AIDS TO THE STUDY OF THE MAYA CODICES, BY CYRUS THOMAS.
That Prof. Cyrus Thomas has long been engaged in the examination of the few Maya records in existence is known from his former works, "A study of the Manuscript Troano" and "Notes on certain Maya and Mexican manuscripts," both published by the Bureau of Ethnology.
The object of the present paper is to give information of some original discoveries and to present some explanations not brought forward by Professor Thomas in his former papers.
The records of Maya and Mexico yet challenge students with unsolved problems similar to those which in the writings of Egypt and Assyria have perplexed so many generations. The translation of the paleographic literature of this continent may be expected to throw light on the past of America, in some degree reproducing the brilliant result which has attended the translation of the hieroglyphs of the eastern hemisphere. Long and laborious comparisons, together with the trial of successive hypotheses, will be necessary to the decipherment of our aboriginal manuscripts, and but few competent persons are actively engaged in the work. It becomes, therefore, the duty of any one whose discoveries tend to clear up even minor points of the great problem to furnish them to his fellow laborers, and thereby limit the remaining field of investigation. In this paper Professor Thomas supplements his former work.