fokstemann] pages 31a-32a, Dresden codex 457 



manuscript recognizes a multitude of numbers which increase from 

 1,200,000 to about 1,000,000. A part of these are actually expressed 

 in the manuscript, and another part, as we shall see presently, are 

 to be found by calculation. Now, all these numbers fall into two 

 distinct divisions. The lesser range from 1,201,200 to 1,278,420. 

 They therefore extend over 297 tonalamatls, or 211 years. The 

 larger, on the other hand, begin at 1,366,560 and end with 1,567,332, 

 thus extending over a period of 773 tonalamatls, or 550 j^ears. There 

 is a blank space between, which can not be due to accident, for it com- 

 prises 339 tonalamatls, or 242 years. Fifteen lesser numbers precede 

 this gap and twenty-four greater numbers follow. It may be sur- 

 mised that this gap is the present, that the lesser numbers are the past, 

 and the larger numbers the future for purposes of prophecy. The 

 stela^ at Copan, whiclrl have mentioned (Zur Entzifferung der Maya- 

 handschriften, IV), extend from the date 1,375,200 to 1,414,800; that 

 is, through 152 tonalamatls, or 109 years. They signify the present, 

 and must, therefore, provided the zero point of chronologic computa- 

 tion is the same, be more recent than the Dresden codex, in which the 

 future begins about where the present begins in Copan. 



Above each of the three large numbers there was a date composed 

 of a number and a glyph, but with the exception of insignificant rem- 

 nants these dates are destroyed. Therefore, I can oidy regard it as 

 a bare possibility that they denote the sixteenth day in the first 

 month, the eleventh in the seventh, and the first in the fourteenth, 

 which positions belong to the three daj^s XIII 20 to be calculated 

 afterwards. 



The three large numbers are as follow : 



1. 1,272,544. This is a day IV 1, the seventeenth day of the sev- 

 enth month in a year 12 Muluc. The number is divisible by 91 and 

 104 : 13,984X^1=1^,230X104. Of the three factors sought, 260 is 

 the only one not found here. 



2. 1,268,540. This is day IV 17, the actual starting point of 

 chronology, and this time it is the eighth day of tlie eighth month 

 in the year 1 Ix. The number is divisible by 260, which is always 

 the case with day IV 17; that is, it is 4,879X260. But it is also 

 divisible by 17; that is, it is 74,620X17. This, too, is not accidental, 

 for the interval between XIII 20 and IV 17 is 17, and we often 

 find that two day numbers jdaced in close proximity with each other 

 are divisible by their ditlVrence. 



3. 1,538,342. This is a day IV 19, the fifteenth day of the eleventh 

 month in the year 12 Muluc. Thus the year has the same designation 

 as that of the first number, but it is 14 katuns (14X18,980) in 

 advance of the former, and the day in it is 78 days in advance, for 

 78 days is the interval between IV 1 and IV 19; but the interval 



