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| The Distance Number and the first part of the Calendar Round date that it leads to were already eroded when Alfred Maudslay visited Palenque in 1891. The second part of the Calendar Round, the month sign, was in worse condition since it was on a stair tread rather than a riser. Maudslay made a cast of the entire inscription, but he only photographed the risers, so decipherment of the month sign has involved either consulting the cast in the British Museum or the drawing of the cast made by Maudslay's artist, Annie Hunter. In 1978, Peter Mathews (Baudez and Mathews, Capture and Sacrifice at Palenque) proposed 2.12.3.3 for the Distance Number, counting forward from Pakal's birth to (9.11.1.16.3) 6 Ak'bal 1 Yax. Mathews subsequently retracted this in favor of Floyd Lounsbury's solution of (9.10.18.8.8) 6 Lamat 1 Sip for the Calendar Round (and a Distance Number of 3.1.3.3 connecting this with a Calendar Round of 7 Chuwen 4 Ch'en later in the inscription). Mathews and Linda Schele did not agree with Lounsbury about the associated Long Count, however, deciding to place the event on 9.8.5.13.8 (April 23, 599), during the reign of Lady Yohl Ik'nal (Schele 1994a). And this is the date that has been generally accepted until recently. But after the 2002 Maya Meetings in Texas, David Stuart proposed a reconsideration of Peter Mathews' original date, the implications of which will be discussed at the end of this chapter. For now, we will proceed with Floyd Lounsbury's solution, as amended by Mathews and Schele. |
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