THOMAS.) METQOD OF NUMBERING THE AHAUES. 55 



Be this as it may, there is nothing in Maya history or the calendar 

 which makes it necessary that the grand cycle should commence with the 

 Xlllth Ahau. As suggested by Perez and Dr. Valentini, this number of 

 the series may have been selected as the one with which to begin their 

 count because of some notable event in their history occurring in it. The 

 serious objection to the plan of Table XXII is that it requires the Xlllth 

 Ahau to begin with the last year of a gi-and cycle, which, I think, is suffi- 

 cient to condemn it. 



Perez's statement bearing on this subject is as follows : 



"As the Indians considered the number 13 as the initial number, it is 

 probable that some remarkable event had happened in that year, because, 

 when the Spaniards arrived in the Peninsula, the Indians then counted the 

 8th as the 1st, that being the date at which their ancestors came to settle 

 there; and an Indian writer proposed that they should abandon that order 

 also, and begin counting from the 1 1th, solely because the conquest had 

 happened in that Ahau." (Cron. Antig., § IX, Valentini's Trans.) ^ 



I have already quoted from Perez, as pertaining to the calendar, the 

 statement in reference to what he believes to be another kind of cycle or 

 method of computation. I called attention to the ftict that the numbers 

 given might be found b)- running up the columns of our table of years. I 

 will now explain what I believe to have been the object and use of these 

 numbers. 



"They had another number which they called Ua Katun, which served 

 them as a key by which to adjust and find the Katunes, and following the 

 order of their march, it falls on the two" days of Uayeh liaal and revolves 

 to the end of certain years; Katunes 13, 9, 5, 1, 10, 6, 2, 11, 7, 3, 12, 8, 4." 



Perez quotes this, as he states, in the exact words of his authority 

 (unfortunately not given). As Bancroft's translation omits the "two" be- 

 fore "days," I have given here a translation of the original as found in 

 Perez's Cronologie Antigua^ 



'As neither Valentini's nor Brasseuvs' translation is literal, I will give the original: 



" Es probable qvio principio en el nuinero 13 por haber acontecitlo en el algiin sueeso notable pues 



despues se eontabau por ol 8; y acabada la conquista de esta peninsula propuso un escritor indio conien- 



zasen &, contar en lo snccsivo cstas ^pocas por el 11 Ahau por que en el se verified aqnella." 



^Nottho "second day of the Vaych haab" as Perez seems, as appears from his comment, to have 



uuderstood the cxpressiou. It is strange that he should have so perversely misinterjireted hLs own 



manuscripts. 



