DIRECTIVE SIGNS. 



95 



FROM A DATE SOME DISTANCE BACK. 



These signs occur only where the reckoning is from a date some distance back, and 

 when it is neither the initial nor immediately preceding date. The numerical character 

 of many of the directive signs already given cannot have escaped attention, but it is 

 more apparent in these than in any of the others. At first look they might seem to 

 indicate the number of removes of the specified date, or the number of intervening 

 days ; but as the three that are substantially the same point to dates of different 

 removes and widely different intervals, the conjecture seems to fail. 



THE UNIVERSAL DIRECTIVE SIGN. 



I have reserved this glyph for special mention. In one or another of its various 

 forms it might have gone into each of the foregoing lists, for on different occasions it 

 seems to perform the duties of all the other directive signs, but in such a peculiar way 

 that I am not able to demonstrate its exact value positively in a single instance. 

 Unlike them, however, it is never used alone. It is always accompanied by one or 

 more glyphs, constituting its suite, and therein lies the secret of its elusiveness. I 

 think it is generally, if not solely, employed in cases where a part or the whole of the 

 period indicated is not notated in the ordinary manner. An example or two will 

 sufficiently illustrate what I mean : 



These six glyphs are the only ones between two dates which are just 13 ahaus, 3 chuens 



