MORLEY] INTRODUCTION TO STUDY OF MAYA HIEROGLYPHS 173 



Deducting from this number all the Calendar Rounds possible, 70 

 (see Table XVI), and apphdng rules 1, 2, and 3 (pp. 139, 140, and 141, 

 respectively) to the remoinder, the date determined by the resulting 

 calculations will be 8 Ahau 13 Pax. Turning to our text again, the 

 student will have little difficulty in recognizing the first part of this 

 date, the day 8 Ahau, in B5. The numeral 8 appears clearly, and the 

 day sign is the profile-head li' or i' , the second variant for Ahau in 

 figure 16. The significance of the element standing between the 

 numeral and the day sign is unknown. Following along through 

 A6, B6, A7, B7, the closing glyph of the Supplementary Series is 

 reached in A8. The glyph itself is on the left and the coefficient, here 

 expressed by a head variant, is on the right. The student will have 

 no difficulty in recognizing the glyph and its coefficient by comparing 

 the former with figure 65, and the latter with the head variant for 

 10 in figure 52, m-r. Note the fleshless lower jaw in the head niuneral 

 in both places. The following glyph, B8, is one of the clearest in 

 the entire text. The numeral is 13, and the month sign on comparison 

 with figure 19 unmistakably proves itself to be the sign for Pax in c' . 

 Therefore the termmal date recorded in B5; BS, namely, 8 Ahau 13 

 Pax, agrees with the terminal date determined by calcuhition; it fol- 

 lows, further, that the effaced cycle coefficient in A3 must have been 9, 

 the value tentatively ascribed to it in the above calculations. The 

 whole Initial Series reads 9.6.10.0.0 8 Ahau 13 Pax. 



Some of the peculiarities of the numerals and signs in this text are 

 doubtless due to its very great antiquity, for the monument presentmg 

 this inscription, Stela 9, records the next to earliest Initial Series ^ 

 yet deciphered at Copan.^ Evidences of antiquity appear in the 

 glyphs in several different ways. The bars denoting 5 have square 

 ends and all show considerable ornamentation. This type of bar 

 was an early manifestation and gave way in later times to more 

 rounded forms. The dots also show this greater ornamentation, 

 which is reflected, too, by the signs themselves. The head forms show 

 greater attention to detail, giving the whole glyph a more ornate 

 appearance. All this embellishment gave way in later times to more 

 simplified forms, and we have represented in this text a stage in glyph 

 morphology before conventionalization had worn down the different 

 signs to little more than their essential elements. 



In figure 68, A, is figured the Initial Series on the west side of Stela 

 C at Quirigua.^ The introducing glyph in A1-B2 is followed by the 

 number in A3-A5, which the student will have no difficulty in reading 



1 The oldest Initial Series at Copan is recorded on Stela 15, which is 40 years older than Stela 9. For a 

 discussion of this text see pp. 187, 188. 



2 An exception to this statement should be noted in an Initial Series on the Hieroglypliic Stains-ay, 

 which records the date 9.5.19..3.0 8 Ahau 3 Zotz. The above remark applies only to the large monuments, 

 which, the writer believes, were period-markers. Stela 9 is therefore the next to the oldest "period stone " 

 yet discovered at Copan. It is more than likely, however, that there are several older ones as yet unde- 

 ciphered. 



3 For the full text of this inscription, see Maudslay, 1889-1902: ii, pis. 17-19. 



