584 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [rill. 2S 



face, Avhich has been regarded as the symbol of the sun, hence the 

 name of this inscription and of the temple. 



At the right and left of the central ])ictiire stands a i^riest, or, more 

 correctly, a jn'iest with his assistant, the latter smaller in size. In I 

 and III the priest is on the right, in II on the left, and his assistant 

 on the other side. The ])riest in each of the three reliefs holds up 

 his hands, also the assistant in III reaching toward him a form re- 

 sembling a human being as a sacrifice. The assistants in I and II 

 hold the hands downward and grasp an object unintelligible to me. 



Tablets of inscriptions on each side of the picture produce a sym- 

 metric whole. In I each of these tablets has six columns, in II and 

 III only four. I designate those in I by A to F and S to X, in II by 

 A to D and L to O, in III by A to D and O to R. The intervening 

 letters I employ for the smaller groups of glj'phs, which are irregu- 

 larly scattered about the central design. In I and II each vertical 

 column consists of 17 glyphs, in III of 1(5. 



Not only are the three inscriptions very much alike in their general 

 arrangement, but they also correspond in many details. All have at 

 the top, on the left, the superscription occurring on other Maya re- 

 mains, which occupies the space of four glyphs. These superscrip- 

 tions, indeed, differ in particulars which are still unexplained, but 

 they all have the signs for 300 and 7,200 days, and must, therefore, 

 denote something like " measure of time ". In fact, the three in- 

 scriptions contain numerous periods and dates, which occur most fre- 

 quently on inscription I, as I have stated in the article referred to. 



The superscription is followed by the eight glyphs A 3 to B 6, of 

 which the several pairs undoubtedly indicate the periods of 144,000, 

 7,200, 300, and 20 days, and in II and III there are two heads of god^ 

 for each period, a fact which is not yet clearly understood. In I, in- 

 stead of the second head (in column B) there is the mere glyph which 

 elsewhere denotes the period in question. I am inclined to conclude 

 from this that I is more recent than II and III. 



A 7 B 7 in I has a hand, cleverly intimating that counting is to be 

 done on its fingers, and there is no head beside it. This at all events 

 denotes the single clay. Both II and III, on the other hand, have two 

 heads each. 



Farther on the three inscriptions become more unlike, yet they 

 still offer manj^ points of comparison. Thus in almost the same 

 place they have a pointing or an extended hand — in I, B 11; in II, 

 B 10; in III, A 11. 



The various glyphs w^hich have a Ben-Ik above them occur in 

 these three inscriptions, as in all Maya literature. They do not 

 therefore prove that a more or less close connection exists between 

 these inscriptions, but they deserve very special investigation. 



That the familiar signs for the days and those of the months, 



