Up to date our knowledge of the meanings of the glyphs is still to all
intents and purposes limited to the direct tradition we have through
Landa, and the deductions immediately involved in these. We know the day
and month signs, the numbers, including 0 and 20, four units of the
archaic calendar count (the day, tun, katun and cycle), the cardinal
point signs, the negative particle. We have not fully solved the uinal
or month sign, which seems to be _chuen_ on the monuments and a _cauac_,
or _chuen_, in the manuscripts. We are able to identify what must be
regarded as metaphysical or esoteric applications of certain glyphs in
certain places, such as the face numerals.[35-*] But every one of these
points is either deducible directly by necessary mathematical
calculation, or else from the names of certain signs given by Landa in
his day and month list, and then found in other combinations, such as
_yax_, _kin_, etc. That we have as many of the points as we have, and
still cannot form from them the key--that we cannot _read_ the
glyphs--is a constant wonder; but a fact nevertheless.
The innumerable efforts to identify the glyphs by their superficial
appearance, calling the banded headdress a "pottery decoration," and
explaining the face-glyph of the North thereby, because in Maya _xaman_
is north and _xamach_ a tortilla dish (to say nothing of others still
more fanciful, by a host of writers), have broken down, as was to be
expected. I mention this instance because it illustrates fully the
results of superficial analysis, united with a seeming ineradicable
tendency even among those most able students who have added the most to
our stock of Maya knowledge (among whom Dr. Brinton was certainly one of
the foremost), to treat these glyphs as carelessly done, to disregard
the differences between manifest variants, or else to talk freely,
whenever a passage does not fit the explanation which is being worked
out, of scribal errors.
In the first place, _if_ these glyphs are to be interpreted primarily by
the Yucatecan Maya dialect (one in which we have most ample printed and
MS. lexicographic material), and if in that dialect no other words at
all resembling _xaman_ and _xamach_ are found, as we are told, then
(_if_ the Mayas named the north star, or the North, by a pun on a
tortilla dish) wherever this banded headdress is found, we must assume
the text to be treating either of the North, or of tortillas. That might
safely be left to break down of its own weight; but we shall also see
that the explanation is given in total disregard of manifest, important
variants. This banded headdress appears ornamenting at least
[Hieroglyphs] five separate and distinct faces; one a wholly human face,
the others with various other definite characteristics, the most
frequent and prominent of which are the monkey-like face and mouth we
see in the [Hieroglyph] glyph for the north, and a sort of bird's
plumage covering the back of the head. These two are separate, are never
combined, and must be classified rigidly apart. We have therefore three
elements, the monkey face, the plumage covering (if we may call it so),
and the banded headdress. It is obvious that while the monkey face may
be specific of the North, the bands are not specific at all, but
general.
It is with the greatest diffidence that I suggest any interpretations on
my own part as yet, but it is of course certain that the distinction of
masculine and feminine existed in the spoken language, and it must exist
somewhere in the glyphs. And it will have to be a prefix, not a postfix;
for what I may call the syntax of glyph formation must follow that of
the speech. At the bottom of Dres. 61 and 62 are seven identical
Oc-glyphs with subfix, and with prefixes. Five of these prefixes are
faces with the woman's curl, recognized on the figured illustrations.
One is a face with the banded headdress. Remembering that this headdress
occurs not infrequently on a plain human face with no other
characteristic, it is not a far guess that it may have denoted a
freeman, a lord, entitled to such a headdress. In this event it may on
the one hand serve as a simple masculine definitive, the prefix _ah-_,
and on the other, to attach the idea of lordship to other glyphs with
which it is incorporated, as: the North Star, or region, the Lord of the
Firmament.
This illustration serves to show what seems to me an essential
preliminary of the work we have in hand, and the part to which I have so
far devoted most effort. The glyphs must be determined, compared and
classified, and what I have called the "syntax" of their composition,
studied. The particles and their positions, the various _incorporated_
elements, are of the utmost importance, though they are very frequently
ignored. _They are the written picture of the spirit of the spoken
language._ The task I have most looked forward to in this connexion has
of course been with the Dresden, but having started upon the Perez for
the reasons I have given, it was a smaller task in itself, and could be
brought to completion within less time, while serving as part of the
larger work. As the determination and classification of the glyphs had
to proceed all as one work, it has enabled me not only to complete my
Index for this codex, but also to print the text in type, and to verify
and bring out such facts regarding the color questions as was possible
to do--both of them stages needed in the general work. In doing it I
have studied with my hands as well as with eyes, and I have been well
repaid. The actual labor has not been small, but it has been worth it
all if only to see before the eyes something of what this Codex must
have been when fresh and new. For as I have said, while in my colored
restoration I may have made some mistakes of eye, for which the
photographs will be a check, I have _guessed_ nothing.
The classification of the glyphs meets of course with some difficulties
in detail, but it can readily be cast into a quite simple general
outline. Something over 2000 different compound forms are found in the
three codices. The simple elements composing these are perhaps 350 in
number, and may be divided broadly into main elements and affixes or
particles. First of course come day and month signs, which, with _kin_,
_tun_, _kal_, and a few marked variants, use up 50 numbers. Next will
come the faces, about 75 simple elements. Next the animal and bird heads
and figures, about 50 numbers. Next the hands, crosses, etc., and the
list of conventional or geometric forms, another 75. Then some 75
particles.
The cards required for the first 50 numbers, including only compounds
formed from day-signs and excluding day-signs used simply as such,
amount to practically one half of the number required for the whole
index. Certain elements, notably the _kin_, the _tun_, the monkey-face
with banded headdress, already referred to, the face with tau-eye, the
_yax_, the cross, produce a great number of compounds--a fact of note,
as it is evident that the number of compounds, having due regard to our
limited material, is an index to the relative position of the idea in
the Mayan vocabularies. Some of the day-signs produce practically no
compounds, others a great many. The compounds fall readily into a system
of primary and secondary derivatives, by which their relations may be
easily studied, and their proportions recognized.
Coming to the distinguishing of variants, one first meets the fact that
the three codices differ. The writing of the Dresden and Perez is
regular and accurate, the Perez exceedingly so. Every different variant
must here be accounted for. In Tro.-Cort. the writing is crude and
careless, so that we have many evident abbreviations which are not
genuine variants. In the next place, certain regular differences occur
in this or that glyph or particle, between the forms of the different
manuscripts. Thus the Perez uses [Hieroglyph] and the others
[Hieroglyph] and so on. A comparison of the compounds shows that these
must be the same. The regular variations between the three manuscripts
and variations of abbreviation, when well evidenced, may be eliminated.
The day-signs have many variants, mostly quite simple, and all
checked positively by the use of the form in some day-series. Ix has
many forms. There are at least three entirely different Cimi forms:
[Hieroglyphs][TN-4] There are found two different forms of the closed
eye, one of which certainly is Cimi, the other occurs regularly in
such different compounds (and I think never as a simple day-sign), as
to make it necessary to separate it; [Hieroglyph] it has probably a
different meaning entirely--perhaps that of sleep.
* * * * *
A noteworthy technical line is to be found in the drawing of the glyphs.
Whereas in the case of the day-signs, faces, and conventional forms in
general, certain variations of handwriting, etc., are evidently
permitted, but only within certain definite lines, in some few animal
glyphs no two instances are just alike. In other words, the glyphs in
general are conventions with established meanings--actual writing;[39-*]
but we also have _pictures_ of birds or animal forms, where the writer
is not following convention, but nature. The freedom of style used in
the latter case only serves to emphasize the conventionality of the
former, and to separate the entire system from either picture or rebus
writing. See the following fish-glyph forms:
[Hieroglyphs]
These pictures are almost exclusively in uncompounded forms, whereas the
conventional glyphs, whether human, animal or otherwise, are subject to
the general rules of incorporation.
Writing is a system of conventional forms with established meanings,
corresponding to and reflecting the structure of the spoken language;
some picture elements whose value as such has remained either wholly or
partly present in the minds of those who use them, are not inconsistent
with genuine writing; when present they add vividness to the writing,
and emphasize its ideographic character. A combination of picture forms
only, may be used as means of communication to a certain degree, but can
never constitute _writing_; that, like speech, must provide for the
expression of the relationships and categories that make up the
structure of language.
Egyptian writing, which is of course _true writing_, contains elements
of every class. It has symbols and also pictures, not only of things or
creatures, but of actions as well, "contracted to a narrow space, made
cursive"; these pictures, although still ranking as such, stand for
_words_--they can be _pronounced_, and have syntax, which is the crucial
test. Egyptian next has unrecognizable forms, whose meaning has become a
simple convention, but which still stand for _words_, or particles. It
has elements which are not pronounced for themselves, but only serve as
determinatives. (Such a use of determinatives is not limited to
hieroglyphic writing, but is possessed also by alphabetic; the second
_o_ in the word _too_ is strictly a determinative, to distinguish the
adverb _too_ from the preposition _to_, both pronounced alike. Tibetan
has an elaborate system of silent letters used as grammatical
determinatives.) And then Egyptian writing finally has pure alphabetic
elements.
As to Maya, I think it far more than likely that, when at last
deciphered, it will be found to contain most if not all of these
classes--_mutatis mutandis_. There seems every evidence that it is made
up of pictures with probably both concrete and abstract meanings;
word-conventions; and grammatical particles. It is at least probable
that there are also silent determinatives and not unlikely that there is
also a pure phonetic or alphabetic element. That the latter element is
not the basic one may I think be now regarded as established.