n is made herein to the phoneticism or phonetic value
of the written characters or hieroglyphs, it is proper that the writer's
position on this point should be clearly understood. He does not claim
that the Maya scribes had reached that advanced stage where they could
indicate each letter-sound by a glyph or symbol. On the contrary, he
thinks a symbol, probably derived in most cases from an older method of
picture writing, was selected because the name or word it represented
had as its chief phonetic element a certain consonant sound or syllable.
If this consonant element were _b_, the symbol would be used where _b_
was the prominent consonant element of the word to be indicated, no
reference, however, to its original signification being necessarily
retained. Thus the symbol for _cab_, "earth," might be used in writing
_Caban_, a day name, or _cabil_, "honey," because _cab_ is their chief
phonetic element.

In a previous work[205-1] I have expressed the opinion that the
characters are to a certain extent phonetic--are not true alphabetic
signs, but syllabic. And at the same time I expressed the opinion that
even this definition did not hold true of all, as some were apparently
ideographic, while others were simple abbreviated pictorial
representations. In a subsequent paper[205-2] I expressed substantially
the same opinion, and gave as my belief that one reason why attempts at
decipherment have failed of success is a misconception of the peculiar
character of the writing, which peculiarity is found in the fact that,
as it exists in the codices and inscriptions, it is in a transition
stage from the purely ideographic to the phonetic. I stated also my
belief that the writing had not reached the stage when each sound was
indicated by a glyph or sign.

This may further be explained by the following illustration: The
conventionalized figure of a turtlehead is the symbol for a "turtle,"
_ak_, _ac_, or _aac_ in Maya; and a conventionalized footprint is the
symbol for "step" or "road," _be_, _beil_, in Maya. These may be brought
together to form the word _akyab_ or _kayab_, which may have no
reference to the original signification of the combined symbols. These
two glyphs are, in fact, combined to form the symbol for the month
_Kayab_.

These statements will perhaps suffice to make clear my views on this
question, which do not appear to have been clearly understood, possibly
because of my frequent use of the words "phonetic"