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.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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