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Representation of Deities of the Maya Manuscripts - Papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Vol. 4, No. 1 by Paul Schellhas
page 21 of 53 (39%)
According to Förstemann, the day ruled by C seems to be Chuen.


D. The Moon- and Night-God.

[Illustration: Figs. 17-20]

This is a deity who is pictured in the form of an old man with an aged
face and sunken, toothless mouth. He is frequently characterized by a
long, pendent head ornament, in which is the sign Akbal, darkness, night,
which also appears in his hieroglyph before the forehead of the deity,
surrounded by dots as an indication of the starry sky. His name-hieroglyph
is Fig. 17, and a second sign almost always follows (Fig. 18) which
evidently serves likewise as a designation of the god, just as god A also
is always designated by _two_ hieroglyphs. The second sign consists of
two sacrificial knives and the sign of the day Ahau, which is equivalent
to "king".

The head of this deity appears in reduced, cursive form as the sign of
the moon (Fig. 20). This character also has the significance of 20 as a
number sign in the calendar. The association of these ideas probably
rests upon the ancient conceptions, according to which the moon
appearing, waxing, waning and again disappearing, was compared to man,
and man in primeval ages was the most primitive calculating machine,
being equivalent, from the sum of his fingers and toes, to the number 20.
Twenty days is also the duration of that period during which the moon
(aside from the new moon) is really _alive_. Moreover the sign (Fig. 20)
appears in many places as a counterpart of the sign for the sun.

God D occurs once as feminine in the same passage mentioned above, in
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