Toltecs

The Story of Atlantis

The Toltecs of Mexico traced themselves back to a starting-point called Atlan or Aztlan; the Aztecs also claimed to come from Aztlan (see Bancroft's Native Races, vol.

Toltec.4.

The result was that at the period we are dealing with—the first map period—there was no pure blood left in the south, and as we shall see it was from these dark races who inhabited the equatorial provinces, and the extreme south of the continent, that the Toltec conquerors subsequently drew their supplies of[22] slaves.

The first of these was in process during the Rmoahal days, about 3,000,000 years ago, while the second took place in the Toltec ascendency about 850,000 years ago.

At this first map period they also—as just stated—peopled the northern coasts, whilst a mixture of Tlavatli and Toltec race inhabited the western islands, which subsequently formed part of the American continent.

We now come to the Toltec or 3rd sub-race.

Indeed so dominant and so endowed with vitality was this race that intermarriages with the following sub-races failed to modify the type, which still remained essentially Toltec; and hundreds of thousands of years later we find one of their remote family races ruling magnificently in Mexico and Peru, long ages before their degenerate descendants were conquered by the fiercer Aztec tribes from the north.

It lay near the west coast of Atlantis about latitude[24] 30° North, and the whole of the surrounding country, embracing the bulk of the west coast of the continent, was peopled with a pure Toltec race.

But as we shall see when dealing with the political organization, their territory eventually extended right across the continent, and it was from their great capital on the eastern coast that the Toltec emperors held their almost world-wide sway.

The great central regions of the continent lying west and south of the Tlavatli mountainous district was their special though not their exclusive home, for they shared these lands with the Toltecs.

It was the Toltec race who developed the highest civilization and organized the most powerful empire of any of the Atlantean peoples, and it was then that the principle of hereditary succession was for the first time established.

This was the golden age of the Toltec race.

It was a moral question which from the very earliest times divided the Atlantean Race into two hostile camps, and what was begun in the Rmoahal times was terribly accentuated in the Toltec era.

The white emperor driven northward re-established himself in a city originally founded by the Tlavatli on the southern edge of the mountainous district, but which was now the seat of one of the tributary Toltec kings.

We shall eventually find a Semite dynasty of sorcerers enthroned in the "City of the[31] Golden Gates," but no Toltec power rose to eminence during the second map period.

There were considerable Toltec populations still, but little of the pure blood remained on the mother continent.

On the island of Ruta however, in the third map period, a Toltec dynasty again rose to power and ruled through its tributary kings a large portion of the island.

Little more remains to be said about the Toltecs.

Exclusive race-dynasties were at an end, but kings of Toltec blood occasionally rose to power both in the north and south, the northern kingdom being constantly encroached upon by its southern rival, and more and more of its territory annexed.

Having dealt at some length with the state of things under the Toltecs, the leading political characteristics of the four following sub-races need not long detain us, for none of them[32] reached the heights of civilization that the Toltecs did—in fact the degeneration of the race had set in.

Being continually worsted in war with their Toltec neighbours, knowing themselves to be greatly outnumbered, and desiring above all things increase of population, laws were passed, by which every man was relieved from the direct burden of maintaining his family.

For it should be realized that when the Atlanteans reached their zenith in the Toltec era, the proportion of population to the square mile[34] on the continent of Atlantis probably equalled, even if it did not exceed, our modern experience in England and Belgium.

We now come to the Toltecs.

It was chiefly to the west that their emigrations tended, and the neighbouring coasts of the American continent were in the second map period peopled by a pure Toltec race, the greater part of those left on the mother-continent being then of very mixed blood.

It may here be noted that while the Mexican empire was for centuries great and powerful in all that is usually regarded as power and greatness in our civilization of to-day, it never reached the height attained by the Peruvians about 14,000 years ago under their Inca sovereigns, for as regards the general well-being of the people, the justice and beneficence of the government, the equitable nature of the land tenure, and the pure and religious life of the inhabitants, the Peruvian empire of those days might be considered a traditional though faint echo of the golden age of the Toltecs on the mother-continent of Atlantis.

The average Red Indian of North or South America is the best representative to-day of the Toltec people, but of course bears no comparison with the highly civilized individual of the race at its zenith.

Although the first settlement in that country was not in the strict sense of the term a colony, it was from the Toltec race that was subsequently drawn the first great body of emigrants intended to mix with and dominate the aboriginal people.

The golden age of the Toltecs was long past.

Dominated all through the centuries by their more powerful Toltec neighbours, it was yet reserved for a small branch of the Turanian stock to conquer and replace the last great empire that the Toltecs raised, for the brutal and barely civilized Aztecs were of pure Turanian blood.

The Semite emigrations were of two kinds, first, those which were controlled by the natural impulse of the race: second, that special emigration which was effected under the direct guidance of the Manu; for, strange as it may seem, it was not from the Toltecs but from this lawless and turbulent though vigorous and energetic sub-race that was chosen the nucleus destined to be developed into our great Fifth or Aryan Race.

It must naturally be with the periods of culture that the following remarks will deal, chief among which stands out the great Toltec era.

But the characteristic feature of the Toltec house was the tower that rose from one of its corners or from the centre of one of the blocks.

During the first map period Toltec was the universal language, not only throughout the continent but in the western islands and that part of the eastern continent which recognized the emperor's rule.

The Tlavatli tongue was the basis used by the Turanians, who introduced such modifications that an entirely different language was in time produced; while the[45] Semites and Akkadians, adopting a Toltec ground-work, modified it in their respective ways, and so produced two divergent varieties.

All through the ages, however, the Toltec language fairly maintained its purity, and the same tongue that was spoken in Atlantis in the days of its splendour was used, with but slight alterations, thousands of years later in Mexico and Peru.

The schools and colleges of Atlantis in the great Toltec days, as well as in subsequent eras of culture, were all endowed by the State.

In such an empire as the Toltec, agriculture naturally received much attention.

Among the domesticated animals of the Toltec days were creatures that looked like very small tapirs.

The Toltec carts appear to have been drawn by creatures somewhat resembling small camels.

Selfishness obtained the upper hand, and war and discord brought the Golden Age of the Toltecs to a close.

In the days of the Toltec greatness there seems to have been no real poverty—even the retinue of slaves attached to most houses being well fed and clothed—but there were a number of comparatively poor houses in the lowest belt to the north, as well as outside the outermost canal towards the sea.

The following remarks will attempt to deal merely with the leading characteristics which differentiate their habits from our own, and these will be chosen as much as possible from the great Toltec era.

Polygamous customs were prevalent at different times among all the sub-races, but in the Toltec days while two wives were allowed by the law, great numbers of men had only one wife.

It was with the increase of population and civilization in the early Toltec times that land first became worth fighting for.

The systems of land tenure which ensued in different parts of the empire on the breaking up of the great Toltec dynasty were many and various.

With the wider diffusion of knowledge in the days of the Toltecs, and more especially with the establishment later on of an initiated priesthood and an Adept emperor, increased opportunities were offered to the people for the attainment of a truer conception of the divine.

In the great Toltec empire of Mexico the sun-worship of their forefathers was still the national religion, while the bloodless offerings to their beneficent Deity, Quetzalcoatl, consisted merely of flowers and fruit.