Atlantis: The Antedeluvian WorldDonnelly, Ignatius
History
Atlantis: The Antedeluvian World
Donnelly, Ignatius
Atlantis (Legendary place); Deluge; Ethnology
There were, according to this document, four ages of the world. The
first was an age of giants (the great mammalia?) who were destroyed by
famine; the second age ended in a conflagration; the third age was an
age of monkeys.
"Then comes the fourth age, Atonatiuh, 'Sun of Water,' whose number is
10 X 400 + 8, or 4008. It ends by a great inundation, a veritable
deluge. All mankind are changed into fish, with the exception of one man
and his wife, who save themselves in a bark made of the trunk of a
cypress-tree. The picture represents Matlalcueye, goddess of waters, and
consort of Tlaloc, god of rain, as darting down toward earth. Coxcox and
Xochiquetzal, the two human beings preserved, are seen seated on a
tree-trunk and floating in the midst of the waters. This flood is
represented as the last cataclysm that devastates the earth."
The learned Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg translates from the Aztec
language of the "Codex Chimalpopoca" the following Flood legend:
"This is the sun called Nahui-atl, '4 water.' Now the water was tranquil
for forty years, plus twelve, and men lived for the third and fourth
times. When the sun Nahui-atl came there had passed away four hundred
years, plus two ages, plus seventy-six years. Then all mankind was lost
and drowned, and found themselves changed into fish. The sky came nearer
the water. In a single day all was lost, and the day Nahui-xochitl, '4
flower,' destroyed all our flesh.
"And that year was that of cé-calli, '1 house,' and the day Nahui-atl
all was lost. Even the mountains sunk into the water, and the water
remained tranquil for fifty-two springs.
"Now at the end of the year the god Titlacahuan had warned Nata and his
spouse Nena, saying, 'Make no more wine of Agave, but begin to hollow
out a great cypress, and you will enter into it when in the month
Tozontli the water approaches the sky.'
"Then they entered in, and when the god had closed the door, he said,
'Thou shalt eat but one ear of maize, and thy wife one also.'
"But as soon as they had finished they went out, and the water remained
calm, for the wood no longer moved, and, on opening it, they began to
see fish.
"Then they lit a fire, by rubbing together pieces of wood, and they
roasted fish.
"The gods Citlallinicué and Citlalatonac, instantly looking down said:
'Divine Lord, what is that fire that is making there? Why do they thus
smoke the sky?' At once Titlacahuan-Tezcatlipoca descended. He began to
chide, saying, 'Who has made this fire here?' And, seizing hold of the
fish, he shaped their loins and heads, and they were transformed into
dogs (chichime)."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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