1881.| Zhe Maya Calendar and the Age of MS. Troano. 76g 
the Christian era, we can from this easily change the years of one 
system into those: of the other. For convenience, I have marked 
on the table the year of our era corresponding with the first and 
last of each Ahau! 
Now let us test this arrangement by the two or three additional! 
_ dates found on record, and which the authorities have failed to 
make agree with any explanation of the calendar heretofore 
given. 
Bishop Landa (‘‘ Relacion de Cosas,” § 41) states that, ‘‘ The 
Indians say, for example, that the Spaniards arrived in the City 
of Merida the year of the nativity of our Lord and Master 1541, 
which was precisely the first year of 11 Ahau.” 
As the Indians could have given dates only by their system 
and by the number of years, it follows that the Bishop connected 
the year 1541 of the one system with that of the first of the 11th 
Ahau by his own calculation. 
As he understood the twenty usually counted years to form a 
complete Ahau, and supposed one of these to follow another 
without any intervening years, he would take 9 Muluc of the 13th 
Ahau—which was 1541 according to my table—as the first of 
the 11th Ahau (13 Muluc), according to his understanding. 
In order to make this plain I have surrounded the usually 
counted years of the 13th and 11th Ahaues with light waved 
lines. I have marked the two years he has confounded (9 and 
13) with a star; the year 4 Kan of the 13th Ahau, which cor- 
responds with our year 1536, is surrounded by a dark circle. 
We know from his express statement that he understood 
twenty years to constitute one of these periods, a fact which will 
probably explain the discrepancy in relation to another date which 
he mentions. : 
While writing his work in 1566, he remarks, ‘‘ According to 
the computation of the Indians, it is now 120 years since Maya- 
Pan was abandoned.” As this period must have been understood 
by him to include six Ahaues, the number as corrected would 
be 144 years, substituting this number and counting hack we 
obtain the year 1422 or 1423—the last year of the 1oth Ahau, or 
first of the 8th, as the one in which the destruction occurred. 
Cogulludo (as stated by Dr. Valentini) places this event “ about 
1 * % 
No notice is taken here of the fractional differences between the years of the two 
Systems, 
