1881.] The Manuscript Treano, 629 
the years of the Maya calendar with those dated from the Chris- 
tian era, if any one can be determined. 
The reader will observe that we have so far proceeded upon 
the assumption that the first year of the cycle was 1 Kan, or in 
other words, that the Kan column always occupied the extreme 
left. That the four days, Kan, Muluc, Ix, Cauac—or “ year bear- 
ers,” as they were called by the Mayas—must follow in the order 
given, is manifest, but that Kan must come first does not follow 
from anything apparent in the system itself; either.day may be the 
first, without any change in the system, but not without a differ- 
ence in the result. There are some reasons apparent in the manu- 
Script itself for believing that the. author considered Cauac the 
first, or ruling day, and hence Kan the second, Muluc the third 
and Ix the fourth. One of these reasons will be given here- 
after. 
The importance of knowing which one of these days came 
first will be apparent from the following illustration: A certain 
event, for example, is dated a particular day in the year, 1 Ix. By 
: reference to the tables we 
TABL : 
= cas mei give here—one commenc- 
ay 8 3 g | 3 ing with Kan and the other 
Zigi#lé |lé § 21 with Cauac—we see that if 
—|—|— |— “|| the former be the correct 
: ‘ : Ps : ; c ‘ one, the year 1 Ix would 
re a BPS te 91 ae (ok be the 27th year of the 
wr se : . ; Ps : cycle (it is marked with a 
"oe My pe ee . aa ae star); if the latter, it would 
3] 4] 5s! 6 3 : 5| 6|| be the 40th, or 13 years 
es i Pe a - - 2 ee later. 
; : PAS ce : 5 As we shall have to re- 
0} | 12 = io zt ‘a RA fer very frequently to the 
calendar, it becomes neces- 
Sary that we construct one. Since the system admits of fifty-two 
changes in the day on which the year begins, it would require 
fifty-two calendars to include the years of one cycle, just as four- 
teen are required to suit all the years of our system—seven for 
the ordinary and seven for the leap years. 
_ As it would require much time and space to write these out in 
