MORLET] INTEODUCTION TO STUDY OF MAYA HIEROGLYPHS 35 



the monuments by ten-year periods is shown in plate 4, where the 

 passage of time (i. e., the successive ten-year periods) is represented 

 from left to right, and the number of dates in each ten-year period 

 from bottom to top. Although other dated monuments will be 

 found from time to time, which will necessarily change the details 

 given in this diagram, such additional evidence in all probability wiU 

 never controvert the following general conclusions, embodied in what 

 has just been stated, which are deducible from it: 



1. At first there was a long period of slow growth represented by 

 few monuments, which, however, increased in number toward the end. 



2. This was followed without interruption by a period of increased 

 activity, the period from which the great majority of the monuments 

 date. 



3. Finally this period came to rather an abrupt end, indicated by 

 the sudden cessation m the erection of dated monuments. 



The consideration of these indisputable facts tends to establish the 

 historical rather than the astronomical character of the monuments. 

 For had the erection of the monuments depended on the successive 

 recurrences of some astronomical phenomenon, there would be cor- 

 responding intervals between the dates of such monuments^ the 

 length of which would indicate the identity of the determining phe- 

 nomenon; and they would hardly have presented the same logical 

 increase due to the natural growth of a nation, which the accompany- 

 mg diagram clearly sets forth. 



Fourth. Although no historical codices ^ are known to have sur- 

 vived, history was undoubtedly- recorded in these ancient Maya 

 books. The statements of the early Spanish writers are very expUcit 

 on this point, as the following quotations from their works will show. 

 Bishop Landa (here, as always, one of the most reliable authori- 

 ties) says: "And the sciences which they [the priestsl taught were 

 the count of the years, months and days, the feasts and ceremonies, 

 the administration of their sacraments, days, and fatal times, their 

 methods of divination and prophecy, and foretelUng events, and the 

 remedies for the sick, and their antiquities " [p. 44]. And again, " they 

 [the priests] attended the service of the temples and to the teaching 

 of their sciences and how to write them in their hooTcs." And again, 

 [p. 316], "This people also used certain characters or letters with 

 which they wrote in their hoolcs their ancient matters and sciences." 



Father Lizana says (see Landa, 1864: p. 352): "The history and 

 authorities we can cite are certain ancient characters, scarcely under- 

 stood by many and explained by some old Indians, sons of the priests 



1 For example, if the revolution of Venus had been the governing phenomenon, each monument would 

 be distant from some other by 584 days; if that of Mars, 7S0 days; if that of Mercury, 115 or 116 days, etc. 

 Furthermore, the sequence, once commenced, would naturally have been more or less uninterrupted. It 

 is hardly necessary to repeat that the intervals which have been found, namely, 7200 and 1800, rest on no 

 known astronomical phenomena but are the direct result of the Maya vigesimal system of numeration. 



2 It is possible that the Codex Peresianus may treat of historical matter, as already explained. 



