[87]. In Cod. Tro., p. 29*, et seq., the black god has a girdle, to which are attached the leg and claw of a scorpion. The name of the large black scorpion in Maya is ek chuh, literally “the black scorcher.” Dr. Seler appositely suggests that this may be a rebus for the name of the god.
[88]. “En figura de feroz negro, como una imagen de esculptura, con los miembros de hombre. * * * Fué gran guerreador y crudelissimo. * * * Quiere decir negro principal, ó Señor de los negros.” Nuñez de la Vega: Constituciones Diocesanas, p. 9; Carta Pastoral, IX. (Rome, 1702.)
[89]. “En muchos pueblos de las provincias de este obispado tienen pintados en sus Repertorios ó Calendarios siete negritos para hacer divinacionès y prognosticos correspondientes à los siete dias de la semana, comenzandola por el viernes à contar.” Nuñez de la Vega: Constituciones Diocesanas, p. 9.
[90]. I add the following definitions: “Mai, polvillo que sale del tabaco, etc., cuando le tratan con las manos. Maay, espuma del palo que se quema. Bolon Mayel, qualquier olor suavissimo y transcendente.” Bolon, nine, in the last word is used in Maya as an expression of admiration. (See p. 25.) The term is from Landa, Cosas de Yucatan, c. 7.
[91]. Among feminine forms I find ix-bouat, prophetess; ix-cunal than, conjuress.
[92]. The Dicc. Motul gives: Ah-koh keuel, for the wizard wearing a mask and clothed in the skin of the jaguar.
[93]. See The Native Calendar of Central America and Mexico, p. 5.
[94]. My count does not agree entirely with that of other observers (Fewkes, Schellhas). I have limited my identifications to such figures as seemed to me beyond reasonable doubt.
[95]. There may be here an ikonomatic allusion, or play on words. The word pek, dog, is close to pec, to sound, to make a noise, which was used for the thunder, as in the current phrase pecni caan, “the sky rang” (sonó el cielo, Dicc. Motul).
[96]. In Spanish, bujarro. The Dicc. Motul says of it, sub voce, coz, “ave de rapina; coge gallinas y grita como muchachos.”