2. Page 43 deals not with the removal of the old cardinal point, but with
the introduction of the new one. Here B is rowing in a boat, as in other
passages (29c), and Muluc, the north, has certainly a close relation to
water. We see here two kinds of food, while none is represented on page 45.
The same bird's head, which we find at the bottom of the corresponding page
28, is placed in front of the canoe, and on 29c it is combined with the
representation of rowing a boat. On the left is the picture of a vessel
with Kan and the iguana. There is something resembling a net between the
boat and the bird.
3. Page 44 likewise refers to the introduction of the new cardinal point,
west, which is represented on page 26 by the tiger Ix. The two hieroglyphs
in the middle of this passage must surely refer to an animal; the lower is
the skeleton of an animal, which we so often find as the sign of the
lightning-dog, but also as that of the month Kankin, and the upper I take
to be a rather vague picture of the day Oc, which certainly denotes the
dog. Below these two signs the fish is represented as the fourth species of
animal food.
The picture belonging to these hieroglyphs is very remarkable. B stands
opposite a seated personage wearing an animal's snout, which somewhat
resembles that of the wind-beast on pages 44b and 45b and also the nose of
the storm-god K, who occurs on the corresponding pages 25 and 26 both with
the coming and the departing Ix years, as he does here with the coming
years. In the picture before us, the two personages seem to be throwing
something resembling a rope at each other, as if these ropes were to be
tied together. Is this meant to suggest the casting of lots by means of the
knotting of cords, as it is represented on page 2? Or of hunting with
snares?
Page 45 refers to the displacement of the Ix period by the Cauac period,
_i.e._, of the west by the south. The end of the former is represented
here. The lightning-beast, which occurred in the preceding period, here
lies on his back and B sits astride his body brandishing in each hand a
burning torch as an appropriate symbol of the south. On pages 29a and 30c
we already saw the god riding on the lightning-dog.
Finally the six interesting hieroglyphs set down in a vertical row on the
left of each of the four pages are still to be examined. I will give here
in the following table what I think is a correct interpretation of them:--
Page 42. 43. 44. 45.
South (1) East (7) North (13) West (9).
It ends (2) (8) (14) (20)
B (3) (9) (15) (21)
the time of the Cauac (4), Kan (10), Muluc (16), Ix (22),
while Kan (5), Muluc (11), Ix (17), Cauac (23)
begins (6) (12) (18) (24).
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