An Annotated Translation of a Colonial Yucatec Manuscript:
On Religious and Cosmological Topics by a Native Author

(About the Heavens)

Endnotes #187-222

187. See Hall (1962:10-19), Hall (1994:40-43), Kuhn (1996:105-113).

188. A diagram illustrating the eleven layers of heaven appears in Pedro de Medina’s Suma de cosmographía de Sevilla, composed in 1561. A surprisingly similar diagram appears on p.31 of the Chilam Balam of Ixil, dated 1701.

189. Accounting for motion in God’s immutable, perfect heavens was a problem for the Church fathers.

190. Hohochil: hoch (reduplicated) meaning to clear land, rake something, harvest it. Hanpiken= hanmisen: BMTV, swept clean, as a milpa that has been completely cleared. Both verbs suggest (or allow for the possibility of) a previous creation.

191. chupsabi = chupsabi.

192. In each case kin could mean sun as well as day. However, this passage continues to say that kin was placed and seated in the Prime Mover, the tenth layer. According to the cosmogram in use in sixteenth-century Spain, the sun itself occupies the fourth layer of the heavens, as our author states on ms. p.182. This suggests that the path of the sun or the day is placed in the Prime Mover. In the Creation of the Uinal passage in the Chilam Balam of Chumayel, sentient beings and units of time precede the creation of everything else. This text follows the same pattern of thought.

193. Note the use of pronouns in this line.

194. The author has trouble with ls and rs.

195. Alfonso X of Castile, 1221-1284, el Sabio, known for his support of astronomical studies which culminated in the compilation of Libros del saber de astronomía.

196. This line is reminiscent of the lines in the Creation of the Uinal passage in the Chilam Balam of Chumayel: Ca hoppi u ximbal tuba tuhunal . . . Ca tun kuchiob te ti likine.

197. The author pairs the Spanish and Maya words for hour.

198. In Spanish, cristalino; our author is drawing on the Latin names for the heavens.

199. Here the author uses the same character for the letter f that he used for s in christalino two lines above in the text.

200. "This is probably a cvc-cvc-nak affect adjective." Barbara MacLeod.

201. Note fr for pl in planets.

202. kakil Diose: fire of God? Perhaps the "element of fire" whose place in the cosmogram is just below the sphere of the moon. This line might also read: "the created fire of God, the birthplace of fire."

203. Here the author seems to make a point of knowing the Latin root of this word.

204. nana ol: fabricar en el entendimiento, especular.

205. eDzecnac: CMM, eDzecnac u talel chem: viene la canoa o barca muy sosegada.

206. ika: CMM, postpuesta, denota atención que uno pide.

207. It = the Firmament. This confusing passage refers to Genesis 1:6-9. "And God said, ’Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it separate the waters from the waters.’ And God made the firmament and separated the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament. And it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And there was evening and morning, a second day." Thus there must be "waters" above the layer of heaven called Firmament, according to the sixteenth-century cosmogram.

208. According to Scripture, God placed water above the firmament. However, according to Aristotle, nothing mutable exists in the heavens. Water is mutable, hence this must be some form of transubstantiated water, similar to the consecrated bread which becomes Christ’s body, or Moses’ staff which becomes a snake, analogies cited by our author.

209. Ualah: CMM, medida como de un estado; y medida para milpas, como de tres brazas.

210. A Mayanized version of the Spanish word for staff: vara.

211. Another example of l for r.

212. The double negative gives this line the meaning, there are some who would call it water. I owe the translation of this line to David Bolles (letter, June 26, 1998).

213. If the author is referring to the Crystalline heaven, and the "waters" gathered there, this should be the ninth rather than the sixth layer. Perhaps he was looking at a diagram of the cosmogram numbered with arabic numerals, and misread 6 for 9 from the side or upside down.

214. It seems to me that the author may be explaining the Crystalline as a mirror or buffer, protecting the human gaze from the overwhelming brilliance of the divine fire in the Empyrean.

215. Perhaps a reference to Revelations 4:5-6. "From the throne issue flashes of lightning, and voices and peals of thunder, and before the throne burn seven torches of fire, which are the seven spirits of God; and before the throne there is as it were a sea of glass, like crystal."

216. This sounds like a formula for prophecy.

217. Perhaps a comparison with Maya knowledge of the heavens, which was esoteric.

218. An interesting passage, both for the account of Lunes as a day of ill-omen and for the repetition of the syllable lu, the sort of mnemonic device favored by day-keepers.

219. In the text, it looks as though the author forgot to write ma and added it above later. He misspells mayor as ma yol. With ma left out, the sun is the yol, the heart or center of the sky.

220. topp usually refers to the unfolding of flowers, the hatching of birds and insects from eggs, and the opening of new paths.

221. U babtic U baobe tu xikobe: literally, they row themselves with their fins.

222. I am not sure about the translation of this line without the context of the following lines.

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