CORRELATION OF MAYA AND CHRISTIAN CHRONOLOGY. 533 
Spinden assumes that the specimen year 12 Kan given by Landa was the year 
1553-1554, which we have already seen (page 497) is probably true, and that it may 
have begun on July 16, 1553 0. s. (July 26, 1553 Nn. s.). This latter assumption, 
however, is very doubtful, although it is evident Landa so believed, since he begins 
his specimen year 12 Kan on July 16. 
A passage from the Book of Chilan Balam of Mani, and another from the Book 
of Chilan Balam of Tizimin (see Nos. 9 and to respectively on page 495), however, 
while they confirm the fact that the year 12 Kan began in 1553, indicate that its 
opening day fell on July 10 and not July 16. In other words, two native sources 
of highest general reliability here contradict a Spanish source on a matter concern- 
ing both chronologies. In such cases the writer prefers to follow the native sources, 
particularly when the Spanish authority is Landa, whose statements concerning 
the native chronology, while accurate in a general way, are rarely precise.? If this 
point were the only objection to Spinden’s correlation, it might be overlooked on 
the grounds that it would only dislocate his tables of equivalents by 6 days, but 
there are others, even more serious. 
Accepting 12 Kan 2 Pop as equal to July 26, 1553 (N. s.) for his point of contact, 
and holding fast to 9 Imix 19 Zip in a year 4 Kan as the date of Napot Xiu’s death, 
he reaches the date September 22, 1545, for that event, thereby not only sacrificing 
the statements of III, IV, and IX that it occurred in a Katun 13 Ahau, and of X, 
that it occurred in the first tun of Katun 11 Ahau, but also throwing over the 
almost unanimous opinion that it occurred in 1536. 
It is the same old question over again in any correlation which rests on this 
passage in III, IV, and LX, what to accept and what to reject, since as they stand 
they contradict themselves in the light of practically all the other evidence. 
If Napot Xiu died in a year 4 Kan on the day g Imix Ig Zip, then he did not die 
in 1536 or in a Katun 13 Ahau, unless all the other authorities are in error. Or, 
on the other hand, if he died in 1536 in a Katun 13 Ahau, then he could not have 
died on g Imix 19 Zip in a year 4 Kan. The whole question reduces itself as to 
which must be rejected. ‘The writer has chosen to hold to the larger time period 
in each chronology involved here, the katun and the Christian year, while Spinden 
and Bowditch hold to the smaller time period in each, the year-bearer and the 
Gregorian day. 
Spinden next accepts the writer’s correlation of the u kahlay katunob and the 
Long Count as already noted, and assigns to the Katun 13 Ahau just before the 
final conquest of the country, the Initial Series 12.9.0.0.0 13 Ahau 8 Kankin, and 
using his value of September 22, 1545 (N. Ss.) for 9 Imix 19 Zip, he runs back until he 
finds the first occurrence of 13 Ahau 8 Kankin before this, which will be April 22, 
1536 (N. s.). But this value for the end of Katun 13 Ahau contradicts both I and X 
in fundamental statements, as the following will show. April 22, 1536, N. s., was 
April 12, 1536, 0. s., or, as used in this discussion, 1536.281. Spinden therefore ends 
Katun 13 Ahau in 1536.281 and the previous katun, 2 Ahau, in 1516.568, which is 
in contradiction to the statement in I that a katun ended in 1517. 
Again, his correlation makes Tun 6 of Katun 9 Ahau run from 1560.922 to 
1561.908, whereas X states that Bishop Toral arrived in this tun, and the Spanish 
sources agree that he arrived between 1562.583 and 1562.622, nearly 9 months later. 
1These passages both state that 11 Chuen 18 Zac fell on February 15, 1544 (0. s.), on which basis, allowing 
for the leap years in 1544, 1548, and 1552, 12 Kan 2 Pop would have fallen on July 10, 1553 (0. s.), 6 days earlier 
than Landa’s date. 
2For example, he assigns the arrival of the Spaniards at Merida, which took place in 1541, to Katun 11 Ahau 
correctly, but proceeds to make it the first tun of that katun, instead of the sixth or seventh, as most of the 
native authorities indicate. 

