Ing moisture upon the Andes, which thus rob the coast of its rainfall. But there is reason to believe that at one time the Andes were several thousand feet lower, and did not offer an insurmountable barrier to the rains. At this period the coast must have been wooded, and a forest must have stood where now is the waterless desert of Tarapaca, a forest of which the only traces are the numerous skeletons of anteaters which once it har boured. Further evidence of the gradual elevation of the country is afforded by the presence of beaches now raised many feet above the sea-level and some miles from the coast while it is evident that this elevation has been proceeding since the advent of man, since traces of his settlements have been discovered in these raised beaches. At points along the coast, however, a good deal of erosion has taken place and the victory has sometimes rested with the sea.
It was already approaching completion when the war broke upon Europe, and, though it was finished by the end of the year, circumstances combined to prevent its publication for the time. Having been engaged for the better part of the last year in work more germane to the present crisis than archaeological studies, I have not found the task of proof-correction very easy, especially as the time which I have been able to devote to it has been extremely limited. For any faults proceeding from these dis advantages I must therefore beg the indulgence Of the reader. The geographical area covered by the book is one which is still very imperfectly known from an archae ological point of View; the people inhabiting it in early times were not so highly developed, politically, as the Mexicans or the Peruvians, and the literature dealing with them is neither large nor easy of access. Still a summary of the known facts may be of use, if only in performing the function of a signpost for future investigators.
The actual area withwhich this book deals is, roughly, that portion of Mexico which lies between the tropic of Cancer and the northern strip of Honduras. It is divided naturally into two portions, a northern and western, and a southern and eastern, by the depression which cuts across the isthmus of Tehuantepec. The natural division corresponds very conveniently with the archaeological; to the north and west lies the seat of Mexican culture, to the south and east, of the Mayan; but it must be remembered that the Maya-speaking people extended at the conquest practically throughout Vera Cruz, though they had by that time fallen under Aztec influence. I propose therefore to divide this book into two corresponding sections, dealing first with the Mexican area, and later with the Mayan. Both from the chronological and cultural points of View the Mayan area should come first, but, as will appear later, we are dependent to so great an extent upon our knowledge of Mexican civilization for our interpreta tion of Mayan archaeology, that it will be more con venient to give the Mexican priority.
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