90 



ABSTRACT DAY SIGNS 



The numerical value of the first of the above signs is not yet determinable. It may be 

 that it does not possess any. One of the Maya terms for day is cab, expressed in the 

 above glyph by the caban symbol, which is frequently used in this simple form by 

 itself to convey the idea of a day or clays in the abstract. The other glyphs are all 

 composed of signs for 13 and 20, the first two being signs for 13 with subfixes 

 indicating 20, and the last two signs for 20 with a 13 subfix. As is the case with all 

 time symbols, the subfixes are sometimes absent from these, showing that the signs 

 were thought to be well enough known to dispense with detail, if necessary. Some- 

 times, again, these characters will be found associated with numerals that would 

 produce a number greater than 260; but in these instances they become symbols for 

 periods, and are no longer mere day signs. 



The subfixes to the chuen symbols are even more unaccountable than those belonging 



to the days, if such a distinction be permissible between things equally unintelligible. 



I think in this case, however, there is a numerical purpose, though all my attempts to 



discover the plan of it have failed. The variation in the number of the dots and 



curves would appear to betoken a discriminative use of them ; but as identical subfixes 



qualify symbols representing widely different numbers of chueus, it is evident that if 



there be an intelligent design in their use it is a very abstruse one. There is a 



circumstance apart from their ordinary variation, however, that strengthens my belief 



in the numeric quality of these subfixes. In nearly every place where the extreme 



number of chuens, 18 (invariably indicated by a sign for 20), is reached, and occasionally 



elsewhere, the dots and curves disappear, and there is either no subfix at all or else 



use is made interchangeably of several signs which there is good reason for supposing 



to represent 400. Now, this would be the number of days in a complete set of chuens 



if there were twenty of them — as I think was the case originally. Is it not reasonable, 



