336 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [hull. 28 



and a Maya word, with a Maya prefix, wdiich means " the ". Landa's 

 story that the rule over Mayapan Avas founded by a family which 

 was supported by the Mexicans living in the great trade centers 

 Tabasco and Xicalanco is therefore fully confirmed by native 

 authorities. 



Landa further declares that this family, who ruled in Mayapan. 

 the Cocom, practiced such constantly growing oppressions that the 

 various village chieftains at last rose against them under the leader- 

 ship of the chieftain family of Tutul Xiu, very powerful among the 

 ahuitz (" people of the sierra ") in the sierra district, that is, in the 

 district of Mani, and slew all members of the Cocom tribe within 

 their reach and destroyed the " citadel Mayapan ". The destruc- 

 tion of Mayapan is accordingly the great event in the pre-Spanish 

 history of Yucatan, as it represents the national reaction against a 

 government sup})orted by strangers; but its result was that there 

 w^as thenceforth no central power in the land. Various chieftain 

 families possessed greater or smaller portions of the land and waged 

 Avar one against another by every means of treachery and open 

 violence. 



According to Landa's statement, at the time when he wrote his 

 Relaciones, that is, in the year 1556, about 120 j^ears had passed 

 since the fall of Mayapan. Most of the native sources place the 

 event in the katun 8 Ahau, and this agrees exactly Avith both Landa's 

 statement and my reckoning, for according to mj reckoning katun 8 

 Ahau began on January 19 of the year 1436. 



Important as this event Avas, even the native chroniclers are not 

 agreed in regard to it. For although, as I said, the majority of them 

 accept katun 8 Ahau as the correct date, yet there is a list, the second 

 of the Chilam Balam of Chumayel, Avhich places the destruction of 

 Mayapan in katun 1 Ahau, A^■hich Avould be in the ])eriod betAveen 

 the years 1377 and 1397; and in another list, that of the Chilam 

 Balam of Mani, katun 8 Ahau and katun 11 Ahau seem to be given 

 side by side. Katun 1 Ahau seems to be given as the date of the 

 event because this list accepts katun 1 Ahau as the beginning of a 

 great cycle of 13 katuns; and the selection of 11 Ahau seems to rest 

 upon similar considerations, for the circumstance that the great and 

 destructive event of the permanent establishment of the Spanish in 

 the country occurred in katun 11 Ahau afforded many of the native 

 authors a motive for beginning the gi-eater cycle of katuns Avith katun 

 11 Ahau. 



No serious attempt Avas made to fix Avith chronologic precision the 

 events preAdous to the destruction of Ma^'apan which are men- 

 tioned — the fall of the principality of Chichen Itza, the sojourn of 

 the Itza people in Champoton, the immigration into Yucatan, and 



