THE ANNUAL CALEXDAE. 19 



THE YEAR. 



The solar year consists of 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes and 46 seconds. The Maya 

 year takes cognizance of the 365 days only. The excess was known, however, we are 

 assured by Landa, and an extra day made of it every fouv years ; but these extra days 

 never appear in the annual calendar nor enter into chronological reckonings. 



Two important consequences result from the number and length of the months and 

 the peculiar numeration of the days. The regular months comprising but 360 days, 

 the five surplus days in a year serve to interrupt the continuity of the order of the days 

 in the months and produce a different arrangement for the succeeding year. The effect 

 of the day numbering is equally important. Thirteen is not an even divisor of 365, but 

 leaves a remainder of one; hence, starting the year with any given day and makin°- 

 twenty-eight full counts of thirteen, an additional day will still be required to complete 

 the year ; so that every year begins with a day number greater by one than the year 

 preceding it. This progression, supposing it to start at one, proceeds to thirteen, 

 when it recedes to one again and starts anew. These series of thirteen years are said 

 to have been regarded as weeks of years, but I cannot discover that any account is 

 taken of them as time measures in the inscriptions. Pour of them, or fifty-two years, 

 complete the calendar. At the expiration of that time the count comes back to the 

 starting-point. This results from the peculiar day numbering and arrangement of the 

 months referred to. In consequence of the Uayeb period the twenty days rotate by 

 stages of five, making a complete revolution every four years. Thus each day at 

 different times takes four different positions in every regular month and one in Uayeb. 

 For instance, if Ahau fall on the 3rd of the month in any given year, the succeeding 

 year it will fall on the 18th, next on the 13th, then on the 8th, and so on in endless 

 rotation. By the ingenious arrangement of the calendar every one of the twenty days 

 with each of the thirteen numerals that give them their identity will occur once in 

 the four positions of the regular months and in the one in Uayeb before the original 

 position with the identical day number is again reached. Thus it will be seen that the 

 length of the calendar is a matter of simple calculation: 18x4 = 72 + 1 = 73x20 = 

 1460x13 = 18,980 days, or fifty-two years. 



I have been thus explicit because the same law governs the chronological calendar, 

 and we are thereby enabled to determine the time of the ahau, katun, cycle, and great 

 cycle rounds and the length of the grand era itself. 





