Difference 34,320 = 132 × 260, on account of the same day.
| 1,538,342, IV Ik. |
| 1,535,004, VII Kan. |
Difference 117 = IV Kan to IV Imix; strictly speaking 377 = 260 + 117.
The upper part of the five columns just now under discussion still remains to be examined. Here are five vertical rows of hieroglyphs, the first four each containing seven, and the fifth only six owing to lack of space.
The two rows at the top are as usual much obliterated, which is the more to be deplored since they consisted of five calendar dates, which would have contributed materially to the comprehension of the entire section. Fortunately, however, one of these dates is preserved complete, and we are able to see in what relation it stands to the rest. Thus we find in the third column of page 63 the date XIII Imix 9 Uo. It comes in the year 12 Ix and represents the number 1,523,921 (or a number separated from it by a multiple of 18,980). Now 1,523,921 = 4175 × 365 + 46 and = 5861 × 260 + 61. This agrees with the lower number inserted in red:—1,538,342 = IV Ik 15 Zac (12 Muluc), which comes later by 14,421 = 39 × 365 + 186 and = 55 × 260 + 121. 121, however, is the difference between both XIII Imix and IV Ik and the days XIII Akbal and IV Kan in the last column of page 62. If we set down with these two numbers, those of the normal date just preceding and the normal date next following, we have
| 1,518,400 = 80 × 18980. |
| 1,523,921, |
| 1,538,342, |
| 1,556,360 = 82 × 18980. |
This is a period of 37,960 = 2 × 18,980 days. It is possible that at some future time an indication of such a transition from
one Katun to the other will be found in the writings. Now these two top lines contain two dates; on page 62 we find 13 Ceh, and on page 63, 13 Xul, but nothing further is to be learned from this than that one or the other of the day-signs, 2, 7, 12, 17, must have been set down in the effaced indication of the position in the Tonalamatl. All else is obliterated. From the third to the seventh row of these five columns it is all extremely simple. The third row consists only of five signs for beginning, the fourth, of five for end, the sixth of B's sign five times and the seventh of the elongated head q four times. But in the fifth, two deities alternate, one is apparently male and the other female; the god is in columns 1, 3 and 5 and the goddess in 2 and 4; the god probably belonging to the days III Chicchan and the goddess to XIII Akbal.
If we look upon this series as the first story of a structure and the large numbers just now discussed as the second, then we find the third story here, as we shall find it again on page 69. In the passage on page 31, which is so closely related to the present one, a timid attempt has already been made with the number 2,804,100 to erect a third story of this kind, which however barely attained to a quarter of the height of the one which now engages our attention. If the numbers hitherto examined refer to a time not very far from the present, we now come to numbers which lie in so remote a future that they can hardly suggest anything else than the destruction of the world or a sort of twilight of the gods. Nevertheless the starting-point of the whole, the series, which is built up with the number 91, i.e., the Bacab period or the quarter of a ritual year, continually comes to view. Indeed, the number of serpents is suggestive of this.
There are four large serpents, which fill most of the space on the left half of page 62 and the right of page 61. The two outer ones are bluish and the two inner ones white. They rise in several coils, their tails below and their heads above. A deity is represented above the gaping jaws of each of the four serpents, having apparently been vomited up. Above the first and third serpents B is represented in a fashion very similar to that which we have already seen on pages 33-35. Above the first serpent B has the pouch hanging from his neck and his hatchet is held