Commentary on the Maya Manuscript in the Royal Public Library of Dresden

by Ernst Wilhelm Förstemann

And furthermore, at the right, bottom, I have substituted the third month for the second of the Manuscript, which proceeding will be justified later on.

The least difficult portion of the contents of this page is the first series consisting of 16 members, each being a multiple of 2920. It begins with the date I Ahau (which is always concealed in these series), regularly stops at the month day Ahau (since 2920 = 146 × 20), but necessarily advances in the week days by 8 days each (since 2920 = 224 × 13 + 8), until 37,960 is reached, when the day I Ahau again appears (since 37,960 = 146 × 260).

According to my method of filling in the numbers, the top row of the page consists only of multiples of 37,960.

On the other hand, the four numbers of the second row from the top are more difficult. They are, it is true, all divisible without remainder by 260, but otherwise they seem to be without rule, and they give one somewhat the impression of a subsidiary computation such as one might jot down on a slip of paper in the course of some important mathematical work.

Nevertheless, the following remarkable results are obtained when the first and third and the second and fourth numbers are combined by addition or subtraction:—

1) 185,120 + 33,280 = 218,400, which is just 600 years of 13 × 28 = 364 days, 280 Mars years of 780 days, 840 Tonalamatls of 260 days or 7800 months of 28 days.

2) 185,120 - 33,280 = 151,840, i.e., precisely the highest number of the top row, = 416 solar years of 365 days each or 260 Venus years of 584 days each, i.e., the product of the days of the Tonalamatl multiplied by the Venus years. We shall again find the 151,840 on page 51, and Seler ("Quetzalcoatl and Kukulcan," p. 400) finds this same period on a relief of Chichen Itza.

3) 68,900 + 9100 = 78,000, i.e., 100 Mars years or 300 Tonalamatls. The half of this number, or 39,000, we shall find again on pages 69-73 by computation; also the whole 78,000.

4) 68,900 - 9100 = 59,800, i.e., 520 Mercury years of 115 days, or 230 Tonalamatls, or five times the period of 11,960 days, in which these two periods are united. By computation again we find the 59,800 on page 58. This period of 11,960 days is, however, to the period of 37,960 in the proportion of 23:73, i.e., 23 × 520:73 × 520. 23 is the fifth part of the apparent Mercury year, as 73 is of the solar year.