These hieroglyphs also form but _one_ line on each page and each line
contains six hieroglyphs. The _first_ of each line is always the same
(_p_). It consists of a surface divided into four quadrants thus suggesting
the four cardinal points, the four Bacabs presiding over them and the four
kinds of years. The superfix seems to be the abbreviated hieroglyph of the
north; the sign for the north, however, is Muluc and these four pages begin
with the Muluc years.
The _second_ sign is the head of D as the supreme god; to this a Yax is
joined on pages 26-28 as the symbol of strength, and on page 25, but
probably by mistake, the abbreviated sign for the west.
The _third_ sign always represents one of the four cardinal points:--on
page 25 the east, on page 26 the south, on page 27 the west and on page 28
the north; here then the usual order is reversed and the signs are set down
according to the diurnal instead of the annual course of the sun, probably
occasioned merely by exchanging the sign for the west (Ix), which belongs
on page 25, with that for the east (Kan), which belongs on page 27.
The other three signs do not stand in the same order on every page.
The _fifth_ sign on pages 26 and 28 and the _fourth_ on page 27 show
correspondence most clearly. This sign is always a head, undoubtedly that
of the god pictured in the bottom third. But on page 25 it is the
hieroglyph of E, who is pictured on the top of page 27, instead of that of
B.
In the same way the 6th sign on page 25, the 4th on page 26, the 5th on
page 27 and the 4th on page 28 have something in common. One element of the
hieroglyph is always the sign for the year of 360 days, combined on page 25
with cross-bones and the Cauac sign, on 26 with Yax and Kan, and on 27 and
28 simply with Yax.
The most puzzling and divergent of these hieroglyphs are the remaining
ones. The 4th on page 25 has an oblique cross (or bones?) and the
abbreviated glyph for the west, the 6th on page 26 is the head of E, the
6th on page 27 is the 360-day sign combined with Kin and Cauac, and the 6th
on page 28 is the usual Kan-Imix sign. Here, too, there seems to have been
a displacement.
Before I leave the four pages 25-28, I will glance at the numerals, which
are scattered over them and which apparently have no connection with one
another. I have discussed these numerals in my article "Die
Mayahieroglyphen" in Volume LXXI, No. 5, of the Globus, and the following
is borrowed therefrom.
First of all, I believe that I proved there, that the sign composed of two
dots with a cross between them is an abbreviation for the usual clumsy
representation of the numeral 18 and designates it like a duodeviginti by
20 - 2. Next, that in this passage as on pages 18a, 18c, 19c, 46b and 50c,
the sign is combined with the hieroglyphs Yax-Kin. Third, that it is
closely related to the god D, inasmuch as it stands on page 27b close
beside the picture of that god.
Assuming this as a known fact, we find scattered over these four pages the
following numbers:--
25: 9, 7, 8, 9, 19,
26: 7, 16, 13, 7, 9,
27: 11, 5, 2, 18, 16,
28: 6, 6, 13, 6, 15.
It is very remarkable that the sum of the numbers on each of the first
three pages is equal to 52, and as an accidental freak it would be most
surprising; somewhere on the fourth page six units may have been omitted;
but perhaps the 6, which stands above the _two_ Chuen signs in the centre,
is to be counted twice. The 52, however, designates the very 52 years,
which are treated of on these four pages.
As yet I know no reason to account for the fact that the 52 is here
separated into these apparently very irregular numbers. The discovery of
this reason would be an important step in advance. Or does it means 52
_days_, perhaps those which follow a Tonalamatl coming in the middle of the
year?
Page 28 is followed in the Manuscript by three empty pages. The scribe's
object in reserving them is beyond our ken; possibly they were intended to
represent the period of 8 years.
Pages 29-45 (_i.e._, to the end of the first part of the Manuscript) all
belong together. After the Maya manner there is very little system
displayed in their arrangement, and though here and there there may be
occasion to consider the three parts of each page consecutively, I will
discuss them here as follows:--First, the top thirds, which are most
difficult owing to the destruction of a large portion of them; then the
middle, and last the bottom thirds. They all consist in great part, with a
few interruptions, of representations of the regular Tonalamatl, such as we
find represented from the beginning of the Manuscript to page 23.
The element which these pages have in common is the fact that the god B,
who can hardly be Kukulcan or Quetzalcoatl, occurs on almost all of them.
He is the god of wind, fire, breath, _i.e._, the true god of life and is
here represented in his relation to the most varied manifestations and
activities of a human being, so that this section bears a certain
resemblance to the Tro-Cortesianus. With this is closely connected his
relation to all four cardinal points, which so often occur. He may have
been the local god of the region from whence this Manuscript came; in the
Tro-Cort. It seems rather to be C who lays claim to this office.
Pages 29a--30a.
XI 13 XI 13 XI 13 XI 13 XI 13 XI
Lamat
Ben
Ezanab
Akbal.
This is a Tonalamatl of 4 × 65 days, each part subdivided into 5 × 13 days.
The four days written on the left are those which may begin the year.
In each of the five sections B is pictured in a sitting posture, the first
four times on a tree (the tree of life rather than the sacrificial tree).
In the first picture he holds in one hand the haunch of venison, so often
occurring as an offering, the last time on page 28; the object above it is
probably the Kan sign. There is a vessel at the god's feet, probably a
receptacle for the venison, bearing the hieroglyph of the 13th day Cib,
which, however, refers rather to a bird.
In the second picture an animal with a protruding tongue lies on its back
at the feet of the god, who kneels upon its stomach. This probably
represents the lightning-dog as vanquished. The same animal is pictured on
the next page and also on page 40b and perhaps on page 60. There are a
number of small dots around B's head, which on page 11c we attempted to
interpret as the starry sky.
I can find nothing of special importance in the third and fourth pictures,
but in the fifth, B is sitting in a house, which is marked repeatedly with
the sign Caban (ground). Here the god is holding the hatchet (machete) in
his hand, as if prepared for some terrestrial activity. Four hieroglyphs in
the usual order belong to each of the five pictures. They are almost
entirely destroyed, but the vestiges show that the fourth sign was always
that of B, while the third sign with the first picture had the abbreviated
hieroglyph of the west as a prefix; with the second picture it had that of
the south, and therefore with the third and fourth it must certainly have
had the signs of the east and north. We should expect the signs with these
prefixes to contain references to Ix, Cauac, Kan and Muluc, but they are
not distinguishable.
Thus B is represented in pictures 1-4 as ruler of the four cardinal points
and in 5 as the ruler of the earth in general.
Pages 30a--31a.
This passage looks like an amplification of the middle picture on page 29a.
Here B is represented with the hatchet in his left hand and holding aloft
by the tail with his right hand the animal, which is spitting out something
upon a stepped pyramidal structure, probably the pyramid of a teocalli.
That this is probably meant to represent lightning is rendered almost a
certainty by the picture on page 40b. In this passage there are several red
and black numerals scattered around the animal in an irregular manner,
which we find nowhere else in our Manuscript, but with which the
Tro-Cortesianus has made us familiar. The sum of the black numbers still
legible is 23, probably a 3 is effaced and the sum should be 26, the sum
which so often occurs in the Cod. Troano 8-13 with the animal represented
there. The red numbers likewise do not admit of exact determination. This
passage also contained hieroglyphs, four standing side by side on each of
the two pages. The legible portion is limited to the Cimi sign in the third
place, perhaps an Imix in the second, and possibly an Ahau in the first.
Pages 31a--32a.
In my article "Zur Entzifferung, etc., VI," published in the year 1897, I
discussed this passage more in detail, and the following will be in
continuation of what I stated there.
The real aim of the computation on these pages is to find a number in which
the following periods of time are united with the Tonalamatl of 260
days:--1. The ritual year of 364 days, and consequently also a quarter of
it, the Bacab period of 91 days. 2. The period of 104 days, being the
number of days which remain after a Tonalamatl has been deducted from a
ritual year. The hypothesis advanced by Mrs. Zelia Nuttall ("Note on the
Ancient Mexican Calendar System," Stockholm, 1894) and also the entirely
different opinion held by Mr. Charles P. Bowditch ("The Lords of the Night
and the Tonalamatl of the Codex Borbonicus" in the American Anthropologist,
N. S., Vol. II, New York, 1900) prove the existence not only of merely
arbitrary Tonalamatls for the purpose of prediction, as those in our
Manuscript, but also of Tonalamatls having a fixed position in certain
years. But after the manner peculiar to priestcraft, the number sought is
found only by an indirect and mysterious process.
In the first place we find on page 32a all the days set down in the
following manner:--
XIII XIII XIII XIII
Manik Cib Chicchan Ix
Chuen Ahau Muluc Ezanab
Men Kan Ben Ik
Cauac Lamat Caban Cimi
Akbal Eb Imix Oc.
That is to say, a series counting from the day XIII Akbal, the New Year's
day of the year I Kan, recurring every 52 years, furthermore a series which
shows the same difference of 91 from the day XIII Akbal to XIII Ix, XIII
Chicchan, etc., and finally ends with XIII Akbal again, after it has run
through a period of 20 × 91, _i.e._, 1820 days = 7 Tonalamatls, like a
similar representation of 7 Tonalamatls on page 51. Above these 20 days,
and to the left of them, numbers are set down rather irregularly, which
begin with 91 and are multiples of that number. The signs of the days
corresponding to these numbers are joined to them; but they are omitted
with the numbers of lowest value. Hence we have:--91, 182, 273, 364 (4),
455 (5), 546 (6), 637 (7), 728 (8), 819 (9), 910 (10). Then with a bound
follow 1456 and 1820; with the last number Akbal is reached in the natural
way, which day the scribe had erroneously set down again with 1456 in place
of Cauac.
The number 728 already united the numbers 91, 104 and 364, but did not
include the number 260. This inclusion is accomplished by the number 3640
on page 32, quite on the left where we find the numbers 10 and 2, under
which only a 0 has been omitted. With the usual hiatuses this series seems
to end on page 31, where I think the numbers 4, 0, 16 and 0 ought to stand,
but they are almost wholly effaced; this would then be 320 × 91, 280 × 104,
112 × 260, 80 × 364 = 29,120.
We have thus gone far in advance of the first problem, but a second always
presents itself in these series, it is that of using these periods for
larger numbers, which refer to a not too remote past or to a future not too
distant. The first numbers are, as a rule, in the neighborhood of
1,252,680, the close of the eleventh Ahau-Katun, and the latter in the
neighborhood of 1,480,440, the close of the thirteenth Ahau-Katun. The
Manuscript presents the following:--
1,272,544 1,268,540 1,538,342.
XIII Akbal XIII Akbal XIII Akbal
121 17 51,419
IV Ahau IV Ahau
8 Cumhu 8 Cumhu IV Ahau.
In connection with this it should be noted first that I have restored the 8
in the statement of the months, and second that the two numbers on the
right were found with the aid of page 63 only by an easy conjecture. For
with the reading of the Manuscript 10, 13, 3, 13, 2, I do not agree, but
read instead 10, 13, 13, 3, 2; the number below, however, is given in the
Manuscript as 7, 2 and then a black 14 joined to a red 5; I read this 7, 2,
14, 19.
The three numbers nearest the bottom have red circles around them,
indicating subtraction, or, according to my present point of view,
addition.
Now let us see how the computer arrived at the large numbers.
Day XIII Akbal, the New Year's day of the 1 Kan years, is given; also the
differences of the series 91 and 104, therefore also in the proportion of 7
to 8. If we combine these last two numbers by addition and then by
multiplication with 260, the result is (7 + 8) × 260 = 3900. If, however,
7, 8 and 3900 be combined by multiplication the product is 7 × 8 × 3900 =
218,400 = 2400 × 91 = 2100 × 104 = 840 × 260 = 600 × 364 = 1120 × (91 +
104). We have already met with the 218,400 on page 24, which was obtained
by the addition of 33,280 + 185,120.
My opinion is as follows:--First 11 Ahau-Katuns = 1,252,680, were taken as
a point of departure, and to this sum was added 15,600 = 4 × 3900, and 243
as the interval between the normal date IV Ahau and XIII Akbal. The result
was 1,268,523. The position of this day, however, is XIII Akbal 11 Xul (1
Ix).
Then the 3900 mentioned above was added to this number and the result was
1,272,423 = XIII Akbal 16 Pop (12 Muluc).
Then to the 1,268,523 was added the 218,400 and the sum was 1,486,923 =
XIII Akbal 1 Kankin (1 Kan), the very place in that year where a Tonalamatl
ends.