278 THE INSCRIPTIONS AT COPAN. 
Underneath the monument was found a cruciform chamber, the axes 
of which are 2.95 meters long, 30 cm. wide, and 60 cm. high. The stela 
rested on a stone slab above the intersection of these axes. The north-and- 
south axis bears 20’ west of true north and the other axis is at right angles 
to it. It is apparent, therefore, that the stela faced very nearly due west, 
1.é., With its back to the Hieroglyphic Stairway. This chamber was opened 
in 1895 by the Fourth Peabody Museum Expedition and was found to con- 
tain thirty pieces of pottery of different types and workmanship (three being 
painted), a few rough pieces of jadeite, a small jar filled with black sulphide 
of mercury and covered with a shell (Spondylus calcifer), and a few fragments 
of stalactites.! The fact that this cache was found beneath Stela M makes it 
possible to refer the pieces of pottery which it contained to a period at least 
as early as the date of this monument, namely, 9.16.5.0.0. Such dated finds 
will ultimately prove of great value to the student of Maya ceramics in 
establishing the relative ages of different types. While it is not possible to 
fix the latest use of any given type found in such caches, we can fix a definite 
date before which it must have been in use. 
Several of these foundation chambers have been found under fallen 
stele here at Copan, notably under Stele 7, 1, I, M, and C, all of which con- 
tained similar objects; and it is probable that the foundations of the standing 
stele, A, B, D, F, H, J, N, and P, will yield similar deposits when excavated. 
Maler found caches of small eccentric shaped flints in the excavation 
of Stele 13 and 15 at Naranjo,’ and Gann reports an almost identical find 
of flints under Stela 1 at Benque Viejo. (See plate 1.) This valuable chro- 
nological line of evidence in the study of Maya ceramics should not be over- 
looked, and in its very nature this practice is likely to be found much more 
widely distributed than at these three sites alone. 
Returning to Stela M, its front or west face is sculptured with a human 
figure of heroic size, whose elaborate dress extends around the corners and 
completely covers the sides, as in the case of Stela D. The back has two 
columns of glyph-blocks surrounded by a beautiful design of rosettes and 
feather pendants, each column having 10 glyph-blocks or 1o+10=20 for 
the entire text. On the basis of this arrangement of the design it may be 
assigned to Class 6. he inscription commences with an Initial Series intro- 
ducing glyph in a1 followed by an Initial Series in Bi-a3a._ This very clearly 
records the hotun-ending 9.16.5.0.0 8 Ahau 8 Zotz, as follows: 
AI Initial Series introducing glyph 
Bid 9 cycles 
Bib ~—- 16 katuns 
A2a 5 tuns 
A2b Oo uinals 
B2a o kins 
B2b 8 Ahau 
A3a 8 Zotz 
It will be noted that the month of the Initial Series terminal date ‘‘8 
Zotz’ follows immediately after the day in B2b instead of in the usual 




1 Gordon, 1896, pp. 35, 36. 2 Maler, 19084, pp. 97, 100, 101, and figure 19. 
