IV LETTER OE TRANSMITTAL 



tables, ''The Archaic Chronological Calendar" and "The Archaic 

 Annual Calendar," which greatly facilitate the decipherment of the 

 calculations recorded in the texts. 



It must be admitted that very little progress has been made in 

 deciphering the Maya glyphs except those relating to the calendar and 

 chronology; that is, the signs for the various time periods (days and 

 months), the numerals, and a few name-glyphs; however, as these 

 known signs comprise possibh' two-fifths of all the glyphs, it is clear 

 that the general tenor of the Maya inscriptions is no longer concealed 

 from us. The remaining three-fifths probably tell the nature of the 

 events which occm-red on the corresponding dates, and it is to these 

 we must tm-n for the subject matter of Maya history. The deci- 

 phering of this textual residuum is enormously complicated by the 

 character of the Maya glyphs, which for the greater part are ideo- 

 graphic ratlier than phonetic ; that is, the various symbols represent 

 ideas rather than sounds. 



In a grapliic system composed largely of ideographic elements it 

 is extremely difficult to debermine the meanings of the different signs, 

 since little or no help is to be derived from varying combinations of 

 elements as in a phonetic system. In phonetic writing the symbols 

 have fixed sounds, which are unchanging throughout, and when these 

 values have once been determine^, they may be substituted for the 

 characters wherever they occui', and thus words are formed. 



While the Maya glyphs largely represent ideas, indubitable traces 

 of phoneticism and phonetic composition appear. There are per- 

 haps half a dozen glyphs in aU which are known to be constructed 

 on a purely phonetic basis, and as the remaining glyphs are gradually 

 deciphered this nimaber will doubtless be increased. 



The progress which has been made in deciphering the Maya inscrip- 

 tions may be summarized as follows: The Maya calendar, chronology, 

 and astronomy as recorded in the hieroglyphic texts have been care- 

 fully worked out, and it is unhkely that future discoveries wiU change 

 our present conception of them. There remams, however, a group of 

 glyphs which are probably non-calendric, non-chronologic, and non- 

 astronomic in character. These, it may be reasonably expected, 

 will be found to describe the subject matter of Maya history; that is, 

 they probably set forth the nature of the events which took place on 

 the dates recorded. An analogy would be the following: Supposing, 

 in scanning a history of the United States, only the dates could be 

 read. We would find, for example, July 4, 1776, followed by unknown 

 characters; April 12, 1861, by others; and March 4, 1912, by others. 

 This, then, is the case with the Maya glyphs — we find dates followed 

 by glyphs of unknown meaning, which presumably set forth the 

 nature of the corresponding events. In a word, we know now the 



