles is 104 years which is
    two 52 year calendar rounds.

    1:14. It had been 158 [156] years since the great hurricane and 4,994 [3,588?], he added years from the sun standing still rather than from the hurricane, the big clue being 1 FLINT] years since the creation of the world, when there occurred another destruction in this land. The people who lived in this corner of the land, which they now call New Spain, were giants called Quinametzin. The destruction consisted of a great earthquake that swallowed up and killed the people when the high volcanic mountains erupted. All of the people were destroyed and no one escaped; or if anyone did escape, it was those who were in the internal parts of the land. Many Tultecas, along with the Chichimecas, who were their neighbors, were killed. This was in the year 1 FLINT, and they called this time period Tlacchitonatiuh, which means sun of the earth.

    1:15. In the year 1 FLINT, which was 5,097 [3,692?] years since the creation of the world and 104 years after the total destruction of the giant Quinametzin, all of the land of this new age being at peace, a council was held of the leading scientific, astrological, and artistic scholars of the Tultecas in their capital city called Huehuetlapallan. Here they discussed many things, including the destruction and the calamities that had taken place, as well as the movements of the heavens since the creation of the world. They also discussed many other things; but because of the burning of the records, we do not know or understand any more than what is written here. Among other things, they added the leap year to the calendar to adjust it with the solar equinox; and they discussed many other interesting things as will be observed from their records and laws regarding the years, months, weeks, days, signs, and planets. These, along with other interesting things, were understood by them.

    1:16. It had been 166 years since they had adjusted their calendar with the equinox and 270 years since the giants had been destroyed when the sun and the moon eclipsed and the earth quaked and rocks were broken into pieces and many other signs that had been given came to pass, although man was not destroyed. This was in the year 1 TEMPLE [10 TEMPLE [1],] which, adjusted to our calendar, happened at the same time that Christ, our Lord, suffered. And they say that this destruction occurred in the first few days of the year.

    1:17. These, and many other things, from the creation of the world up to our time, were understood by the Tultecas. As I have heretofore stated, according to what appears in their histories and paintings, they only made an abridgment, primarily of their origins; I mean all of the things that are found in their paintings and histories are just an abridgment compared to the records that the first archbishop of Mexico ordered to be burned.

    1:18. It had been 305 [354] years since the time of the eclipsing of the sun and the moon, 438 [387] years since the time of the destruction of the large Quinametzin [he meant since the Incarnation, see verse 1:19], and 5,486 [4,211] years since the creation of the world, when Chalcatzin and Tlacamihtzin, chief leaders and descendants of the Tulteca royal lineage, following many years of quiet peace, commenced to desire the usurpation of the kingdom, desiring to overthrow the legitimate successor. This was the year 13 REED.

    1:19. They were exiled, and there began to be wars, and they cast them out of the City of Tlachicalzincan, in the region of Hueytlapallan, their homeland. And they were cast out with their families and allies, their men as well as their women, and a great number were exiled. They left in the year following 1 FLINT, banished from all that land, as you will see in that which follows [in Chapter 2:1]. And this transpired, according to our calculations, 439 years [or perhaps 388 AD? See note 8] after the birth of our Christ the Lord.

    1:20. The ancestors of the natives of this land that is now called New Spain, according to the common and general opinion of everyone, as well as that which appears demonstrated in their paintings, came from the Occidental areas.

    1:21. And all who are now called Tultecas, Aculhuas, and Mexicanas, as well as the other people in this land, boast and affirm that they are descendants of the Chichimecas. The reason, according to their history, is that their first king, whose name was Chichimecatl, was the one who brought them to this new land where they settled. And it was he, as can be deduced, that came from the Great Tartary [Persia, Caspian & Asia], and was part of those who came from the division of Babel. This account is described in great detail in their history, and it tells how he, their king, traveled with them crossing a large part of the world, arriving at this land, which they considered to be good, fertile, and abundant for human sustenance. As mentioned earlier, they populated the major part of the land, and more particularly that which falls along the northern part. And the Chichimecatl called the land by his own name.

    1:22. In each place where the Chichimecatl settled, whether it be a large city or a small village, it was their custom to name it according to the first king or leader who possessed the land. This same custom prevailed among the Tultecas. The general area was called the Land of Tollan, after the first king who was so named. Be that as it may, this custom was prevalent in naming other cities and villages throughout the land.

    1:23. Notwithstanding that some were called Tultecas, others Aculhuas, Tepanecas and Otomites, they all were proud to be of the lineage of the Chichimecas, because they all descended from them. However, it is true that there were divisions among the Chichimecas themselves. And some were more civilized than others, such as the Tultecas. And others were more barbaric, such as the Otomites, and others like them. Those who are pure Chichimecas, whose kings were direct descendants of the first king and founder Chichimecatl, were bloodthirsty men, warriors, and lovers of power, holding other nations in bondage.

    1:24. Although one nation was inclined to righteousness and another nation was full of mischief idleness, being exceedingly haughty and proud and being warmongers, or although one nation was virtuous and another full of iniquity, both, as recorded in their history, came from the same lineage, the Chichimecas. And all are descended from the same forefathers; and as it has been said, they came from the Occidental areas.

    1:25. In this land called New Spain, there were giants, as demonstrated by their bones that have been discovered in many areas. The ancient Tulteca record keepers called them Quinametzin. They became acquainted with them and had many wars and contentions with them, and in particular in all of the land that is now called New Spain. They were destroyed, and their civilization came to an end as a result of great calamities and punishments from heaven for some grave sins that they had committed.

    1:26. It is the opinion of some of these ancient historians that these giants descended from the same Chichimecas mentioned earlier, and they say that in these northern lands, where the ancient Chichimeca Empire was located that there are villages where there are still men living who are over thirty hands tall. And it is of no wonder, that even our own Spaniards have not yet entered into the interior of the lands, but have only traveled along the coastal areas such as the lands of the Chicoranos and the Duharezases, and they have found men in these parts who are eleven and twelve hands[3] in height, and have been told that there are others even taller.

    1:27. The greatest destruction that occurred among the Quinametzin was in the year and date that the natives call 1 Tochtli, signifying the date 1 RABBIT [2 RABBIT], 299 years after the birth of Jesus Christ, and with them ended the third age, which was called Ecatonatiuh, because of the great winds and earthquakes. And almost everyone was destroyed.

    1:28. The Tultecas were the second civilization in this land after the destruction of the giants, and they had a knowledge of the creation of the world and of how the world had been destroyed by the flood; and many other things are recorded in their history and paintings.

    1:29. … the word Tulteca means men of the arts and sciences, because those of this nation were great artisans, as you can see today in many parts, and especially in the ruins of buildings, such as Teotihuacan, Tula, and Cholula.

    1:30. The most serious authors and historians of the ancient pagans included Quetzalcoatl, who is considered to be the first. Some of the modern pagans include Nezahualcoyotzin, king of Texcuco, and the two infants of Mexico, Itzocatzin and Xiuhcozcatzin, sons of King Huitzilihuitzin. And there are many others I could mention if it were necessary.

    1:31. It is declared through their histories about the god Teotloquenahuaque, Tlachihualcipal Nemoanulhuicahua Tlaltipacque, which, according to the correct interpretation, means the universal god of all things, creator of them and in whose will lives all creatures, lord of the heaven and of the earth, etc. After having created all things, he created the first parents of men, from whence came forth all others; and the dwelling place and habitation that he gave them was the world.

    1:32. It is said that the world had four ages. The first, which was from the beginning, was called Atonatiuh, which means sun of water, signifying that the world was terminated by a flood. The second, called Tlachitonatiuh, means sun of earth, because the world came to an end by great earthquakes, in such a manner that almost all of mankind was destroyed. This age or time occurred during the time of the giants, who were called Quinametintzoculihicxime.

    1:33. The third age, Ecatonatiuh, means sun of air, because this period came to an end by winds that were so strong that they uprooted all of the buildings and trees and even broke the rocks in pieces; and the majority of mankind perished. And because those who escaped this calamity found a large number of monkeys that the wind must have brought from other parts, the survivors said man must have been changed into monkeys.

    1:34. Those who possessed this new world in this third age were the Ulmecas and Xicalancas; and according to what is found in their histories, they came in ships or boats from the east to the land of Potonchan, and from there they began to populate the land.

    1:35. On the banks of the Atoyac River, which is the one that passes between Puebla and Cholula, there were found some of the giants who had escaped the destruction and extermination of the second age. Taking advantage of their size and strength, they oppressed and enslaved their new neighbors.

    1:36. The principal leaders of the new settlers determined to liberate themselves, and the means they employed were to invite the old settlers to a very solemn feast. After the old settlers became full and intoxicated, they were killed and destroyed with their own weapons, with which feat the new settlers remained free and exempt from bondage, and this increased the domain and command of the Xicalancas and Ulmecas.

    1:37. The people were living in a time of great prosperity, when there arrived in this land a man whom they called Quetzalcoatl. Others called him Hueman because of his great virtues. He was considered just, saintly, and good, teaching them by deeds and words the road to virtue. He instructed them to refrain from vices and not to sin, and he gave them laws and sane doctrine. He told them to constrain their appetites and to be honest, and he instituted the law of the fast.

    1:38. And he was the first to be worshipped and to be placed in authority, and for that reason he is called Quiauhtzteotlchicahualizteotl and Tonaceaquahuitl, which means god of the rains and of health and tree of sustenance or of life.

    1:39. After he had preached the above mentioned to all of the other Ulmeca and Xicalanca cities, and especially in the City of Cholula, where he spent a great deal of time, and seeing the small amount of fruit that resulted from his doctrine, he returned to the same place from whence he had come, which was to the east, disappearing at Coatzacoalco.

    1:40. And at the time of his farewell from these people, he told them of times to come. He said that in the year that would be called 1 REED, he would return and then his doctrine would be accepted, and his children would be lords and heirs of the earth. He also told them that they and their descendants would pass through great calamities and persecutions. He prophesied of many other things that would surely come to pass.

    1:41. Quetzalcoatl, by literal interpretation, means serpent of the precious feathers, with an allegoric meaning of, man of exceeding great wisdom. And Huemac (Hueman), some say, was the name given to him because his hands were printed, or stamped, on a rock, like a very fine wax, as testimony that what he prophesied would come to pass. Others say that Hueman means, he with the great or powerful hand.

    1:42. A few days after he left, a great destruction and devastation took place, which is referred to as the third period of the world. At that time, the great building and tower of Cholula, which was so famous and marvelous, was destroyed. It was like a second tower of Babel that these people had built, with virtually the same idea in mind. It was destroyed by the wind.

    1:43. And later, those who escaped at the end of the third age, in place of the ruins, the people built a temple to Quetzalcoatl, whom they named the god of wind, because it was destroyed by the wind. They understood that this calamity was sent by his hand. And they called it 1 REED, which was the name of the year of his coming. According to the history referred to, and from the records, the foregoing took place a few years after the birth of Christ our Lord.

    1:44. After this age had passed, beginning at this time, entered the fourth age called Tletonatiuh, which means, sun of fire, because it is said that this fourth and last age will end by fire.

    1:45. Quetzalcoatl was a man of comely appearance and serious disposition. His countenance was white, and he wore a beard. His manner of dress consisted of a long, flowing robe.

    Second Account: History of the Toltecs

    2:1. In the year 1 FLINT [439. Or perhaps 388?] [2], as has been said [in 1:19], the Tultecs [Nahuatls] were banished from their country and nation. They left fleeing and as they could, while the followers of Tlaxicholiucan, their kindred, came following, harassing them, until they arrived at a point more than sixty leagues away from their lands, where they stayed, reorganizing themselves and cultivating the land and doing other things for their sustenance.

    2:2. This land they called Tlapallanconco and the discoverer of this land was called Cecatzin.

    2:3. … they were near their country eight years making war, until they were entirely driven out….

    2:4. And before going on, I want to make an account of Huematzin the astrologer [prophet]….

    2:5. Before dying, he gathered together all the histories the Tultecas had, from the creation of the world up to that time and had them pictured in a very large book, where were pictured all of their persecutions and hardships, prosperities and good happenings, kings and lords, laws and good government of their ancestors, old sayings and good examples, temples, idols, sacrifices, rites and ceremonies that they had, astrology, philosophy, architecture, and the other arts, good as well as bad, and a resume of all things of science, knowledge, prosperous and adverse battles, and many other things; and he entitled this book calling it Teoamoxtli, which, well interpreted, means Various Things of God and Divine Book.

    2:6. The natives now call the Holy Scriptures Teoamoxtli, because it is almost the same, principally in the persecutions and hardships of men.

    2:7. Likewise he declared that when five hundred and twelve years [495 years, 498 by Ixtlilxochitl’s own reckoning][4] had passed since they left their country, a lord (chief, master, ruler) was to inherit the kingdom [Topiltzin inherited throne in AD 883, Moctezuma II in AD 1502], with the good will of some and against the will of others.

    2:8. Further, that he was to have certain marks on his body, and the main one, he was to have curly hair, and of the hair itself nature was to form a tiara on his head, from birth until he died.

    2:9. And during his life time he was to be, at first, very just, wise, and of a good government. In mid-life he was to be foolish and unfortunate, for which reason those of his nation were to perish with very great punishments from heaven, and no less than three destructions would they have, and that last would be in the year 1 FLINT.

    2:10. Some men of his own lineage would rise and persecute him with very great wars, until nearly all of them were exterminated. And he was to escape and return toward where his ancestors had come from. And the latter part of his life, he was to be very just, wise, and discreet, as at the beginning.

    Horned rabbit caused by Shope papillona virus.

    2:11. And a few years before their destruction there were to be certain unnatural signs among them, that the rabbit was to grow horns like the deer, the bird Huetzitzilin was to grow spurs like cocks, and rocks were to give forth fruit, and principal women were to go on pilgrimages as is the use and custom. They were to have carnal access to the priests of the temples, the priests breaking the chastity that they professed there in their false religions.

    2:12. And he said Tloquenahuaque, seeing this, would be angry against them, and the other gods (his inferiors) would punish them with lightnings, hails, ice, hunger, vermin, and other persecutions from heaven; and after this with wars with which they would exterminate each other completely.

    2:13. Further, that so many years from that time, those who escaped this destruction would have another, and even some of the Chichimecas too, because that star Tecpatl (which is a flint) would again do its part.

    2:14. These and other things he declared he understood through his astrology and the signs that planets had in store for them. And also these things came to pass, with God’s will, just as he said.

    2:15. And almost in the last of these years two principal leaders and five minor ones got together to discuss whether they would stay in this land or whether they would go farther.

    2:16. There arose among the Tultecs a great astrologer [prophet] who called himself Huematzin, saying to them that he found that since the creation of the world they had always had great persecutions from heaven, and after persecutions their ancestors had enjoyed great well being, prosperity, and long power, and their persecutions always occurred in the year 1 FLINT … and this year 1 FLINT once past, they would enjoy great well being, that it was a great evil, prelude to a greater good.

    2:17. And Huematzin went on tell them that thus it was not convenient for them to stay so near their enemies. Besides, he found in his astrology that the land toward the rising of the sun was was extensive and prosperous, where the Quinametzin had lived for many years, and it had been many years since they had been destroyed, and it was unsettled.

    2:18. Besides, the fierce Chichimecas, their neighbors, very few times went that far and the planet [omen bearing comet] that governed that land lacked many years before fulfilling its threats, that in the meantime they could enjoy a golden and happy century[5], they and all of their descendants to the tenth degree, succeeding from children to parents.

    2:19. Besides, that planet did not govern over their nations, but rather over the Giants–and it might be that it would not hurt their descendants very much–and that in this place, they should some people to settle it and remain as their vassals, and as time went on they would return against their enemies and recover their country and nation.

    2:20. These and many other things Huematzin declared and these two leaders and the other minor ones thought it good and agreed on it, carrying it all out.

    2:21. And Huematzin told them that if they were different from the others, that is, from the Giants who had done wickedly, and were good, they should remain a few days supplying themselves with everything for what was ahead.

    2:22. At the time that they left this land, it had been eleven years since they had left their country because they were near their country eight years making war, until they were entirely driven out, and three years in the land they called Tlapallanconco. As has been said, they left some of the common people, their women and children, so that they might settle it.

    2:23. … they left Tlapallanconco and traveled another sixty leagues. And it is to be noted that history says that they traveled 12 days to each journey of a new land that they discovered, from which it can be deduced that they traveled six leagues a day, on account of having so many people, women, and children, all loaded. And besides, once started on a day’s journey they did not stop until night made them stop to sleep and rest; and each day they made six leagues, rather more or less. And 12 days having past, according to the way I figure, they must have traveled about 70 leagues.

    2:24. They arrived at a good and fertile land which was called Hueyxallan, where they stayed four years. There they likewise sowed and did what had been done before where they had been previously, preparing for what was ahead. The discoverer was Ohuatzon, one of the five minor leaders or captains. And on the third year, which year was called 1 TEMPLE, they counted a tlalpilli, which was a period of thirteen years, since they had left their country and they stayed another year.

    2:25. And then, at that point, they left there and traveled toward the rising sun, and more than a hundred leagues having been traveled, because they had traveled more than 20 days uninterruptedly, they arrived at Xalixco, a land which was near the sea, and here they stayed 8 years, the discoverer being Xinhcohuatl, also one of the five minor captains. And they did what they had done at the other places.

    2:26. … they left Xalixco with all of their people in pursuit of their enterprise, traveling another 20 days, which must have been some 100 leagues, in different parts, as they had done in the other parts. They arrived at some islands and seashore that was called Chimalhuacan Atenco, where they stayed 5 years.

    2:27. And this was the first place where man began to have access with their wives, and here the women began to give birth to children. They had made a vow at the time they left their country that for 23 years they were not to know their wives and those who broke this vow were to be cruelly punished. And thus the women began to give birth in these islands and seashore.

    2:28. On the fourth year, which was 1 RABBIT, there having been two tlalpilli of years, it was 27 years since they had left their country, which in our count was the year 466 [414] from the birth of Christ our Lord.

    2:29. And the five years having passed, they began the journey, always travelling toward the rising of the sun, going up to Tochpan, where they stopped. And on this road they travelled 18 days, which must have been about eighty leagues, and having arrived at this land, they stayed another five years, doing what they had done in the other parts, and they multiplied in number. The discoverer was Mexotzin, the last of the said five captains.

    2:30. They took the road again through the same way of the orient. And they traveled 20 days, covering what must have been another hundred leagues, through different parts, and on the last day of them, they arrived in Quiyahuixtlan Anahuac, which were lands of the coast and arms of the sea, passing on canoes and boats from one part to another. And the time they stayed there was six years. Always they suffered great hardships. The discoverer of them was Acapichtzin, one of the principal leaders.

    2:31. And then they took their road and traveled 18 days journey, which must have been some 80 leagues, in different parts, until they arrived at Zacatlan. The discoverer was Chacatzin, likewise one of the principal leaders. And the first year they arrived here was the year 1 REED, at which time they counted a Xiuhtlalpilli since they had begun their wars against their kindred nation.

    2:32. And there was born at this time a son of his and because it was such a significant year they named the son after the land and he was called Zacapantzin. At that time it was fifty-two years since they had begun to have wars one with another. And they stayed here 7 years.

    2:33. They traveled another eighteen days, which must have been some eighty leagues, when they arrived at Tutzapan, and they stayed there six years. And on the last of the six years, which was the year 1 FLINT, a son of his was born, and because it was such a noted year, and because a Xiuhtlalpilli had gone by, which are fifty-two years, since the left their country, calling the son Totzapantzin.

    2:34. And then, the six years having passed, they began to travel, and they traveled twenty-eight days through different parts, at Tepetlal, which must have been some hundred and forty leagues. They stayed here seven years, the discoverer being Cohuatzon, which was the second time.

    2:35. And the seven years having passed, they began their road, and they travelled eighteen days, which must have been some eighty leagues, until arriving at Mazatepec, the discoverer being Xiuhcohuatl. And here they stayed eight years and the sixth, which was 1 TEMPLE, they counted sixty-six [65] years since they had left their country.

    2:36. And eight years having passed, they began to travel, and they traveled another eighteen days, which must have been another eighty leagues, until they arrived at Xiuhcohuac, where they stayed another eight years, the discoverer being Tlapalmetzin, which was the second time.

    2:37. And then they began to travel, and they traveled twenty days, which must have been some hundred leagues, until arriving at Iztachuexuca, which is toward the north where they stayed twenty-six years, the discoverer being Metzotzin. And the third year, which was 1 RABBIT, that they were in the land seventy-eight years since they had left their country, thirteen years hence, which was 1 REED, they counted ninety-one since they left their country.

    2:38. The twenty-six years having passed, they returned to Tulantzinco and they traveled eighteen days through different parts, which must have been some eighty leagues until arriving at the said place of Tulantzinco, where they made a very large house of lumber in which there was room for all of the people; and they stayed there almost sixteen years, and on the third year they counted a venus century, which is one hundred and four years, which are two Xiuhtlalpilli, since they had left their country, being the year 1 FLINT, which according to our count was the year of 543 [492] of the Incarnation, the discoverer being Acamapichtzin.

    2:39. This was the third time he discovered new land. And further on we shall give an account of their lives and permanence in this land. In all parts where they arrived they left people so that they may settle these lands, as I have said at the beginning.

    The following few verses are found in another place in the Kingsborough version (p. 213), but Chavoro places it here since it deals with this timeframe]

    2:40. Banished from their homeland, the Tultecas undertook their journey along the coast. Traveling through the country, they arrived at California by the sea, which they called Hueytlapallan, which today is called Cortez, which name was given because of its reddish [colorado] color. The date of their arrival was in the year CE Tecpatl, which corresponds to 387 AD.

    2:41. Following along the coast of Xalixco (Jalisco) and all along the south, leaving from the port of Huatulco 30 and traveling through diverse lands, they arrived at the province of Tochtepec, which is located along the sea north. And after walking and exploring, they settled in the Tolantzinco [new Tolan?], leaving colonies in the places where they made Great Houses (hecieron mansion).

    2:42. The Tultecas were the third settlers of this land, counting the giants [tall ones] as the first, with the second being the Ulmecas (olmecs) and Xicalancas. While in Tolantzinco [new or ‘little’ Tula] they counted one hundred and four years of having left their homeland. The names of the seven leaders/chieftains who led them, and among whom the government took turns, were ‘: 1- Tlacomíhua that others call Ácatl: 2- Chalchiuhmatzin: 3- Ahuecatl: 4- Cóatzon: 5- Tiuhcoatl: 6- Tlapalhuitz: 7- Huitz: whom later populated the city of Tollan, head of the monarchy. Seven years after it was founded, they elected king and supreme lord, the first being Chalchiuhmatzin Chalchiuhtlatanac which was in the year Chicome Acatl and in our dates, 510 AD.

    Third Account: Kings of the Toltec Empire

    3:1. In the year of 1 TEMPLE (which is the figure of a house, sign of a planet which properity and properous and abudant power, lucky in all things), the Tultecas, or rather Heutlapalanecas, arrived in Tula, a city which was the seat of their kingdoms and power for many years, and according to our count it was the year 556 [505?] of the Incarnation….

    3:2. And having arrived at this place and land [Tolantzinco], the Tultecas thought it very good, and especially Huematzin, the astrologer [prophet] who led them, who was already more than 180 years old. And seeing the location so good for their purpose and the temperateness of the land, and the other things which he found in his astrology to be good for a city, they began to build it. And for six years they were building houses, temples, and other things they used and were accustomed to.

    3:3. And they agreed to swear one of the principal men as king and lord of all of them; and seeing that when they were in Xiuhcohuac and Huexutla (which is a place of Panuco and Tampico) the Chichimecas, their competitors, were very near, and that the Chichimecas had bothered them at these two places, and seeing that they had them so near and fearting their would someday rise against them and take away their lands, towns and places, they agreed to go see the lord who at the time was ruled of the Chichimecas, and ask them to give a son or very near relative, so that they would swear him as their king and lord. And with this they were also to ask him upon his word that neither he nor his descendants at any time would bother them.

    3:4. This agreement and opinion was considered good, for the old astrologer Heumac prophesied it. Besides, he had found in his astrology that in times to come this land was to be settled by the Chichimecas.

    3:5. And thus, with this determination, some of the principal men, with presents of gold and other things, went to see the lord of the Chichimecas, who, seeing what the Tultecas asked of him, was very pleased and considered it all as good. He gave his word that neither he nor his descendants would bother them; and he gave a young son he had, whom they brought with great rejoicing all the way to Tula.

    3:6. And it was already the year 7 REED and ours of five hundred sixty two [511]; and the same year they swore him as their king and married him to a lady, daughter of the principal Tultecas, who was Acapitzin. And they called him Chalchiuhtlanetzin, which means “precious stone that illumines”, meaning to say that with their new lord they were illuminated (enlightened) and were rested and were free from worry and persecutions.

    3:7. And they ordered that their kings were not to reign more than fifty-two years, and that when these years passed, if he were still alive, his son, the legimate successor, was to take charge of the government; and that if he died before the fifty-two years, the republic was to govern until finishing out the term.

    3:8. And thus, this Chalchiuhtlanetzin governed for fifty-two years, and almost on the last of them (the years) he died, and he was buried in the principal temple with his royal insignias, different from the way it was later done, which was to burn the bodies, as shall be related in its place.

    3:9. After his death, his legitimate successor, Ixtlilcuechahuac, known also as Izacatecatl, succeeded him in the same year, and according to our count it was in the year six hundred and fourteen [563]…. And he ruled another fifty-two years like his father. At thirty-two years of his government, which was in 1 FLINT, the Tultecas counted two hundred and sixty years since they had left their country [actually this occurred in the 32nd year of the next king].

    3:10. After the death of this lord, his son, legitimate successor, called Huetzin, succeeded him in the same year that his father died, which was 6 RABBIT, and ours of six hundred sixty six [614] of the Incarnation.

    3:11. Turning to our history, King Huetzin, who was the successor, as we have already said, governed the fifty-two years, and on the last of them (years) he died, which was the year of 6 RABBIT, and in our count seven hundred and seventy-eight [666].

    3:12. He (Heuztin) was succeeded by his legitimate son called Totepeuh, who governed his kingdom and possessions in quiet peace and his last parents as his last parents and ancestors had done, for fifty-two years. And on the last he died, being succeeded by his son Nacaxoc in the year 5 TEMPLE, which in our count was seven hundred and seventy [717] of the Incarnation. And this Nacaxoc governed another fifty-two years with the same order as his ancestors.

    3:13. The fifty-two years having passed, King Nacaxoc died and was succeeded by his son Mitl which was in the year 5 TEMPLE, and this time adjusted to ours, it was in the year eight hundred and twenty-two [769]….

    3:14. This Mitl reigned for fifty-nine years and broke the ancient order of the Tultecas of reigning fifty-two years. He was a man of great government, built great temples, and other memorable things, and he built among the temples he made one of the Frog, goddess of water, a very beautiful temple. All its ornaments were of gold and precious stones and the frog was of emerald. The Spaniards who came to this land got to see it, and they gave a good account of it.

    3:15. Almost at the end of the fifty-nine years, this lord died, which was the year of 11 REED, and in ours of eight hundred and eighty [828]….

    3:16. And after his death his wife Queen Xiutlaltzin succeeded in the kingdom. She reigned four years and died. Her son, legitimate successor, called Tecpancaltzin, inherited the kingdom.

    3:17. And before going on, I want to make an account of the state in which the Tulteca nations were. At this time, almost for 1,000 leagues they had settled and built towns and cities, villages and places. Among the most famous was Teotihuacan, which means “City and Place of God”. This city was greater and more powerful than Tula, because it was the sanctuary of the Tultecas: it had very large and tall temples, the most immense building in the world, which even today appear in their ruins, and other great curiousities.

    3:18. In Toluca they made some palaces all of stone carved in figures where were all of their calamities, wars and persecutions, triumphs, good happenings, and prosperities. In Cuahnahuac, another city with a famous ancient work, was a palace all built (carved) of large stones, of hewn stones without mud, nor mortar, nor beams, nor any lumber, but only some large stones placed one against the other, and they also founded other great cities like Cholula, and Xalixco, Yototepec of the South Sea [Pacific], and many other cities that were to the South and toward the Orient, which are now all destroyed, although in their ruins they show that they were the greatest cities in the world.

    3:19. The Idols that the Tultecas had of old were the most principal, which were Tonacatecuhtli, and today his personage is in the highest Cu (temple of this people), which is dedicated to the Sun. The name means God of Sustenance. His wife they regarded as a goddess. They say that this god of the sustenance was a figure of the sun and his wife of the moon.

    3:20. And they had other gods which they called the brothers and sisters of the sun and moon, of which there are still pieces in the Cus (temples).

    3:21. And they had another idol which they have worshipped up until the time the Spaniards came. It was Tlaloc. Tlaloc temple was in the highest sierra of Texcuco, and pieces of it are still there. And they say that this idol was a god of stormy rains, and that he was very brave king of the Quinametzin (who are the Philistines) [giants]. He did great things and for that reason they set him up as a god.

    Table 2. Toltec king reigns.
    (Years listed match the Aztec years shown.)

    3:22. These false gods were the oldest ones and the main ones of more than two thousand years of the Tultec history. In addition, Texcatiputla and Huitzilopuchtli who were over certain very brave gentlemen. It is even found that Texcatiputla was a great necromancer (conjurer, magician) and was a great cause of the persecution of the Tultecas.

    3:23. Although it is true that this people were very great idolaters, they did not sacrifice men nor did they do the superstitious sacrifices that the later Mexicans [Aztecs] were accustomed to use, except to Tlaloc. They sacrificed to him five or six maidens of tender age, taking out their hearts and offering them to him, and their bodies they burned, and to Tonacateuchtli, at certain times of the year they took the greatest evil-doers who had committed great crimes, to a certain artifice (device) which they called Telimonanaiquian, which means “meeting place of the stones”, and there they placed him in the middle, so that two stones met at the corners and tore him to pieces there with the artifice of these stones. Then they would bury him.

    3:24. In the feasts they had, all the chiefs would get together. They had a dance that would last nearly all day, and they went through certain ceremonies, which, as I have already related, were not as abominable as those of the Mexicans when the Marquis del Valle [Cortez] came, and the entrance of Evangelical Law (gospel rule) into the land …

    Fourth Account: Birth of Topiltzin, Last Toltec King

    (Fifth Relation, of the Toltec kings and their destruction. Kingsborough p. )

    4:1. Tecpancaltzin having inherited the lordship of the Tultecas, after he had governed ten years there came to his palace a maiden, very beautiful, who had come with her parents to bring a certain present for him. And they even say that is found in history that black honey of maguey and some chiancacas, sugar of this honey. They were the first inventors of this delicacy; and as it was a new thing, they brought it as a gift to the king.

    4:2. These gentlemen, being of noble blood and of his own lineage, the king was very pleased to see them and granted them many favors. He thought a great deal of this present, and on account of her beauty, he grew very fond of this maiden, who was called Xochitl, which means Rose Flower.

    4:3. He ordered them to favor him with this present and he ordered that their daughter bring it alone with some woman servant. And the parents, not thinking of what might happen, were very pleased, and gave him their word that they would do so.

    4:4. And after a few days the woman came to the palace with a woman servant loaded with honey, chiancaca, and other small gifts newly invented, or rather, maguey preserves. As soon as she arrived, they notified the king that the maiden, daughter of the gentlemen who invented the maguey honey, called Papantzin, was there. The king was very pleased and order her to be brought alone with the gift she brought.

    4:5. And the servant, who was an old nurse of hers, was ordered to sit in the room and the king ordered that they give her many mantles and gold, and go entertain her until it was time for her to return with her mistress. And the servants did so, bringing in the maiden alone, and rendering all kinds of service and entertainment to the servant woman, according as the king commanded it.

    4:6. The king, having seen the gift of the maiden Xuchitl and her parents, was very pleased, and he told her how he had been fond of her for days, begging her to accede to his wishes, that he would give her his word to do many favors to her parents and to her.

    4:7. Consequently they were quite a while in the rendezvous until the maiden, seeing that there was no way out of it, had to do what the king ordered her to do. His low desires having been satisfied, he had her taken to a small place outside the city, placing many guards there. And he sent word to her parents that he had given her to certain ladies to be instructed, because he wanted her to marry a king, neighbor of his, as a reward for the present she had brought him.

    Events in 1 FLINT.

    4:8. He told her parents not to be sad, and to consider her as if she were at their home; and with this he granted them many favors and gave them certain towns and vassals so that they would be lords over the inhabitants and their descendants. Her parents, although they were sorry about it, pretended not to be, for, as it is said, where there is strength, right is lost.

    4:9. And the king went often to see the lady Xuchitl, his mistress, who was in a very strong, small place, on a hill call Palpan. She was waited on and feasted to be sure, as something belonging to the king, the Tulteca monarch.

    4:10. In a very short time she became pregnant and gave birth to a son whom his father named Meconetzin, which means child of the maguey, in memory of the invention and virtues of the maguey. The child was born in the year of 1 REED, which according to our count was that of nine hundred [843]…. This child had nearly all of the signs that the astronomer Hueman said the Tulteca king was to have, in whose time and government the Tultecas were to be destroyed.

    4:11. The parents of the maiden Xuchitl, for they considered her a maiden, seeing that it was almost three years since they had seen their daughter, were very, very sorry, and they always tried to find out where she might be. Since the city of Tula was so large and there were so many houses of lords (gentlemen), this time period of three years passed without success on their part.

    4:12. Almost at the end of the third year they found out that the king had her at a certain place with many guards, at a place called Palpan, as I have already stated, and that no person could see her. The king had ordered particularly that no relative be allowed to enter the place.

    4:13. And this gentleman (the father) seeing the command of the king, was very worried and sad, and looked for a way to be able to enter without be recognized. Not finding any way, he disguised himself, dressing himself as a farmer, pretending (feigning) that he had gone to the city to sell certain things.

    4:14. Since it seemed to the guards that he was a simpleton, they let him enter, he having pretended he wanted to see that place. He told the guards certain things so that they would let him enter, and thus they gave him permission and he entered looking in all directions.

    4:15. And entering through some gardens he found his daughter, who held the child in her arms. As he recognized her, he was overjoyed with tenderness on seeing his daughter, and asked her whether the king had put her in that place to play with children, not knowing that it was his grandson. The daughter, although with shame, then related to her father all that had happened with the king and he was very sad. However, he let it be (tolerated it) because it was something that touched his honor.

    4:16. Then taking leave of his daughter, he started back. The next day he went to see the king, complaining of the affront he had done to him. The king consoled him and told him not to be sad, that since it was a thing of the king that he didn’t suffer any affront, and besides, the child would be his heir, for he did not want to marry any lady.

    4:17. And many other things were said to Xuchitl’s father by the king as he granted favors to him and to his relatives. And the king ordered that whenever he and his wife wanted to see Xuchitl, they could do so, provided that she did not go out of that place.

    4:18. The king trusted his guards because they were persons of his devotion. And the king did all these things because they lived at that time with such uprightness that the Tultecas his vassals considered any small chance or fault on the part of the king as a great evil.

    4:19. And with this, the good old Papantzin returned to his house somewhat consoled, consoling his wife and relatives. And from then on they often went to see the shut up daughter as often as they wanted to.

    4:20. King Tecpancaltzin having governed fifty-two years and, as he was still alive, he decided to have Meconetzin, his natural (illegitimate) son sworn king. His son, known also by the name of Topiltzin, was already a man over forty years old, and very virtuous and a great wise man.

    4:21. And in order that the Tultecas would not invent any novelty (there were three lords of his lineage very near heirs, who were worthy on account of their great honor and virtue and who were in his kingdom residing far away from the city of Tula more than two hundred leagues near the South Sea in Xalixco and other places), he called together some friends and relatives of his, particularly those who were devoted to him.

    4:22. Among those called together were two very important leaders who controlled very large lands and many cities and provinces, the one being Cuauhtli and the other Maxtlatzin. Many other gentleman (nobles) attended. He told them what he had planned, saying that if they agreed to this, they would be in the city of Tula and they and their children would govern all the kingdoms and possessions, becoming principal heads over all kings and vassals, all three important leaders governing in close accord, although his son was to have the highest (supreme) place, as his heir to be king of kings as he was.

    4:23. This agreement seemed good to these two kings, and they agreed to it, swearing that this Topiltzin as their king and monarch, with the rites and ceremonies they were accustomed to use. This swearing was in the year 2 REED and ours of 937 [883]….

    Fifth Relation, of the Toltec kings and their destruction

    (Kingsborough p. 329)

    5:1. Topiltzin had been ruling [nearly] forty years when the signs which the astrologer [prophet] Hueman had pronosticated began to appear on earth as well as in the sky. Topiltzin, almost at the last of these forty years had committed very grave sins, and with his bad example, so had all of the people of Tula and the rest of the provinces and cities and lands of the Tultecas.

    5:2. And the ladies would go on pilgrimages to the temples, sanctuaries and false gods, and would get mixed with the priests. And the Tultecs committed other grave and abominable sins.

    5:3. For example, a very important lady from Tula went to Cholula to visit the temples of that city, which were founded seventy-eight years before, and especially a temple dedicated to the god 1 Reed. At the temple were two priests, one called Ezcolotli and the other Texpolcatl. As I have already said, the false priests of the Tultecas professed chastity, and it was a very great sin if they broke it. And thus, Texpolcatl, seeing this lady, who had already professed chastity, made love to her and had obtained her friendship.

    5:4. And a few years later she gave birth to a child who was called Izcax. Later he and his descendants continued to inherit the office and dignity of these great false priests and pontiffs. She stayed as matron in the temple nearly all of her life until its destruction.

    5:5. The inventors of these sins were two brothers, gentlemen of different parts, very brave and great necromancers. The elder brother was called Tezcatlipuca, and the younger Tlallauhquitezcatlipuca. Later the Tultecas set them up as gods.

    5:6. The king, all his court and his vassals, persisted in great sin, doing things in this evil art they knew, with which they persuaded them easily to commit great sins and do ugly and abominable deeds.

    5:7. The king, going one day to certain gardens and forests of his, found a rabbit that was there with deer horns, and he found the bird Huitzitzilin, sucking the nectar of the flowers, with a very long spur. And inasmuch as the king had seen many times in the Teoamoxtli that Hueman had painted that these were some of the marvels and signs he had pronosticated, he was very sorry.

    5:8. He had the priests of the temples called; and when they were come he showed them what he had seen, now dead, for they shot them with a cervataua, and he also showed them the Teoamoxtli, and how these were signs of their total destruction. And so that their god could be appeased, it was necessary to make great feasts and sacrifices, rites and ceremonies to them.

    5:9. But then in the following year, which was 1 TEMPLE and ours of 984 [921], at the time when wheat and fish rained, God our Lord began to punish these blind, perverse, and idolatrous people, sending them very great heavy showers, hurricanes, and toads from heaven that destroyed the greater part of their buildings. It rained almost a hundred days without stopping, for which reason they understood that the world seemed as if it were to end with another deluge. But the Lord through his mercy appeased the waters.

    5:10. And the following year which was 2 RABBIT, a great heat and drought came, so that all the plants and trees dried up. And on the third year which was 3 REED, when they were beginning to be delivered from persecutions, some frosts fell that burned the whole earth and anything remaining. And on the fourth year which was 4 FLINT, such large hail and lightnings fell from heaven, and in such abundance, that they totally destroyed all the trees that escaped the previous calamities, and even the Magueyes were destroyed, without their remaining memory of anything. Even the buildings and strong walls were destroyed.

    5:11. And this time of calamities having passed, the earth was quiet for nearly twelve years and the plants began to produce which was in 4 TEMPLE [937]. Then came many locusts, worms, vermin, and fowls that destroyed everything. Also there were very great wars with the three near heirs, all on account of the beautiful Xuchitl. Her son had inherited the kingdom and he governed the whole land. Although the Tultecas had had great persecutions from heaven, their forces and power were still great.

    5:12. Likewise in this same year, almost at the last of it, the weevil ate up all of the grain in the granaries where the Tultecas kept it. Another four years passed with some rest, when on the fifth, which was in the year of 7 RABBIT [9 RABBIT, 942], during the first days they found a child on a hill.

    5:13. It was very white and blond and beautiful. It must have been the devil. They took him to the city to show him to the king. When he saw him, he ordered him taken again to the point from whence they had brought him, because it didn’t seem to him to be a good omen; and the head of this child-devil began to rot on him, and from the bad odor many people would die.

    5:14. The Tultecas tried to kill him, but they never could get to him, because all who approached would die right away. This bad odor cause a great pestilence throughout the land, so that of every thousand Tultecas, nine hundred died. All these things happened to them, and many other things, but in order to save space they are not set down here.

    5:15. And the three lords, their competitors, did not cease damaging the few Tultecs who had escaped, taking little by little many provinces and cities subject to this great Topiltzin. And from that time forth there was a law that wherever a child was born that was very white and blond, when it was five years of age it was right away sacrificed. This law lasted until the coming of the Spaniards.

    5:16. After a few days the pestilence relented, and Topiltzin, seeing that his competitors were little by little taking possession of his lands and provinces, decided to send them a great present of gold, mantles and precious stones, and jewels, by way of two ambasssabors, very brave gentlemen, and a game of ball equipment (for the game being sufficient to fill a medium-sized room) which game is called Tlachtli. Included among the gifts were four kinds of precious stones, that is to say, emerald, ruby, diamond, and jacinth; and also a ball, a carbuncle.

    5:17. Topiltzin sent them word that enough of their wrath had been experienced, that they knew well the hardship he had had, and the persecutions from heaven, and that he was aware of his own ruination and their valor. And he asked that they accept the game of ball, which was the greatest treasure he had, and other precious stones, and other pieces of gold and jewels, and that just as the Tlachtli had four kinds of precious stones, all four very esteemed and equal, thus, neither more nor less, all four of them would govern their kingdoms and possessions, in very great peace and conformity.

    5:18. And Topiltzin further stated to them that as between the four rulers, that whoever first ordered anything done that the other three would consider it as very well done, and they would live always in conformity and with each other, they and their descendants.

    5:19. These and many other words the great Topiltzin sent to be told to his three competitors, fearing that they at some time might become lords of all. And Topiltzin told his three competitiors that if they did not want his friendship, they ought to desist from invading Tultec lands and cities–which is what worried the Tultecs–because the land was already so demolished that it no longer served any purpose and was very sickly.

    5:20. It is found in history, besides in the account old men give, that this present and treasure was the greatest that was ever seen in the land. This Tultec treasure was so large and it weighed so much that onxi quipili tlacatl of the Tultecas were counted, which are eighteen thousand men and that it took them one hundred and forty days to move the treasure to Xalixco [Jalisco/West Mexico] in Quiyahuitztlanxalmolan.

    5:21. When Topiltzin’s ambassadors arrived, they were well received and the treasure pleased the donees, but even then did the three enemies desist from pursuing their endeavor, although for the moment with feigned words did they bade the ambassadors farewell, saying to them that they would not discuss anything at all. However, they told Topiltzin’s ambassadors that they would stop doing them harm by destroying Topiltzin’s armies, and they said other words, neither very good nor very bad, but all cautious.

    5:22. For this reasons the ambassadors returned very sorrowful, and gave their answers to the great Topiltzin. Although not very pleased, Topiltzin consoled himself because the greater part of the treasure had been taken to the enemy, which was made them quarrel the most. The enemy already had kingdoms and possessions; and they were very prosperous and free from calamities from heaven.

    5:23. In the year of 1 REED and in ours of nine hundred and ninety-eight [947],… the three competitor kings of the great Topiltzin came into the city of Tula with a great army. They made fun of all the Tultecas as a shattered people and they entered into the very city.

    5:24. Topiltzin, on learning of their entry, received them and ordered that they and their people be given whatever they needed. And he discussed with them peace and conformity again, just as he had done before by his ambassadors. They did not come for that purpose, but rather to avenge themselves, and so they refused to agree to it. They told him to get his people ready, that they would understand each other with arms.

    5:25. Topiltzin, seeing himself so oppressed and that there was no way out, asked for time, for it was a law that before a battle they would notify each other some years in advance so that on both sides they would be warned and prepared. The idea was that their descendants, at some future time, could with just reason do the same. This custom was adhered to up to the time the Spaniards came to this land. They answered Topiltzin, telling him that they would give him ten years, and on the last of the ten years they would engage in battle at Tultitlan [Jalisco?].

    5:26. And with the plan and agreement they returned to their lands, because their army was suffering very great hunger, for this land was such that even its inhabitants could hardly support themselves. And it is found in the histories that this journey that these three lords made with their army and so useless a journey, was made only for the purpose of seeing the Tultec land and the state of things in it, and to countermine and see the forces and resistance that Topiltzin might have. The pretext was that the soldiers were looking for food for their maintennce. They did not leave the city until they had seen it well.

    Chapter 6: Fall of the Toltec Empire

    (Quinta Relation, de los reyes Toltecas y de su destruction. Kingsborough p.331-332)

    6:1. During the last days of the year 10 FLINT, these three chieftains returned with a greater army than at first, which was according our count the year 1008 [956]…. Already by this time the great Topiltzin had two armies stationed, one a hundred leagues [260 miles] from Tula, towards the lands and provinces of Tlahuicas [Morelos/Cuernavaca area], and the other in Tultitlan [Jalisco?], where he in person remained with his army and all his vassals. The general in command of the first army was a great captain called Huihuitenuxcatl.

    6:2. Ever since their competitors had left, the Tultecs had done nothing but prepare themselves, make many arms, and gather from all the cities, provinces, and places, the people that there were, without omitting any men at all. And even women were loaded with food, for the people were few, although from the many few there came to be two very great armies, as I have clearly stated.

    6:3. The scouts notified the first army that the enemy was near. The general went out to meet the army at a good place he had selected, and the two armies faced each other.

    6:4. They engaged in battle, innumerable people dying on both sides. The war lasted three complete years. Those of Topiltzin had few reinforcements, while the three chieftains, their competitors, every day received great numbers of people. The Tultecs were vanquished and nearly all the people were killed in the battle. Many Tultec matrons fought very bravely, helping their husbands. Many of them died.

    6:5. Having been vanquished, the great captain Huihuitenuxcatl, seeing himself lost, went fleeing from his enemies, and with some of the Tultecs he escaped to Tultitlan where the great Topiltzin was. Topiltzin was already prepared with his second army to fight with the enemy which was approaching. Topiltzin in the meantime, ordered certain of his men-servants and women-servants to take the children, his sons (the elder called Pochotl and the younger Xiloltzin) legitimate successors of the kingdoms, to the very high mountains and lands of Toluca, so that the lineage of the Tultec kings might not end with them. The servants immediately carried out the order.

    6:6. When the enemy arrived, the armies fought cruelly, dying on one side and the other. They had been fighting forty days, day and night, when those of the great Topiltzin began to get discouraged with the small forces they had. Not being able to resist the great impetus of the enemy, Topiltzin in person and his old father and even their wives and other matrons of the city were obliged to go out and fight, plucking up heart, as it is said.

    6:7. And among them were his mother, the beautiful Xuchital, fighting bravely and doing all they could. But finally they were vanquished, and killed, old men and young men, women, and children, none being spared. They were all there together, women as well as children, waiting to see how it would all end, for the war had been going on for fifty days.

    6:8. In the year of 1 FLINT, on the last day of the month Totozoztzintli, on the first day of the week called Ollin, which according to our system was in the year 1011 [960],… the great Topiltzin, seeing himself and his people vanquished, went fleeing towards Tula, their city. But the enemy overtook them in Chiuhnauhtlan, although they couldn’t overcome them because they defended themselves.

    6:9. Then they went fleeing to Xaltocan, and from there to Teotihuacan, then to Totolapan. And before they reached the place called Tultecaxochitlalpan and the beautiful Xochitl was killed by dagger stabs. Xiuhtenancatzin killed the old king who had defended himself bravely and Cohuanacoxtzin killed Xuchitl who had also defended herself bravely.

    6:10. After these two were killed, these two enemy kings went pursuing Topiltzin. The two kings who swore allegiance to Topiltzin, Cuauholli, and Maxtla, and other Tultec lords, were overtaken and torn to pieces. And in the meantime Topiltzin went fleeing and got into Xico, a cave that is near Tlalmanalco, and thus they could not overtake him.

    6:11. Beyond Xico the enemy overtook Huehuetunexcatl, the great captain, together with those Tultecas who had escaped, and there they had another cruel battle in which Huehuetunexcatl and the whole army died. A nurse took Topiltzin’s younger son, called Xilotzin, and with some other Tultecas she fled into the wilderness, making an escape. She went ahead with some Tultecas, nobles as well as plebians, who got into the lakes and sierras with their wives and children. Some whose swift feet saved them were those of Mallauxiuhcohuac, Macatepec, Totzatepec, Totoepec, Quauhquechallan, Tepexomacotlazallan, Chapoltepec, Culhuacan, and other parts.

    Events in 1 REED.

    6:12. The three kings, seeing that they had already killed everybody and that all remained uninhabited then went to the large Tultec cities. From the temples and palaces they took out all the treasures and riches that they found, and returned to their lands with the spoils of their enemies, no person remaining, because the land was very dry and sickly and fruitless.

    6:13. Then a few days after that, Topiltzin left Xico with some of his servants, for his enemies were not to be seen. Seeing the land totally destroyed, he went up to Atlapallan, a province that reaches down to the South Sea [Pacific], a land very prosperous, rich, and well populated.

    6:14. He said to his vassals, to the few who were in Culhuacan and who had gone there to escape from the enemy, that he was going towards the rising sun to some kingdoms and possessions of his ancestors, very prosperous and rich and that five hundred and twelve years [520] later he would return to this land in the year 1 REED and would punish the descendants of those kings, his competitors. And many other things he said, many impossible promises he made to his vassals, which would be too long to relate.

    6:15. He returned once more to Xico (Xieco), and one night, with some Tultecas he left for Tlapallan [Tabasco area], travelling by night through the wilderness until he arrived at that place, where he afterwards lived almost thirty years. He was waited upon and honored by Talpaltecas, and died at the age of one hundred and four [156] years [dying in 1 REED in 999, 520 years before Cortez arrived], leaving many laws constituted, which later his descendant Netzahualcoyotzin confirmed. And he himself ordered his body to be burned with the rites and ceremonies that were later used (and he was the first to be burned), and he did and planned many other things. (“y otras muchas cosas que hizo y orden”… 1/3 way down p.332 Kingsborough)

    Notes

    Images and some commentary adapted from John P. Pratt Ixtlilxochitl’s Toltec History. Which was adapted from,

    Brian, Amber, et al., translators, History of the Chichimeca Nation: Don Fernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl’s Seventeeth-Century Chronicle of Ancient Mexico (3 Oct 2019).

    The translation of Chapter 1 is by Allen, Joseph L. Exploring the Lands of the Book of Mormon (Orem, UT: S.A. Publishers, 1989), pp. 139-147, where it is accompanied by excellent explanatory notes and maps. The text of that entire Chapter 11 of the book is on line at ancientamerica.org/library/media/382chapter11.htm. Another translation of the same material is included by Hunter, Milton R. and Ferguson, Thomas Stuart, Ancient America and the Book of Mormon (Oakland, CA: Kolob Publishers, 1950). That book is also excellent with many other sources also quoted. It is the source of the translation of Chapters 2-6, which was done by Arnulfo Rodriguez, a Spanish teacher at USC in 1939 from the 1891 Spanish edition.

    Year names have two parts, a number from 1 to 13 and one of four glyphs. Ixtlilxochitl translated most of the numbers into digits, but left some in Nahuatl, including “ce” meaning 1, “ome” meaning 2, and “chicome” meaning 7. My translation of the glyphs are as follows: “Tecpatl” as “Flint”, referring to a flint knife for sacrifice, but also a comet which periodically causes destruction (see verse 2:13) “Calli” as “Temple” (which Ixtlilxochitl translates as “House” in v. 3:1, having lost the original meaning that a temple is a sacred house), “Tochtli” as Rabbit (v. 1:27), and “Acatl” as “Reed”.

    Hunter and Ferguson detected an error of about 100 years (discussed in footnote 9) just after the time of Christ and perpetuated their correction of it all the way through to the end of the Toltec empire, dating all AD events about 104 years earlier than Ixtlilxochitl. For example, the birth of Topiltzin in 1 REED, which Ixtlilxochitl dates as 900, they date as about 785 (verse 4:10). They did not check to see if their correction matched the Aztec year names, which were clearly the primary source. Their mistake is only pointed out here to emphasize how this field is fraught with pitfalls. Overall their work is wonderful and brings together a wealth of other ancient sources. Similarly, Ixtlilxochitl perpetuated his mistake all through, and I make my best correction (52 years earlier than Ixtlilxochitl, see footnote 9) and perpetuate it thereafter.

    This relationship to the Venus cycle was pointed out by L. Taylor Hansen in He Walked the Americas (Amherst, WI: Amherst Press, 1963), p. 223: “Venus, being the second planet from the Sun and Earth the third, swings around its internal orbit making thirteen revoltions to eight revolutions of the earth. Thus, among all the Indian tribes the Earth-number is eight, and the number of the Morning and Evening Star is thirteen. Eight thirteens would then bring the planets into their original position. This would be a full cycle, or one hundred and four years.” (See also Figure 3 in text for another reason that 8 and 13 are so useful.) That quotation was from her notes at the end of the book, referring to her chapter entitled “Prophecy at Cholula” which quoted the tradition that the white-and-bearded prophet Kate-Zahl had prophesied of just when the continual wars after the arrival of Cortez would end: “For five full Cycles of the Dawn Star, the rule of the warring strangers will go on to greater and greater orgies of destruction…. Know that the end will come in five full cycles …” (p. 168). Here, “full Cycle of the Dawn Star” refers a venus century, 104 years. This unit actually works out best without leap years because 5 cycles of Venus of 584 days exactly equals eight 365-day years (5 x 584 = 8 x 365 = 2,290 days). Thus, Venus realigns with the earth every 8 years. A round of 52 years is not a multiple of 8 years, but 104 years equals 13 x 8 = 104 years. Note also that five venus centuries (520 years) after the arrival of Cortez in 1519 brings one to the year 2039, 1 REED, the same year in which Quetzalcoatl was said to have promised to return to a people who would accept Him (v. 1:40).

    The division into verses of Chapter 1 follows that by Joseph Allen, op. cit.

    Note that the translation from the original term “hacia donde sale el sol” (see here) to “towards the rising sun” is problematic. Primarily because place names such as “Xalisco” (2:41), Tulancinco, Xiuhcohuac and Iztachuexuca do not fit with an eastward journey. We must then assume that the text has reference to some idiomatic expression when using these terms (2:17-generally, 2:25-to Xalixco, 2:29-to Tochpan, & 6:14-to “some kingdoms”). We see the same interesting opposite terminology in The Kolbrin, where the Egyptians sail from Punt (likely near the horn of Africa) “towards the sunsetting [east], past Kindia [India] to the land of Bemer [Indonesia]. Its not understood why the directions seem to be reversed, but they apparently are.

    Although another explanation lies in the directions used by the Spanish Explorer Cabaza de Vaca who after being marooned in the New World lived with the Natives many years, and suggested in his book ‘Original Naratives’, Chapter 1, verse 1, that the Valley of Mexico was ‘west’ of Culiacan. (when in fact it is 257 leagues northwest). “He states, Culiacan… is 210 leagues west of Mexico”



    Ancient Puebloan (aka. Anasazi) Timeline

    This timeline goes along with our Book of Mormon timeline. Most notable is the idea that the Book of Mormon account of happenings after the Time of Christ which are dated in the text from 0 – 380 CE, correlate with the events among the Toltec, Chichimec/Aztlan culture of West Mexico, Southwest cultures and Cohokia which radiocarbon date from about 800 – 1180 CE. Two theories are provided to explain the dating discrepancy.

    1599 CE – Don Juan de Oñate and 129 soldiers attacked and captured Acoma Pueblo, mutilating many survivors by cutting off hands and feet as punishment. Roberts/Old Ones, p. 91)

    1598 CE – Oñate’s conquistadors marched to New Mexico through Chihuahua (Lekson p. 214)

    Arrival of Spanish colonists (Lekson p. 246)

    1541

    Coronado’s soldiers camped in the Texas Panhandle (Lekson, p. 26)

    1540

    Coronado arrived at Zuni and “took” the pueblo (Stuart)

    By this date, Cahokia was gone (Lekson, p. 26)

    Coronado’s armies entered the Southwest’s deserts looking for gold (Lekson p. 247)

    to 1541

    Francisco Vasqueze de Coronado, inspired be de Vaca’s stories, mounted an expedition into the Southwest (Lekson, p. 25)

    to 1542

    Coronado’s expedition (Stuart)

    1539

    Spanish arrived in pueblo country (Roberts p. 218)

    1537

    The Papal Bull, Sublimis Deus, issued by Pope Paul III declaring Native Americans to have souls (Lekson, p. 24)

    1536

    Cabeza de Vaca, the shipwrecked Spaniard, wandred through a corner of New Mexico (Lekson, p. 25)

    1535

    Coronado arrived in Mexico City (Stuart)

    Pizarro conquered the Incas (Stuart)

    1530

    Nuno de Guzman, one of Cortes’s more difficult lieutenants, assembled a large army at Culiacan to search for the seven cities (Lekson, p. 25)

    1519

    Cortés arrived as conqueror in Mexico (Stuart)

    1500

    By this time, Southwest populations had declined to levels of the eighth and ninth centuries (Lekson, p. 189)

    By this time, no vestige remained of that earlier Anasazi political world: there was no longer any central government (Lekson p. 197)

    1450

    Paquimé’s fall, though it could be as late as 1500 (Lekson, p. 26)

    Just about everyone (in former Anasaziland) was gathered into about a hundred large towns, clustered at Hopi, Zuni, Acoma, and Laguna in the Rio Grande Valley from Socorro in the south to Taos in the north — a very big change (Lekson p. 194)

    After this date, dramatic decline in Pueblo towns; things grew much worse after European intrusion; more than fifty large Rio Grande pueblos were abandoned in historic times, leaving only twenty today (Lekson p. 197)

    Little left of Hohokam’s earlier glories (Lekson p. 246)

    Before this date in the south, ethnography has little useful to say (meaning oral stories of descendant puebloans has little value) (Lekson p. 249)

    to 1500

    Paquime sacked and burned sometime during this period (Lekson p. 214)

    1440

    Aztec king Moctezume I sent an expedition to the north to find Aztlan, the mythic source of the original Aztecs (Lekson, p. 191)

    1420

    Disastrous floods hit the Gila River drainage (Lekson p. 243)

    1410

    Arroyo Hondo declined again due to drought, burned in 1420 and abandoned by 1425 (Stuart)

    1400

    At the latest, Mogollon culture had disappeared (Martin p. 141)

    Navajo arrive in Four Corners region (source?)

    Mogollon uplands largely depopulated (Lekson, p. 24)

    After this date, typical Anasazi village size jumped to more than 500 rooms … that effectively subugated the needs of the few to the will of the many (Lekson p. 195)

    to 1450

    A second large-scale “abandonment,” rivaling the Four Corners, emptied the southern Pueblo region — the big pueblos of the Mogollon uplands and along the toe of the Plateau (Lekson p. 1960

    1386

    to 1395

    Decade of drought in Salt River (Hohokam) drainage (Lekson p. 206)

    1384

    Enormous floods along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1382

    Enormous floods along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1381

    Enormous floods along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1375

    Trafficking in Macaws ended (source?)

    1370

    Arroyo Hondo resettled (Stuart)

    1360

    to 1361

    Catastrophic drought in drainage area of the Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1359

    Disruptive flood along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1358

    Disruptive flood along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1357

    Disruptive flood along Salt River (Hohokam) (Lekson p. 205)

    1350

    Dental transfiguration noted in Guasave, Sinaloa (source?)

    to 1400

    Many of the Mexican cultures had collapsed (Martin p. 141)

    to 1600

    Pueblo IV: Large plaza-oriented pueblos; Kachina Phenomenon widespread; corrugated pottery replaced by plain utility types; black-on-white pottery declines relative to red, orange, and yellow types (Roberts from Lipe)

    1345

    Arroyo Hondo abandoned (Stuart)

    1340

    “The tree-ring reconstructions show that at 1300 to 1340 it was exceedingly wet,” said Larry Benson, a paleoclimatologist with the Arid Regions Climate Project of the United States Geological Survey. “If they’d just hung in there…” Though the rains returned, the people never did. —“Vanished: A Pueblo Mystery,” by George Johnson, April 8, 2008, The New York Times

    1335

    Precipitation declined around Arroyo Hondo (Stuart)

    1325

    First evidence of Kachina cult (Roberts p. 102; 150)

    Mexican Aztec culture developed from anarchic post-Toltec culture in Central Mexico (source?)

    1325 to 1350

    Population of Pueblo IV people was as much as three-quarters lower than population of Anasazi around 1050 (Stuart)

    1320

    1320 to 1350s

    On many mesas and isolated hillocks overlooking farmlands adjacent to the Rio Grande and Rio San Jose (in the Acoma area), people built thick-walled citadels (Stuart)

    1310

    Arroyo Hondo Pueblo, five miles south of Santa Fe at 7,100 feet, was founded; by 1330 the site was immense with more than 1,000 rooms (Stuart)

    1300

    There never was an “Anasazi tribe”, nor did anyone ever call themselves by that name. Anasazi is originally a Navajo word that archaeologists applied to people who farmed the Four Corners before 1300 AD. (BLM)

    By this date, natural conditions (precipitation — the lack of) had forced Chacoan survivors to a few sites along rivers (Stuart)

    By this date, only the best-watered east-facing canyons and slopes were still inhabited (Stuart)

    Early this century, masked rain gods and the kachina cult, thought to have originated west of the Zuni area, began to penetrate the eastern pueblos and displace many older religious customs (Stuart)

    Mid-century: Violence on the southern frontiers seems to have been largely sorted out, and settlements shifted downhill to the rivers’ open floodplains (Stuart)

    By this time the Anasazi heartland (around modern Four Corners) was empty (Lekson, p. 23)

    Cahokia was empty and derelict (Lekson, p. 152)

    By this year, northern Chihuahua was one of the most densely settled areas in the southeast (compared to essentially empty at 1200) (Lekson, p. 176)

    A watershed year, a demographic zenith for the Southwest, followed by catastrophic population decline, nearly complete reorganization of peoples and polities, and then centuries of colonization (by the Spanish) (Lekson, p. 189)

    The Mexica, who would become the Aztecs, arrived in the Valley of Mexico from the north (Lekson, p. 191)

    After this time, most Pueblo IV towns had only two or three large kivas — something happened around this time to radically change basic Anasazi house/village form (Lekson p.195)

    End of migrations out of the Four Corners (Lekson p.195)

    After this date until 1450, dramatic growth for Pueblo towns (Lekson p. 197)

    T-shaped doors all but gone from the Plateau and Pueblo region, only to reappear throughout Paquime (Lekson p. 211)

    Before this date in the north, ethnography has little useful to say (meaning oral stories of descendant puebloans has little value) (Lekson p. 249

    Pueblos developed after this time as a reaction to state-level governments, conscious rejections of earlier hierarchies. They deliberately replaced the kings of Chaco with the priests of Zuni. (Lekson p. 251)

    to 1500s

    Galisteo basin pueblos controlled most of the turquoise trade by controlling Mount Chalchihuitl (“turquoise mountain”) in the Cerillos Hills — the Aztecs of Mexico actually had a place glyph for this mountain (Stuart)

    to 1350

    Population peaked across the whole Southwest, then plummeted sharply (Lekson, p. 189)

    to 1340

    “The tree-ring reconstructions show that at 1300 to 1340 it was exceedingly wet,” said Larry Benson, a paleoclimatologist with the Arid Regions Climate Project of the United States Geological Survey. “If they’d just hung in there…” Though the rains returned, the people never did. —“Vanished: A Pueblo Mystery,” by George Johnson, April 8, 2008, The New York Times

    1295

    “Fully half the Anasazi domain had been abandoned around 1295 and never reoccupied.” (Roberts p. 213)

    1290

    This decade, Tyuonyi, a great circular ruin in Bandelier National Monument, was founded, along nearby Frijoles Creek, a permanent stream (Stuart)

    1286

    Last construction date for Keet Seel (Roberts p. 105)

    1285

    Salmon abandoned by Mesa Verdeans (Frazier p. 135)

    1280

    It’s interesting that the BLM uses the word occupation. The Anasazi occupation of the Four Corners lasted until 1280. The Nazi occupation of France lasted until 1944.

    The last villagers left Mesa Verde (Lekson, p. 163)

    1276

    to 1299

    The great Chaco Canyon drought (Roberts p. 151)

    The Great Drought (Lekson, p. 143)

    1275

    After this date, the erratic and declining rainfall turned into a series of deep, localized droughts (Stuart)

    Even worse drought hit Anasazi region and violence spun out of control (Lekson p. 239)

    1275

    To enforce its failing rule [after yet another drought began in 1275], Aztec unleashed lethal force. At farmsteads, squads of warriors fell upon families failing in their duties, old and young. They were executed to intimidate other villages that might be thinking of slipping Aztec’s yoke. Men, women, and children were brutally and publicly killed and left to rot, unburied, in the ruins of their homes. These horrible scenes replayed a score or more times, but even terror could not hold Aztec’s failing polity together. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 239. Image of Anasazi warriors from a website with no clear name displaying a Reproduction by Thomas Baker of an Anasazi Indian kiva mural unearthed at Pottery Mound, New Mexico.

    1275 to 1300

    The Great Drought brought Sinagua to collapse (source?)

    1270

    By this year, Aztec West’s Chaco-sized rooms had been subdivided into tiny unit pueblo rooms, and family “kivas” had been jamed into adjacent Chaco chambers (Lekson, p. 160)

    1267

    1267 to 1286

    Construction of Betatakin (Roberts p. 96)

    1263

    Most Mesa Verdeans leave Salmon (Frazier p. 135)

    1260

    Drought struck again with a vengeance (Stuart)

    Mesa Verdeans moved into Salmon this decade (source?)

    1260 to 1270

    Farmers on west-facing slopes were hardest hit by drought, while those on east-facing slopes survived (Stuart)

    1259

    A major volcanic eruption somewhere outside the Southwest dropped temperatures (Lekson, p. 162)

    1253

    1253 to 1284

    Mummy Cave constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1250

    After this time, precipitation became more erratic (Stuart)

    By this decade, trade across the region increased (Stuart)

    “Around 1250, you see an incredible change. Everybody’s moving into the canyons, building cliff dwellings. At Sand Canyon, 75% of the community lived within a defensive wall that surrounded the pueblo. All through southeastern Utah, northeastern Arizona, southwestern Colorado, the same thing’s happening. Suddenly, at 1250, the trade ware goes to zero. Before that, you had plenty of far-traded pottery, turquoise, shells, jewelry. Suddenly, nothing. And right at 1250, the ceramics revert from Mesa Verde-style pitches–tall, conical vessels with rounded bulblike bases–to the kinds of mugs made at Chaco 200 years earlier.” (Roberts from Bruce Bradley of Crow Canyon Archaeological Center, p. 150-151)

    Construction start date for Keet Seel (Roberts p. 105)

    A general breakdown in annual predictability of precipitation made farming increasingly chancy (Lekson, p. 162)

    Paquimé rose to prominence (Lekson, p. 172)

    After this year, platforms became elite residences (Lekson p. 202)

    In the decades after this time, Chacoan ruling families were looking for someone to rule. Hohokam needed leaders and the Platueau had a surplus (Lekson p.203)

    1250 to 1500

    Casas Grandes in northern Mexico as center of Chacoan culture (Frazier p. 234, from Lekson)

    1250 to 1450

    Great migrations shifted tens of thousands of people acros the region, shaping a new Southwest (Lekson, p. 190)

    1250 to 1325

    All across the Pueblo world, from Hopi to the Rio Grande, population increased, doubtless from relocations from the Four Corners (Lekson p. 197)

    1250 to 1450

    Hohokam towns spread over large areas, prefiguring the urban sprawl of modern Phoenix (Lekson p. 210)

    1230

    1230 to 1240

    This decade, Anasazi society regrouped and aggregated into sites in the northern Rio Grande, typically at 6,600 to 7,300 feet in elevation; all were built to withstand attack; some were attacked, leaving much evidence of violence such as skulls caved in my hard blows and burning, but no looting of valuables, suggesting an attempt to drive them away or rid the country of the people (Stuart)

    1230 to 1260

    Large new pueblos such as Bayo Canyon Ruin near Los Alamos were constructed on hundreds of mesa tops through the Southwest (Stuart)

    1223

    Mean date of pit house communities (average six pit houses) in eastern Arizona, Taos, Santa Fe district, Apache Creek [?], Cebolleta Mesa [?], and in the Sierra Blanca near Ruidoso, NM; evidence of pottery trade is substantial, with more than a dozen types at many locations (Stuart)

    1220

    Villages began leaving the stressed sphere around Aztec Ruins (Lekson p. 239)

    1216

    1216 and 1262

    Spruce Tree House at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1204

    Square Tower House at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1200

    Early this century, trade was reestablished across the four-corners region (Stuart)

    Mesa Verdeans cliff houses flourished this century (Stuart)

    Most skeletons from this century are marked by evidence of overwork and an inconsistent food supply (Stuart)

    Or perhaps as early as 1125, Chaco Canyon culture had collapsed (Roberts p. 161)

    Rock art depictions in Four Corners region of the feathered serpent, or Quetzalcoatl (aka Xipe Totec to Toltecs; aka Maasaw to modern Hopi)

    Before this time, Anasazi villages were almost always small and short-lived, with the important exception of Chaco Canyon (Lekson, p. 137)

    By this year, the arc of Pueblos — Hope in the west through Zuni and Acoma to the norther Rio Grande on the east, was well settled (Lekson, p. 163)

    1200 to 1230

    Known as the Little Ice Age in Europe; it probably got colder and wetter in the American Southwest as well (Stuart)

    1200 to 1250

    Precipitation increased in quantity and reliability enough to provide some surpluses of food supply (Stuart)

    1200 to 1300

    Late Pueblo III; Mesa Verde Phase; Pots: Mesa Verde black-on-white, indented corrugated (rock & sherd); major re-population (Tom Windes)

    Mogollon culture begins moving into the Hopi-Zuni region (Martin, p 21)

    Tens of thousands of Anasazi left, never to return (Lekson, p. 162)

    1190

    1190 to 1206

    Balcony House at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1190 to 1260

    Construction of all of the cliff dwellings including Mesa Verde, Bandelier National Monument, Gallina highlands, Chuska Mountains, Montezuma Castle, Mavajo National Monument in Arizona, and Gila Cliff Dwellings in Mogollon country; most were inhabited less than 100 years (Stuart)

    1185

    Salmon reoccupied by Mesa Verde people (Frazier p. 135)

    1170

    By this decade, the Chaco culture was but a memory (Stuart)

    Civil war resulted in fall of Tula, capital of the Toltecs, followed by anarchy

    Fighting abated in the highland regions around Chaco Canyon this decade (Stuart)

    This decade, small pueblos founded at higher elevations with no sign of palisades or defensive measures, none built on cliffs; fewer had kivas; mineral-based paint on pottery replaced by organic paint from burnt plant material  (Stuart)

    1168

    The Toltec capital Tula was destroyed by successive new tribes of barbarians coming from the north, among them the Aztecs (Waters p. 117)

    1150

    Aztec abandoned (Frazier p. 131)

    Many Hohokam sites abandoned and relocated, about the time platform mounds replaced ball courts (Lekson, p. 23)

    Many Mogollon districts abandoned (Lekson, p. 24)

    Hohokam crashed (Lekson, p. 80)

    No ball courts (Hohokam) were built after this time

    T-shaped doors first appeared at Chaco Great Houses, but not commoner dwellings) (Lekson p. 211)

    After this date, T-shaped doors showed up at Aztec Ruins (Lekson p. 211)

    Hohokam ball courts replaces by platform mounds (Lekson p. 240)

    After this time, everything sagged south, with migrations out of the northern Plateau bumping people of the southern Plateau farther south into the Mogollon uplands (Lekson p. 241)

    This year, give or take a decade, was a rough one for North America — Tula fell, Cahokia and Chaco crashed, and Hohokam fell apart (Lekson, p. 150)

    Tula [Toltecs] fell about 1150. [W]ith Tula’s end, the Post-Classic pattern came into focus in vibrant clarity: expansive politics, long-distance dynamics, power plays and upheavals, and a swirling world of migrations, invasions, expulsions, and fragmentation. —Lekson p. 242

    1150 to 1300

    The events of 1150 to 1300 [spelled] the end of Tula [Toltecs] and consequent regional reorganization marked by audacious long-distance trade and flamboyant political adventures. —Lekson p. 144

    1150 to 1200

    Wars of attrition and atrocities spread across the Chacoan world (Stuart)

    1150 to 1300

    A number of architectural features appeared in the San Juan Basin with clear Mexican derivation, such as triple-walled towers

    The end of Tula (Toltecs) and consequent regional reorganization marked by audacious lang-distance trade and flamboyant political adventures (Lekson, p. 144)

    Hohokam suffered destructive and sporadic floods about once per generation (Lekson, p. 167)

    1150 to 1350

    Pueblo III: Large pueblos; cliff dwellings; towers; corrugated gray and elaborate black-on-white pottery, plus red or orange pottery in some areas; abandonment of the Four Corners by 1300 (Roberts from Lipe)

    1150 to 1200

    Cahokia fell gradually (Lekson, p. 115)

    Cahokia rose and began a precipitous decline (Lekson, p. 152)

    1145

    Construction began at the Wupatki Great House, perhaps as a rival to the northern San Juan, especially Aztec Ruins (Lekson, p. 157)

    1140

    Drought had lasted greater part of a decade, and the collapse of the Chacoan system was underway (Frazier p. 205)

    Charoan roads had no historical precedent and were never re-used after the Chaco peak & fall of 1140 AD

    The Chaco phenomenon had ended (Stuart)

    This decade, Escalante Ruin was abandoned (Stuart)

    1140 to 1200

    Pueblo III; McElmo Phase; Pots: McElmo, indented corrugated (rock/sherd/sand); major de-population and severe drought (Tom Windes)

    1140 to 1180

    Between 1140 and 1180 AD, nine out of every ten skeletons found around the Mesa Verde region in Colorado show signs of violent injury.

    1139

    Last known construction at Salmon (Frazier p. 205, although it’s written as “1239,” which I believe is a typo)

    The last roof bean was cut and raised at Bis sa’ani, 20 miles north of Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    1135

    Wupatki built (Lekson p. 238)

    1135 to 1180

    Major drought hit Anasazi region (Lekson p. 239)

    1133

    Temporary relief from sharp drought (Frazier p. 205)

    1133 to 1135

    Cliff dwellings in Grand Gulch, Utah, constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1132

    The last-known tree-cutting in Chaco Canyon at Pueblo Alto (Frazier p. 205)

    1130

    ## women and children were burned to death in the tower kiva.

    Founded just before 1100, Salmon was a Chacoan refuge until a number of its women and children were burned in the tower kiva that once arose from the main block. —Anasazi America, by David E. Stuart, p. 105. It was apparently attacked and more than 30 women and children who had sought refuge in its impressive tower kiva died horribly in a fire set to destroy the town [in about 1130]. —Anasazi America, by David E. Stuart, p. 136. Aerial view of Salmon Ruins from The Foxworthy Traveling Show.

    After the drought of this year, tens of thousands of farmers and others displaced from shrinking great houses and fled to the uplands, including Chuska and Lukachukai mountains to the west, Mesa Verde and San Juan ranges on the north, Gallina highlands on the east, the foothills of Albuquerque’s Sandia and Manzano mountains on the southeast, and Cebolleta Mesa, the El Morro district, and the Zuni Mountains to the south [odd, then, that CR was abandoned this same year] (Stuart)

    Beginning of severe drought that lasted 50 years (Frazier p. 205)

    Doyel proposes that a prolonged and severe drought brought more than 250 years of Chacoesque development to an end

    Fifth and last major construction period for Pueblo Bonito (Frazier p. 77)

    Salmon abandoned; it was apparently attacked and more than 30 women and children who sought refuge in its impressive tower kiva died horribly in the fire set to destroy the town (Stuart)

    The Chacoan elites who held on in a half-dozen of the more stable great houses after this year lost access to nearly all their signature trade goods: corn surplus; dried meat; etc. [turquoise?] (Stuart)

    The second Chaco drought was the coup de grace that brought the Chacoan culture down (Stuart)

    Pochteca, “long-distance traders and spies who hailed from Aztec Mexico…we know them only from an era well after the AD 1300 abandonment, [though] they serve as a powerful model for hypothesized earlier traders who may have brought Mesoamerican ideas to the American Southwest, particularly Chaco Canyon.” (Roberts, p. 170)

    Mimbres ended — at 1100 there were five to ten thousand people living in Mimbres towns throughout southwestern New Mexico; by 1150 there weren’t any (Lekson, p. 174)

    When Chaco’s move to Aztec Ruins was complete, Mimbres region emptied (Lekson p. 241)

    1130 to 1140

    This decade, Bis sa’ani was built, perhaps to protect the central Chaco Canyon from unrest among the Chacoan northern farming communities (Stuart)

    1130 to 1135

    Chimney Rock abandoned

    1130 to 1150s

    Fighting peaked in the highland regions around Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    1130 to 1180

    Prolonged drought with precipitation below normal — coincides with gradual abandonment of Chaco (Frazier p. 181, from Judge)

    Yet another great drought (Lekson, p. 154)

    During the drought, unspeakable violence came out of Aztec, marked by brutality and cannibalism (Lekson, p. 160)

    1127

    Pueblo Bonito was “still” occupied (Frazier, p. 76)

    1125

    “The richest burial ever reported in the Southwest,” as described by John McGregor, at Ridge Ruin near Flagstaff, Arizona (Roberts p. 219)

    Ida Jean great house established (Stuart)

    Kin Kletso construction began and continued through 1130 (NPS.gov)

    Wallace great house established (Stuart)

    After this date, the Anasazi center of gravity and gravitas shifted north, from Chaco Canyon to Aztec Ruins (Lekson, p. 153)

    Construction at Chaco Canyon declined sharply and ceased by this year — just before the nasty drought of 1130-1180 (Lekson, p. 156)

    1125 to 1129

    Escalante great house established (Stuart)

    1120

    By this date, there was more than 100,000 square meters of floor area under roof in Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    Chetro Ketl abandoned (Frazier p. 79)

    Final Aztec construction (Frazier p. 131)

    This decade Mesa Verde region Chacoan-style communities were constructed: Ida Jean, Wallace, Escalante Ruin, each at 6,300 feet elevation or greater; probably founded by groups of male colonists (Stuart)

    1120 to 1140

    No Chacoan great kivas constructed (Stuart)

    1120 to 1140s

    Escalante Ruin was constructed, including one large kiva, in southwest Colorado at 7,200 feet (Stuart)

    1116

    Eerily, [Salmon Ruin’s] last roof beams were repaired and replaced at A.D. 1116, the same year repair and expansion stopped in most great houses within the canyon. —Anasazi America, by David E. Stuart, p. 84. Image of roof beams from Aztec Ruins, not Salmon, fromThe Foxworthy Traveling Show.

    End of minor refurbishing at Salmon (Frazier p. 135)

    Last Chetro Ketl beam cut (Frazier p. 79)

    Salmon ruin: Exodus begins; Rex Adams said, “rather dramatic internal modifications, such as the sealing of doors and the deposition of trash in the ground floor of many rooms began.” Final abandonment “was rather abrupt.” (Frazier p. 135)

    The last roof beams cut and put in place at Salmon (Stuart)

    1116 to 1120

    Most construction in the canyon itself stopped between 1116 and 1120, and some older great houses such as Chetro Ketl were actually being abandoned. But at others, as at Pueblo Bonito, new walls and room blocks were built to close off old courtyards and limit access. —Page 121 (Stuart)

    1115

    Aztec constructed (Stuart)

    Most Aztec construction ends (Frazier p. 131)

    Spring House at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1115 to 1140

    Signs of significant reorganization of Chaco culture: most construction during this period took place at sites north of Chaco Canyon (Frazier p. 203)

    1112

    Oak Tree House at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1111

    New great houses were established at Aztec (A.D. 1111-1116, expanded in the 1200s),Escalante (1125-1129), Ida Jean (about 1125), and Wallace (about 1125), all north of the San Juan River…where good water, uncrowded conditions, and upland game were available. —Anasazi America, by David E. Stuart, p. 120-121.

    1111 to 1116

    Aztec great house established, expanded again in the 1200s (Stuart)

    1110

    Chaco ended about 1125 and rose again 60 kilometers due north at Aztec, where major construction began about 1110. That was the final outcome, but there may have been a false start or two. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 154

    The Great North Road line was extended north [about 10 miles] from Salmon to a stream of more appropriate size, the Animas River. Construction started on Aztec Ruins about 1110. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 154. Photo of Aztec Ruinsfrom ImagesOfAnthropology.com.

    Main Aztec, New Mexico, construction begins (Frazier p. 131)

    Major construction began at Aztec Ruins (Lekson, p. 154) in a solsticial orientation (Lekson, p. 155)

    Construction began at Aztec Ruins (Lekson p. 238)

    1110 to 1121

    Beams cut for Aztec Ruin (Frazier p. 77)

    1110 to 1275

    Aztec as center of Chacoan culture (Frazier p. 234, from Lekson)

    1102

    Fourth major construction period for Pueblo Bonito (Frazier p. 77)

    1101

    1101 to 1104

    Windes claims this was tree-harvesting dates for Pueblo del Arroyo — after last was cut, they were moved into the canyon and building began (Frazier p. 227, from Windes)

    1101 to 1105

    North and south wings, plaza, and the tri-walled structure were added to Pueblo del Arroyo (NPS.gov)

    1100

    Most of the later and so-called higher developments of the Anasazi came to them from the Hohokam and Mogollon groups, so that the climax that occurred about A.D. 1100 may be regarded as an accumulations of southern and possibly Mexican traits that were taken over by the Anasazi bit by bit—by trade, by drift, perhaps by war—and reworked to fit their ideas and cultural layout. (Martin p. 20)

    Large religious gatherings did not take place in Chaco Canyon after 1100. —Stuart/Anasazi America p. 143

    All of this evidence of violence dates to the 1100s. —Stuart/Anasazi America p. 121

    Representations of masked dancers appear on Mogollon pottery (Martin p. 131)

    Small copper trinkets, probably imported from Mexico, found in some Mogollon sites after this date (Martin p. 77)

    After this date, large religious gatherings did not take place in Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    By this date there were nine great houses in Chaco Canyon: Peñasco Blanco, Casa Chiquita, Kin Kletso, Pueblo del Arroyo, Pueblo Bonito, Chetro Ketl, Hungo Pavi, Una Vida, and Wijiji; plus three up on the mesa: Pueblo Alto, New Alto, and Tsinkletzin (Stuart)

    By this time, most of the great houses in the southern San Juan basic were abandoned (Stuart)

    During the early part of this century, Chaco’s great houses walled their courtyards and built control gates where roadways passed village walls (Stuart)

    Early this century, Wijiji constructed (NPS.gov)

    Early this century evidence of violence abounds in and around Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    Early this century, a pit-house community in Gallina was laboriously stockaded, from fear of the invading Chacoan farmers; many such sites exist, all of which have been breached and burned (Stuart)

    Early this century: An estimated 60 percent of adults and 38 percent of children died violently in the Gallina highlands after the collapse of Chacoan society (Stuart)

    Early-to-mid-century: Kin ya’a (south of Chaco Canyon) was burned and abandoned (Stuart)

    Huge explosion in number of kivas built (Stuart)

    Kin ya’a was expanded (Stuart)

    Peak population of Chacoans during early part of this decade (Frazier p. 91)

    The center of Chaco culture shifted to near the banks of the San Juan River, north of Chaco Canyon the first few decades of this century (Stuart)

    The middle of this century, Navajo people invaded Chacoan territory — perhaps the cause of the fear that made Chacoans build defensive structures and cliff dwellings (Stuart)

    There are 3,200 known sites dated to this decade, a ninefold increase from 500 years before (Stuart)

    Trafficking in Macaws began (presumably out of Mexico and into Four Corners area) — what’s the source on this? I propose Macaw feathers appeared long before this; need to double-check this one, or ignore it

    Numic tribes (Utes, Paiutes, Shoshone–linguistic roots of the modern Hopi language) were in the Great Basin of Nevada as early as this date (Roberts p. 204, 205)

    Pueblo towns such as Oraibi and Acoma began, perhaps even sooner (Lekson, p. 20)

    Pueblo Bonito, originally build in the 900s with a solstitial alignment, changed and adopted Pueblo Alto’s consciously cardinal orientation (Lekson, p. 127)

    By this time, a few score elite Chacoan elite families (Lekson p. 236)

    1100 to 1130

    Chaco rainfall in excess of normal (Frazier p. 203)

    1100 to 1190

    Most pit house communities were constructed and occupied in the highlands surrounding Chaco Canyon, most probably with farmers dispersed from the Red Mesa Valley and other areas sound of Chaco; most of these [if not all] were attacked and burned (Stuart)

    1100 to 1300

    Grand Gulch on Cedar Mesa in Utah inhabited again, the cliff dwellings were built, then abandoned (Roberts p. 131)

    1100 to 1200s

    Chaco had a central government that sanctioned violence in the 1100’s

    Chaco…had a central government, however diffuse or non-Western…. It’s likely that Chaco had a regional economy. And perhaps Chaco and its successor, Aztec Ruins [in northern New Mexico], had the use of force; witness the brutality of apparently socially sanctioned events of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. —Lekson p. 223

    Hovenweep built, including tower with slits for sunlight that describes a complete solar calendar (Frazier p. 199)

    1100 to 1200

    Cahokia Creek split in two, spelling its ultimate doom (Mann p. 296)

    1099

    1099 to 1116

    Chetro Ketl architecture degenerated; poor workmanship (Frazier p. 78)

    1098

    Full moon on the summer solstice, June 15, 1098. (Equinox & Solstice Calculator and Moon Page)

    1095

    1095 to 1100

    MAJOR construction at chacoan pueblos. 

    [Stephen] Lekson divided the construction activity into five-year segments and found that the last five years of the eleventh century, A.D. 1095-1100, were the most labor intensive. During those five years, Chacoan construction programs took up an average of 55,645 man-hours, or 5,565 man-days, or 186 man-months, per year. Thus thirty-one men working six months a year or sixty-two men working three months a year could have carried out the most intensive single period of construction at Chaco Canyon. —Page 179 (Frazier)

    1094

    Lunar standstill and, some claim, second wave of building at Chimney Rock Great House (building perhaps began in 1093) (Frazier p. 222)

    Salmon mostly completed

    Second building phase at Chimney Rock (Roberts p. 217)

    1094 to 1104

    Minor construction and finishing work at Salmon (Frazier p. 135)

    1093

    26 wood samples from Chimney Rock Great House were cut in this year; also five samples from rebuilt East Kiva match this year

    Last wave of trees cut for Salmon construction (Frazier p. 135)

    1090

    Chaco’s shift to the north began four decades before an 1130-1180 drought, often blamed for Chaco’s demise. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 154

    A drought began that lasted five or six years (Stuart)

    Drought, no summer rains for six years (Stuart)

    Sharp drought this decade (Frazier p. 203)

    Major construction began on the Salmon Ruins Great House (Lekson, p. 154)

    1090 to 1140

    Early Pueblo III; Late Bonito Phase; Pots: Chaco-McElmo/Gallup b/w, indented corrugated (sand); Major great-house construction north of San Juan River; Major population increase, then decrease (Tom Windes)

    1090 to 1100

    Proposed dates for pollen from the fill of a Chimney Rock indigenous hearth on Chimney Rock lower mesa

    1090 to 1115

    Pueblo Bonito was “finished” to look much as it does today, including the addition of 14 new kivas (Stuart)

    1090 to 1116

    The third and final wave of great-house construction in Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    1088

    Salmon ruin was mostly built as one massive project between A.D. 1088 and 1090. The great house was constructed in the shape of a square C. Its back (north) wall is 450 feet long. The two arms of the C, each 200 feet long, reach south toward the Great North Road from Chaco. The great house once stood two to four stories tall, contained at least 175 rooms, and had a floor area of 90,000 square feet—nearly two acres… [I]t was built in the midst of the worst drought since the rains had become more favorable 90 years before. —Anasazi America, by David E. Stuart, p. 83. Image of Salmon Ruins from TripAdvisor.com.

    1088 to 1090

    Most trees cut for Salmon [great house] construction (Frazier p. 135)

    Salmon [great house] was constructed as one massive project (Stuart)

    1087

    Tree-ring date of a partially burned branch from a domestic fire pit in an indigenous house on Chimney Rock lower mesa

    1085

    1085 to 1110

    Windes concludes 18 households living in Pueblo Bonito; Hayes estimates 179 families (Frazier p. 157)

    1080

    Summer rainfall had begun to decline noticeably (Stuart)

    Chaco got drier, but the drought had surprisingly little effect on building (Lekson, p. 155)

    1080 to 1100

    Casamero in Red Mesa district was constructed, perhaps as a last-ditch effort to hold the area together (Stuart)

    Chacoans built four-story tower kivas at great expense of labor and materials (Stuart)

    1079

    Full moon on the summer solstice, June 16, 1079. (Equinox & Solstice Calculator and Moon Page)

    1077

    1077 to 1081

    Widespread building at Pueblo Bonito (Frazier p. 231, from Windes)

    1076

    Lunar standstill and, some claim, first building at Chimney Rock Great House (Frazier p. 222)

    Tree-ring date of one cross pole from ventilator shaft of Chimney Rock East Kiva; Eddy accepts this as date of building, most others suspect this is an older re-used timber

    1075

    After this date it appears that rooms at larger sites were no longer used for living or storage, but for possible ceremonial functions (Frazier p. 185, from Judge)

    By 1075, at the latest, Hohokam had begun to unravel [just as] Chaco burst forth to dominate the Plateu from 1020 to 1125. (Lekson p. 234)

    First building phase at Chimney Rock  (Roberts p. 217)

    New foundations laid at Pueblo Bonito that were never completed (Stuart)

    Pueblo del Arroyo construction began in the central portion (NPS.gov)

    Hohokam really fell apart (Lekson, p. 116)

    Things around Phoenix (for Hohokam) began to detriote — ball courts were abandoned and platforms were built over mounds (Lekson p. 203)

    1075 to 1115

    Around A.D. 1075 the Chacoans began an unparalleled flurry of building activity that would last forty years…. From then until 1115 the Chacoans carried out six major construction programs in Chaco Canyon. They built the east and west wings of Pueblo Bonito. —Page 177 (Frazier)

    1075 to 1130

    Fourth Chaco building period: major building period: east and west wings of Pueblo Bonito, added third story to Penasco Blanco, north and south wings of Pueblo del Arroyo, constructed Wijiji — yearly levels of labor were twice that of 1050 to 1075 (Frazier p. 174+, from Lekson)

    1073

    Cliff Palace at Mesa Verde constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1070

    26 of 53 wood samples from small, down-slope Chimney Rock sites give dates in this decade; only 2 of 47 samples from Great House from this decade

    After this date only Type III masonry used at Chetro Ketl (Frazier p. 78)

    Hohokam ball court networks were in serious decline if not total collapse (Lekson, p. 121)

    About the time of the Sunset Crater volcanic explosion? (Lekson p. 238)

    1068

    Salmon Ruins was as large as the largest construction at Chaco Canyon.  It was not a casual experiment.

    After the initial four-room unit [started in 1068], there was nothing tentative about the move. Salmon Ruins was as large as the largest individual construction events at Chaco Canyon. This was not a casual experiment. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 154.

    Salmon Ruins’ east wing was built as early as 1068. About 1090 major construction began on the actual Great House, a building the size and shape of Hungo Pavi back at Chaco Canyon. —A History of the Ancient Southwest, by Stephen H. Lekson, p. 154. Diagram of Salmon Ruins from University of Idaho.

    A four-room unit was the first built at Salmon Ruins (Lekson, p. 154)

    1067

    Pueblo Bonito’s “golden age” (Frazier p. 76)

    1066

    Vingta born (The Last Skywatcher Series)

    March 20, 1066

    Halley’s Comet appeared (Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Halley’s_Comet)

    1063

    Sunset Crater exploded after this year, covering the Sinagua area with a thin layer of “black sand” (Lekson, p. 76, citing Colton)

    1062

    First use of Type III masonry at Chetro Ketl

    1092 to 1070

    Both Types II and III masonry used at Chetro Ketl

    1060

    1060 to 1061

    Pueblo Pintado was built as one planned project (Stuart)

    1060 to 1065

    Pueblo Bonito enlarged again, mainly with the addition of stories (Stuart)

    1060 to 1090

    Major remodeling and rebuilding of Chetro Ketl (Frazier p. 78)

    1060 to 1096, 1219, 1275

    White House Ruin in Canyon de Chelley constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1057

    Date of The Last Skywatcher, prequel novel to The Last Skywatcher Series

    Lunar standstill (Frazier p. 222)

    Full moons in 1057 (www.moonpage.com): January 23, February 22, March 23, April 22, May 21, June 19 (four days after the Summer Solstice), July 18, August 17, September 15 (two days before the Fall Equinox), October 15, November 14, December 13 (two dates before the Winter Solstice)

    Solar dates in 1057 (Equinox and Solstice Calculator): Spring Equinox, March 14; Summer Solstice, June 15; Fall Equinox, September 17; Winter Solstice, December 15

    Which dates would they watch the lunar standstill through the Chimney Rock twin towers? This illuminates (and surprises), from http://www.idialstars.com/mls.htm:

    A major (or minor) lunar standstill always happens near an equinox; and what’s more, it happens when the Moon is at or near quarter phase. A major lunar standstill faithfully occurs within one week of a lunar or solar eclipse, and oftentimes takes place right between a lunar and solar eclipse.

    This implies that the most likely date to watch a full moon rise between the twin spires of Chimney Rock National Monument, Colorado, closest to its standstill in 1057, is September 15.

    1054

    July 4

    Crab Nebula Supernova “first observed on 4 July 1054, and that lasted for a period of around two years. The event was recorded in contemporary Chinese astronomy, and references to it are also found in a later (13th-century) Japanese document, and in a document from the Arab world. Furthermore, there are a number of proposed, but doubtful, references from European sources recorded in the 15th century, and perhaps a pictograph associated with the Anasazi Pueblo Peoples found near the Peñasco Blanco site in New Mexico.” (Wikipedia article on SN 1054) Also “Around 4-5 July 1054 the supernova was visible in broad daylight, having reached a maximum brightness about ten times that of Venus, the brightest astronomical object visible from Earth besides the Sun and Moon. It remained visible by day for 23 days, and by night for 653 days.” (Solar Astronomy in the Prehistoric Southwest on the The National Center for Atmospheric Research site)

    1053

    to 1103

    Pueblo del Arroyo, just across the wash from Pueblo bonito, constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    1050

    In many cases, Chaco elites were sometimes able to co-opt Great Kivas. The largest Great Kiva of its age was built within the walled plaza of Pueblo Bonito—the first and greatest Great House—about 1050. (Lekson p. 235)

    A third masonry-lined kiva was added to site 627 (Stuart)

    After this date, Chacoan farmers began moving into the northern San Juan basin with few, if any, underlying Basketmater or Pueblo I houses (Stuart)

    After this date, formal roadways were constructed from Chaco Canyon to the most architecturally complex buildings to the south (Kin ya’a, Casameo, etc.) (Stuart)

    Basic structure of Chaco System was in place (Frazier p. 185, from Judge)

    By this decade, the Chaco culture was three-tiered: farmsteads, district great houses, and Chaco Canyon great houses (Stuart)

    Hohokam took a downturn (Lekson, p. 116)

    to 1060

    Wing additions to Pueblo Bonito (Stuart)

    to 1075

    Construction during the third period, 1050 to 1075, was mainly of additions to existing buildings. The Chacoan builders added wings, then less symmetrical additions, extensions and modifications. More [labor hours of] construction work was being done each year. —Page 176 (Frazier)

    The second wave of great-house construction in Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    Third Chaco building period: mainly additions to existing buildings; only one new structure: Pueblo del Arroyo (Frazier p. 174+, from Lekson)

    to 1080

    New farming districts opened to the north of Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    to 1100

    Road networks built round Chaco (Frazier p. 187, from Judge)

    Sunset Crater erupted sometime between these years, the first eruption in the Southwest in more than a thousand years (Lekson, p. 156)

    At its peak, A.D. 1050 to 1100, Cahokia may have been home to as many as 15,000 people. Monks Mound, the largest earthwork in North America at 100 feet tall, may have been constructed in only 20 years. More here: “Cahokia’s Monks Mound May Have Been Built in Only 20 Years” on ArchaeologicalConservancy.org.

    to 1115

    Judge argues that formal pilgrimages to Chaco were in place by this time (Frazier p. 186)

    to 1125

    At least three Chaco-style remodeling events took place between these years at Guadalupe Ruin (Frazier p. 145)

    to 1130

    Chaco precipitation was generally above normal, except for sharp drought in the early 1090s (Frazier p. 181, from Judge)

    to 1075

    Hohokam sites were depopulated (Lekson, p. 116)

    1041

    Tuwa born, a primary character in The Last Skywatcher Series

    1041

    Only tree-ring date available for Casamero (Stuart)

    1040

    This decade, only major Chacoan building period not linked to wetter than normal conditions; construction integrates Pueblo Bonito, Pueblo Alto, and Chetro Ketl with the great roads; Windes suggests this signifies Chaco Canyon’s emergence as a regional center (Frazier p. 231)

    to 1080

    Pueblo Bonito construction included only 10 rooms with hearths (Frazier p. 157)

    to 1100

    Late Pueblo II; Classic Bonito Phase; Pots: Gallup b/w, indented corrugated (sand & trachyte); Major greathouse construction; Major depopulation, varied climate, drought, major crop surplus (Tom Windes)

    1038

    Lunar standstill (calculated by me)

    1033

    to 1092

    Third major construction period for Pueblo Bonito (Frazier p. 77)

    1030

    to 1070

    Chetro Ketl Type II masonry (Frazier p. 78)

    to 1090

    Second Chetro Ketl construction and occupation — marked by rapid growth; Type II masonry (Frazier p. 78)

    to 1300s

    Pueblo III culture (Frazier p. 81)

    1020

    By this decade, the Chaco culture was two-tiered: farmers and those in charge of food storage and ritual (Stuart)

    Chetro Ketl construction began, with modifications in the 1100s (NPS.gov)

    Elite families flourished on the Chacoan Plateau (Lekson, p. 129)

    Construction at Chaco Canyon added wings of warehouses, ritual spaces, public monuments, and barracks (at least group houseing) (Lekson p. 235)

    to 1040

    The great expansion of Pueblo Bonito, which added two stories of rear rooms and great thickness to the outer rear wall (Stuart)

    to 1050

    Chaco cornered the turquoise trade (Frazier p. 183, from Judge)

    Chacoan world became much more complex, with rise of elite class and expansion of lower farming class (Stuart)

    land use and settlement patterns changed rapidly in Chaco Canyon, with great-house expansions that made them enormous (Stuart)

    The next major construction, from 1020 to 1050, was at Pueblo Alto, Chetro Ketl, and Pueblo Bonito (additions). The architectural forms begun in the 900s were continued. —Page 176 (Frazier) See Author Note The Anasazi Buildings of Chaco Canyon: Largest “Apartments” in the World.

    The first wave of great-house construction in Chaco Canyon (Stuart)

    to 1080

    Formal Chacoan great houses in the southern San Juan basin were invariably established well after the farms were founded (as opposed to great houses of the north, which were not) (Stuart)

    to 1120

    More than 2 million man-hours of labor went into the great houses in Chaco Caynon, including an estimated 215,000 ponderosa trunks up to 30 feet long each cut by stone ax and carried 20 to 30 miles (Stuart) [Note: This is 384 hours per week all year long for 100 years, which is about 9 men working 40-hour weeks every week every year for 100 years.]

    to 1125

    Building boom of Chacoan Great Houses (Lekson, p. 123)

    to 1130

    the period generally referred to as the Chaco Phenomenon

    to 1125

    Chaco burst forth to dominate the Plateau (Lekson p. 234)

    1019

    Lunar standstill (calculated by me)

    1018

    Lunar standstill as reported by Chimney Rock National Monument, Colorado, website

    1017

    Second major construction year for Pueblo Bonito (Frazier p. 77)

    1001

    Lunar standstill (calculated by me)

    1000

    Probably light settlement of Stollsteimer Valley below Chimney Rock began

    Mogollon designs on Mimbres pottery became increasingly complex, better, and more delicately executed (Martin, p. 116)

    Mogollon towns after this began to break up into new separate units and move a short distance away (Martin p. 90)

    The tribute-demanding and militaristic theocracy of the Toltec culture began to collapse

    Mogollon before this year characterized by brownware pottery made by coiling and pit houses; after this year pueblos of stone or adobe and farming

    Mogollon prior to this year were very cozy with Hohokam (Lekson, p. 64)

    Mimbres architecture became more like Anasazi unit pueblos from pithouses (Lekson, p. 94)

    The final demise of the West Mexican Teuchitlan polities (Lekson, p. 114)

    Substantial Anasazi populations migrated into the Mogollon Rim country of Arizon and into the Mogollon highlands of west-central New Mexico (Lekson, p. 136)

    to 1020

    Chaco firmly established as the primary source of finished turquoise for perhaps entire San Juan Basin (Frazier p. 183, from Judge)

    to 1050

    Additions and improvement at site 627, including renovation of two pit houses into kivas (Stuart)

    to 1100

    Pueblo II; Early/Classic Bonito; Kivas appear (Tom Windes)

    to 1115

    Chetro Ketl was built (Stuart)

    to 1130

    Midsummer rains came more predictably, with only one interruption in the 1090s (Stuart)

    994

    to 1084

    Range of tree-ring dates for Chimney Rock Great Kiva (below Great House on mesa)

    990

    to 1102

    Northern San Juan effectively empty; Pueblo I in Chaco (Lekson, p. 99)

    987

    Toltec King Topiltzin Quetzalcoatl ousted for political reasons from kingdom were Mexico City is now (Mann p. 27)

    982

    Lunar standstill (calculated by me)

    980

    to 990s

    Food shortages and starvation among Chaco farming communities (Stuart)

    964

    Lunar standstill (calculated by me)

    950

    By this time there were densely packed farming communities of unit pueblos on every ridge and hillock in the Red Mesa Valley (near Gallup, NM), Skunk Springs, and the Chuska Valley (Stuart)

    Chaco people began building surface structures seemingly derived from Mexican culture (such as what?)

    The Late Pithouse Period (Mogollon) ended with a shift from pit structures to pueblo-style architecture (Lekson, p. 92)

    Turner identifies 11 cannibalized skeletons at Burnt Mesa in northwestern NM (Roberts p. 158)

    to 1000

    Rooms added to site 627 (Stuart)

    All masonry house blocks around Kin ya’a (south of Chaco Canyon) were built (Stuart)

    to 1150

    Chaco Canyon boomed expansively, then collapsed (Lekson, p. 69)

    to 1250

    Cahokia, Mississippi, at its height. (Mann p. 291)

    945

    to 1030

    Chetro Ketl construction and occupation — Type I masonry (Frazier p. 78)

    936

    to 957

    Sliding Ruin in Chinle area of Navajo Reservation in Arizona constructed (Frazier p. 77)

    930

    to 960

    Una Vida underwent expansions (Stuart)

    920

    to 925

    The earliest construction at Pueblo Bonito, in which 17 rooms had hearths (Frazier p. 157)

    919

    First year of construction for Pueblo Bonito

    Oldest beam cut for Pueblo Bonito (from a tree that was 219 years old when cut) (Frazier p. 76)

    900

    Chacoans began construction in the early 900s at Penasco Blanco, Pueblo Bonito, and Una Vida…. They gave them all remarkable similar floor plans. They created a line of large circular pit structures in the plaza. Behind them they build a row of large ramada-living rooms, a second row of large featureless rooms, and in the rear, a third row of smaller storage rooms. They formed above-ground rectangular rooms into suites, each of which consisted of a ramada-living room, a large room, and paired storage rooms. This pattern of rooms is remarkably similar to smaller sites built in Chaco and in the surrounding area at the same time. —Pages 174-175 (Frazier) See Author Note The Anasazi Buildings of Chaco Canyon: Largest “Apartments” in the World.

    By 900 there were hints of hierarchy [in the Hohokam] not within but between towns, with the largest occupying positions of control at the heads of canal systems—positions of power. (Lekson)

    We propose that these southerners [from Mexico, mainly the Toltecs]…entered the San Juan basin around A.D. 900 and found a suspicious but pliant population whom they terrorized into reproducing the theocratic lifestyle they had previously known in Mesoamerica. This involved heavy payments of tribute, constructing the Chaco system of great houses and roads, and providing victims for ceremonial sacrifice. The Mexicans achieved their objectives through the use of warfare, violent example, and terrifying cult ceremonies that included human sacrifice and cannibalism. Turner/Man Corn pp. 482-483

    Atlatl and snares had completely disappeared from Mogollon inventory (Martin, p. 75)

    Conch trumpets were first found in ruins of Southwest (Frazier p. 168)

    Guadalupe Ruin, easternmost outlier at 54 miles southeast of Chaco, built in this mid- to late-century (Frazier p. 145)

    Middle of this decade, the great Maya city-states collapsed [Toltecs?] (Stuart)

    The feathered serpent [Xipe Totec] appears in Anasazi rock and kiva art sometime after 900 (Turner p. 466)

    Toltec expeditions reached the southern outposts of Mogollon culture (perhaps even Anasazi) (source?)

    Toltec invaders entered the San Juan Basin around this time, the inhabitants of which they began to terrorize with social-control cannibalism (Turner)

    After this date, relations between the Southwest and Mesoamerica became notably more formal and “patterned” (Lekson, p. 137)

    First hints of hierarchy among Hohokam (Lekson p. 232)

    La Quemada crashed (Lekson, p. 63)

    Before this date, Cotton and Clylcimeris shell armlets were widely imported from the south (Lekson, p. 68)

    Cahokia (across the Mississippi from St. Louis) rose rapidly (Lekson, p. 115)

    Three Great Houses built in Chaco Canyon by this time (Lekson p. 234)

    At this time, only a few elite Chacoan families at most (Lekson p. 236)

    Mesa Verde’s Mummy Lake was likely not built to store water. It was built as a…

     

    to 1000 

    (Pueblo II): skull from this period found in Pueblo Bonito of 45-60-year-old male with dental transfiguration (Turner)

    As Chacoan society blossomed in the A.D. 900s and early 1000s, it probably incorporate several once-isolated tribal groups speaking different languages…. As Chacoan society came undone, those ancient linguistic, social, and religious differences would have been rich fodder for ethnic and tribal hatreds acted out in the uplands…[just as] Yugoslavia in the mid-1990s threw off…Tito’s nation and returned to medieval society. —Stuart/Anasazi America p. 143

    to 1030

    Pueblo II culture

    to 1040

    Early Pueblo II; Earlly Bonito Phase; Pots: Red Mesa b/w, narrow neckbanded (sand); Small-house aggregation and sharp increase, greathouses appear in numbers in San Juan Basin; Major population rise, beginnings of turquoise industry and crafts, corn ubiquitous in sites, water-control systems appear (Tom Windes)

    to 1050

    Precipitation at Chaco was unpredictable (Frazier p. 181, from Judge)

    to 1100

    Road networks built in Schroeder (where? source?)

    to 1125

    Chaco emerges as first regional center of Chacoan culture (Frazier p. 234, from Lekson)

    to 1150

    Pueblo II: Chacoan florescence; “Great Houses,” great kivas, roads, etc., in many but not all regions; “unit pueblos” composed of a kiva and small surface masonry room block; corrugated gray and elaborate black-on-white pottery plus decorated red or orange types in some areas (Roberts from Lipe) [Note: Frazier, p. 81, claims Pueblo II is 900 to 1030]

    to 940

    First Chaco building period: Penasco Blanco, Pueblo Bonito, Una Vida (Frazier p. 174+. From Lekson)

    from 200

    Mayan culture at its height (Mann p. 304)

    to 1000

    Roads and colonnades appeared at Chaco Canyon, after La Quemada, whith its elaborate system of causeway roads and colonnades crashed in 900 (Lekson, p. 63)

    to 950

    Hohokam canals had reached levels of technological and organizational complexity unprecedented in the Southwest and indeed most of North America — well beyond the control of village-level authority (Lekson, p. 81)

    to 1150

    Hohokam began its long slide down while Chaco pumped itself up; Mimbres, once closely allied to Hohokam, shifted its alliance north to Chaco (Lekson, p. 106)

    The biggest, busiest, and best in the long history of the Plateau (including Chaco) (Lekson, p. 111)

    Interactions at a distance were impressive: Tula in central Mexico and Chichen Itza more than 1,000 kilometers away replicated in remarkable detail each other’s major monuments (Lekson p. 234)

    to 1125

    Dubbed the Pax Chaco, a remarkable era of peace blessed the countryside (Lekson, p. 129)

    to 1200

    Chaco leaders kept the peace, promoted general welfare, enhanced its own glory, and got things done (Lekson p. 235) — and also used social-control cannibalism according to Turner

    From 900 to 1200 AD Chaco kept the peace, promoted the general welfare and got things done.

    Many things came to Chaco and stayed there, in the service of the kings. Maize moved into and through the canyon, from places that had plenty to places that had none. Consequently, violence and raiding almost ceased. Its success, from 900 to 1000, allowed Chaco’s leaders to expand their horizons. Its influence soon reached far beyond its original domain…. Local leaders almost everywhere on the Plateau joined with or deferred to Chaco…. From 900 to 1200, Chaco kept the peace, promoted the general welfare, enhanced its own glory, and got things done. —Lekson p. 235

    One day in 1993, [physical anthropologist Christy G.] Turner and David Wilcox plotted the three dozen cannibalism sites on a large map. “Suddenly,” Turner recalled, “we had a kind of ‘Eureka!’ Nearly every site lay close to a Chaco outlier. And the dates were right—between 900 and 1200. Roberts/Old Ones, pp. 159-160

    880

    to 900

    Center of Anasazi population was around upper San Juan and southeastern Utah (Lekson, p. 99)

    875

    to 925

    Late Pueblo I to Early Pueblo II; Early Bonito Phase; Pots: Kiatuthlanna @ Red Mesa b/w, Lino Gray & Kana’a Neckbanded; Above-ground slab-house sites, small to moderate in size; Shift from dry to wet period (Tom Windes)

    860

    There were at least twenty major Pueblo I village sites with an average of 123 above-ground rooms and fifteen or more pit structures (Lekson, p. 95)

    At least one third to one half of the known population in the Anasazi world was in the Northern San Juan, a relatively small corner of the Anasazi region (Lekson, p. 98)

    856

    Nomads known as Chichimecs from Aztlán migrated into the northern end of the Valley of Mexico and founded the capital of the Toltec empire, Tula, 54 miles northwest of Mexico City (Waters, p. 117)

    850

    Earliest room construction at Pueblo Bonito this decade, not 900s as originally thought (Frazier p. 229, from Windes)

    Hohokam intervillage squabbles reached levels of warfare (Lekson p. 233)

    to 1000

    At least 10,000 farmsteads were established and agriculture reached its widest geographical limits, never to be reached again in prehistoric times (Stuart)

    to 864

    Longest, wettest period during the 800s (Frazier p. 231)

    to 900

    Chaco Great Houses began, reaching critical mass around 1000 (Lekson, p. 123)

    to 1150

    Pueblo Bonito built (Lekson p. 234)

    840

    to 860

    Late Basketmaker, Pueblo I, and early Pueblo II cultures coexisted (Stuart)

    to 880

    Center of Anasazi population was around Montezuma Valley/Great Sage Plains/Dolores (Lekson, p. 99)

    830

    to 840

    Pueblo II period had begun with the first construction of small blocks of masonry surface rooms on the margins of open valleys (Stuart)

    828

    to 1126

    Pueblo Bonito…was built by the Ancestral Puebloans, who occupied the structure between AD 828 and 1126. (Wikipedia, “Pueblo Bonito”)

    825

    to 850

    Mimbres Three Circle Phase, when lots of really big sites popped up — this means canals really kicked in about this time (Lekson, p. 94)

    810

    to 860

    Center of Anasazi population was around Mesa Verde, Mancos (Lekson, p. 98)

    800

    Community houses emerged as people became more agrarian (Stuart)

    Cultures near Taos, New Mexico, and the Gallina highlands flanking the west side of the Jemez Caldera turned their backs on the emerging Chacoan world and refused to trade with them (Stuart)

    Pueblo Bonito built and occupied from mid-800s to 1300s (NPS.gov)

    Pueblo Bonito founded sometime in this century (Stuart)

    Pueblo I structures began having enclosed ramadas (Mexican influence?) (Frazier p. 90)

    Una Vida constructed in mid 800s and inhabited until mid-1100s (NPS.gov)

    Una Vida constructed shortly after this date (Stuart)

    By this time, the Plateau was lurching toward war — not organized armies, but farily widespread and constant killing, driving people into large villages (Lekson, p. 100)

    Metallurgy reached West Mexico from the Pacific coast (Lekson, p. 114)

    Great Houses reappeared on the Plateau — not among the Uto-Aztecan kin in the west, but among the native peoples of the eastern Plateau (Lekson p. 232)

    to 1000

    [D]uring this protracted period of Toltec cultural strife, between roughly A.D. 800 and 1000, waves of diverse Mexican traits were carried into the American Southwest by cultists, priests, warriors, pilgrims, traders, miners, farmers, and others fleeing or displaced by the widespread unrest and civil war in central Mexico. —Turner/Man Corn p. 463

    to 875

    Pueblo I; White Mound Phase; Pots: Whitemound b/w, Lino Gray; Classic above-ground slab row house sites, small to moderate size, first greathouses appear; Major increase in storage facilities (Tom Windes)

    to 900

    In Chaco Canyon itself, game was already so scarce that it could not provide even 10% of the daily diet; dried meat had to be imported; the Pueblo I pithouses in the Navajo Lake District to the north had become palisaded strongholds and refused to trade with Chaco (Stuart)

    to 1100

    Aztatlan “horizon,” a series of city centers along 800 kilometers of the West Coast of Mexico linked by long-distance trade to Mesoamerica (Lekson, p. 114)

    780

    Small Pueblo I settlement across canyon from Una Vida begun: site 627 (Stuart)

    770

    to 830

    Center of Anasazi population was in southeastern Utah (Lekson, p. 98)

    750

    to 900

    Pueblo I: Large villages in some areas; unit pueblos of “proto-kiva,” plus surface room block of jacal or crude masonry; great kivas; plain and neck-banded gray pottery with low frequencies of black-on-white and decorated red ware (Roberts from Lipe)

    750

    Glycimeris shell armlets became a staple of Hohokam sites (Lekson, p. 59)

    Most of the Mogollon region before this time were essentially upland Hohokam (Lekson, p. 64)

    By this year, Teotihuacan was gone, removed to myth (Lekson, p. 79)

    to 810

    Blue Mesa-Ridges Basin, with limited occupation into the 830s (Lekson, p. 97)

    Center of Anasazi population was around Durango (Lekson, p. 98)

    700

    People became Hohokam. Perhaps the most conspicuous and widespread markers of Hohokam were armlets of Glycimeris shell. Bivalve shells from the Gulf of California were carefully shaped into armlets and sometimes carved with symbols—birds carrying snakes, desert toads, and the like. Shell bracelets or armlets became a badge or marker of Hohokam; they had once been rarities, but after 700 they were ubiquitous. Someone in every sizable settlement had armlets prominently displayed on an upper arm. (Lekson)

    Intervillage squabbles escalated after 700, occasionally reaching levels approaching warfare by 850. Increasing violence also called for leaders, military or diplomatic. (Lekson p. 233)

    Reed cigarettes appeared in Mogollon culture (Martin p. 99)

    Cotton became economically important to Hohokam (Lekson, p. 59)

    Hohokam defined by ball courts, red-on-buff pottery, stone pallets, complex cremation burial ritual; crashed by 1150 (Lekson, p. 80)

    By this time, dozens of sizable pit house village crowded the low terraces where creeks and rives left the mountains and flowed into the Chihuahuan Desert of southwestern New Mexico (Mimbres Mogollon) (Lekson, p. 89)

    Mimbres heated up when red-on-brown pottery showed up and riverside village became established and lasted as long as three centuries (Lekson, p. 94)

    Intervillage squabbles escalated among Hohokam after this time, approaching levels of warfare by 850 (Lekson p. 233)

    to 800

    Early Pueblo I; White Mound Phase; Pots: Whitemound b/w, Lino Gray; Deep pithouses that are dispersed; sparse storage facilities (Tom Windes)

    to 900

    The 934 known Basketmaker sites from this period increased to 1,174 Pueblo I sites by the end of this period (Stuart)

    to 1000

    Hohokam villages consisted of central plaza surrounded by single-room house clustered in threes or fours around courtyard (Lekson, p. 23)

    Evidence of the introduction of cotton fiber to Anasazi land via trade routes through Mesoamerica. With the cotton fiber comes the technologically advanced back strap loom and the vertical frame loom. (Chronology of Textiles and Fiber Art in New Mexico) See Author Note: Anasazi Footwear: Shoe-Socks and Sandals.

    to 800s

    A tight package of cultural practices came together that define Hohokam (Lekson, p. 58)

    Hohokam figurines all but disappeared, replaced by ritual mounds (Lekson, p. 62)

    Chaco Great Houses originated in the northern San Juan region (Lekson, p. 123)

    to 950

    Hohokam exploded outward, then shrank back in on Phoenix (Lekson, p. 69)

    Perhaps the most dynamic in the history of the Southwest (Lekson, p. 78)

    to 900

    Most, and all of the largest, ball courts were built (as a technique for political decision-making that is not clear to science, art, and industry) (Lekson, p. 86)

    to 1130

    The tenfold Anasazi population growth could not have happened through increased birthrate alone. (Wikipedia)

    to 1300

    Six rooms and a kiva basic form of Anasazi village

    650

    Teotihuacan culture in Mexico looted and violently destroyed (by whom?)

    Toltec culture began to develop from the ashes of the Teotihuacan culture in Central Mexico

    to 750

    Grand Gulch on Cedar Mesa in Utah inhabited again, then abandoned again (Roberts p. 131)

    La Quemada hit is stride, ending around 900 (Lekson, p. 63)

    600

    First in a long line of black-on-white Anasazi pottery type appeared (Lekson, p. 57)

    By this date, Plateau potters quit digging clay in creek bottoms and began mining pottery clays from geological strata, grinding and tempering them, and firing them a good gray color (Lekson, p. 57)

    Teotihuacan collapsed with great violence (Lekson, p. 79)

    to 700

    Late Basketmaker III; La Plata Phase; Pots: La Plata b/w, Lino & Obelisk Grays; Shallow pithouses that are dispersed; Moderate storage facilities (surface cists) (Tom Windes)

    Pit houses became uniform in design (Stuart)

    to 750

    Burial ideas changed, from one of taboo places away from homes, to burial in abandoned pit houses and nearby kitchen middens — another evidence of shift from hunter-gatherer to farmers (Stuart)

    to 800

    Road networks built in La Quemada, Mexico

    585

    Radiocarbon date of one Basketmaker site in Chaco Canyon (Frazier p. 90)

    550

    Basketmaker III really heated up (Lekson, p. 65)

    After the fall of Teotihuacan, Southwest Big House leaders emulated the southern kings of Mesoamerica. 

    The fall of Teotihuacán [thirty miles northeast of modern-day Mexico City] (about 550) sent tsunamis of political power outward, rulers looking for places to rule. In the following decades, displaced, dispersing elites transformed cities and towns throughout Mesoamerica.…Petty chiefs and Big House leaders [of the Four Corners]…were tempted to emulate southern kings. —Lekson p. 231

    Teotihuacan collapsed with great violence (Lekson, p. 79 & 231)

    to 600

    Teotihuacan crashed (Lekson, p. 62)

    to 950

    Late Pithouse Period for, particularly, the Mimbred Mogollon (Lekson, p. 89)

    500

    After this date, “the severe, magnificent tapering-bodied anthropomorphs of Basketmaker II grow smaller, ‘cuter,’ squatter, and more triangular.” (Roberts p. 179)

    Some years before this, Cave 7 in Whiskers Draw [where is this? Near Blanding, Utah, I think] more than ninety men, women, and children were killed, perhaps ritually executed, many were scalped and tortured before death (Roberts p. 186, from Turner)

    Cotton arrived in Arizona Hohokam region (Lekson, p. 59)

    La Quemada began (Lekson, p. 63)

    Teotihuacan was the principal fact of central Mexico and all points north (Lekson, p. 79)

    to 600

    Basketmaker III; La Plata Phase; Pots: La Plata b/w, Lino & Obelisk Grays; Shallow pithouses, two aggregated great communities with great kivas appear; Moderate storage facilities (surface cists) (Tom Windes)

    to 750

    Basketmaker III: Habitation is deep pithouse plus surface storage pits, cists, or rooms; plain gray pottery, small frequencies of black-on-white pottery; bow and arrow replaces atlatl; beans added to cultigens (Roberts from Lipe)

    to 700

    Hohokam socially differentiated with oversized or special architecture fronting plazas at Snaketown and Valencia Vieja, with beginnings of mortuary practices that indicate ritual and political leaders (Lekson, p. 58, citing Wallace and Lindeman)

    450

    A slipped redware was added to Hohokam and Mogollon assemblages but not to those of the Anasazi, who instead began to paint images on their pottery 56)

    to 500

    First beans and first pottery coincide (Roberts p. 185)

    to 525

    Hohokam populations aggregated (Lekson, p. 58)

    400

    From this year onward, corn cob size increased (Stuart)

    A horizon of small pit houses sites, all sharing a common brownware, extended from southern New Mexico and Southern Arizona (and probably northern Sonora and Chihuahua) north to the San Juan River drainage (Lekson, p. 56)

    Canal technology of Tucson and Land Between spread into the Phoenix Basin (Lekson, p. 59)

    Late this century, new, more productive corn arrived in Arizona Hohokam area (Lekson, p. 59)

    to 500

    Late Basketmaker II; Brownware Phase; Pots: Obelisk Gray & brownware (Tom Windes)

    to 750

    Late Basketmaker period (Stuart)

    to 500

    Substrate of agricultural pit houses using brownware pottery (Lekson, p. 47)

    to 700

    The archaeological patterns we call Anasazi, Hohokam, and Mogollon emerged (Lekson, p. 49)

    Teuchitlan cities, with their round, terraced, wedding-cake pyramids, flourished (Lekson, p. 63)

    to 500

    Teotihuacan peaked (Lekson, p. 62)

    300

    By this time the Teotihuacan culture dominated much of central Mexico

    to 400

    Pottery came to Four Corners area (Stuart)

    200

    Dental transfiguration began in Northern Mexico (Nuevo León)

    to 400

    Grand Gulch on Cedar Mesa in Utah first inhabited, then abandoned (Roberts p. 131)

    to 900

    Mayan culture at its height (Mann p. 304)

    to 500

    Best dates for brownware pottery in Four Corners Plateau (Lekson, p. 46)

    to 550

    Early Mimbre and other Mogollon areas had a notable predilection for high places: buttes, mesas, hilltops — notably unlike Hohokam, who lived down by the river (Lekson, p. 64)

    to 950

    Teotihuacan dominated Mesoamerica, sending emissaries and enclaves to the heart of the Maya region and to the north (Lekson p. 228)

    150

    Settlements in pre-Hohokam culture changed from intermittent to permanent (Lekson, p. 58)

    to 200

    Best dates for brownware pottery in Four Corners deserts (Lekson, p. 46)

    100

    Macaws found in ruins of Hohokam culture (Frazier p. 168)

    The more livable portions of the Chacoan plateau were occupied, beginning the political tensions of over-crowding (Lekson, p. 128)

    50

    to 500

    Basketmaker II (late): Habitation is shallow pithouse plus storage pits or cists; no pottery; atlatl and dart; corn and squash but no beans (Roberts from Lipe)

    1

    Incense burners found in Hohokam ruins at least this far back (Frazier p. 168)

    Water tables rose in SW, meaning more constantly flowing streams, springs, more ponds (Stuart)

    Teotihuacan began, peaked 400-500, crashed 550-600 (Lekson, p. 62)

    to 300

    Bow and arrow appeared, imported from northern Great Plains (Stuart)

    to 400

    Early Basketmaker period (Stuart)

    -100

    States had convincingly risen in Mesoamerica (Lekson, p. 63)

    to 400

    Hopewell occupied (Lekson, p. 47)

    -161

    “The famous Cato, a dour and hard-fisted old farmer, who treated his own slaves as they aged with notorious callousness, was then censor, an office with wide powers over morals and manners. Though himself an able speaker, he was hostile to those who taught the art. In 161 B.C., teachers of rhetoric were expelled from Rome.” (Stone, p. 42) This is an example of how the rich and powerful of a society that ultimately collapsed quashes free speech and the education of common citizens.

    -200

    The centralized and stratified Teotihuacan culture began developing in the Valley of Mexico

    -300

    Cooking, storing, and serving pottery first appears in Mogollon culture (Martin p. 83)

    -500

    500 BC – Around this date, waves of Uto-Aztecan speakers moved onto the western Four Corners Anasazi plateau (Lekson, p. 46)

    Beans appeared in the American Southwest (Stuart)

    How Old is the Earth? How the Bible Timeline Fits with Earth’s Geologic & Archaeological Prehistory.

    I believe the Hebrew Old Testament was created as a response to ancient-academic histories. Just as Pharaoh Ptolemy commissioned Manetho to write Aegyptiaca, the History of Egypt in the 3rd century BC, modern scholarship seems to point toward Ezra as they key figure in assembling a sizable team of Israel’s best post-exilic scholar-priests to write the history of the world through the Jewish lens from the libraries and best resources they had in 491 BC. (Before both Herodotus’ Histories & Menetho’s Aegyptiaca)

    From my experience reading fascinating channeled texts such as those written by mystics like John Ballou Newbrough (1828–1891) or John S.M. Ward (1885 – 1949), I suspect Ezra also employed skilled prophetic mystics who claimed the ability to channel/reveal large sections of impressive historic works through a type of revelation which allowed them to see history in a condensed visionary and symbolic/meaningful way. (read their impressive works here)

    These scholar/mystics either foreran or followed ancient scholars like Plato, Ptolemy & Hipparchus in computing the ‘great year‘ or prophetic/symbolic version of the procession of the equinoxes. This ‘Platonic Year’ as it came to be known was a system of mystical knowledge based on the actual astronomical calculations for the length of the cycle it takes for the stars to precess and then return into their original locations. A process that relates to being able to prophecy or predict lunar & solar eclipses, as well as the metonic cycle (upon which the Jewish calendar is largely based) and which involves the mystical numbers of 7, 70, & 490 from jewish prophetic texts. (70×360°=25,500 & 490×52=25,500)

    However, even though I sympathize with those who see the first chapters of Genesis as a literal accounts of the earth’s 7000 year creation. I believe it makes far more intellectual and spiritual sense to see those chapters as an incredibly creative and sophisticated way of weaving the true sequence and key points of creation together with an inspired ancient prophetic timeline which seeks to condense and symbolize the earth’s long history into a shorter predictive system of sevens based on lunar-solar cycles as well as larger astronomical cycles.

    Timeline correlations

    It’s significant to note that Genesis is separated into three main sections separated into sets of ten, pointing to its highly symbolic nature. These are; 1. Then ten demigods. 2. The ten Patriarchs 3. The history of the current cycle.

    First in its timeline are the ten demigods. Most ancient histories of Ezra’s day started with the demigod’s of their culture with lifespans ranging from the hundreds to the tens of thousands. An account of many such ancient demigod genealogies can be read about in Diodorus and Eusibus Chronicle here. (Both the oldest Babylonian & Egyptian histories started with the demigods.)

    For Ezra, he seems to have employed exactly ten demigods between creation and flood, followed by exactly ten patriarchs between the flood and Abraham (the father of his people). The number ten in each case seems to be symbolizing a complete age, and fulfilling multiple purposes in his chronology. By making each demigod have a lifespan approximating 1000 years he seems to symbolize an Egyptian concept of a full ‘age’ or cycle of heavenly time. Joseph Smith attempted to explain this in saying.

    And I, Abraham, had the Urim and Thummim, which the Lord my God had given unto me, in Ur of the Chaldees; And I saw the stars, that they were very great, and that one of them was nearest unto the throne of God; and there were many great ones which were near unto it; And the Lord said unto me, by the Urim and Thummim, that Kolob was after the manner of the Lord, according to its times and seasons in the revolutions thereof; that one revolution was a day unto the Lord, after his manner of reckoning, it being one thousand years according to the time appointed unto that whereon thou standest. This is the reckoning of the Lord’s time, according to the reckoning of Kolob. (Book of Abraham 3:1–4) As also “Kolob, signifying the first creation, nearest to the celestial, or the residence of God. First in government, the last pertaining to the measurement of time. The measurement according to celestial time, which celestial time signifies one day to a cubit. One day in Kolob is equal to a thousand years according to the measurement of this earth, which is called by the Egyptians Jah-oh-eh.” (facsimile 2, figure 1)

    This concept is further explained in the channeled apocryphal work, Oahspe. Where the Egyptian cycle is called a ‘dan’ and is said to equate to roughly 2500-3500 years of earth’s orbit wherein it passes through a celestial zodiac and makes a complete “harvest of souls” before a time of cosmic destruction. (add reference & quote). Therefore according to Oahspe, the ten demigods would roughly represent 10 past cycles of time which approximated 3000 years each, much like the Platonic Great Year of ~25,000. By adding 2 such sequences of 10 (the demigod plus the patriarchs), Ezra may have meant to equate his symbolic timeline to 70,000 years. Seven thousand years short of the important cosmic processional number of 77,400 years. Or a period of 3 great years.

    Dualistically, Ezra may have used specific numbers slightly less than 1000 to encode crytpic cypers in a way that accorded with Egyptian or Babylonian records for Menes, called Aegyptus and the father of the Egyptian race (according with Hermes in Greek). Note that in Oahspe, the timeline of Abraham is used to dualistically symbolize an entire age of ~2500 years. [finish this….]

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    UNDER CONSTRUCTION FROM THIS POINT

    -From The Book of Inspiration in Oahspe: THE TOWER OF BABEL WAS A DAN’HA DESTRUCTION. It is what destroyed the cycle of Zarathustra. Abraham, probably lived through it and was the dispensational head of the next cycle. He is the ‘master’ spoken of in the Kolbrin as well as the Osiris/Imhotep mentioned in the Law of One who lived through the initial construction of the pyramids (which were then enlarged by Joseph who may have also taken the name Imhotep/??)

    [the intro featured image to this should be the timeline… but I should really pack a TON of info and color into it]

    Outline.

    Put on both web sites. This is where you should explain how the fight between religion & science has ruined both. Each takes an extreme position and the truth is in the middle.

    Moses 1 is the key. It explains clearly that Moses’ revelation of the earth is only PARTIAL, and gives an account ONLY of this cycle of THIS earth. In verse 30 Moses essentially asks “why did you create the universe (heavens), earth, it continents (lands) and people?” And god makes it clear that he is not going to answer that question. He responds in verse 31, “For mine own purpose have I made these things. Here is wisdom and it remaineth in me” (Moses 1:31)

    Discontent with being denied an answer, Moses tries a more specific question, “Be merciful unto thy servant, O God, and tell me concerning this earth, and the inhabitants thereof, and also the heavens, and then thy servant will be content.”

    The answer given to Moses question is confused in translation, as we have lost common usage of the idiom “the heavens and earth shall pass away”. The ancients understood well that the history of the earth was one of global destruction and re-creation.

    38 And as one earth shall pass away, and the heavens thereof even so shall another come; and there is no end to my works, neither to my words…

    40 And now, Moses, my son, I will speak unto thee concerning this earth upon which thou standest; and thou shalt write the things which I shall speak.

    We have thought this mean, I’m going to tell you about the planet earth, and its creation and history. But it is actually saying I will tell you about THIS CYCLE of earth (heavens & earth)

    Rewrite the above, and summarize a bit better. To just explain that its a “symbolic summary”.

    Texts such as the Kolbrin (which contains interesting material supposedly pre-dating the Bible) suggests that the bible was NOT meant to be taken literally in it pre-Moses timespans. Revealed texts such as Oahspe, and Joseph Smith’s Book of Moses also make this clear, although the talking snake (Egyptian apep, god of the under world) and woman coming from man’s rib should be enough of a hint that the formative periods of the book are meant to be a deeply symbolic metaphor.

    Howver, what many might not have considered is that Genesis is actually meant to accord or roughly correspond to the visions seen by Moses (according to LDS theology–see Moses ch. 2) or seen by the adepts of old (see Oahspe) concerning the formation of the earth. In fact for a modern example of this, see J.S.M. Ward’s vision of the formation of the earth here. This would explain why it begins with details of the formation of energy/light, the galaxy, the planets and the plants and animals. For a more detailed ancient view of those parts of the bible, see the opening books of the Kolbrin (Link).

    In correlating the bible with Geology, I believe the important geophysical events such as the creation of earth, the creation of animals (and beginnings of them dying and making fossils) as well as The Flood and separation of the Continents at Peleg at least seem to be put in the correct order, but then superimposed upon the narrative of mankind so as to create a timeline which correlates natural science with scripture. (ie. Things start living and dying in both the Garden of Eden and Cambrian Explosion, then there’s a Great Dying at the Flood/Permian Extinction, then there’s a separation of the continents at Peleg/Pangea, and then a general march to the conditions of today.

    As I know there are many Jews, Muslims and Creationists who visit this site, I offer the following Geologic/Scriptural correlation that is at least somewhat rational. (Which is more than I can say for the majority of creationist biblical correlations out there). Take it for what it’s worth even though it is only meant to represent what I believe the writers might have intended or perhaps even thought in the way they saw the earth’s progression through time.

    AND NOTE. The ONLY rational placement of a Global Flood is with one of the two mega-extinction events such as the Great Permian Extinction superimposing geologic events over the human timeline. Any other placement comes up against insurmountable problems. Also the separation of the ‘land’ or continents at Peleg can match only with the separation of Pangea in the Permian. The following correlation would have to assume things like 1. Current Radiometric dates are off by millions of years. 2. Man existed in the early geologic record but left no trace in the fossil record. 3. Rates of erosion and deposition in the deep past occurred under uniformitarian principles, but at vastly higher rates because of the draining of creation and flood waters from the land over hundreds of years. 4. Oogenesis is driven by rapid pole shift, not convection cells.

    Biblical Actualism– A Novel Young Earth Model

    Radiometric dating correlation curve showing hypothetical correlations between actual dates (bottom x axis) and hypothesized, highly skewed radiocarbon dates (left y axis) and Ar/ar & Uranium series dates. If galactic conditions involving vastly different relativistic conditions (and neutrino flux?) caused vastly faster decay in the past, then those geologic dates would skew progressively younger the farther back you go. On the other hand, largely different solar conditions might cause radiocarbon dates to skew in a wholly different timeline.
    My Brother’s chart showing a possible literal or symbolic correlation between true prehistory and the events of scripture. If symbolic, the adepts who authored the bible (chiefly the Egyptian Moses) may have attempted to create correlations to from events they saw in vision to those they saw in vision (including a “separation of the earth” during Peleg matching Pangea’s separation, a global flood matching the End Permian extinction, etc…
    see Lambert Dolphin’s population calculations for if known numbers are even viable.

    under construction:

    The Bible
    1- The 10 patriarchs from before the flood,
    2- 10 patriarchs from after the flood to Babel/Abraham,
    3-Babel/Abraham to present

    Matching with New Age literature of both Oahspe, Law of One and Occultist like Blavatsky
    1-Mu/Lemuria, 75-50k BP. (matching with antediluvians). see LOO 10.15
    2-Atlantis, 50-25k BP (matching with Noah to Abraham)
    3-Current Cycle

    Problems with literally trying to Match with Geologic Time
    1-Paleozoic. People would have to had lived on a Precambrian bedrock craton, which we’d have to suggest has been subducted somewhere since there’s ZERO evidence of it. (Some have suggest Lemuria or Mu are under the Antartic ice cap, or sunk in the continental crust around New Zealand… Animals would have had to have spread from the proverbial “garden of Eden” of this lost continent and slowly have begun filling the earth and creating the illusion of fossil/faunal succession from their reproduction/dispersion rates. They would have had to be evolutionarily ancient (likely more ape or big-foot like, which is what law of one says, and had the capability of breathing a VERY different atmosphere). They would have been obliterated at the Permian Extinction. Coincidentally, the Bible and NewAge literature make these assumptions
    2-Mesozoic. Again, people would have lived on a Precambrian bedrock craton in a world and atmosphere of the dinosaurs. Here, their foods and plants would have just begun to proliferate but not made any meaningful inroads into the fossil record until the very end. All early hominids would need to be reassessed based on their geologic provenance, pushing the evolution of man back over 200 million years.
    3-Cenozoic. During Cenozoic times, flora and fauna quickly become modern. This would have to correlate with the period symbolized in the Bible by the Tower of Babel/Abraham where remnants of Giants and Nephalim still roam the earth and things quickly become modern.

    Matching with Ice Ages Somehow
    1- Wisconsin, the last ice age ENDED with Abraham/Current cycle. (this is totally unworkable)
    2- Illinoisan,
    3- Pre Illinioan: late Mesozoic glacial periods

    GET AARON TO WRITE A FICTIONAL STORY ON THIS.

    -The most important part of this imaginative fictional story is the idea: what if religion and science actually tell the same story?
    -Aliens have been on this earth planet seeding since the Cambrian explosion.
    -They lived with highly sophisticated space ships, taking them on and off planet every since life began on earth.
    -They coexisted with dinosaurs of the Mesozoic and giant trees and dragonflies of the Paleozoic.
    -What story could we tell here? I’m picturing something like avatar or ewok adventures that really captures the best parts of the massive plants and animals of the past, but has humans coexisting with them.
    -It needs to be marketed to creationists AND MUSLIMS! (which would require finding out what they believe of Adam and eve)
    -It needs to really re-tell the story of Adam and Eve. And it needs to travel through time somehow.
    -WHATS THE STORY? Maybe the idea I once had of the kid in North Korea who had no idea there was a bigger world around him, and then he goes to a space base, and the tables turn and now its the whole world that has no idea there’s a bigger world of interconnected off-planet people around them. Perhaps in the orientation you could introduce TIME-TRAVEL, which is under STRICT guard not to be used under the rules of non-intervention. But in this case THEY HAVE TO BE USED. Why would the time travel be needed?

    -A big part of this movie needs to be like a near death experience. With the higher dimensional beings explaining to the hero how reality works. How gods are all connected ‘as ONE’, and how they occasionally intervene in earth’s affairs. But most importantly, how an aspect of ourselves is part of that ONENESS, and how our hero has been reincarnated over and over but now needs to go back in time to

    Mormon Modesty (What I’d Like My Daughters to Know)

    This is mostly a rough draft of my thoughts on modesty and advice for my daughters. Things I hope they’ll remember as they navigate this difficult issue.

    1. THERE ARE NO ABSOLUTES in dress standards. In the 1800s LDS and Christian women had a FAR different standard of modesty than today.  In fact, even today, LDS and Christian saints in some parts of the world are expected to dress differently and cover more or less of themselves than in other parts of the world. And I get that the unequal expectations on girls and women in dress standards seems unfair. But there’s actually a really good reason for it that I hope you can come to understand by reading this and talking to me.

    2. DRESS IS A FORM OF COMMUNICATION. The way you dress says something, just as if you wore a sign on your shirt or forehead. The problem is that WHAT IT COMMUNICATES IS OFTEN AMBIGUOUS. If you walk down the street in a miniskirt and stickers on your nipples, many guys are going to think you are TRYING to communicate something like “I’m sexually available, please make advances on me”. In fact they are going to think that anytime you push the envelope of what is socially “acceptable”. And the things that men think about you are NOT ENTIRELY YOUR RESPONSIBILITY,  (although if you strongly push the envelope of accepted norms you can’t be surprised when guys think you’re attempted to communicate corresponding levels of sexual availability to them!) But it is something your going to have to deal with—so be smart about it.  If a boy gets a tattoo on his forehead that says something provocative like DTF, he’s sending a message. And whether he meant to communicate “Dare To Fly” or “Down To F#&%” might not matter as much as what OTHERS THINK HE’S TRYING TO COMMUNICATE.  So he’s going to have to deal with that in the work place, and social arena and all parts of his life. This is no different with your clothing.  Understand what different types of apparel communicate to men and other girls and make sure that’s the message you want to send.

    What you wear to church or school or the swimming pool communicates something different to all the people who look at you. (Just like the type of house you live in or car you drive or bumper stickers & shirt slogans you sport). Become savvy to what you are communicating by your apparel and take responsibility for it.  But at the same time you are only responsible to a certain extent–and that extent is dictated by society as a whole NOT BY SOME FRINGE ASPECT of society.  Some will tell you that “you are NOT responsible for other people’s thoughts”. Others will tell you “You ARE LARGELY responsible for other people’s thoughts”. Both of these are extreme stances of a complex situation.  The truth is, society at large makes the rules for what’s “normal” and you as a youth must learn what is “normal” or mainstream and then decide whether you want to push the envelope of those norms or be conservative in keeping those norms.  I hope you’ll consult with me to get a feel for what’s mainstream in our social circle and be sure that you are communicating intelligently within those bounds.

    But I hope you internalize this ONE takeaway. Boys are biologically programmed to interpret the way you push the envelope of dress standards to equate with your sexual availability. Just like a courting bird that ruffles her feathers or a cat in heat that walks past potential sex partners with their tail in the air, when you expose more of your body than is normal for the situation, boys will see it as an invitation to hit on you and explore your sexual availability. Be ready for it. And be firm in helping them know your intentions. If you dress provocatively… don’t be surprised when you largely attracted guys you want to sexually use you and then throw you away!

    3. CLOTHING SHOULD PRIMARILY BE A TOOL. A BODY SHOULD NOT. Use clothing wisely, use it selflessly. It can keep you warm or cool you off. But you can also use clothing to gain power over others. You can use your body to gain power over others. You can use it as an object just as you would use other objects which equate to power. Power in social status, Power in sexuality, Power in relationships. Attractive bodies can be powerful. And you can use that power selfishly or unselfishly. I hope you try and use the way you dress to polarize toward selflessness. The more selfless you are, the easier your relationships are going to be to maintain.

    Try to use your body, and the clothes you display it in, to serve others (within limits). Relationships that are based on power plays have a greater change of ending poorly and painfully. You need to realize how many people out there USE OTHERS BODIES to explore and validate their own power and social status. In other words, if they see a really ‘attractive’ person, they will try and get that person to like them (or have sex with them) in order to prove to themselves and others that they are ‘equal or better’ than that person. They often do this subconsciously.  You will do it subconsciously.  Once we get someone to like/love us, we prove to ourselves and others that we are ‘equal or better’ than them. If there is no other component to bind a couple together, once that goal has been ‘proven’, the relationship falls apart.

    Don’t allow yourself to ever be used by selfish people. Don’t let people take advantage of you. Don’t do it yourself to others. When you are selfless in a non-equal or non-reciprocating relationship, no-one wins. When you date for power no-one wins. Pandering to a man’s selfishness simply makes him more selfish. If people see you doing this to men, they will rightly call you a slut or gold-digger. Take that feedback constructively but dont listen to haters who just want to hate. Try to be selfless, and if you give your body in a selfless way to please someone else be sure it is building an equal relationship of give and take reciprocity.

    4. Realize that a lot of what you are going to learn about “modesty” in our culture or at church is remnants of social mores dating from a less civilized time when women lived in constant fear of being raped, stalked or seduced by sexual predators. (or stolen away by the king or people of higher class, power and estate.) Other rules and social mores were created from a desire of other women to level the playing field so socially ‘attractive’ women don’t get all the attention. Standards were created to encourage attractive women to cover themselves so as to not make less “attractive” women jealous (by whatever cultural standard of beauty). In some cases women used shame as a way to deter other women from luring away their men. (such as an older woman calling a young attractive, sexily dressed co-worker of her husband’s a whore or slut and shaming her into dressing more “modestly”.)

    You didn’t create these social customs, you don’t need to feel bound by them or responsible for them. But you should understand the psychology behind why they exist and navigate the ‘cultural modesty’ issue with an intelligence that is aware of the why’s and how’s behind our social and religious mores. If you ever feel tempted to shame someone because of their body, be sure to understand the fears or biases which are causing you to do it. Body shaming isn’t very productive. Don’t do it to yourself or others.

    5. UNDERSTAND THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MALE & FEAMALE SEX DRIVES.  If you get on Tinder or online dating sights you’ll notice right off the bat that a huge percentage of women’s profiles say something like “no one night stands” or “not DTF” or LTR only. On the other hand essentially NO men’s profiles say this.  Why? Because much like a monkey or dog, men are programmed to desire sex with almost any eligible partner. Even if they aren’t really physically, emotionally, socially or spiritually matched with that person they still desire sex with them. This is very different than the typical female who expects physical, emotional, social & spiritual compatibility before sex. This mismatch primal desires VERY often leads to a mismatch in expectations and hurt feelings.  The female thinks if he’s willing to have sex with her, he must feel the same way she does about him!  NOTHING COULD BE MORE WRONG! Typically, until a man is older or has an innate strong spirituality, his sexual desire is based on hormones and visual/chemical triggers.  The male sex drive can be INCREDIBLY strong, and once aroused he will say/be/do many completely uncharacteristic things in order to follow that animal programming to its natural end of sex (and much of this is actually subconscious).

    If you want to avoid the heartbreak that comes from believing a man is physically, emotionally, socially or spiritually matched and bonded with you, only to find out after the sexual chemicals subside that he is not, then you must go to extensive lengths to assure those physical, emotional, social and spiritual compatibilities before the hope of sex causes him to alter his behavior. You also need to realize that the hope of ‘sexual security’ and being ‘valued and cherished’ tend to be the primal drivers in the female sexual drive, and can induce the same short term changes in rational behavior in you, as his drive for sex or an attractive partner induce in him.

    It is ESSENTIAL to a happy, lasting relationship that you realize early the characteristics which lead to lasting relationships and pursue THEM, instead of simply perusing your/his sexual triggers as a basis for relationships.  I hope after putting some thought into what I’ve explained above you also see the danger of getting a boy to ‘like you’ by wearing clothing which consistently evokes his sex drive as a means of encouraging him to pursue you.

    6. FEEL AWESOME ABOUT YOUR BODY. No matter what stage of life or shape you are in, feel awesome about your body, AND DON’T LET ANYONE MAKE YOU FEEL BAD ABOUT IT. If they do, avoid them. If you need to wear ‘modest’ clothes or even a burka to feel good about yourself, go for it. If you need to go naked to free yourself to feel good about yourself… go for it. Don’t shame others. Don’t shame yourself. But be smart. Be confident. Be considerate. Be kind to yourself and others.  Think of the effects of your dress on other girls as well as guys, but if that responsibility brings you pain, then you likely need to readjust your thinking.  Nothing should make you feel crappy about your body.  (But at the same time, realize myself and pretty much all of us do for much of our life, so it’s pretty damn normal.)

    ———————————————————————————————————————————————-

    Sons need a different lesson. Why? Because they typically don’t really give a damn about dress—but they do have to deal with other types of inadequacy (particularly height, muscle mass, wealth and social standing). And they’re not going to get a bunch of stupid “modesty” lessons in school or church which end up often distorting the important reasons behind modesty anyway.

    And importantly men rarely get raped. Women do. Women rarely commit adultery with their hot young coworker who wears a muscle shirt.  Men do.  Modesty and purity culture have been shaped by the reality of dangers which exist in the world of sexual expression & sexual violence. We shouldn’t be a fool who pretends these realities don’t exist or that they are ONLY a social construct. Its not true. I once watched a national geographic show about some loin-cloth-only topless aborigines in Africa, where one of the attractive young ladies was talking to the translator about how she wanted to murder one of the older men in the tribe. The translator later found out she was so upset because she had been repeatedly raped by this man over the years. This problem had nothing to do “purity culture” or “being/not being responsible for other people’s thoughts”.  All of that was irrelevant. The question for parents and social leaders in nearly every culture on the planet is HOW TO WE PROTECT OUR YOUNG GIRLS FROM THESE ABUSES?!  Modesty is one way. Burkas are one way. Laws and rules concerning both modesty and rape are one way. Teaching young boys informed consent is one very important way. Carrying guns and mace is one way.  You can decide which of those ways seems to be the most logical way to balance the risk and rewards of sexual expression.  But realize this… men are driven by different sexual stimulus than women.

    Tinder is the perfect place to see this through experimentation. Take a marginally attractive man or woman, with great bodies and put them on tinder–the man with his shirt off and the girl in a bikini, and see who gets more matches.  The woman will get 10x the matches every time. Because contrary to what many might try and say, men are apparently, indeed more visually driven by sex appeal.  On the flip side take the same people and put pictures of both the man and women in situation which display social standing, status and wealth and the exact opposite effect will manifest. Because woman appear to be generally more attracted to these things than simply masculine sex appeal.

    On top of that we must add in the undebatable fact that MEN are far, far more prone to inflict sexual violence on a woman than vice versa.  So why do we impose modesty on women and not men?  Simple… it is to protect women. If a modesty norm, rule or lesson does not tend toward helping the goal of protecting women, it needs to be reworked.  And this includes the “protection” that comes from making one girl feel horrible about her body because it cannot ever compare to the body of another girl nor does she have any chance of attracting the positive attention and social approval that comes with the body type which men tend to be physiologically drawn to like a moth to a flame.  So we need to keep in mind that its not all about protecting girls from boys or predatory men.  It can be about leveling the playing field among girls in general—something which carries its own ethical debate.  And it can also be about helping potential mates focus on physical, emotional, social and spiritual compatibilities instead of just sexual attraction.

    What I’d Like My Kids to Know About Love

    To My Kids…    about this crazy thing called love.

    Guys…  I’m not sure if your adolescence will be anything like mine. I know there’s a lot of different ways to guide your life that are all unique and beautiful in there own way.  I hope at very least I can give you a feeling of being loved and valued as you grow up.  And I also hope I can impart some life-learned wisdom to give you a head start on your journey.

    I know when I was an adolescent, I was very confused about love. It made little sense to me. I heard one thing from movies and the media, another thing from my friends and another thing from church—and none of them made a lot of sense. I really didn’t believe much in love growing up… I saw it as a farse, or set of nearly random emotions that only the simple-minded fell pray to. I’ve always been very thoughtful and analytical, and at very least I understood at a fairly young age that the “love” I wanted in order to make my future marriage work needed to be stronger than the sorrow-filled “love” that made my parent’s marriage an ill-ending disaster. Love, to me, was a commitment. You loved by staying with and being committed to someone. I understood that there was a huge difference between love as a verb and love as a feeling or noun–but because of my lack of understanding I think I shut my heart and actions down to some extent in a misguided effort to avoid pain. In retrospect I wish I would have gotten involved in a lot more foolish flings. Put myself out there enough to have a broken heart a few times.  And had fun making out and being more sexual. I hope that my advice will help you find the right balance and harmony to make your love life a happy one.

     

    What is Love

    Love is not the same as romance, although that is an aspect of it. It is definitely not synonymous with sexuality. It is not simply a friendship or family bond, although that gets closer to the meat of it. It is not simply a feeling, nor are there different unrelated types of love (Eros, Agape, Phileao, Storge). All descriptions of it are mired in arguments of semantics or opinions of definitions. So I’d like to start by laying a scientific framework I read about in a book called ‘The Law of One’.  It’s probably the most powerful framework I’ve come across in respect to the idea of love.

    As I’ve searched through a lot of religious and philosophical material to find the best cohesive, scientifically viable definition for love,— Fractal Theory combined with the Chakra philosophy make the most sense. I’ll try and quickly summarize them as a foundation for a discussion on how to have a beautiful love-filled life.

    In short, fractal theory or the law of relative relationships teaches that everything in the universe evolves or is created to follow a similar pattern wherein the small is relatively a copy of the large. In particular it means that you can learn about yourself by studying the planet, or the solar system or the atom. Plato called this microcosm and macrocosm, but some form of this framework of parallelism exists in every global religion.

    Each unit of the fractal has

    The fractal

    The reason why this matters is because using this framework we can compare Love (n.) to Cosmic Energy. By Cosmic Energy, I mean the energy in the cosmos that all matter is made of. Thus just as everything in the universe is made of energy… all things are made of love.  This is why God is often called ‘love’. Additionally we can compare and define Loving (v.) as the focus and use of that energy. Every “living” sphere in the galaxy lives because it has created a system of absorbing and giving cosmic energy or love, and the same is true for you. The Chinese called this cosmic energy Chi. The Hindus called it Prana. The Christians call it God’s Spirit, and Mormonism sometimes equates it with Spirit and sometimes with priesthood. Jesus and all the great pillars of humanity come to symbolize it and show its possible uses. Regardless of what we call it, in your adolescence you will decide on a delicate balance of receiving and giving that same energy or love. It will be your focus and use of love or your energy that makes you who you are, determines your joy, your happiness and your eternal identity. You can decide whether to be a sun, or a black hole, a thriving planet or a near-dead rock, a rogue asteroid or a communal pillar of the Galaxy. You can decide to focus your energy or love on yourself or others—or to shut it down and not love much at all.

     

    Here’s a few points concerning love that I hope you can understand and remember.

    -With the act of loving (giving or receiving energy & attention), comes emotion. Do not confuse the emotions of love, with love, loving or being in love.  But realize that the emotions of love are a measuring stick to let you know how much–and what types–of love you are giving and receiving. Think of it in regards to physics. When a system gains energy it creates heat. When it looses energy, it manifests cold. The same goes for your body. When you gain energy, you will experience emotional ‘heat’. That heat can be interpreted as passion, anger, sexual attraction, excitement or other types of love. When you lose more energy than you are gaining you will experience emotional ‘cold’. That cold can manifest as loneliness, depression, indifference, hate or certain types of love.

    -Sometimes the most rewarding relationships… are the hardest ones. The ones where you feel the least feelings of love, but are challenged to be loving and giving in new and different ways.

    -The increased feelings of the emotions of love that come with new relationships do not mean you love that person more than your existing relationships.

     

    A Short Overview of the Chakra System

    The ancient Hindus came up with an amazingly effective system of describing how the human body uses love, energy or “spirit” to affect our emotions, actions and personality. In this system, each individual finds a unique balance of dispersing their energy to 7 bodily energy centers which each have unique functions. Comparing this system to the modern understanding of biology, many have noticed that these ancient centers seem to correlate with the way in which our nervous system disperses its energy to the endocrine glands–which are in charge of translating the nerves energy signals to chemical hormones which in turn govern the bodies feelings and emotions.

    The hormonal balance which dictates your emotions of happiness are said to be the result of a combination of your own decisions, the decisions of your ancestors (as passed through DNA), and the configuration your spirit brought with you from your pre-mortal existence (past lives). Each energy center or endocrine gland controls specific hormones which govern your biology and emotions such as testosterone/estrogen (which govern sexuality and physical size),  epinephrine/adrenaline (which govern your anxieties, fears & risk taking proclivities), pancreatic polypeptides like glucose/insulin (which govern your energy levels) ,  serotonin/melatonin (which help govern joy/depression and chronobiology) and many, many more. (For more information see my more detailed article on chakras/endocrine glands).

    Knowing exactly what these hormones are and what they do, is not as important as understanding that your emotions are a result of the “directions” your brain sends to your endocrine glands to tell them what balance of hormones to stick in your blood stream. In other words it is important to understand that your thoughts and behaviors have a direct influence on your joys, feelings of love and emotions. At the same time, it is important to realize that many of these things are controlled subconsciously, and just like taking control of the usually subconsciously controlled speed of your heartbeat— can take great meditation, intelligence and practice. This is one important function of religion and spirituality. With religion, great masters have sought to institute ways of life which bring balance; and systems of ritual which allow you to take conscious control of otherwise subconscious biological processes. Whether it be singing in church or in your car, taking the sacrament or doing yoga and meditative breathing, or going to the temple or losing yourself in nature I hope you will learn to intelligently use the tools you have been given to manage your energy or love pathways which regulate your chemical balances and thus your emotional and spiritual well being. I pray you will not be tempted to synthetically regulate your hormonal system with drugs or tobacco—since all of the euphoric feelings drugs will give you can be gotten naturally—without the devastating addiction and toxic side effects.

     

    Bonding

    Other than regulating your own chemical balances, the most important thing you will do with love in your life is bonding. The same is true for any planet or atom.

     

     

     

    The internal energy configuration of these bodies dictates what they will be attracted to and what they can or will bond to. Oil will not mix with water and inert gasses will not bond to much of anything. On the other hand, what Florine wants, Florine gets.

     

     

     

     

    periodic table of the elements showing the electron shells of each element.

    periodic table of the elements showing the electron shells of each element.