Deferring an investigation of the significance of this date, I shall now draw attention to what is to me the most interesting and important feature of the whole image. The view of the top of the two heads, as may be seen by the accompanying reproduction from a photograph (fig. 58) exhibits, at their line of union, a small square with diagonal cross-lines. The position of this symbol which resembles the top view of a pyramid and forms, as it were, the apex of the statue, every detail of which is deeply symbolical, clearly reveals the sanctity and importance attached to this graphic image of the Centre, the union of four in one or _vice versa_, the theme on which the native mind played numberless and endless variations.
A reflection, again forced upon one in studying the monumental composite image of the dual and quadruple forces of nature, is that it must have been as intelligible to a Maya as to a Mexican, and conveyed the conception of Kukulcan to the one and Quetzalcoatl to the other. Several facts point, however, to the greater probability that the original conception of the monument must have arisen amongst Maya-speaking people.
The divided square, simulating a pyramid and so obviously a symbol of four=can, carved on the head of a serpent=can, throws an interesting light upon the probable derivation of the affix=can, which occurs in certain names of localities in Mexico, and in some cases distinctly stands for "mountain." It is a fact which has already been cited in Señor Antonio Penafiel's useful work on the Geographical names of Mexico that, in the pictographic hieroglyphs of localities the affix can signifies a town, being synonymous with the _tepec_, _i. e._ tepetl, the Nahuatl name for mountain or town. One of many similar instances, which could be produced, is illustrated in his fig. XXIII, 1, where _can_ obviously stands for the mountain which is represented as twisted or bent over (colhua), in the hieroglyph for Colhuacan. The hieroglyphs for the towns Acayocan and Tenayocan, furnish a similar employment of the mountain to express the sound can. The sense of the affix _can_, meaning a town, only becomes clear when we interpret it as the name of the artificial mountain with four sides, the pyramid, which was the symbol of four=the Maya _can_, and was the emblem of a central capital. This is convincingly proven by the Codex Mendoza for instance, in which it is shown that the Mexican mode of recording the conquest of a tribe was to paint their hieroglyphic name and a picture of the destruction of the pyramid temple which had stood in the centre of their capital. In other words, the conquered town ceased to be a centre of rule--its captive chieftain was taken to the capital, where the horrible rite of sacrifice performed upon him and the tearing out of his heart likewise symbolized the destruction of the independent life of the tribe or integral whole he represented in his person. It was thus brought home to the conquered people that they had ceased to exist as an independent body, and the distribution of the chieftain's flesh to the ritualistic cannibals graphically symbolized its absorption into the great central state. It is necessary to emphasize here that these horrible rites were of comparatively recent origin and had been invented by the Mexicans for the purpose of intimidating their vassals, after a prolonged period of wars and bloodshed, which menaced the very existence of the integral state. The presence in Mexico of numerous names of towns, ending in can, seems to indicate the influence, in ancient times, of the Maya-speaking civilization to which the origin of the pyramid must be assigned. The association of the latter with the word _can_ is strikingly illustrated in the name of Teotihua-Can, where stand the ruins of two of the largest and most imposing pyramids of ancient America. The base of the larger of the two has been estimated at about 700 feet square, it being impossible to take an exact measurement owing to the mass of accumulated débris which covers the lower part of the structure.