Читать книгу The City of the Sacred Well онлайн

43 страница из 66

If only their bigotry had vented itself in some other way, how much these old manuscripts might have told us! Apropos of the burning of the priceless documents Landa says, “We collected all the native books we could find and burned them, much to the sorrow of the people, and caused them pain.”

A PAGE FROM THE PEREZ CODEX, DESCRIBING AN ECLIPSE OF THE SUN. THIS ANCIENT MANUSCRIPT ILLUMINATED IN COLOR IS NOW IN THE LIBRARY OF PARIS

The group of books called the Chilan Balam, which are chiefly ideographic transcripts of the more ancient works, written in the Maya tongue but in Spanish characters, probably were made surreptitiously by some of the educated natives soon after the Conquest. There are sixteen of these books still extant. The meaning of this Maya name, Chilan Balam, is interesting. Chi means “mouth”; lan indicates action. Therefore Chilan is “mouth action,” or “speech.” Balam is synonymous for either “tiger” or “ferocity.” But the tiger was worshiped as a deity and the combination of the words, Chilan Balam, means “Speech of the Gods.” The Maya priests were sometimes called by the name, indicating that they were the mouthpieces of the gods, and doubtless these records took their name from the priestly appellation.