1893.] -"07 [Briuton. 



Cakchiquel, chah means arrow, and to shoot one ; also to open 

 the mouth ; while ch''ab is mud, clay, mire. As red and Mack 

 clays were the primitive pigments, this last may connect the 

 Tzental day name with the Maya. 



The Seventeenth Day. 



1. Maya, cahan ; 2. Tzental, cMc ; 3. Quiche-Cak., noh ; 4. Zapotec, 

 xoo ; 5. Nahuatl, ollin, or (Mezlitlan) nahui olli, or (Pipil) teepila 

 nahuatl. 



The Maya caban has been explained bj^ Dr. Seler diversely as 

 " what is below," or " brought below," and again as " above," 

 " what is above," " heaven," etc. Pio Perez offered no explana- 

 tion of it. I derive it from the Maya radical cab, might or 

 strength (la fuerza, rigor, 6 fortaleza de alguna cosa, Dice. 

 Motul). In this sense it corresponds precisely in meaning with 

 the Tzental chic {= Maya, chich, cosa fuerte y dura), the Quiche- 

 Cak. noh, strong, great, and the Zapotec ccoo, which has the gen- 

 eral signification of force, power or might (comp. Cordova, 

 Arte Zapoteca, p. 114). 



The Nahuatl oUin or olin means motion or movement, the re- 

 sult of force applied, as in tlalli olini, the earth moves, an earth- 

 quake. Nahui olin, " the four movements," is an expression 

 which refers to the apparent movements of the sun. 



The Eighteenth Day. 



1. Maya, edznab ; 2. Tzental, chinax ; 3. Qaiche-Cak., tihax ; 4. Zapotec, 

 gopaa ; 5. Nahuatl, tecpatl. 



The Nahuatl term means flint, especiall}^ the flint stone knife 

 used in sacrificing to cut the victim. The Zapotec gopaa, which 

 Dr. Seler derives from rogopa, cold, is more likely to be a variant 

 of guipa, a sharp point or edge, whence the word for stone knife, 

 gueza-guipa, from guia, stone. 



The Tzental chinax is an old or sacred form for the usual ziii- 

 nax, knife (Lara) ; and the Cakchiquel tihax, the literal meaning 

 of which is, according to Ximenes, " it bites, scraping " (muerde 

 rasgando), would seem to be a figurative and highly correct ex- 

 pression for such an implement. 



There remains the Maj'a edznab. Pio Perez offers no expla- 

 nation of it, while Dr. Seler suggests that it may be from the 



