Note 91 — TRAVELS IN THE INTERIOR OF NORTH AMERICA, IN THE YEARS 1832, 1833, AND 1834 (continued 3)

See the "Disseminator" for 1831. Say writes—"Some arrow-heads and knives made of flint were found in the same tumulus, which are perfectly like those often found on the surface. These arrow-heads are generally known, but the instrument which probably served as a knife, deserves more particular consideration. It is from an inch and a half to two inches and a quarter long, from three-tenths to seven-tenths broad, and has two edges; in shape it resembles the obsidian knives of the ancient Aztecks, or, perhaps, of the Tultecks, of which we found a great many near the Mexican city of Chalco, and of which there are engravings in one of the last numbers of 'Silliman's Journal.' We have compared several specimens of flint and obsidian knives, and found them as perfectly alike as if they had been made by the same artist, and as the difference of the material allows. If we cannot decide how far this fact may serve to confirm the hieroglyphic accounts of the emigration of the Aztecks and Tultecks from north to south, it seems, however, to strengthen the conjecture that the remote ancestors of the present Mexicans erected the tumuli and walls which are spread in such numbers over this country, and of the origin of which the present race of red men have no tradition." These obsidian knives are likewise represented in one of the early volumes of the French Academy, but Warden does not mention them in his "Antiquités Mexicaines." He puts the question, whether the people of the Ohio Valley may not have been a colony of the ancient inhabitants of Palenque? The old tumuli of Harmony appear, at least, to belong to a kindred race. On this obscure but highly interesting subject, see Alex. V. Humboldt, "Voy. au Nouv. Cont." t. iii. p. 155, &c.—Maximilian.