But what of the other glyphs? Are they simply all calendar signs interlaced with a few other glyphs appertaining to deities; or are they records of Mayan history? D. G. Brinton, in his book A Primer of Mayan Hieroglyphics (Chicago, 1898), says: "We need not search for the facts of history, the names of the mighty kings or the dates of conquests. We shall not find them. Chronometry we shall find, but not chronicles; astronomy with astrological aims; ritual, but no records. Pre-Columbian history will not be constructed from them. This will be a disappointment to many, but it is the conclusion towards which tend all the soundest investigations of recent years."
Is Dr. Brinton right? Are we to find no records of this mysterious civilisation? Are we to be for ever denied written proof whence the Mayans came and how they attained their civilisation? It is to be hoped that his presumption is incorrect, and that these undeciphered glyphs and those which cannot as yet be regarded as satisfactorily accounted for as mere chronological data will prove to be the key to this problem of the New World. Of the glyphs that are alleged to be calendar signs we have already spoken; their importance can only be shown when their neighbours have been deciphered, and until that day comes the wise will withhold their acceptance of the present calendar or astronomical reading. Searches have been made, searches are being made, but the students who have worked and who are working have received little support in their enterprise.
It has been suggested and in some cases proved that many of the glyphs apart from the calendar signs are astronomical and animal ideographs of deities. Amongst those which are repeatedly made use of is the chief beneficent god of the Mayans, Itzamna, who was to them what Quetzalcoatl was to the Mexicans. Tradition relates, according to D. G. Brinton, that "he came in his magic skiff from the East, across the waters, and therefore he presided over that quarter of the world assigned to him." His name meant "the dew or moisture of the morning." To him all the arts are due. He was the god of their culture, their arts, their writings on stone monuments and books. His sign is found throughout the codices, in paintings, and among the glyphs. The tapir was his principal symbol, and to what does this fact point? Is it not possible to see in him a culture-god coming from the East? The Buddhists came from the East; they were the culture-heroes of Central America; they were the men who taught the building arts and who possibly introduced the tapir as a deity instead of the elephant of their native country. Thus may Itzamna have risen the personification of their arts and crafts after they had died, the elephant cult of Asia being represented by the tapir.
The other deities were but minor ones compared with Itzamna. They were Cuculcan, Kin-ich, the God of the North Star, the Bee-God, the Bat-God, and Ghanan, the God of Earth, growth and fertility; Ah-Pach (God of Death), always depicted in battle scenes with his torch or spear and flint knife; Ek Ahau, the Black God, suggested to have been the god of the much-cultivated cocoa plant, although his attitude of war with appendages of shield and spear does not quite harmonise with this suggestion that he was a god of agriculture. In addition to these anthropomorphic deities we find animal life represented by the serpent, the dog, the jaguar, the macaw, deer, armadillo, turtle, monkey, quail, frog, scorpion, zopilote, pelican, blackbird, and what D. G. Brinton has called his "fish and oyster sign."
Again, many are reminiscent of domestic life, for example, of weaving, the spinning whorl, the flint knife (always denoting death or sacrifice and near the God of Death), and lastly there are those having reference to sacrificial acts and the priests' devotion by the piercing of their tongues. Astronomical ideas figure largely too. Primitive peoples always held the heavens in awe. Their calendar was formed partly by the lunations of the moon and by the celestial bodies, and naturally we find their ideographs often portrayed. Landa mentions that the Mayas measured their time by night, "Regianse de noche, para conocer la hora, por el lucero, i las cobrillas i los artilegros, de dia, por media dia."
There is no doubt the Mayan knowledge of the stars was considerable. The Pleiades and Orion were watched by them. They called the North Star Xaman Ek (Xaman north: Ek star). Their astronomers studied the course of the Milky Way and the sun was figured in the glyphs in various forms. The much-discussed Benik sign (Ben, idea: ik, life) had probably much to do with the sun; but D. G. Brinton believed it to more particularly represent "strength and deific power," and says of Dr. Seler, when referring to this glyph, "that he is apt to see gory human heads everywhere," because Seler thought the glyph represented a head carried in a sling as a sign of "conquered in war."
But the signs which have been most in dispute are those which D. G. Brinton has called "Drum Signs." Professor Leon de Rosny thought these variants of the ahau sign; Professor Cyrus Thomas a heap of stones; Dr. Phillip J. J. Valentini a censer or brazier; and Dr. Seler a precious stone. They are always found on the "initial" or cycle glyphs at Copan, Quirigua, and Palenque. D. G. Brinton is probably correct in the christening of them; for they are exactly like the drums which the Indians possessed at the coming of the Spaniards, according to Father Duran's Historia de los Indios, and which are depicted in the ancient codices. Thus it would seem that these are "Drum Signs" with a symbolical meaning. Another sign which has been the subject of much controversy is that which de Rosny and Professor Forstemann are probably right in calling the "Phallus Sign"; but which Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg thought represented a gourd, D. G. Brinton the "Yax or Feather Ornament," and Seler a tree of some kind. Dr. Schellhas has gone further and declared it to be the sign "zapote tree," the wood most used by the Mayans in building.
But the time has not yet come when it is possible to say who is right or wrong in the naming of these glyphs. Up to the present it is all more or less surmise based upon the writings of the Spanish historians—such as Bishop Landa. It is on his work that is based the assumption that the signs on the monuments refer chiefly to the calendar. It is true they seem to be mathematically correct, but this could not be otherwise when the numberings of the dates have been assigned by those who have shown them to be correct. The alphabet which Landa bequeathed us has been proved beyond all question to be false. In fact it is obvious that no alphabet can be formed upon the glyphs, for there are hundreds of signs, some of which would appear to have many variants. If his key to the actual writing through his alphabet is incorrect, there is good reason to doubt his statements as to the calendar signs; and the student ought not to allow himself to begin where others have finished in these researches. He should first of all glance back over the ground which is supposed to have been already covered, and see for himself whether or not there is actual proof that the calendar signs have been correctly interpreted.
Much might be said on the codices and books that have been left us by the historians. They belong to two classes and two widely separate dates. The Codices are the surviving ancient glyphic writings of pre-Conquest times which escaped the Spanish bonfires, and are of native paper about ten inches wide and of various lengths, inscribed on both sides, and folded zigzag-fashion like the oldest Buddhist literature. The others are the books written in Latin characters after the Conquest in several towns and villages and known as the "Books of Chilan Balam."