Mexico by James A. Michener

INDIAN ANCESTORS: THE ALTOMECS

At the beginning of the tenth century, when Nopiltzín was preoccupied with the discovery of pulque, there existed in a series of dark caves along a network of rivers that ran through the steaming jungles several hundred miles north of Mexico City a tribe of Indians who for three or four thousand years, at least, and possibly much longer, had kept alive in their tribal traditions memory of an age when they had lived in a high place. This recollection was so persistent that after the Conquest the tribe was given the name Altomec, a mixture of Spanish and Indian meaning "Those who seek a high place," but during the time of which I speak they were called by others either the Cave People or the Followers of Glittering-Fish Color-Bird.

They were a short-statured, very dark people. Their standard of living was abysmal. In three or four thousand years, huddling in their caves, they had failed to invent cloth, or to develop any simple decoration for their pottery, or to tame the turkey. But they had made two discoveries that were to remake the history of Mexico. Along with their relatives, the Aztecs, who were a little more advanced, the Cave People had learned the effectiveness of organized tribal action, and they had found a god ideally suited to lead them.

Their capacity for unified movement was remarkable, and all during the first half of the eleventh century their rulers sent out disciplined bodies of men to scout the rest of Mexico in the search for a new homesite, for it had become apparent that continued life in the caves was not desirable. Some of these scouting parties penetrated as far south as the areas beyond Guatemala. Others had spied upon the lands of the Drunken Builders, and these had reported favorably on that domain.

Sometime about 1050 the Cave People decided to abandon the caves. Loading their men and women with heavy burdens, they set forth with rude implements, statues of their god weighing thousands of pounds, seeds, gourd baskets, totems of one kind or another and hundreds of small children. Each year, from September to April, they moved a few miles from their old camping ground to a new site, where in the spring they planted the seeds they had been carrying through the winter. For five months they tended their crops and during another month they harvested, and then they pushed south. Scouting parties were constantly probing the areas ahead and for a period of ten years it was intended that they would settle somewhere in the Yucatán peninsula. It was a strange fact that most of the people in the areas spied upon by these nomads were not aware of their presence, so stealthy were their operations. But they did leave a trail, for wherever they probed, a few local men would mysteriously disappear; Glittering-Fish Color-Bird required the constant sacrifice of young warriors.

The powerful god of the Cave People acquired its name Glittering-Fish Color-Bird in this curious way.

Sometime around the birth of Christ the Cave People had seen in a river a fish whose scales seemed to be made of some glittering substance that caught the sun and held it prisoner. After three days of marveling at the phenomenon, the priests proclaimed the fish a god, for it was apparent that it had some control over the sun, and for six or seven hundred years it was worshiped as one of the Cave People's principal deities.

In the year 753, three hundred years before the Cave People set forth on their tribal journey through Mexico, one of their scouting parties brought back from Guatemala a dead specimen of that extraordinary bird the quetzal, whose bright bronze-green and red plumage and immensely long tail would excite all Indian tribes who saw it. The priests were convinced that no such bird could have been placed on earth without the direct intervention of the gods, so on the spot they added the divinity of this colorful bird to that of the glittering fish to create one god.

When trying to explain Glittering-Fish Color-Bird to people who do not know Mexico, I have found it helpful to remind them that the god was a composite whose two halves had originated seven centuries apart. Glittering-Fish was a primal god who could be represented by any kind of shimmering material, and since the Cave People had no metal of any kind, they used waxy leaves, fish scales, polished bones and human teeth to indicate the glittering quality of their deity. The glitter also represented the movement of water that brought fish, the movement of the heavens that brought the growing seasons, and the radiance of the sun. Thus Glittering-Fish was one of the most practical gods in Mexican history, and one of the most serviceable, for he served as intermediary with the rivers, the fields, the flowers and the life-giving sun.

The attributes of glorious Color-Bird, represented by feathers, flowers and iridescent stones, were the intangible virtues such as love of beauty-even though the Cave People were deficient in this-honesty and loyalty. Color-Bird was worshiped by displaying before him featherwork, bouquets of flowers and costumed dancers. The figure chosen to represent this benign deity was, appropriately, an androgynous figure with a benevolent countenance and an all-embracing smile.