cessary if we undertook to explain
fully even the plates of the codices we have referred to.

As before remarked, the Cortesian plate is arranged upon the same plan
as that of the Fejervary Codex, evidently based upon the same theory and
intended for the same purpose. In the latter the four year symbols are
placed in the outer looped line at the four corners, and so
distinguished as to justify us in believing they mark their respective
quadrants. In the former we find the four Maya year-bearers, Cauac, Kan,
Muluc, Ix, in corresponding positions, each distinguished by the numeral
character for 1 (see 31, 1, 11, and 21 in our scheme, Fig. 2), the
first, or the right, corresponding with the green loop and the year
Tochtli; the second, at the top, corresponding with the red loop and the
year Acatl; the third, at the left, corresponding with the yellow loop
and the year Tecpatl, and the fourth, at the bottom, corresponding with
the blue loop and the year Calli. This brings Cauac to the south, Kan to
the east, Muluc to the north, and Ix to the west, and the correspondence
is complete, except as to the colors, which, as we have seen, cannot
possibly be brought into harmony. This view is further sustained by the
fact that the god of death is found on the right of each plate, not for
the purpose of indicating the supposed abode of the dead, but to mark
the point at which the cycles close, which is more fully expressed in
the Cortesian plate by piercing or dividing the body of a victim with a
flint knife[49] marked with the symbol of Ezanab (the last day of the Ix
years) and the symbol of Ymix, with which, in some way not yet
understood, the counting of the cycles began.

In the quotation already made from Sahagun we find the following
statement: "Tecpatl, which is the figure of a flint, was dedicated to
_Mictlampa_, nearly towards hell, because they believed that the dead
went towards the north. For which reason, in the superstition which
represented the dead as covered with mantas (cloths) and their bodies
bound, they made them sit with their faces turned toward the north or
_Mictlampa_."

Although he is referring to Mexican customs, yet it is worthy of note
that in this Cortesian plate there is a sitting mummied figure, bound
with cords, in the left space, which, according to my interpretation, is
at the north side.

Since the foregoing was written I have received from Dr. D. G. Brinton
a photo lithograph of the "wheel of