Aztec - Jennings Gary - Страница 26

The standard trade was five hundred ears of maize for a male of working age or four hundred for a female of breeding age. If a family had one sellable child, that boy or girl would be relinquished so the rest of the household might eat. If a family had only infants, the father would sell himself. But for how long could any household subsist on four or five hundred ears of maize? And when those were eaten, who or what remained to be sold? Even if the Good Times were suddenly to come again, how could a family survive without a working father? Anyway, the Good Times did not come—

That was during the reign of the First Motecuzoma and, in attempting to alleviate his people's misery, he depleted both the national and his personal treasury, then emptied all the capital's storehouses and granaries. When the surplus was gone, when everything was gone except the still-grinding Hard Times, Motecuzoma and his Snake Woman convened their Speaking Council of elders, and even called in seers and sayers for advice. I cannot vouch for it, but it is said that the conference went thus:

One hoary sorcerer, who had spent months in studying the thrown bones and consulting sacred books, solemnly reported, "My Lord Speaker, the gods have made us hungry to demonstrate that they are hungry. There has not been a war since our last incursion into Texcala, and that was in the year Nine House. Since then, we have made only sparse blood offerings to the gods. A few prisoners kept in reserve, the occasional lawbreaker, now and then an adolescent or a maiden. The gods are quite plainly demanding more nourishment."

"Another war?" mused Motecuzoma. "Even our hardiest warriors are by now too feeble even to march to an enemy frontier, let alone breach it."

"True, Revered Speaker. But there is a way to arrange a mass sacrifice..."

"Slaughter our people before they starve to death?" Motecuzoma asked sardonically. "They are so gaunt and dried-up that the whole nation probably would not yield a cupful of blood."

"True, Revered Speaker. And in any case, that would be such a mendicant gesture that the gods probably would not accept it. No, Lord Speaker, what is necessary is a war, but a different kind of war...."

That, or so I have been told, and so I believe, was the origin of the Flowery Wars, and this is how the first of them was arranged:

The mightiest and most centrally situated powers in this valley constituted a Triple Alliance: we the Mexica with our capital on the island of Tenochtitlan, the Acolhua with their capital at Texcoco on the lake's eastern shore, and the Tecpaneca with their capital at Tlacopan on the western shore. There were three lesser peoples to the southeast: the Texcalteca, of whom I have already spoken, with their capital at Texcala; the Huexotin with their capital at Huexotzinco; and the once mighty Tya Nuu—or Mixteca, as we called them—whose domain had shrunken until it consisted of little more than their capital city of Chololan. The first were our enemies, as I have said; the latter two had long ago been made our tribute payers and, like it or not, our occasional allies. All three of those nations, however, like all three of ours in the Alliance, were being devastated by the Hard Times.

After Motecuzoma's conference with his Speaking Council, he conferred also with the rulers of Texcoco and Tlacopan. Those three together drafted and sent a proposal to the three rulers in the cities of Texcala, Chololan, and Huexotzinco. In essence it said something like this:

"Let us all make war that we may all survive. We are diverse peoples, but we suffer the same Hard Times. The wise men say that we have only one hope of enduring: to sate and placate the gods with blood sacrifices. Therefore, we propose that the armies of our three nations meet in combat with the armies of your three nations, on the neutral plain of Acatzinco, safely far to the southeast of all our lands. The fighting will not be for territory, nor for rule, nor for slaughter, nor for plunder, but simply for the taking of prisoners to be granted the Flowery Death. When all participating forces have captured a sufficiency of prisoners for sacrifice to their several gods, this will be mutually made known amongst the commanders and the battle will end forthwith."

That proposal, which you Spaniards say you find incredible, was agreeable to all concerned—including the warriors whom you have called "stupidly suicidal" because they fought for no apparent end except the extremely likely and sudden end to their own lives. Well, tell me, what professional soldier of your own would refuse any excuse for a battle, in preference to humdrum, peacetime garrison duty? At least our warriors had the stimulus of knowing that if they died in combat or on an alien altar, they earned all people's thanks for pleasing the gods, while they earned the gods' gift of life in a blissful afterworld. And, in those Hard Times, when so many died of inglorious starvation, a man had even more reason for preferring to die by the sword or the sacrificial knife.

So that first battle was planned, and it was fought as planned—though the plain of Acatzinco was a dreary long march from anywhere, so all six armies had to rest for a day or two before the signal was given to commence hostilities. Other intentions notwithstanding, a goodly number of men were killed; some inadvertently, by chance and accident; some because they or their opponents fought too exuberantly. It is difficult for a warrior, trained to kill, to refrain from killing. But most, as agreed, struck with the flat of the maquahuitl, not with the obsidian edge. The men thus stunned were not dispatched by the Swallowers but were quickly bound by the Swaddlers. After only two days, the priest-chaplains who marched with each army decided that prisoners enough had been taken to satisfy them and their gods. One after another, the commanders unfurled the prearranged banners, the knots of men still grappling on the plain disengaged, the six armies reassembled and marched wearily home, leading their even wearier captives.

That first, tentative War of Flowers took place in midsummer, normally also mid-rainy season, but in those Hard Times just another of the interminable hot, dry spells. And one other thing had been prearranged by the six rulers of the six nations: that all of them should sacrifice all their prisoners in their six capital cities on the same day. No one remembers the exact count, but I suppose several thousand men died that day in Tenochtitlan, in Texcoco, in Tlacopan, in Texcala, in Chololan, in Huexotzinco. Call it coincidence if you like, reverend friars, since the Lord God was of course not involved, but that day the casks of clouds at last broke their seals, and the rain poured down on all this extensive plateau, and the Hard Times came to an end.

That very day, also, many people in the six cities enjoyed full bellies for the first time in years, when they dined on the remains of the sacrificed xochimique. The gods were satisfied to be fed merely with the ripped-out hearts heaped on their altars; they had no use for the remainder of the victims' bodies, but the gathered people did. So, as the corpse of each xochimiqui, still warm, rolled down the steep staircase of each temple pyramid, the meat cutters waiting below dissected it into its edible parts and distributed those among the eager folk crowding each plaza.

The skulls were cracked and the brains extracted, the arms and legs were cut into manageable segments, the genitals and buttocks were sliced off, the livers and kidneys were cut out. Those food portions were not just flung to a slavering mob; they were distributed with admirable practicality, and the populace waited with admirable restraint. For obvious reasons, the brains went to priests and wise men, the muscular arms and legs to warriors, the genitalia to young married couples, the less significant buttocks and tripes were presented to pregnant women, nursing mothers, and families with many children. The leftovers of heads, hands, feet, and torsos, being more bone than meat, were put aside to fertilize the croplands.