663 



[Brinton. 



The subject is of great scientific interest, being a new classification of 

 eleven families of Coleopterous insects in thi-ee series, upon the basis of 

 a wider and closer study of all their features than has yet been made ; 

 and after personal inspection of the cabinets of Europe. The families of 

 insects described belong to the class of weevils in the language of agri- 

 culture. 



We recommend that the memoir be printed separately as No. 95 and 

 Vol. XV of the Proceedings, with the necessary appropriation of fifty 

 dollars fi>r illustrations ; and that the Secretaries be authorized to com- 

 mence the publication of the Proceedings of 1876 with No. 96, page 1, 

 Vol. XVI. 



Dr. Brinton communicated the results of his correspond- 

 ence with Dr. Yalentini, oi Mexico, and read a statement of 

 Dr. Valentini's tlieory of the Calendar Stone, as a votive tablet 

 to the SunGrodjdeducingimportant historical data therefrom. 

 Dr. Brinton reported that the MSS. had been sent to him, 

 and moved the appointment of a committee to report 

 whether it deserved publication. Dr. Brinton, Prof. Ken- 

 dall and Mr. Lesley were appointed the committee. 



The author, in the introductory pirt of his memoir refutes the theory 

 prevalent on the meaning of the Mexican Calendar Stone. This theory 

 was advanced by Don Leon y Gama, in the year 1490, and may be con- 

 densed into the following : 



The stone is a sun dial, and has the additional function of showing : 



1. The two transits of the sun by the zenith of the City of Mexico. 



2. The two equinoctial days. 



C. The day of the Summer Solstice. 



The way of ascertaining thess days has been to set above the stone an 

 apparatus, constructed of eight vertical poles, whose points were con- 

 nected by threads ; and the shadows of these threads, on the above said 

 days, would fall i;pon the surface of the dial, and cut the figure of the re 

 spective hieroglyphics and thus determine the day of the celestial phe- 

 nomenon. 



The day of the Winter Solstice is supposed to be sculptured upon 

 another stone of the same kind, which is still to be discovered. 



The author shows that the stone lacks all the requirements necessary 

 for representing a sun dial ; he doubts, whether the Mexicans had been 

 acquainted with the existence of the named astronomical days ; he further 

 pi-ovas that the two hieroglyphics, or the pretended equinoctial, and the 

 two for the pretended Transit days, simply refer to the four tablets that 

 represent the four destructions of the world, and that they designate the 

 days on which the Mexicans were accustomed to celebrate a feast in order 

 to commemorate those pre-historic events ; and, finally, that the day for 

 the pretended Summer Solstice turns out to be the hieroglyphic for the 



