Dr. Schliemann reports, in the Ethnological Museum at Berlin, a pottery
bowl from Yucatan ornamented with a Swastika, the two main arms crossing
at right angles, and he adds,[263] citing Le Plongeon, "Fouilles au
Yucatan," that "during the last excavations in Yucatan this sign was found
several times on ancient pottery."
Le Plongeon discovered a fragment of a stone slab in the ancient Maya city
of Mayapan, of which he published a description in the Proceedings of the
American Antiquarian Society. It contains an ogee Swastika (tetraskelion),
with ends curved to the left and an inverted [U] with a wheel (fig. 261).
Le Plongeon believed it to be an Egyptian inscription, which he translated
thus: The character, inverted [U], stood for _Ch_ or _K_; the wheel for
the sun, _Aa_ or _Ra_, and the Swastika for _Ch_ or _K_, making the whole
to be _Chach_ or _Kak_, which, he says, is the word _fire_ in the Maya
language.[264]
[Illustration: Fig. 261. FRAGMENT OF STONE SLAB FROM THE ANCIENT MAYA CITY
OF MAYAPAN. Ogee Swastika (tetraskelion). Proceedings of the American
Antiquarian Society, April 21, 1881.]