Hieroglyph 1 is the cross _b_, 2 is B's sign, 3 probably that of the
grain-god E, and 4 being Kan-Imix refers to grain. Favorable weather seems
to have set in.
8. The astronomical signs are not the same as those in the three preceding
instances (Mercury and sun?). Below them is a deity with tortoise-head--in
my opinion, the sign for the longest day--holding a torch in each hand and
thus referring to the heat.
Hieroglyph 1 (_w_) with the superfix suggesting K still puzzles me. 2 is
the cross _b_, 3 is the tortoise-head with the number 4, which probably
refers to the Kan, Muluc, Ix and Cauac years, as the 4 sometimes appears
prefixed to N's hieroglyph. In exactly the same way the tortoise-head with
the tortoise itself occurs frequently in the Cortesianus. 4 is the sign of
the year with prefixed Kin and Cauac, _i.e._, day-Cauac-year.
9. A thunder-storm, which is very appropriate after the longest day. The
lightning-beast, likewise holding a burning torch, is plunging down from
the astronomical signs, which are different ones again (Venus and the
moon?).
The second hieroglyph contains the sign of the dog together with the cross
_b_, while the third is that of the north-god C, and the fourth is Muluc. I
cannot explain the first sign; its prefix, which rarely occurs, appears
also on pages 23b, 25a, 37b, 63a, and possibly on pages 53b, 62-63a, 69b.
10. Page 41. Another representation of rain. There is an old deity in the
rain, who is N rather than F, denoting the end of the old year. He is
emerging from a snail (cf. with this page 37b), and is pointing upward; a
part of the first hieroglyph is on his head.
This first hieroglyph recalls the sign which, in the Zeitschrift für
Ethnologie, XXIII, p. 145, I ventured to connect with the change of the
year; but it also suggests the snail pictured below, hence the birth of the
new year. The beginning of the year for the Mayas, although of course not
for all parts of the country, is fixed, as a rule, to fall on the 16th of
July. This would agree admirably with the eighth and ninth sections, which
represent the time of the longest day and of thunder-storms.
The second hieroglyph is B's, the fourth the cross _b_, probably referring
here to a union of two years, and the third with its Cauac to the duration
of the rainy season or to the god N.
11. The rain seems to fall with less violence. B is seated, clad in the
gala mantle with a Kan on his head, as the sign of grain. His headdress
also strongly recalls that of the grain-deity E (which is also the case of
the headdress on the preceding picture.)
Hieroglyph 1, the upper part of which is very like that of the first sign
of the preceding group, looks like a plaited mat. Does it not suggest that
the name of the first month of the new year is Pop and that this word is
denoted by carpet, mat? Hieroglyph 2 is B's, 3 is the sun between a dark
and a bright sky, and 4 is the common Kin-Akbal, day and night.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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