488 THE INSCRIPTIONS AT COPAN. 
Event D. 
The date of this event, the foundation of the city of Merida, the Spanish 
capital of Yucatan, is happily exactly fixed in our own chronology by VI as having 
taken place on January 6, 1542. But even here we must allow ourselves some 
leeway, since the Spaniards had arrived at Ichcansihoo, or Tihoo or T’ho, the site 
of the new capital, about a year earlier, Francisco Montejo having received the 
Lord of Mani there on the day of San Idefonso, January 23, 1541, but not having 
perfected his hold on the region until he had defeated a coalition of eastern Maya 
chieftains near there on June 11, 1541. The formal act of incorporation of the 
municipality, however, was not drawn up until January 6 of the following year: 
“After this event [the battle of June 11] for all that year they [the Spaniards] occupied 
themselves in conciliating all the neighboring chieftains (cazzques), and when it seemed that 
the latter were subjected and tractable, and the year [15]42 having begun, they resolved to 
initiate the foundation of the City, by finding the site with the qualifications which the 
instructions had demanded. A conference was held and all agreed upon this day of the 
Feast of the Holy Kings, the 6th of January of the said year of 1542.’! (VI.) 
This event is also given by Source I as follows: 
“In the year 1542 the Spaniards settled the territory of Merida, . . . . the third time 
they arrived they settled permanently, in the year 1542 they settled permanently in the 
territory of Merida, 13 Kan being the year-bearer according to the Maya reckoning.’”? 1.) 
In II the notice of this event seems to refer to the preliminary occupation of the 
site of Merida about a month after the battle of June 11, 1541, rather than to the 
formal act of foundation on January 6, 1542: 
“The Indians say, for example, that the Spaniards had just arrived at Merida in the 
year of the Nativity of our Lord, 1541, which was precisely the first year of the age of 11 
Ahau, which is that where the cross is [reference to a drawing of a katun-wheel in the text] 
and they arrived the same month of Pop which is the first month of their year.’ (II.) 
The four native chronicles already quoted, although they do not give the date 
in Christian chronology, are all in satisfactory agreement as to the katun. Says 
III in this connection: 
“The count of [Katun] 11 Ahau was not ended when the Spaniards, mighty men, arrived 
from the east, they came, they arrived here in this land.’* (II1.) 
The wording of IV is almost identical: 
“{Katun] 11 Ahau; foreigners arrived—mighty men from the east; they came, they 
arrived here in this land.’ (IV.) 
In LX the additional fact that the Spaniards brought the sickness, is recorded: 
“{Katun] 11 Ahau; the mighty men came from the East; they brought the sickness.’ 
(IX.) 
1Cogolludo, 1688, p. 136. He also gives the text of the act and a list of the first officers of the municipality. 
The writer has followed Cogolludo for the other dates of this second entry of the Spaniards under Francisco 
Montejo the younger, as follows: 1537 for the arrival at Champoton (ibid., p. 114), 1540 for the foundation of the 
Villa of Campeche (bid., p. 128), 1540 (late in the year) for the arrival at Merida (ibid.), January 23, 1541, for the 
visit of the Lord of Mani at Merida (ibid., p. 130), June 11, 1541, for the victory over the coalition of eastern Maya 
chieftains near Merida (ibid., p. 136), and January 6, 1542, for the foundation of Merida (ibid.). Molina Solis 
places the arrival at Champoton on Christmas Eve, 1540 (1896, p. 646, note 1), the visit of Tutul Xiu to Merida 
on January 23, 1542 (ibid., p. 646), and the defeat of the Eastern Maya, on June 11, 1542 (ibid., pp. 654, 655), on 
the authority of the Probanza of Garcia de Medina, which gives a report by Hernando Munoz Zapata, Encomendero 
of Oxkutzcab, of February 21, 1581. Munoz Zapata states that Montejo disembarked at Champoton on December 
24, 1540, and reached Campeche before the end of the year, 7. ¢., within a week, but this disagrees with Nakuk 
Pech, who says “they remained in Champoton 6 years, when they went forth to Campeche” (Brinton, 1882, p. 
218). Nakuk Pech heze agrees more nearly with Cogolludo, who places the stay at Champoton at 4 years, 1537 
to 1540. ‘The point is not of especial importance in the present connection, since Molina Solis accepts Cogulludo’s 
date for the foundation of Merida as January 6, 1542 (Molina Solis, op. cit., p. 633), that is, for Event D. 
2Brinton, 1882, p. 228. 3Landa, 1881, p. 103. 4Brinton, 1882, p. 104. *Lbid., p. 149. *Jbid., p. 162. 

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