548 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 28 



Ihc tiMitli in his iviiiark on pago ()o : "I venture to suggest that the 

 inscription constitutes a chronologic record of some kind ". 



2. Cyrus Thomas, A Study of the Manuscript Troano. Wash- 

 ington, 1882, This contains the special chapter, pages 198 to 208 : 

 Inscrij^tions on the Palenque Tablet. The author here settles, beyond 

 dispute, the order in which the inscription is to be read (two columns 

 at a time). With his accustomed carefulness he examines one series 

 of characters and, although he does not accomplish his purpose, he 

 very nearly succeeds in reading correctly the various periods occur- 

 ring here. 



3. Philipp J. J. Valentini, Analysis of the Pictorial Text Inscribed 

 on Tavo Palenque Tablets; parts 1 and 2. Worcester, Mass., 1895- 

 1896. Valentini lays stress on the decided ritual character of the 

 inscription ; at the beginning of the first column he finds the por- 

 traits of the founders of the theocrac3^ of the country, and farther 

 on the scattered pictures of later priests, with an account of their 

 time and the manner of their ritual activity. He especially directs 

 his attention to the discussion of the separate da}^ signs and the 

 relation between the monumental characters of the inscription and the 

 cursive characters of the manuscripts, in the course of which he 

 makes a number of suggestive observations. The author unfor- 

 tunately adheres to the idea of reading each colunm separately, and 

 so deprives himself of the possibility of finding the right way to 

 interpret the connection. 



In what follows I shall abstain from all controversy with my 

 predecessors and leave my opinions to vindicate themselves. 



Long after the following had been Avritten, I received a treatise by 

 Lewis W. Gunckel printed in the American Anthropologist for May, 

 1897 : The Direction in which Mayan Inscriptions Should be Read. 

 This memoir treats chiefly of the inscription of the Cross, but does 

 not touch upon its meaning, merely discussing the succession of the 

 characters, a point which I had long since settled in my own mind 

 and which Mr Gunckel also recognizes. 



We see, therefore, that little progress has been made hitherto 

 toward comprehending the meaning of the Cross inscription. But 

 we are fortunately enabled by the successful interpretation of the 

 Maya numeral system and the discovery of the meaning of several 

 glyphs to make a considerable advance in this direction. 



This progress results chiefl}^, however, from the observation that 

 the inscriptions of the Maya region, excepting some short inscriptions 

 on buildings and altars, are of two different kinds: 



(1) The so-called stelae, which, as a rule, display glyphs in pairs of 

 vertical rows, beginning at the top with a large number lying between 

 one and one and a half millions, which, reckoned from the starting 



