d.

53 Landa states that Mayapan signified "the banner of Maya," the latter
being the name of the "tongue of land" on which the capital was
situated. This explanation is, however, scarcely satisfactory, for
pantli is Nahuatl. If the entire word be regarded as Nahuatl, we
obtain "the banner of the hand." As another Maya name for the
capital was Ho and this means five it seems possible that this
numeral and sound were actually expressed by an open hand and that
the Nahuatl name thus arose.

54 As throughout America four brothers are always found associated, in
consequence of the general spread of the quadruple organization, the
fact that three rulers only are mentioned here and that three
powerful tribes were found in possession of Yucatan, indicates that
these must have separated themselves from their original State. The
subsequent reduction of their number to two shows further
dissension.

55 It seems reasonable to refer to this date the expulsion of the Maya
tribe, the Huaxtekans, who founded their colony at Panuco, named
their capital Tuch-pan and carried with them their execrable
practices and ideas. At the same time they possessed and handed down
such a proficiency in the art of weaving that at the time of
Montezuma the most beautiful textile fabrics, furnished to him as
tribute, were the Huaxtecan "centzon-tilmatli" or mantles of four
hundred colors, "finely woven and covered with intricate and
artistic designs." This circumstance points to a possible connection
with Zilan, the reputed Maya centre of female industry. It has been
stated by good authorities that the only antiquities thus far found
in America, which testify to the existence of a degraded and obscene
cult, are from the region of Panuco.

56 It is interesting to note in the above description absolutely no
mention of woman in the organization of Mayapan. It is therefore to
be presumed that they were excluded from this capital, and
inhabited, as in Mexico, their own town, under female rulership and
that of the "lords of the Night."

57 See the Atlatl or Spear-thrower of the Ancient Mexicans. Peabody
Museum Papers, vol. 1, no. 3. Cambridge, 1891.

58 Relacion. ed. Brasseur de Bourbourg, p. 52. In a note the Abbe
states that the above description reca