Justin Martyr (100 – 165 AD) wrote, “But if this idea take possession of some one that if we acknowledge God as our helper, we should not, as we say, be oppressed and persecuted by the wicked; this, too, I will solve. God, when He had made the whole world, and subjected things earthly to man, and arranged the heavenly elements for the increase of fruits and rotation of the seasons, and appointed this divine law–for these things also He evidently made for man–committed the care of men and of all things under heaven to angels whom He appointed over them.
But the angels transgressed this appointment. and were captivated by love of women, and begat children who are those that are called demons; and besides, they afterwards subdued the human race to themselves, partly by magical writings, and partly by fears and the punishments they occasioned, and partly by teaching them to offer sacrifices, and incense, and libations, of which things they stood in need after they were enslaved by lustful passions; and among men they sowed murders, wars, adulteries, intemperate deeds, and all wickedness.
Whence also the poets and mythologists, not knowing that it was the angels and those demons who had been begotten by them that did these things to men, and women, and cities, and nations, which they related, ascribed them to god himself, and to those who were accounted to be his very offspring, and to the offspring of those who were called his brothers, Neptune and Pluto, and to the children again of these their offspring.
For whatever name each of the angels had given to himself and his children, by that name they called them. -The Second Apology of Justin Martyr (Chapter V — How the angels transgressed) Conqusidor Bernal Diaz del Castillo (about 1492-1584 AD), who participated as a foot soldier in the conquest of Mexico with Hernan Cortes, writes in his memoirs, ” The tradition was also handed down from their forefathers, that in ancient times there lived here a race of men and women who were of immense stature with heavy bones, and were a very bad and evil-disposed people, whom they had for the greater part exterminated by continual war, and the few that were left gradually died away.
In order to give us a notion of the huge frame of this people, they dragged forth a bone, or rather a thigh bone, of one of those giants, which was very strong, and measured the length of a man of good stature. This bone was still entire from the knee to the hip joint. I measured it by my own person, and found it to be of my own length, although I am a man of considerable height. They showed us many similar pieces of bones, but they were all worm-eaten and decayed; we, however, did not doubt for an instant, that this country was once inhabited by giants.
Cortes observed, that we ought to forward these bones to his majesty in Spain by the very first opportunity. ” (The True History of the Conquest of New Spain – CHAPTER LXXVIII. How Cortes questioned Mase Escasi and Xicotenga about things in Mexico) In 1540, Spanish conquistador Francisco Vasquez de Coronado led an army from Mexico in search of the fabled golden cities of Cibola. Pedro de Castaneda, who accompanied Coronado later wrote, “From here a force went down the river to the seacoast to find the harbor and to find out about the ships.
Don Rodrigo Maldonado, who was captain of those who went in search of the ships, did not find them, but he brought back with him an Indian so large and tall that the best man in the army reached only to his chest. It was said that other Indians were even taller on that coast. ” -Frederick W. Hodge, ed. Spanish explorers in the southern United States, 1528-1543. New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1907. Excerpts from “The History of the Indies of New Spain (1581)” by Fray Diego Duran (1537-1588 AD), “It cannot be denied that there have been giants in this country.
I can affirm this as an eyewitness, for I have met men of monstrous stature here. I believe that there are many in Mexico who will remember, as I do, a giant Indian who appeared in a procession of the feast of Corpus Christi. He appeared dressed in yellow silk and a halberd at his shoulder and a helmet on his head. And he was all of three feet taller than the others. ” “When these six tribes had settled, they recorded in their painted books the type of land and kind of people they found here.
These books show two types of people, one from the west of the snow-covered mountains toward Mexico, and the other on the east, where Puebla and Cholula are found. Those from the first region were Chichimecs and the people from Puebla and Cholula were ‘The Giants,’ the Quiname, which means ‘men of great stature. ‘” “These Giants lived no less bestially than the Chichimecs, as they had abominable customs and ate raw meat from the hunt.
In certain laces of that region enormous bones of the Giants have been found, which I myself have seen dug up at the foot of cliffs many times. These Giants flung themselves from precipices while fleeing from the Cholultecs and were killed. The Cholultecs had been extremely cruel to the Giants, harassing them, pursuing them from hill to hill, from valley to valley, until they were destroyed. ” “Even if we detain the reader a little, I should like to tell the manner in which the people of Cholula and Tlaxcala annihilated that evil nation.
This was done by treason and deceit. They pretended to want peace with the Giants, and after having assured them of their good will they invited them to a great banquet. An ambush was then prepared. Some men slyly robbed the guests of their shields, clubs, and swords. The Cholultecs then appeared and attacked. The Giants tried to defend themselves, and, as they could not find their weapons, it is said that they tore branches from the trees with the same ease as one cuts a turnip, and in this way defended themselves valiantly.
But finally all were killed. ” Garcilaso de la Vega (1539-1616 AD), who accompanied Hernando De Soto, wrote of indian chief Tuscaluca and his son, “Tuscaluca was forty years of age or thereabouts, and two feet higher (. 61m) than those who accompanied him, so that he appeared a giant. His face, his shoulders, and the rest of his body corresponded with his height, and he was large in proportion ; a handsome man, of proud and noble mien ; the best formed and greatest that they had yet seen in Florida.
“The army refreshed itself two clays in the village, and the third it left. Tuscaluca, under pretext of friendship and service, wished to accompany- it daring its march over his lands. Therefore, Soto commanded that they should have ready a horse for this cacique, the same as they had done, until then, for all the other Indian lords, which I had forgotten to mention. But as Tuscaluca was large, they had trouble to find a steed for him. Nevertheless, when they had searched well, they found a large pack-horse.
They put him thereupon, after having given him a scarlet dress, and cap of the same color, but his feet lacked very little of touching the ground. ” “THE general sojonrned ten days at Talisse,where he inquired about the neighboring provinces and the journey he had to make. In the mean time the son of Tuscaluca visited him. He was a young man, about eighteen years of age, but so tall that he exceeded in height, by nearly half of his body, all the Spaniards and all the Indians of the army. ” –The Florida of the Inca (1605) by Garcilaso de la Vega
