Page:A Study of the Manuscript Troano.djvu/49

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CHAPTER II

THE MAYA CALENDAR.

The Maya divisions of time (no notice is taken here of the divisions of the day) were as follows: The day, the week, the month, the year, the five intercalated days, the week of years, the Ahau or Katun, the cycle of fifty-two years, and the Ahau Katun or great epoch.

The day ("Kin" or Sun) was used in the ordinary sense, each of the twenty days of the month having its name, as we name the days of our week, and its character or hieroglyph, as follows:

Fig. 2 — Day characters

The characters here given are copied from Landa's work, our only original authority on this point. There are several important variations from these forms found in the Manuscript, but these, the orthography of the names according to different authors, together with the significations of the names, have been given by others, hence will not be repeated here. Although the month did not always commence with the same day, the order of the days as here given, to wit, Kan, Chicchan, Cimi, Manik, Lamat,