THE FALL OF THE OLD EMPIRE. 457 
been large in the first place. Thus, under Cook’s hypothesis, it is not sur- 
prising to find that Copan was one of the first of the larger cities to have been 
abandoned, 9.18.10.0.0 being the last contemporaneous date found there. 
Not only was it one of the very oldest of the cities, but also it was located in 
a small valley where the area available for cultivation was comparatively 
restricted. 
Piedras Negras, located in a small semicircular flat surrounded by hills 
on one side and the Usumacinta River on the other, appears to have been 
abandoned about a hotun earlier, 1.¢., 9.18.5.0.0, and Yaxchilan, on the 
opposite (west) bank of the same river, in a similar location higher up, about 
the same time, 9.18.3.1.5. The closing dates at Quirigua and Uaxactun, 
located in the midst of fairly broad plains, are the same, namely, 9.19.0.0.0, 
and that at Naranjo, similarly located, is only 10 years later, 7. ¢., 9.19.10.0.0. 
Thirty years later, in 10.1.0.0.0, we get the closing dates at Benque Viejo, 
Ucanal, and Nakum, all in the northeastern corner of Peten, and 20 years 
later, in 10.2.0.0.0, the last dates of the Old Empire at Flores, Tikal, and 
Seibal, the last two being located in the midst of very large plains, the for- 
mer in the northeastern section of Peten, and the latter in the rich valley of 
the Pasion River, 150 kilometers farther south. 
Probably not long after 10.2.0.0.0 the last of the Maya moved out of the 
Peten region, some going north into Yucatan and others south into the high- 
lands of Guatemala, and the cities of the Old Empire were left deserted, to be 
reclaimed eventually by the same tropical forest from which they had 
originally been carved. Happily we are not without direct archeological 
evidence as to the two-fold direction of this Mayan exodus which com- 
pletely depopulated the Old Empire, the nature of which we will now pro- 
ceed to examine. 
To begin with, as early as the Middle Period, 1n 9.13.0.0.0 or 9.14.0.0.0 
(according to the writer’s correlation of Maya and Christian chronology), 
we have documentary evidence of the discovery of the region lying to the 
north of the Old Empire, z.¢., the Peninsula of Yucatan. Three of the five 
chronicles in the Books of Chilan Balam, those from the Mani and Tizimin 
manuscripts, and the first chronicle in the Chumayel manuscript, record 
the discovery of the Province of Ziyancaan or Bakhalal' in 9.13.0.0.0 or 
9.14.0.0.0. The Mani manuscript describes this event in the following 
words: 
“Then [9.14.0.0.0] took place the discovery of the Province of Ziyancaan or 
Bakhalal; 4 Ahau [i. ¢., 9.15.0.0.0 4 Ahau 13 Yax], 2 Ahau [1. ¢., 9.16.0.0.0 2 Ahau 
13 Tzec], 13 Ahau [1. ¢., 9.17.0.0.0 13 Ahau 18 Cumhul, three score years they ruled 
Ziyancaan when they descended here; in these years that they ruled Bakhalal, 
it occurred then that Chichen Itza was discovered.’ 

1 Brinton (1882, p. 124) gives the following etymology for these two names: Bakhalal “cane-brakes,” halal 
the cane and bak roll or inclosure, possibly referring to the cane-brakes around the shores of the lagoon of this 
name in the southeastern part of the peninsula; and Ziyancaan, “‘the birth of the sky” ziyan, birth and caen, sky. 
Brinton believes the latter is a picturesque allusion to the view from the seashore nearby, where the sky appears 
to rise from out of the water. 2 Ibid., pp. 95, 96, 100, and tot. 
