Chapter V: Introduction: Contents (2)

"On referring to a table, or, as the Mayas did, to a 'Katun wheel,'
we find the 11th Cauac to be the 24th year of the cycle; add ten to
this and we have 34 as the number of the year in the cycle to which
10 Ahau XI corresponds. The great simplicity and convenience of
this will be evident without further discussion."

The important question remains, how closely, by these cycles, did the Mayas approximate to preserving the exact date of an event?

To answer this fairly, we should be sure that we have a perfectly authentic translation of their hieroglyphic annals. It is doubtful that we have. Those I present in this volume are the most perfect, so far as I know, but they certainly do not agree among themselves. Can their discrepancies be explained? I think they can in a measure (1) by the differing length of the katuns, (2) by the era assumed as the commencement of the reckoning.

It must be remembered that there was apparently no common era adopted by the Mayas; each province may have selected its own; and it is quite erroneous to condemn the annals off-hand for inaccuracy because they conflict between themselves.

Sec. 8. _Ancient Hieroglyphic Books._

The Mayas were a literary people. They made frequent use of tablets, wrote many books, and covered the walls of their buildings with hieroglyphic signs, cut in the stones or painted upon the plaster.

The explanation of these signs is one of the leading problems in American archaeology. It was supposed to have been solved when the manuscript of Bishop Landa's account of Yucatan was discovered, some twenty years ago, in Madrid. The Bishop gave what he called "an A, B, C," of the language, but which, when applied to the extant manuscripts and the mural inscriptions, proved entirely insufficient to decipher them.

The disappointment of the antiquaries was great, and by one of them, Dr. Felipe Valentini, Landa's alphabet has been denounced as "a Spanish fabrication."[61-1] But certainly any one acquainted with the history of the Latin alphabet, how it required the labor of thousands of years and the demands of three wholly different families of languages, to bring it to its perfection, should not have looked to find among the Mayas, or anywhere else, a parallel production of human intelligence. Moreover, rightly understood, Landa does not intimate anything of the kind. He distinctly states that what he gives are the sounds of the Spanish letters as they would be transcribed in Maya characters; not at all that they analyzed the sounds of their words and expressed the phonetic elements in these characters. On the contrary, he takes care to affirm that they could not do this, and gives an example in point.[62-1] Dr. Valentini, therefore, was attacking a windmill, and entirely misconstrued the Bishop's statements.

I shall not, in this connection, enter into a discussion of the nature of these hieroglyphics. It is enough for my purpose to say that they were recognized by the earliest Spanish explorers as quite different from those of Mexico, and as the only graphic system on the continent, so far as they knew it, which merited the name of writing.[62-2]

The word for book in Maya is _huun_, a monosyllable which reappears in the Kiche _vuh_ and the Huasteca _uuh_. In Maya this initial _h_ is almost silent and is occasionally dropped, as _yuunil Dios_, the book of God (syncopated form of _u huunil Dios_, the suffix _il_ being the "determinative" ending). I am inclined to believe that _huun_ is merely a form of _uoohan_, something written, this being the passive participle of _uooh_, to write, which, as a noun, also means a character, a letter.[63-1]

Another name for their books, especially those containing the prophecies and forecasts of the priestly diviners, is said to have been _anahte_; or _analte_. This word is not to be found in any of the early dictionaries. The usual authority for it is Villagutierre Sotomayor, who describes these volumes as they were seen among the Itzas of Lake Peten, about 1690.[64-1]

These books consisted of one long sheet of a kind of paper made by macerating and beating together the leaves of the maguey, and afterwards sizing the surface with a durable white varnish. The sheet was folded like a screen, forming pages about 9 x 5 inches. Both sides were covered with figures and characters painted in various brilliant colors. On the outer pages boards were fastened, for protection, so that the completed volume had the appearance of a bound book of large octavo size.

Instead of this paper, parchment was sometimes used. This was made from deerskins, thoroughly cured and also smoked, so that they should be less liable to the attacks of insects. A very durable substance was thus obtained, which would resist most agents of destruction, even in a tropical climate. Twenty-seven rolls of such parchment, covered with hieroglyphics, were among the articles burned by Bishop Landa, at Mani, in 1562, in a general destruction of everything which related to the ancient life of the nation. He himself says that he burned all that he could lay his hands upon, to the great distress of the natives.[65-1]

A very few escaped the destructive bigotry of the Spanish priests. So far as known these are.--

1. The Codex Tro, or Troano, in Madrid, published by the French government, in 1869.

2. What is believed to be the second part of the Codex Troano, now (1882) in process of publication in Paris.

3. The Codex Peresianus, in the National Library, Paris, a very limited edition of which has been issued.

4. The Dresden Codex, in Kingsborough's Mexico, and photographed in colors, to the number of 50 copies, in 1880, which is believed to contain fragments of two different manuscripts.

To these are, perhaps, to be added one other in Europe and two in Mexico, which are in private hands, and are alleged to be of the same character.

All the above are distinctly in characters which were peculiar to the Mayas, and which are clearly variants of those found on the sculptured beams and slabs of Uxmal, Chichen Itza, Palenque and Copan.

It is possible that many other manuscripts may be discovered in time, for Landa tells us that it was the custom to bury with the priests the books which they had written. As their tombs were at times of solid stones, firmly cemented together, and well calculated to resist the moisture and other elements of destruction for centuries, it is nowise unlikely that explorations in Yucatan will bring to light some of these hidden documents.

The contents of these books, so far as we can judge from the hints in the early writers, related chiefly to the ritual and calendar, to their history or Katuns, to astrological predictions and divinations, to their mythology, and to their system of healing disease.

Sec. 9. _Modern Maya Manuscripts._

As I have said, the Mayas were naturally a literary people. Had they been offered the slightest chance for the cultivation of their intellects they would have become a nation of readers and writers. Striking testimony to this effect is offered by Doctor Don Augustin de Echano, Prebend of the Cathedral Church of Merida, about the middle of the last century. He observes that twelve years of experience among the Indians had taught him that they were very desirous of knowledge, and that as soon as they learned to read, they eagerly perused everything they could lay their hands on; and as they had nothing in their tongue but some old writings that treated of sorceries and quackeries, the worthy Prebend thought it an excellent idea that they should be supplied, in place of these, with some ---- _sermons_![67-1] But what else could be expected of a body of men who crushed out with equal bigotry every spark of mental independence in their own country?

The "old writings" to which the Prebend alludes were composed by natives who had learned to write the Maya in the alphabet adopted by the early missionaries and conquerors. An official document in Maya, still extant, dates from 1542, and from that time on there were natives who wrote their tongue with fluency. But their favorite compositions were works similar to those to which their forefathers had been partial, prophecies, chronicles and medical treatises.

Relying on their memories, and no doubt aided by some of the ancient hieroglyphical manuscripts, carefully secreted from the vandalism of the monks, they wrote out what they could recollect of their national literature.

There were at one time a large number of these records. They are referred to by Cogolludo, Sanchez Aguilar and other early historians. Probably nearly every village had one, which in time became to be regarded with superstitious veneration.

Wherever written, each of these books bore the same name; it was always referred to as "The Book of Chilan Balam." To distinguish them apart, the name of the village where one was composed was added. Thus we have still preserved to us, in whole or in fragments, the Book of Chilan Balam of Chumayel, of Kaua, of Nabula, etc., in all, it is said, about sixteen.

"Chilan Balam" was the designation of a class of priests. "Chilan," says Bishop Landa, "was the name of their priests, whose duty it was to teach the sciences, to appoint holy days, to treat the sick, to offer sacrifices, and especially to utter the oracles of the gods. They were so highly honored by the people that usually they were carried on litters on the shoulders of the devotees."[69-1] Strictly speaking, in Maya, _chilan_ means "interpreter," "mouth-piece," from "_chij_," "the mouth," and in this ordinary sense frequently occurs in other writings. The word _balam_--literally, "tiger,"--was also applied to a class of priests, and is still in use among the natives of Yucatan as the designation of the protective spirits of fields and towns, as I have shown at length in a study of the word as it occurs in the native myths of Guatemala.[70-1] "_Chilan Balam_," therefore, is not a proper name, but a title, and in ancient times designated the priest who announced the will of the gods and explained the sacred oracles. This accounts for the universality of the name and the sacredness of its associations.

The dates of the books which have come down to us are various. One of them, "The Book of Chilan Balam of Mani," was undoubtedly composed not later than 1595, as is proved by internal evidence. Various passages in the works of Landa, Lizana, Sanchez Aguilar and Cogolludo--all early historians of Yucatan--prove that many of these native manuscripts existed in the sixteenth century. Several rescripts date from the seventeenth century--most from the latter half of the eighteenth.

The names of the writers are generally not given, probably because the books, as we have them, are all copies of older manuscripts, with merely the occasional addition of current items of note by the copyist; as, for instance, a malignant epidemic which prevailed in the peninsula in 1673 is mentioned as a present occurrence by the copyist of "The Book of Chilan Balam of Nabula."

These "Books of Chilan Balam" are the principal sources from which Senor Pio Perez derived his knowledge of the ancient Maya system of computing time, and also drew what he published concerning the history of the Mayas before the Conquest, and from them also are taken the various chronicles which I present in the present volume.

That I am enabled to do so is due to the untiring researches of Dr. Carl Hermann Berendt, who visited Yucatan four times, in order to study the native language, to examine the antiquities of the peninsula, and to take accurate copies, often in fac-simile, of as many ancient manuscripts as he could discover. After his death, his collection came into my hands.

The task of deciphering these manuscripts is by no means a light one, and I must ask in advance for considerable indulgence for my attempt. Words and phrases are used which are not explained in the dictionaries, or, if explained, are used in a different sense from that now current. The orthography is far from uniform, each syllable is often written separately, and as the punctuation is wholly fanciful or entirely absent, the separation of words, sentences and paragraphs is often uncertain and the meaning obscure.

Another class of documents are the titles to the municipal lands, the records of surveys, etc. I have copies of several of these, and among them was found the history of the Conquest, by Nakuk Pech, which I publish. It was added to the survey of his town, as a general statement of his rights and defence of the standing of his family.

My translations are not in flowing and elegant language. Had they been so, they would not have represented the originals. For the sake of accuracy I have not hesitated to sacrifice the requirements of English composition.

Sec. 10. _Grammars and Dictionaries of the Language._

The learned Yucatecan, Canon Crescencio Carillo y Ancona, states in his last work that there have been written thirteen grammars and seventeen dictionaries of the Maya.[72-1]

The first grammar printed was that of Father Luis de Villalpando. This early missionary died in 1551 or 1552, and his work was not issued until some years later. Father Juan Coronel also gave a short Maya grammar to the press, together with a _Doctrina_. It is believed that copies of both of these are preserved. Beltran, however, acknowledges that in preparing his own grammar he has never seen either of these earlier works.[73-1]

In 1684, the _Arte de la Lengua Maya_, composed by Father Gabriel de San Buenaventura, a French Franciscan stationed in Yucatan, was printed in Mexico.[73-2] Only a few copies of this work are known. It has, however, been reprinted, though not with a desirable fidelity, by the Abbe Brasseur (de Bourbourg), in the second volume of the reports of the _Mission Scientifique au Mexique et a l'Amerique Centrale_, Paris, 1870.

The leading authority on Maya grammar is Father Pedro Beltran, who was a native of Yucatan, and instructor in the Maya language in the convent of Merida about 1740. He was thoroughly conversant with the native tongue, and his _Arte_ was reprinted in Merida, in 1859, as the best work of the kind which had been produced.[74-1]

The eminent antiquary, Don Juan Pio Perez contemplated writing a Maya grammar, and collected a number of notes for that purpose,[74-2] as did also the late Dr. Berendt, but neither brought his work to any degree of completeness. I have copies of the notes left by both these diligent students, as also both editions of Beltran, and an accurate MS. copy of Buenaventura, from all of which I have derived assistance in completing the present study.

The first Maya dictionary printed was issued in the City of Mexico in 1571. It was published as that of Father Luis de Villalpando, but as he had then been dead nearly twenty years, it was probably merely based upon his vocabulary. It was in large 4to, of the same size as the second edition of Molina's _Vocabulario de la Lengua Mexicana_. At least one copy of it is known to be in existence.

For more than three centuries no other dictionary was put to press, although for some unexplained reason that of Villalpando was unknown in Yucatan. At length, in 1877, the publication was completed at Merida, of the _Diccionario de la Lengua Maya_, by Don Juan Pio Perez.[75-1] It contains about 20,000 words, and is Maya-Spanish only. It is the result of a conscientious and lifelong study of the language, and a work of great merit. The deficiencies it presents are, that it does not give the principal parts of the verbs, that it omits or does not explain correctly many old terms in the language, and that it gives very few examples of idioms or phrases showing the uses of words and the construction of sentences.

I can say little in praise of the _Vocabulaire Maya-Francais-Espagnole_, compiled by the Abbe Brasseur (de Bourbourg), and printed in the second volume of the Report of the _Mission Scientifique au Mexique et a l'Amerique Centrale_. It contains about ten thousand words, but many of these are drawn from doubtful sources, and are incorrectly given; while the derivations and analogies proposed are of a character unknown to the science of language.

Besides the above and various vocabularies of minor interest, I have made use of three manuscript dictionaries of the first importance, which were obtained by the late Dr. Berendt. They belonged to three Franciscan convents which formerly existed in Yucatan, and as they are all anonymous, I shall follow Dr. Berendt's example, and refer to them by the names of the convents to which they belonged. These were the convent of San Francisco in Merida, that at the town of Ticul and that at Motul.

The most recent of these is that of the convent of Ticul. It bears the date 1690, and is in two parts, Spanish-Maya and Maya-Spanish.

The _Diccionario del Convento de San Francisco de Merida_ bears no date, but in the opinion of the most competent scholars who have examined it, among them Senor Pio Perez, it is older than that of Ticul, probably by half a century. It is also in two parts, which have evidently been prepared, by different hands.

_The Diccionario del Convento de Motul_ is by far the most valuable of the three, and has not been known to Yucatecan scholars. A copy of it was picked up on a book stall in the City of Mexico by the Abbe Brasseur, and sold by him to Mr. John Carter Brown, of Providence, R. I. In 1864 this was very carefully copied by Dr. Berendt, who also made extensive additions to it from other sources, indicating such by the use of inks of different colors. This copy, in three large quarto volumes, in all counting over 2500 pages, is that which I now have, and have found of indispensable assistance in solving some of the puzzles presented by the ancient texts in the present volume.

The particular value of the _Diccionario de Motul_ is not merely the richness of its vocabulary and its numerous examples of construction, but that it presents the language as it was when the Spaniards first arrived. The precise date of its compilation is indeed not given, but the author speaks of a comet which he saw in 1577, and gives other evidence that he was writing in the first generation after the Conquest.

FOOTNOTES:

[9-1] "Tambien diz [el Almirante] que supo que ... aquella isla Espanola o la otra isla Jamaye estaba cerca de tierra firme, diez jornadas de Canoa que podia ser sesenta a setenta leguas, y que era la gente vestida alli." Navarrete, _Viages_, Tom. I, pag. 127.

[10-1] "In questo loco pigliorono una Nave loro carica di mercantia et merce la quale dicevono veniva da una cierta provintia chiamata MAIAM vel Iuncatam con molte veste di bambasio de le quale ne erono il forcio di sede di diversi colori." _Informatione di Bartolomeo Colombo._ It is thus printed in Harisse, _Bibliotheca Americana Vetustissima_, p. 473; but in the original MS. in the Magliabechian library the words "vel Iuncatam" are superscribed over the word "MAIAM," and do not belong to the text. (Note of Dr. C. H. Berendt.) They are, doubtless, a later gloss, as the name "Yucatan" cannot be traced to any such early date. The mention of _silk_ is, of course, a mistake. Peter Martyr also mentions the name in his account of the fourth voyage: "Ex Guaassa insula et Taia Maiaque et cerabazano, regionibus Veraguae occidentalibus scriptum reliquit Colonus, hujus inventi princeps," etc. _Decad._ III, Lib. IV.

[10-2] I have collected this evidence, drawing largely from the manuscript works on the Arawack language left by the Moravian missionary, the Rev. Theodore Schultz, and published it in a monograph, entitled: _The Arawack Language of Guiana in its Linguistic and Ethnological Relations_. (_Transactions of the American Philosophical Society_, 1871.) There was a province in Cuba named _Maiye_; see Nicolas Fort y Roldan, _Cuba Indigena_, pp. 112, 167 (Madrid, 1881). According to Fort, this meant "origin and beginning," in the ancient language of Cuba; but there is little doubt but that it presents the Arawack negative prefix _ma_ (which happens to be the same in the Maya) and may be a form of _majujun_, not wet, dry.

[12-1] Eligio Ancona, _Historia de Yucatan_, Tom. I, p. 31 (Merida, 1878).

[12-2] _Diccionario Maya-Espanol del Convento de Motul._ MS. _Sub voce, ichech._ The manuscript dictionaries which I use will be described in the last section of this Introduction. The example given is:--

"ICHECH; tu eres, en lengua de Campeche; _ichex_, vosotros seis; _in en_, yo soy; _in on_, nosotros somos. De aqui sale en lengua de Maya, _tech cech ichech e_, tu que eres por ahi quien quiera," etc.

[13-1] See Eligio Ancona, _Hist. de Yucatan_, Tom. I, p. 37.

[13-2] "MAYA (accento en la primera); nombre proprio de esta tierra de Yucatan." _Diccionario de Motul_, MS. "Una provincia que llamavan de la _Maya_, de la qual la lengua de Yucatan se llama _Mayathan_." Diego de Landa, _Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan_, p. 14. "Esta tierra de Yucatan, a quien los naturales llaman _Ma'ya_," Cogolludo, _Historia de Yucatan_, Lib. IV, Cap. III. "El antiguo Reyno de Maya o Mayapan que hoy se llama Yucatan." Villagutierre, _Historia de el Itza y de el Lacandon_, p. 25. The numerous MSS. of the Books of Chilan Balam are also decisive on this point.

[14-1] _Nombres Geograficos en Lengua Maya_, folio, MS. in my collection.

[15-1] Note to Landa, _Rel. de las Cosas de Yucatan_, p. 14.

[15-2] _Vocabulaire Maya-Francais-Espagnole_, _sub voce_, MAYA.

[15-3] _Hist. de Yucatan_, p. 37.

[19-1] A discussion of the items of the census of 1862 may be found in the work of the Licentiate Apolinar Garcia y Garcia, _Historia de la Guerra de Castas de Yucatan_, Tomo I, Prologo, pp. lxvii, et seq. (Merida 1865.) The completion of this meritorious work was unfortunately prevented by the war. The author was born near Chan [C]enote, Yucatan, in 1837, and was appointed _Juez de Letras_ at Izamal in 1864.

[20-1] See, for example, _El Toro de Sinkeuel, Leyenda Hipica_ (Merida, 1856), a political satire, said to be directed against General Ampudia, by Manuel Garcia.

[20-2] D. G. Brinton, _The Myths of the New World; a Treatise on the Symbolism and Mythology of the Red Race of America_, Chap. VI (2d Ed. New York, 1876).

[23-1] _Maya-uel_ may be from _maya_ and _ohel_, to know either intellectually or carnally; or the last syllable may be _uol_, will, desire, mind. This inventive woman would thus have been named "the Maya wit" (in the old meaning of the word).

[23-2] Sahagun, _Historia de la Nueva Espana_, Lib. X, Cap. XXIX, p. 12.

[24-1] Fray Diego Duran, _Historia de las Indias de Nueva Espana y Islas de Tierra Firme_, Cap. XIX (Ed. Mexico, 1867).

[24-2] See _Lettre de Fray Nicolas de Witt_ (should be Witte), 1554, in Ternaux Compans, _Recueil des Pieces[TN-2] sur le Mexique_, p. 254, 286; also the report of the "Audiencia" held in Mexico in 1531, in Herrera, _Historia de las Indias Occidentales_, Dec. IV, Lib. IX, Cap. V.

[27-1] I mention this particularly in order to correct a grave error in Landa's _Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan_, p. 130. He says, "Suelen de costumbre sembrar para cada casado con su muger medida de cccc pies que llaman _hun-uinic_, medida con vara de XX pies, XX en ancho y XX en largo." The agrarian measure _uinic_ or _hun uinic_ (one man) contained 20 _kaan_, each 24 yards (_varas_) square. One _kaan_ was estimated to yield two loads of corn, and hence the calculation was forty loads of the staff of life for each family. Landa's statement that a patch 20 feet square was assigned to a family is absurd on the face of it.

[28-1] "La lengua castellana es mas dificultosa que la Maya para la gente adulta, que no la ha mamado con la leche, como lo ha ensenado la experiencia en los estranjeros de distintas naciones, y en los negros bozales que se han radicado en esta provincia, que mas facilmente han aprendido la Maya que la castellana." Apolinar Garcia y Garcia, _Historia de la Guerra de Castas en Yucatan_. Prologo, p. lxxv. (folio, Merida, 1865).

[31-1] Friedrich Mueller, _Grundriss der Sprachwissenschaft_, II Band, s. 309. (Wien, 1882).

[31-2] Lucien Adam, _Etudes sur six Langues Americaines_, p. 155. (Paris, 1878).

[35-1] Gabriel de San Buenaventura, _Arte de la Lengua Maya_, fol. 28 (Mexico, 1684).

[40-1] _Memoire sur la numeration dans la langue et dans l'Ecriture sacree des anciens Mayas_, in the Compte-Rendu of the Congres International des Americanistes, Vol. II, p. 439 (Paris, 1875).

[41-1] _Leti u Ebanhelio Hezu Crizto hebix Huan_, London, 1869. This translation was made by the Rev. A. Henderson and the Rev. Richard Fletcher, missionaries to the British settlements at Belize.

[41-2] _Leti u Cilich Evangelio Jesu Christo hebix San Lucas._ Londres, 1865. The first draught of this translation, in the handwriting of Father Ruz, with numerous corrections by himself, is in the library of the Canon Crescencio Carrillo at Merida. A copy of it was obtained by the Rev. John Kingdon of Belize, and printed in London without any acknowledgment of its origin. It does not appear to me to be accurate. For instance, chap. X, v. 1, "The Lord appointed other seventy also," where the Maya has _xan lahcatu cankal_, "seventy-two;" and again chap. XV, v. 4, the ninety-nine sheep are increased to _bolon lahu uaxackal_, one hundred and fifty-nine!

[42-1] _Apuntes para una Gramatica Maya._ Por Don Juan Pio Perez, MSS. pp. 126, 128.

[42-2] "Me parece que _tu_ es sincopa de _ti u_." (Note of Dr. Berendt.) There is no doubt but that Dr. Berendt is correct.

[43-1] This is not correct. Beltran gives for 45, _hotu yoxkal_, which I analyze, _ho ti u u ox kal_.

[44-1] _Apuntes del Diccionario de la Lengua Maya. Por un yucateco aficionado a la lengua_, 4to, pp. 486, MSS.

[45-1] "CAL: hartar o emborrachar la fruta." _Diccionario Maya-Espanol del Convento de San Francisco_, Merida, MS. I have not found this word in other dictionaries within my reach.

[46-1] _Calepino en Lengua Cakchiquel por Fray_ Francisco de Varea,[TN-4] MS. s. v. _chuvi_. This MS. is in the Library of the American Philosophical Society, Philadelphia.

[46-2] F. Pantaleon de Guzman, _Compendio de Nombres en Lengua Cakchiquel_, MS. This MS. is in my collection.

[48-1] _Codice Perez_, p. 92, MS. This is a series of extracts from various ancient Maya manuscripts obtained by the late distinguished Yucatecan antiquary, Don Juan Pio Perez, and named from him by Canon Crescencio Carrillo and other linguists. A copy of it is in my collection. It is in quarto, pp. 258.

[54-1] All the examples in the above paragraph are from the Appendix to the _Diccionario Maya-Espanol del Convento de San Francisco, Merida_, MS. It also gives its positive authority to the length of the katuns, as follows: "Dicese que los Indios contaban los anos a pares (_sic_), y cuando llegaba uno a veinte anos, entonces decian que tenian _hunpel katun_, que son veinte anos.'[TN-6] I think the words _a pares_, must be an error for _a veintenas_; they may mean "in equal series."

[54-2] The _Diccionario de Motul_ MS. has the following lengthy entries:--

"TZUC: copete o coleta de cabellos; o de crines de caballo, o las barbas que echa el maiz por arriba estando en la mazorca; y la cabeza que tienen algunas hachas y martillos en contra del tajo, y la cabeza del horcon, y las nubes levantadas en alto y que dan que denotan segun dice tempestad de agua. Partes, enpartimientos. Cuenta para pueblos, para partes, parrafos i articulos, diferencios y vocablos montones."

[55-1] _Historia de Yucatan_, Lib. IV, cap. V.

[56-1] M. Delaporte's calculations are mentioned by Leon de Rosny, _Essai sur le Dechiffrement de l'Ecriture Hieratique de l'Amerique Centrale_, p. 25 (Paris, 1876); Professor Thomas' will be found in the _American Naturalist_, for 1881, and in his _Study of the Codex Troano_, Washington, 1882.

[57-1] Pio Perez, _Cronologia Antigua de Yucatan_. Sec. VIII.

[57-2] "_Katun_, para siempre." Beltran de Santa Rosa, _Arte del Idioma Maya_, p. 177.

[58-1] The following extracts from two manuscripts in my hands will throw further light on this derivation--

KATUN: espacio de veinte anos; _hun katun_, 20 anos; _ca katun_, 40 anos, etc.

KATUN: batallon de gente, ordenada de guerra y ejercito asi, y soldados cuando actualmente andan en la guerra.

KATUN (TAH, TE): guerrear, hacer guerra, o dar guerra.

KATUNBEN: el que tiene tantas venteinas de anos, segun el numeral que se le junta, _hay katunben ech?_ cuantas venteinas de anos tienes tu? _ca katunben en_, tengo dos venteinas.

DICCIONARIO DE MOTUL, MS., 1590.

CAT (he): generalmente sig^a cortar algo con acha, cuchillo o hiera; detener algo que se huya, atajarlo, etc.

Varea, _Calepino en Lengva[TN-8] Cakchiquel_, MS., 1699.

[61-1] _Proceedings of the American Antiquarian Society_, 1880.

[62-1] The example he gives is the word _le_, which he says "para escrivirle con sus caracteres _habiendoles nosotros hecho entender_ que son dos letras, lo escrivian ellos con tres," etc., thus plainly saying that they did not analyze the word to its phonetic radicals in their system. _Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan_, p. 318.

[62-2] Las Casas says, with great positiveness, that they found in Yucatan "letreros de ciertos caracteres que en otra ninguna parte." _Historia Apologetica_, cap. CXXIII. I also add an interesting description of their books and letters, furnished by the companions of Father Alonso Ponce, the Pope's Commissary-General, who traveled through Yucatan in 1586, when many natives were still living who had been born before the Conquest (1541). Father Ponce had traveled through Mexico, and, of course, had learned about the Aztec picture-writing, which he distinctly contrasts with the writing of the Mayas. Of the latter he says: "Son alabados de tres cosas entre todos los demas de la Nueva Espana, la una de que en su antiguedad tenian caracteres y letras, con que escribian sus historias y las ceremonias y orden de los sacrificios de sus idolos y su calendario, en libros hechos de corteza de cierto arbol, los cuales eran unas tiras muy largas de quarta o tercia en ancho, que se doblaban y recogian, y venia a queder a manera de un libro encuardenada en cuartilla, poco mas, o menos. Estas letras y caracteres no las entendian, sino los sacerdotes de los idolos, (que en aquella lengua se llaman 'ahkines'), y algun indio principal. Despues las entendieron y supieron leer algunos frailes nuestros y aun las escribien." (_Relacion Breve y Verdadera de Algunas Cosas de las Muchas que Sucedieron al Padre Fray Alonso Ponce, Comisario-General en las Provincias de la Nueva Espana_, page 392). I know no other author who makes the interesting statement that these characters were actually used by missionaries to impart instruction to the natives.

[63-1] "_uooh_; caracter o letra. _uooh_ (tah, te) escribir. _uoohan_, cosa que esta escrita." _Diccionario de Motul_, MS.

[64-1] His words are: "Y satisfaciendoles por la quenta senalada, que ellos mismos tenian, de que vsavan, para ajustar sus antiguas Profezias, y los Tiempos de su cumplimiento, que eran vnos Caracteres y Figuras pintadas en vnas cortezas de Arboles, como de una quarta de largo cada hoja, o tabilla, y del gruesso como de vn real de a ocho, dobladas a vna parte, y a otra, a manera de Viombo, que ellos llamavan Analtees," etc., _Historia de la Conquista de la Provincia de el Itza_, Lib. VII. cap I (Madrid, 1701). Pio Perez spells the word _anahte_, _Diccionario de la Lengua Maya_, s. v. following a MS. of the last century, given in the _Codice Perez_. The word _hunilte_, from _huunil_, the "determinative" form of "_hun_," and _te_, a termination to nouns which specifies or localizes them (e. g. _amay_, an angle, _amay te_, an angular figure, etc)., would offer a plausible derivation for _analte_.

[65-1] "Se les quemamos todos lo qual a maravilla sentian y les dava pena." _Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan_, p. 316.

[67-1] "La experiencia de manejar tan incessantemente a los Indios en cerca de doce anos que los servi, me enseno, que el motivo de estar todavia muchos tan pegados a sus antiguedades, era porque siendo los naturales muy curiosos, y aplicandose a saber leer: los que esto logran, quanto papel tienen a mano, tanto leen: y no aviendo entre ella, mas tratados en su idioma, que los que sus antepasados escribieron, cuya materia es solo de sus hechicerias, encantos, y curaciones con muchos abusos, y ensalmos; ya se ve que en estos bebian insensiblemente el tosigo para vomitar despues su malicia en otros muchos." _Aprobacion del Doctor D. Augustin de Echano_, etc., to Dr. Don Francisco Eugenio Dominguez, _Platicas de los Principales Mysterios de Nvestra[TN-9] S^ta Fee, hechas en el Idioma Yucateco_. Mexico, 1758. This extremely rare work is highly prized for the purity and elegance of the Maya employed by the author.

[69-1] _Relacion de las Cosas de Yucatan_, page 160.

[70-1] _The Names of the Gods in the Kiche Myths of Central America. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society_, Vol. XIX, 1881. The terminal letter in both these words--"_chilan_," "_balam_,"--may be either "_n_" or "_m_," the change being one of dialect and local pronunciation. I have followed the older authorities in writing "_Chilan Balam_," the modern preferring "_Chilam Balam_."

[72-1] _Historia Antigua de Yucatan, p. 123_ (Merida, 1882).

[73-1] _Arte del Idioma Maya_, p. 242 (2d ed).

[73-2] _Arte de la Lengua Maya_, compuesto por el R. P. Fr. Gabriel de San Buenaventura Predicador y difinidor habitual de la Provincia de San Joseph de Yucathan del Orden de N. P. S. Francisco. Ano de 1684. Con licencia; En Mexico, por la Viuda de Bernardo Calderon, 4to. pag. 1-4, leaves 5-41.

[74-1] _Arte del Idioma Maya reducido a succintas reglas, y semilexicon Yucateco_ por el R. P. F. Pedro Beltran de Santa Rosa Maria. En Mexico por la Viuda de D. Joseph Bernardo de Hogal. Ano de 1746. 8vo, pp. 8, 1-188. Segunda edicion, Merida de Yucatan, Imprenta de J. D. Espinosa. Julio, 1859. 8vo, 9 leaves, pp. 242.

[74-2] _Apuntes para una Gramatica Maya._ Por Don Juan Pio Perez, pp. 45-136. _MSS._

[75-1] _Diccionario de la Lengua Maya_, por D. Juan Pio Perez. Merida de Yucatan. Imprenta literaria, de Juan F. Molina Solis, 1866-1877. Large 8vo, two cols. pp. i-xx, 1-437.

THE CHRONICLES.

I. THE SERIES OF THE KATUNS.
_From the Book of Chilan Balam of Mani._

II. THE SERIES OF THE KATUNS.
_From the Book of Chilan Balam of Tizimin._

III. THE RECORD OF THE COUNT OF THE KATUNS.
_From the Book of Chilan Balam of Chumayel._

IV. THE MAYA KATUNS.
_From the Book of Chilan Balam of Chumayel._