Brinton.] ^^^ (Oct. 6, 



root edz, hard, solid. It appears rather to be a figurative ex- 

 pression for the sacrificial knife, from nab, something anointed 

 or blood (cosa ensangrentada),* and edz, to adjust, to point, to 

 sharpen (as in the phrase, edzcabte a iokijah, punta la lanceta 

 para sangrar, Dice. Motul). Thus, the same signification under- 

 lies these various names. 



The Nineteenth Dai/. 



1. Miiya, cauae ; 2. Tzental, cahogli ; 3. Quiche-Cak., caolc, or cook; 4. 

 Zapotec, ape, appe, or aape ; 5. Nahuatl, quiahuitl, or (Pipil) ayotl. 



The three Maya dialects present obviously the same word. 

 The Tzental has been by some writers erroneously spelled ca- 

 bogh, and Dr. Seler, following this false orthography, obtains for 

 it the extraordinary meaning, " the darkness descending and 

 overspreading the Earth ! " Xuiiez de la Yega gives cahogh, and 

 no other form. It is a pure Mayan word, meaning "lightning 

 and thunder," the concomitants of the electrical storm. The 

 Pokomchi and Pokomam have precisel}' this form, cahok, cohoc ; 

 Lara gives the Tzental chauc (relampago, trueiio, tronido, Vocab- 

 wZfflrzo, MS.), the Chontal chauoc ; the Huasteca, tzoc, proving 

 that it is an ancient radical of this family, as this is the remotest 

 of the Mayan dialects. 



The Zapotec ape, apt, etc., which Dr. Seler translates " cloud 

 covered," evidently means the same, as we see in the words laari- 

 api-niza, ri-api-laha, translated " relampago, relampaguear," in 

 the Vocabulario Castellano-Zapoteco (Mexico, 1893). 



The Aztec quiahuitl is the ordinary word for rain ; while the 

 Pipil a.yotl means turtle, which is quite in correspondence with 

 " lightning " as the day-name, this being, as Dr. Schellhas has so 

 well shown, the " lightning animal," das Blitzthier.-\ 



* To confirm this rendering, I add that Sahagun specially states that the tecpatl, or 

 flint, was represented in the Mexican Calendars '• stained with blood for the half of its 

 lengtli," Ilistoria de la Nueva E.f}mna, Lib iv, Appendix. It was the iztapaltotec, " peder- 

 nal ensangrentado " of the Codex Teller iano-Rcmensis, Lara, xxxii. 



t Dr. Schellhas points out that in the Maya pictography the turtle is a sign of the light- 

 ning, or the thunder-storm. It is associated with the hieroglyphs of tlie months Kayab 

 and Pop. See his article, "Die Gottergestalten der Maya Handschriften" in the Zeit- 

 sehrift fiir Eihnoloqle, 1S<)2, p. 120. It is not easy, at first sight, to understand why so pro- 

 verbi^dly slow an animal .should lieconie tlie symbol of the lightning. ^My explanation 

 is that it is an example of the '• ikonomatic " method. The Mayan term for liglitning 

 is cooc, or caoc; the word for turtle is con ; from the shnilarUij of the soumh, the turtle was 

 used in the picture writing to mean " lightning." 



