There is also an obstacle in the very limited number of manuscripts in this character which have been preserved. Of the vast number found among the natives at the conquest, only three or four are known to be in existence. One of these is the "Dresden Manuscript," another the "Manuscript Troano," the third the "Manuscrit Mexican, No. 2," of the Bibliothéque Impériale; and perhaps the "Pesth Manuscript" is in the same shrift. Of these the Dresden Manuscript may be seen in the large collection of Lord Kingsborough on Mexican Antiquities, and the Manuscript Troano was published in fac simile by the French government under the editorship of M. Brasseur de Bourbourg. (Mission Scentifique au Mexique et a l'Amérique Centrale, Linguistique. Paris, 1869. Imprimeire Imperiale.) There is, however, material almost inexhaustible in the inscriptions preserved upon the stone temples, altars, and pillars of Yucatan, which we may with great confidence look to see deciphered before many years.
The only serious difficulty which is at present in the way is our want of knowledge of the ancient Maya language. All the published grammars and vocabularies are extremely deficient and incomplete, and quite inadequate to serve us in interpreting the inscriptions. But even this alarming obstacle is only temporary. There exists in manuscript a most complete and carefully composed dictionary of the Maya, written about 1650, two copies of which are in this country, one in the hands of the Smithsonian Institution, and which we earnestly hope will shortly be published under the efficient superintendence of Dr. Hermann Berendt, the most accomplished Maya scholar living. With it in hand, the deciphering of the inscriptions of Palenque, Uxmal, Itza, and the other ruined cities of Yucatan, and of the manuscripts already mentioned, will become certainly a less serious task than that of translating the cuneiform inscriptions of Ninevah.
Even without other aids than the limited vocabularies already published, some antiquarians have boldly set to work on the Yucatecan writings. Most conspicuous of them is M. Brasseur de Bourbourg, who first published Diego de Landa's work containing the alphabet. (Relation des choses de Yucatan de Diego de Landa. Texte espagnol et traduction francaise en regard, comprenant les signes du calendrier, et de l'Alphabet hiéroglyphique de la langue Maya. Paris, [1864.]
His recent edition of the Manuscript Troano is prefaced by an Etude in which he attempts to interpret several of its pages. It is painful to be unable to say a single word in favor of his views. They are thoroughly untenable and groundless. The Abbé Brasseur deserves the highest praise for his ardor and devotion to archæological studies, but his theories do not bear a moment's examination. They are so utterly wild that we are almost afraid to state them. He imagines that these inscriptions and manuscripts all contain geological reminiscences, chiefly concerning the submersion of a portion of the American continent and the consequent formation of the West India Islands. He explains all the letters as "expressive images of the cataclysm of which they are the phonetic expression." The culture of the Mayas and Aztecs he regards as the debris of a far higher civilization, which once extended over most of the American continent, and from which that of ancient Egypt (!) was derived. He insists on the identity of the ancient Maya and Aztec tongues, for which there is not a shadow of proof, and going further, claims that they are both derived from Germanic roots. Of course, with such notions as these, his "interpretation" of the Manuscript is an absurdity, and can never obtain a serious hearing in scientific circles.
A very different student is M. H. de Charencey, long favorably known for his researches into the Basque language, the dialects of Central America, and other critical publications. In the first volume of the Actes la Société Philologique (Paris, 1870) he has an "Essai de Déchiffrement d'un Fragment d'Inscription Palenquienne." He takes for his subject the famous "bas-relief of the Cross," found on the back of the great altar at Palenque. It is portrayed in Stephens's [Travels in Central America], and more carefully in the work of Cabrera on the ruins of Palenque, from a drawing by M. de Waldeck. It seems to represent the ceremony of baptism, or something analogous to it. The central figures are surrounded by inscriptions. Immediately above the bird which surmounts the cross is found this character:—
This he analyses as follows, commencing at the right: h (variation of No. 13 of the alphabet), o (variation of No. 22 enclosed in a circle), nab (the Maya word for the palm of the hand which supports the middle letter), ku (variation of No. 17),=honabku. This, in the orthography hunabku, a discrepancy of no great moment, is a familiar Maya name of divinity, and means the only, or the one God. The course of argument by which he supports this analysis is careful and judicious.
The second group which M. de Charencey analyses is this:—
This he resolves, commencing at the right hand upper figure, proceeding from above downward, and from right to left, into the following letters of Landa's alphabet: