Chapter 4 continues the theme of the European Mythology of the Indies (II), exploring the intellectual framework employed by Europeans (specifically Spanish, French, and British) to situate native peoples within a European worldview, taking the narrative from the sixteenth century, through the seventeenth century, and into the early eighteenth century. The chapter considers the use of the terms “civilization” and “barbarism” to characterize indigenous peoples, traditions of millennial thought and prophecy among the Franciscan friars, theories of demonology and witchcraft as applied to native inhabitants, and the myth of the so-called pre-Hispanic evangelization of the Americas and the identification of the Christian St. Thomas with the Mesoamerican god Quetzalcoatl, the myth of indigenous peoples as descendants of the Lost Tribes of Israel, and finally the myth of the noble savage.

The tradition of the apotheosis probably arose through the confluence of native and European beliefs and actions, rather than as simply a one-sided European creation or imposition. Indigenous understandings of the significance of white men originated not with Europeans but with native peoples themselves. Natives are on record as rejecting European claims, and they formed their own view independently. There is no evidence for an apotheosis in Mesoamerica or the Andes in the original sixteenth-century sources, especially those written at the time of the Spaniards’ arrival. The myth of Viracocha and the myth of Quetzalcoatl both reflect a retrospective view rather than one held at the time of the Spaniards’ arrival. Europeans channeled a life force that made them “more-than-human,” or “human-plus.” Both native peoples and Europeans interpreted their mutual contact in terms of their preexisting mythology. The traditional contrast between scientific, rational, modern Europeans, on the one hand, and myth-bound, irrational, premodern indigenous peoples, on the other, is entirely misleading. Both groups made interpretations based on reason and rational enquiry, and at the same time employed mythological explanations.

The subject of Chapter 2 is the tradition of the apotheosis in Mesoamerica, principally Central Mexico. The chapter opens with the context of indigenous political and social organization, and a summary of Spanish penetration of Mexico from 1519. There follows a fictive reconstruction of dialogue between the Aztec ruler Moctezuma and his counsellors in order to offer one plausible, source-based scenario for how the ruling elite might have interpreted the advent of the Spaniards on the basis of rational, pragmatic considerations. The chapter then analyzes the response of Moctezuma and the Mexica, outlines the lack of evidence for an apotheosis in the Spanish and native chroniclers, and examines the significance of Nahuatl terminology, in particular the concept of teotl, which was the word often translated as “god.” The Quetzalcoatl myth (the notion of the identification of Cortés with the god Quetzalcoatl) is presented as a post-conquest construct, devised retrospectively to make sense of the momentous events. The tradition of pre-conquest omens is discussed. No evidence is found that the emperor Moctezuma treated Cortés as a god at their meetings.

A spiritually enveloping, time-consuming, and value-creating set of activities, Aztecs centered their religion on powerful spiritual beings. Ceremony and time were fundamental parts of everyday life. From the smallest household to the largest city, rituals of offering to the gods took place every day as Aztecs sought water, food, the survival of human life, and balance in what they perceived to be a chaotic spiritual and material world. In their dynamic universe, deities and their human embodiments and priests and priestesses manifested great power. Ceremonies conducted for those beings, the offerings presented to them, and exchanged or distributed provide examples of the power and energy that offerings, including living humans, provided. Time-keeping focused on the notion of progressive ages, the idea of cyclical time, and two calendar systems. Their calendars used two ways of keeping track of days and months for ceremonies, agriculture, and war. Aztecs drew blood for human and plant fertility, purification, and to nourish and repay their debt to the creator deities. Yet the greatest offering human beings could give was to provide human lives, offering hearts and blood, though they did not do so in the numbers often suggested.