Mexico, from Cortes to Carranza . ating bridge on which it was taken across thelake had broken down, and precipitated the stone andmany of the priests who were superintending its mov-ing to the bottom of the lake. The priests weredrowned, but the stone was finally raised and installedin the temple with many human sacrifices. Since this very calendar stone is to-day on exhibi-tion in the N^ational Museum of Mexico, we may lookover Axas shoulder and see it just as he did. The carvings signify the Mexican system of keepingtime. They divided time into cycles, years and cycle was fifty-two y
Mexico, from Cortes to Carranza . ating bridge on which it was taken across thelake had broken down, and precipitated the stone andmany of the priests who were superintending its mov-ing to the bottom of the lake. The priests weredrowned, but the stone was finally raised and installedin the temple with many human sacrifices. Since this very calendar stone is to-day on exhibi-tion in the N^ational Museum of Mexico, we may lookover Axas shoulder and see it just as he did. The carvings signify the Mexican system of keepingtime. They divided time into cycles, years and cycle was fifty-two years. The year, like ours, con-sisted of three hundred and sixty-five days. At theend of every cycle they added five days which servedthe purpose of the twenty-ninth of February in ourLeap Year in keeping the reckoning correct, but were 24 MAInTN^ERS and customs of the AZTECS nevertheless considered very unlucky. Each year wasdivided into eighteen months of twenty days each, andthe months were divided into four weeks of five days. The Gbeat Calendar Stone each. Each day had a different name, such as Mon-key, Rain, Small Bird, Sea Animal, and soon. The months were also named, such extraordinarynames as Garlands of corn on the necks of idols, orMother of the Gods. 25 MEXICO The Aztecs could not have divided time in this wayif they had not been versed in mathematics and able toobserve accurately the movements of the sun, stars andplanets. After Axa left the temple, he went to the house ofa boy friend where he had been invited to make a friend was named Maxtla. He belonged to a goodfamily who lived in the best section of Tenochtitlanin a fine stone house. Axa, upon reaching there, found to his great delightthat preparations for a party were in progress. Theoccasion was the birthday of Maxtlas father. Theservants, under the direction of Maxtlas mother andsisters, were preparing many kinds of meat and fish,as well as the inevitable tortillas (corn meal cakes),frijoles (bean
Size: 1586px × 1575px
Photo credit: © The Reading Room / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublishernewyorklondondappl
