of the Above with a peak or point is further illustrated
by a well-known peaked diadem always painted blue which was the symbol of
the visible ruler (fig. 36, no. 5). A peak also occurs on military shields
accompanied by four bars (fig. 36, no. 3) and presents an analogy to no. 4
from the "Lyfe of the Indians." The latter is given as the symbol of a
sacred festival which I have demonstrated in a previous publication to
have coincided with the vernal equinox.(15) For further reasons which I
shall present in my calendar monograph, I infer that we have in this
drawing a most valuable image of the gnomon and dial employed by the Sun
priests for the observation of the equinoxes and solstices. The human
victim who was attached to the centre of the circular stone during the
same festival is usually represented with the same cone or point and eight
appendages on his head (fig. 36, no. 2). Owing to the circumstance that
this peaked head-dress, or cone, was sometimes employed by the scribes for
its phonetic value, as in fig. 36, no. 1, from the Codex Mendoza, in which
instance it is figured on a mountain and is usually painted blue, we know
positively that its name was Yope or Yopi--a valuable point since a temple
and a sort of monastery in the courtyard of the Great Temple of Mexico
were both named Yopico (Sahagun). At the same time it should be noted that
the Maya name for "a mitre," the symbol of a divine ruler, is Yop-at. In
the Mexican ollin-signs a cone or ascending point is usually placed above
and opposite to a symbol consisting of a ring or loop. These evidently
signify the Above and Below, and in this connection it is worth noticing
that archaeologists have long puzzled over the curious forms of the two
kinds of prehistoric stone objects which have most frequently been found
in the island of Porto Rico. The first of these consists of an elongated
stone, the centre of which rises in the shape of a cone, whilst the ends
are respectively carved in the rough semblance of a head and of feet. The
second form, which has frequently been found in caves, consists of a large
stone ring, and is popularly termed "a stone collar." I am inclined to
regard the latter as being analogous to the "stone yokes" of ancient
Mexico and to infer that the aborigines of Porto Rico practised a form of
the same cult. It should be borne in mind that the high conical stone, on
which the human victims were sacrificed, was a salient feature in an
ancient