The question has been posed in academic circles as to whether or not astrology is a divinatory system.[1] This seemingly broad topic can be brought to narrower focus by considering Nicholas Campion’s assertion that ‘astrology exists only within a cultural context’.[2] Likewise, ethnographer Barbara Tedlock points out that difficulty arises in trying to qualify a definition of divination as ‘the terms used often spring from or apply to only one culture, or else a small group of cultures.’[3] It stands to reason then, that the answer to this question can only be addressed in terms of a particular given culture. Commenting on the Maya culture, J. Eric S. Thompson said ‘we must face it: so far as ends are concerned Maya astronomy is astrology.’[4] On these grounds then, examples from stela inscriptions recounting campaigns of conquest timed by the apparitions of Venus, the ‘Maya Zodiac’ of the Paris Codex, historical accounts from Spanish conquerors, ethnographic studies of modern day-keeper rituals, and the 2012 doomsday prophesy hysteria could all be used in addressing this question. The evidence presented here will be a focused examination of selected almanacs from the Dresden Codex, a Post-Classic period screen-fold manuscript. It will be demonstrated that gods and goddesses exist within the codex, that these deities were invoked in the practice of divination, that the codex contains astronomical and astrological observations, and lastly, that the astrological almanacs were used for the purposes of divination. As this primary source is a hieroglyphic document, to extract meaning from the chosen almanacs they will need to be examined in turn calendrically, iconographically, epigraphically, mechanically, and astronomically in order to ascertain the likelihood of the existence of astrology used for the purposes of divination within the given texts.
A Definition of Terms, the Cultural Context, and the Maya Calendar
A necessary step in addressing this question is to first define the terms and then place these definitions within the context of the culture under examination. The definitions of astrology are many and varied, one of the finest being that of Patrick Curry, who defines astrology as ‘the practice of relating the heavenly bodies to lives and events on earth, and the tradition that has thus been generated.’[5] When considering the nature of divination on the other hand, it is helpful to recall Cicero’s acknowledgment that ‘there is an ancient belief, handed down to us even from mythical times and firmly established by the general agreement… that divination of some kind exists among men.’ [6] John Addey suggests that there are three main types of divination: the first where some higher power is sought or invoked, the second where the diviner possesses a psychometric or psychic sensitivity to objects, and third, where the divinatory ability is gained through a study of symbolism and used to interpret ‘unrecognized truths about the existences involved’.[7] Perhaps more concise is Tedlock’s definition of divination as ‘a way of exploring the unknown in order to elicit answers (that is, oracles) to questions beyond the range of ordinary human understanding.’[8]
It is also important to define what is meant here by ‘Maya culture’ and to briefly introduce the Maya calendar system which was intimately related to their observation of the heavens. Although by no means an all-encompassing definition, for the sake of this argument Maya culture can be represented by the Mesoamerican civilization of the Pre-Classic (2000 B.C.E - 250 C.E) and Classic (250 - 900 C.E) periods as reconstructed by the material cultural remains, the Post-Classic (900 -1500 C.E.) and colonial period as portrayed in the primary textual sources, and the non-westernized remnants of this culture which still survive in the Guatemalan Highlands today. Concerning the Maya understanding of time, Thompson states that ‘no people in history [have] shown such interest in time as the Maya.’[9] Their intricate calendar was comprised of a series of interlocking cycles, including but not limited to the 365-day ‘vague-year’ known as the haab, the 360-day tuun, the 52-year Long Count, and the Lords of the Night cycle and Lunar Series (discussed last time).
The most important of these cycles was the 260-day tzolk’in, or the Sacred Calendar, which consisted of two separate subsidiary cycles: a cycle of numbers (1 to 13) and a cycle of 20 day names used in a constant order (Imix, Ik’, Ak’bal, Kan, Chikchan, Kimi, Manik, Lamat, Muluk, Ok, Chuwen, Eb, Ben, Ix, Men, K’ib, Kaban, Etz’nab, Kawak, Ahaw).[10] To demonstrate how this cycle functions, suppose the first day-name, Imix, is paired with the number 1; the next day would be 2 Ik’, and so on, proceeding to 13 Ben. Here the numbers would reset but the day-names continue onward as 1 Ix proceeds to 7 Ahaw, the twentieth day-name in the cycle. The numbers would now continue as the day-names reset; the next day would be 8 Imix, followed by 9 Ik’. The calendar returns to its starting point of 1 Imix after a complete cycle of 260 days. Although the origin of the sacred calendar remains unclear, its length has been linked to the average gestation period of a human female (266 days), the interval between the appearance of Venus as morning star and evening star (263 days) and other celestial cycles.[11] The importance of this calendar is testified by the fact that almost every inscription in stone, wood, bone or plaster from the Classic period is accompanied by a Tzolk’in date. Furthermore, the Dresden Codex is comprised, almost in its entirety, of sacred 260-day almanacs.
Having now defined the terms and briefly identified the cultural context, it is possible to insert these definitions into the question ‘is astrology a divinatory system?’ Substituting Curry’s definition of astrology, Tedlock’s definition of a divinatory system and adding Thompson’s insights into the culture, the question now becomes ‘Did the Maya use the practice of relating the heavenly bodies to their lives and events on earth as a way of eliciting answers to questions beyond the range of ordinary human understanding utilizing the Sacred 260-Day Calendar?’
Deities and Iconography in the Dresden Codex
Of the few surviving Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican books which escaped destruction at the hands of Spanish conquerors, sixteen deal either directly or indirectly with observational astronomy and/or the sacred calendar.[12] Only four of these screen-fold manuscripts, the Dresden, Madrid, Paris, and Grolier Codex, are of Maya origin. Harvey and Victoria Bricker state that ‘the Maya codices are fundamentally religious and astrological works, whose protagonists are gods rather than historical personages’, which stands in stark contrast to the Classic-period monumental inscriptions which are primarily concerned with the lives of rulers.[13]
That the anthropomorphic figures depicted throughout the codices represent deities was realized in part through the decipherment of the glyph as k'uh, a Yucatec word meaning ‘god’ or ‘sacred’.[14] This glyph is often paired with name glyphs in the texts denoting deity. Vail suggests that these deities are best understood ‘not as individual entities, but rather in terms of their relationships with each other and as groupings of related deities.’ Aveni points out that the Maya also viewed the planets as ‘divinities who interacted with their terrestrial realm to create a cosmic unity.’[15] To the Maya the stars were gods to be worshiped and attended to, whose appearance foretold the start of rainy season, advantageous times to plant, and the abundance of the harvest that would result from these efforts.
That celestial objects were viewed as gods and that these deities are best understood in relationship to one another is perhaps best illustrated by the fact that the moon appears to have been represented by a number of similar deities depending upon its phase. In 1897, German scholar Paul Schellhaus categorized the various deities appearing in the codices and labelled each with a letter designation.[16] The waxing moon, for example, is represented by the young Moon Goddess, Goddess I, who is often connected with weaving, crops, motherhood and sexual license.[17] The waning moon, Goddess O, on the other hand, is a manifestation of the old Moon Goddess. This goddess, named Ix Chel, was associated with divination, medicine, and childbirth in early Colonial Times.[18] There also seems to be a number of hybrid moon goddess representations with combined iconographic characteristics of each of these, usually designated as Goddess I/O.[19] Other gods of importance in the selected almanacs representing forces of nature include God A, the Death God, and God H, the wind-god Sak Nik.
To take the concept of deification a step further, concerning the sacred 260-Day Tzolk’in calendar, Thompson writes:
'Each of the 20 names and 13 numbers was a god or goddess, not merely influenced by some god, and each day was looked on as a living being. Every activity on earth and in the skies was related to this sacred almanac, with certain days and numbers propitious or otherwise for such activities as planting crops, hunting, marriage, collecting honey, curing disease, making war, or the outgoings and incomings of planets.'[20]
How the Codex Was Used: Case Study of a Divinatory Almanac
With evidence for the importance of the Maya gods and goddesses within the codices now established, the texts will be examined for evidence of divinatory practice. Unlike many primary source texts in astrology or divination, one cannot simply quote from the Maya codices. To extract meaning from these manuscripts a comprehensive approach including iconography, epigraphy and calendrics must be used. This approach will be attempted here by using as an example one of the shortest and simplest almanacs from the Maya codices, in order to examine its contents for evidence of divination. The following almanac is taken from the Dresden Codex ‘Moon Goddess’ pages, which Edwin Barnhart of the Maya Exploration Center says ‘have long been known to have been used for the purposes of divination.” [21]
For ease of reference, the almanac presented in Figure 1 is divided into five columns labelled ‘A’ through ‘E’, and seven rows designated 1 through 7. Maya glyphs are typically read downward in pairs starting from A1 to B1, then A2 to B2.[22] In this instance, since column ‘A’ does not include glyphs, the reading order is B1-C1, B2-C2, D1-E1, and lastly D2-E2. The first column of the table, positions A3 through A7, contains instead the tzolk’in ritual calendar day-signs for Ik’, Ix, Kimi, Etz’nab, and Ok. Almanacs in the codices are usually further sub-divided into columnar units that relate to a particular prognostication called a t’ol, often accompanied by an illustration.[23] This short almanac has two; columns ‘B’ and ‘C’ represent the first, and columns ‘D’ and ‘E’ represent the second.
The Maya number system is vigesimal, a base 20 system, as opposed to base 10. The writing system is comprised of dots, bars and shell glyphs where the dot signifies a ‘one’, the bar a ‘five’, and the shell a ‘twenty’.[24] Therefore the double bar in position A2 represents the number 10 and the compound glyph of shell (20), bar (5) and four dots (4) in position B3 represents the number 29. (It can be noted that the numbers recorded in black in this almanac are called ‘distance numbers’ and the numbers recorded in red are part of sacred calendar dates, as will be explained below.) The counting scheme of this almanac is comprised of five equal partitions of 52 days read as a round of time totalling 260 days. The entry date of an almanac is called the lub.[25] Here the lub is determined by the number in the A2 position (A1 is empty) and the first of the sacred tzolk’in day signs in the A3 position. Therefore the start day for this almanac is 10 Ik’.
Figure 1: A complete ‘Moon Goddess’ almanac from the Dresden Codex, page 19b[26]. Annotations by Christopher Layser. Illustration descriptions by Edwin Barnhart.[27]
The almanac works as follows: the lub, or starting point, is 10 Ik’. Counting twenty-nine days forward in the sacred calendar as represented by the glyph in position B3 (which is for this reason referred to as a ‘distance number’), the day 13 Chewen is reached. The red 13 is represented in position C3. There was no need to include the day-sign for Chewen, as this day-sign was understood by the forward count in the same way as three days from Wednesday is understood in modern western culture to be Saturday. 13 Chewen lands in the first t’ol, the left portion of the almanac, and the prognostication in the glyphs is as follows:
B1 C1 B2 C2
yatan Ix Kaab Sak Ixik ox wil
Barnhart suggest “her offering” as possible translation of yatan.[28] Ix Kaab is the Moon Goddess with the alphabetic designation I.[29] The glyph in position B2 with the prefix Sak (white) represents and alternative form of the Goddess I’s name.[30] This can be read as ‘White Moon Lady’.[31] A new interpretation of the word wil reads ‘over abundance’.[32] Here it is prefixed by ox, the number three, possibly to mean ‘three abundances’. At this first stop through the almanac the prognostication may read ‘Her offering, the Moon Goddess I, White Moon Lady, is three abundances.’ This is a positive outcome.
The accompanying illustration shows the Moon Goddess sitting in a position describes as ‘erotically entwined’ with God H, who is not actually mentioned in the text.[33] God H, the deity associated with celebratory music and dance, has been suggested to be the god depicted in the ‘head glyph’ variant for the number three.[34] If this is indeed the case it would be an interesting iconographical tie to the choice of positive omen glyph used in the C2 position, ox wil, or ‘three abundances. Susan Milbrath points out that in the illustration in t’ol 1 the goddess has clustered death spots and in t’ol 2 she has single death spots.[35] She reports that Carlos and Antonio Villacorta suggested in 1977 that these spots may refer to lunar eclipses; but it is interesting to note that in the favourable prognostication the dots are clustered into a group of three.
Continuing through the almanac, the distance number represented by the glyph in position D3 prompts a count forward 23 days to 10 Ix. While the red 10 number-glyph is in position E3 the day-sign for Ix is found in column ‘A’, row 4, anticipating the start of the next 52 day cycle. Since the red 10 in E3 is squarely in the second t’ol, the prognostication is as follows:
D1 E1 D2 E2
yatan Ix Kaab Sak Ixik ah kimil
Here the outcome is negative, as ah kimil translates as ‘death’.[36] Indeed in the right t’ol illustration, the goddess now sits, eyes closed, facing the Death God, both of which are covered in death spots. The prognostication may read ‘Her offering, the Moon Goddess I, the White Moon Lady, is death.’
The second cycle now counts forward 29 days to its next stop, 13 Ak’bal, and another positive omen. Notice for this particular almanac the days with a number 13 are positive outcomes (t’ol 1) and days with a number 10 are negative outcomes (t’ol 2). The complete cycle is represented in the table below.
Table 1: The 5x52 = 260 Day cycle of the Moon Goddess almanac on D.19b
10 Ik’ +29 = 13 Chewen +23 = 10 Ix
10 Ix +29 = 13 Ak’bal +23 = 10 Kimi
10 Kimi +29 = 13 Men +23 = 10 Etz’nab
10 Etz’nab +29 = 13 Manik’ +23 = 10 Ok
10 Ok +29 = 13 Kawak +23 = 10 Ik’ – cycle complete
Now that the mechanics of this simple almanac have been demonstrated, the technique could be extrapolated to show how ancient day-keepers used the various other almanacs, not only to predict the future, but also to determine the root cause of illnesses and misfortune. The relationship demonstrated here between the Moon Goddess and her offering of a positive (three abundances) or negative (death) outcome, reflects Addey’s first method of divination in which ‘the guidance of some supposedly higher power is in some way sought or invoked’.[37]
Astronomy in the Dresden Codex
Next it shall be considered whether or not the Dresden Codex contains references to astronomy and astrology. Since, as Aveni points out, the Maya people ‘exhibited a compelling need to link celestial occurrences with every facet of human activity’, it would seem logical to expect that reference in the codices would be made to astronomical objects. [38] Indeed, a table from pages 51a through 58b does seem to apply this. Examining the iconography of the illustrations throughout this table and the brief texts at the head of each t’ol, Bricker and Bricker identify glyphic representations of what is determined to be solar and lunar eclipses.[39] They remark that ‘the presence of these representations and the general correspondence between the table's intervals (178, 177, and 148 days) and those of solar eclipse cycles confirm that solar eclipses are indeed the principal concern of the table.’ In fact, it has been shown that besides the Eclipse Table, the Dresden Codex contains an elaborate Venus Table (pages 24 and 46 -50), a Mars Table (pages 43b to 45b), a Venus-Mercury almanac (pages 30c-33c), seasonal agricultural almanacs related to eclipses (pages 38b-41b) and an incomplete planetary conjunction table (pages 58c-59).[40] Figure 2 shows a small sample of common astronomical glyphs found in these almanacs and the celestial objects which they represent.
Figure 2: Astronomical Glyphs[41]
Sun Glyph Moon Glyphs Eclipse of the Sun Eclipse of the Moon Venus Glyphs
Evidence for Divination and Astronomy in the Same Almanac
It has been shown of the Dresden Codex almanacs that first, they were religious works whose protagonists were deities, second, they were used for divination purposes, and third, they contained detailed astronomical and astrological content. Lastly, in order to answer the question as to whether or not Maya astronomy/astrology was used as a divinatory system, it needs to be shown, without delving too deeply into an epigraphical discourse, that both astrological and divinatory glyphs were utilized within the same almanac.
Figure 3 shows a list of omen glyphs, both positive and negative, found in the codices. Already encountered was the compound glyph ah kimil, translated as death, sickness, or He of Death (God A, the Death God) and the compound glyph ox wil translated here as ‘three abundances’ or ‘thrice blessed’, and quite possibly related to celebration associated with God H.
Figure 3: Omen Glyphs[42]
negative positive negative positive negative positive negative
ah kimil ox wil nuk men k’aa ha’ wah k’ak te tun tz’ak ahaw lobil
death 3 abundances big sin (?) abundance drought (?) eternal reign wickedness
of food and water
The next excerpt from the Dresden Codex that will be examined is a portion of the aforementioned Eclipse Table, specifically page 53a, the upper-portion of page 53. The goal will be to locate within the same t’ol both an astronomical glyph (from Figure 2) and an omen glyph (from Figure 3). Again, for ease of reference, the almanac presented in the figure below is divided into eight columns labelled ‘A’ through ‘H’, and ten rows designated 1 through 10. Columns ‘A’ through ‘C’ each represent an individual t’ol. Columns ‘D’ and ‘E’ and the accompanying illustration are related to the third t’ol. The mechanics of the eclipse almanac is significantly more complex than the Moon Goddess almanac addressed earlier, and will not be fully explained in detail here. All that is necessary to meet the objectives of determining whether or not both astrological and divinatory glyphs were utilized within the same almanac is an examination of the t’ol represented by Columns ‘C’ through ‘E’. Although much of row 1 and row 2 are lost, a cursory examination of the text will show three instances of the negative omen glyph ah kimil in positions A2, C1, and D5. Several various astronomical glyphs also appear on this page, for instance: D3 translates as eclipse of the sun; E3 translates as eclipse of the moon, the compound glyph in E5 contains k’in, the sun; F2 is the Venus glyph ek’, and the glyph in position C2 is a head-variant for uh, the moon.[43]
Figure 3: Excerpt from the Dresden Codex Eclipse table, page 53a.[44] Annotation and translation by Christopher Layser
Therefore, the prognostication for the third t’ol [C1, C2] reads ah kimil uh, which translates ‘the moon is death’, surely a negative outcome. Furthermore, one possible translation of columns ‘D’ and ‘E’ may read:
[A bad omen, big sin?] Damage to the earth and sky. He of the ancestor-lord.
Eclipse of the Sun, Eclipse of the Moon.
‘One-Grasps-At-The-Sky’, He of the Dog-Lord (Venus?) is death.
Damage to the sun.
Although the precise meaning may not be completely understood, this almanac, with its combination of celestial and omen glyphs, demonstrates that the Maya did indeed use astronomical observations and astrological practice for the purposes of divination. In fact, Thompson asserts that ‘so far as the Dresden Codex is concerned, the theme of these tables is divination, not the glorification of intellectual achievements. Their purpose is to attain correct dates for application of their divinations.’[45]
Conclusion
After defining the relevant terms and placing those definitions with the context of the Maya culture, the question ‘is astrology a divinatory system?’ can be asked as ‘Did the Maya use the practice of relating the heavenly bodies to their lives and events on earth as a way of eliciting answers to questions beyond the range of ordinary human understanding utilizing the Sacred 260-day calendar?’ Using the Dresden Codex as a representative example, it can be seen that the codices were primarily concerned with the Maya gods and goddesses, who were often anthropomorphised versions of celestial objects, forces of nature, or sacred calendar days. As in Addey’s first method of divination in which a higher power is sought, these deities were invoked for the purposes of divination through the use of various sacred 260-day almanacs, the mechanics of which have been demonstrated here. Furthermore, the codex contains many astronomical and astrological observations within its almanacs, demonstrating the Maya pension for relating celestial occurrences with every facet of their lives. Finally, evidence for the existence of both astrology and divination within the same almanac, the Dresden Codex Eclipse Table, demonstrates that the Maya themselves believed their astrology to be a divinatory system.
References
[1] Liz Greene, ‘Is Astrology a Divinatory System?’ Culture And Cosmos, Vol. 12 no 1, Spring/Summer (2008), p. 3
[2] Nicholas Campion, 'Introduction: Cultural Astronomy', ed. Nicholas Campion, Patrick Curry and Michael York (ed.) Astrology and the Academy, papers from the inaugural conference of the Sophia Centre, Bath Spa University College, (Bristol: Cinnabar Books 2004), p. xxi
[3] Barbara Tedlock, ‘Divination as a Way of Knowing: Embodiment, Visualisation, Narrative, and Interpretation’, Folklore, Vol. 112, No. 2 (Oct., 2001), p. 191
[4] J. Eric S. Thompson, Commentary on the Dresden Codex, a Maya Hieroglyphic Book, Memoirs, Vol. 93 (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1972) p.77
[5] Patrick Curry, ‘Astrology’, The Encyclopaedia of Historians and Historical Writing, Vol. 1, ed. Kelly Boyd, (London: Fitzroy Dearborn 1999) p. 55
[6] Cicero, De Divinatione, trans. W. A. Falconer (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1923), Book 1, p. 223
[7] John M. Addey, ‘Astrology as Divination’, Astrology 56:2 (1982) pp.39-40
[8] Tedlock, ‘Divination as a Way of Knowing’, p. 189
[9] J. Eric S. Thompson, ‘Maya Astronomy’, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Mathematical and Physical Sciences, Vol. 276, No. 1257, The Place of Astronomy in the Ancient World (May 2, 1974), p. 83
[10] Harvey M. Bricker and Victoria R. Bricker, ‘Classic Maya Prediction of Solar Eclipses’, Current Anthropology, Vol. 24, No. 1 (Feb., 1983), p. 1
[11] Anthony F. Aveni, Skywatchers: A Revised and Updated Version of Skywatchers of Ancient Mexico (Austin: University of Texas Press 2001) pp. 144-145
[12] John B. Carlson, ‘The Grolier Codex - An Authentic 13th- Century Maya Divinatory Venus Almanac: New Revelations on the Oldest Surviving Book on Paper from the Ancient Americas’. Lecture given to the Pre-Columbian Society of Washington D.C., sdsdt5y6November 7th, 2014,
[13] Harvey M. Bricker and Victoria R. Bricker, Astronomy in the Maya Codices (Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society), (Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2011) p. 111
[14] Gabrielle Vail, ‘The Maya Codices’, Annual Review of Anthropology, Vol. 35 (2006), p. 500
[15] Anthony F. Aveni, ‘Venus and the Maya’, American Scientist, Vol. 67, No. 3 (May-June 1979), p. 275
[16] Michael D. Coe and Mark Van Stone, Reading the Maya Glyphs, (London: Thames & Hudson, 2001) p.108
[17] Susan Milbrath, Star Gods of the Maya: Astronomy in Art, Folklore, and Calendars (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2000) p. 138
[18] Bricker and Bricker, Astronomy in the Maya Codices, p.116
[19] Milbrath, Star Gods of the Maya, p 142
[20] Thompson, ‘Maya Astronomy’, p. 84
[21] Edwin L. Barnhart, ‘The First Twenty-Three Pages of the Dresden Codex: The Divination Pages’, Based a May 1996 Thesis submitted to the Graduate School of the University of Texas at Austin, supervisor: Linda Schele (2005) p.3
[22] John F. Harris and Stephen K. Stearns, Understanding Maya Inscriptions: A Hieroglyph Handbook, (Philadelphia: the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, 1997) p. 3
[23] Aveni, Skywatchers, p. 171
[24] Harris and Stearns, Understanding Maya Inscriptions, pp. 6-7
[25] Aveni, Skywatchers, p. 182
[26] Codex Dresdensis, (Sächische Landesbibliothek Dresden, facsimile-Ernst W. Förstemann 1892) p. 19b
[27] Barnhart, ‘The Divination Pages’, p.91
[28] Barnhart, ‘The Divination Pages’, p.91
[29] Martha J. Macri and Gabrielle Vail, The New Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs, Volume Two: Codical Texts, (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2009) p.97
[30] Coe and Stone, Reading the Maya Glyphs, pp. 117-118
[31] Milbrath, Star Gods of the Maya, p. 140
[32] Barnhart, ‘The Divination Pages’, p.91
[33] Barnhart, ‘The Divination Pages’, p.91
[34] Matthew G. Looper, To Be Like Gods: Dance in Ancient Maya Civilization, (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010) pp. 59-60
[35] Milbrath, Star Gods of the Maya, p 138
[36] Coe and Stone, Reading the Maya Glyph, pp.119-120
[37] Addey, ‘Astrology as Divination’, p.39
[38] Aveni, ‘Venus and the Maya’, p. 275
[39] Bricker and Bricker, ‘Prediction of Solar Eclipses’, p.2
[40] Bricker and Bricker, Astronomy in the Maya Codices, pp. 163-690
[41] Macri and Vail, The New Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs, Volume Two, pp. 122, 149, 157, 174-175
[42] Barnhart, ‘The Divination Pages’, pp. 6-9
[43] Macri and Vail, The New Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs, Volume Two, pp. 122, 149, 174-175
[44] Codex Dresdensis, p. 53a
[45] Thompson, Commentary on the Dresden Codex, p.77