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Let it therefore suffice, for the present purpose, to state that the comparative study of the language of the Mayas led us to suspect that, as it contains words belonging to nearly all the known languages of antiquity, and with exactly the same meaning, in their mode of writing might be found letters or characters or signs used in those tongues.
It may be said of the religion of the Mayas, as I have had occasion to remark, what the learned author of the Five Great Monarchies says of that of the primitive Chaldees: “The religion of the Chaldeans, from the very earliest times to which the monuments carry us back, was, in its outward aspect, a polytheism of a very elaborate character.
It is hardly supposable that the communism here described by Mr. Stephens was a new thing to the Mayas; but far more probable that it was a part of their ancient mode of life, to which these ruined houses were eminently adapted. The subject of the adaptation of the old pueblo houses in Yucatan and Central America to communism in living will be elsewhere considered.
In some cases the upper part of the dress seems to have been detached from the lower, and to form a sort of jacket which reached about to the hips. We again see this identical dress portrayed in the mural paintings. The same description of ornaments were affected by the Chaldees and the Mayas bracelets, earrings, armlets, anklets, made of the materials they could procure.
The plan of life within these houses is not well understood, but it can still be seen in New Mexico, and it is to be hoped it will attract investigation. This is a fair statement of the Iroquois law of hospitality found among the Mayas, practiced among themselves and towards strangers from other tribes.
In several districts besides those of the Mayas and the Quichés the natives still maintained independent governments.
"Well, Mayan refers to the Mayas, an aboriginal people of Yucatan. The Mayas had a peculiar civilization of their own, thousands of years ago, and their calendar system was so involved " "Never mind about dates," again interrupted Ned. "Get down to brass tacks. I'm willing to take your word for it that there's a Copan valley in Honduras. But what has your friend Professor Bumper to do with it?"
The name Maya seems to have existed from the remotest times in the meridional parts of Hindostan. The emissaries of RAMA having entered by mistake within the Mayas territories, learned that all foreigners were forbidden to penetrate into them; and that those who were so imprudent as to violate this prohibition, even through ignorance, seldom escaped being put to death.
If in Hindostan, Afghanistan, Chaldea, Asia Minor, we have met with vestiges of the Mayas, in Egypt we will find their traces everywhere. Whatever may have been the name given to the valley watered by the Nile by its primitive inhabitants, no one at present knows. The Assyrians designated Egypt under the names of MISIR or MISUR, probably because the country is generally destitute of trees.
The Egyptians, it is said, in very remote ages, divided the year by lunations, as the Mayas, who divided their civil year into eighteen months, of twenty days, that they called U moon to which they added five supplementary days, that they considered unlucky.
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