Fig. 75. Drawings of the Initial Series: A, On the Leyden Plate. This records a Cycle-8 date and next to the Tuxtla Statuette Initial Series, is the earliest known. B, On a lintel from the Temple of the Initial Series, Chichen Itza. This records a Cycle-10 date, and is one of the latest Initial Series known.
The other Initial Series showing a cycle coefficient 8 is on the Leyden Plate, a drawing of which is reproduced in figure [75], A. This Initial Series is far more satisfactory than the one just described, and
its authenticity, generally speaking, is unquestioned. The student will easily identify A1-B2 as an Initial-series introducing glyph, even though the pair of comblike appendages flanking the central element and the tun tripod are both wanting. Compare this form with figure [24]. The Initial-series number, expressed by normal-form numerals and head-variant period glyphs, follows in A3-A7. The former are all very clear, and the number may be read from them in spite of certain irregularities in the corresponding period glyphs. For example, the katun head in A4 has the clasped hand, which is the distinguishing characteristic of the cycle head, and as such should have appeared in the head in A3. Neither the tun head in A5 nor the kin head in A7 shows an essential element heretofore found distinguishing these particular period glyphs. Indeed, the only period glyph of the five showing the usual essential element is the uinal head in A6, where the large mouth curl appears very clearly. However, the number recorded here may be read as 8.14.3.1.12 from the sequence of the coefficients—that is, their position with reference to the introducing glyph—a reading, moreover, which is confirmed by the only known period glyph, the uinal sign, standing in the fourth position after the introducing glyph.
Reducing this number to units of the first order by means of Table [XIII], we have:
| A3 = | 8 × | 144,000 = | 1,152,000 |
| A4 = | 14 × | 7,200 = | 100,800 |
| A5 = | 3 × | 360 = | 1,080 |
| A6 = | 1 × | 20 = | 20 |
| A7 = | 12 × | 1 = | 12 |
| ———— | |||
| 1,253,912 | |||
Deducting from this number all the Calendar Rounds possible, 66 (see Table [XVI]), and applying rules 1, 2, and 3 (pp. [139], [140], and [141], respectively) to the remainder, the terminal date reached will be 1 Eb 0 Yaxkin. The day part of this date is very clearly recorded in A8, the coefficient 1 being expressed by one dot, and the day sign itself having the hook surrounded by dots, and the prominent teeth, both of which are characteristic of the grotesque head which denotes the day Eb. See figure [16], s-u.
The month glyph appears in A9a, the lower half of which unmistakably records the month Yaxkin. (See fig. [19], k, l.) Note the yax and kin elements in each. The only difficulty here seems to be the fact that a bar (5) is attached to this glyph. The writer believes, however, that the unexplained element (*