Meaning
The Classic reading of the glyph is probably ahk'ab, night or darkness, and the Yucatec name Ak'b'al means the same. Thompson read the glyph as the interior of the earth and gave the day to the jaguar god of the underworld; the Ixil and K'iche' he surveyed also linked it with night.
The highland reading turns the darkness toward the light. The Komon Tohil daykeepers gloss the name as darkness but explain it as the dawn, the light of early morning; the Maya' Wuj manual makes it dawn and dusk, the two poles of light, and a day for bringing hidden things into the open.
Our reading: the threshold between night and day, new beginnings and what is not yet seen. People born on Aq'ab'al are described as steady and reserved, able to carry difficulty quietly until things come to light. The sentences are ours.
In the highlands today
The Zunil daykeepers use Aq'ab'al to ask for light to reach everything, and call it a day for the feelings of the heart; Maya' Wuj adds stability, learning and work.
In Momostenango the reminder is simply the dawn and the early hours: rise before the sun, or the sun has beaten you, as Andrés Xiloj put it in 2005.
The glyph and the old readings
Aq'ab'al never bears a year in the highlands, but in the Late Classic Campeche set the four bearers were Ak'b'al, Lamat, B'en and Etz'nab'. Thompson's Yucatec augury for the day is darkness, with the jaguar as an uncertain reading.
The Central Mexican day of the same position is Calli, the house: a different image in a different count.
In the count
Aq'ab'al comes round every twentieth day, thirteen times in the 260: on days 3, 23, 43, 63, 83, 103, 123, 143, 163, 183, 203, 223 and 243, with the numbers 3, 10, 4, 11, 5, 12, 6, 13, 7, 1, 8, 2 and 9 in that order, so 3 Aq'ab'al is its first day in the count and 9 Aq'ab'al its last. In the nawal cross of a person born on Aq'ab'al, the day eight before (conception) falls on Tz'ikin, the day eight after (destiny) on B'atz', six before (the right hand) on No'j and six after (the left hand) on Toj, each with its own number.
Correspondences
Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.
- Thompson's reading of the glyph (1950)
- interior of the earth sourced
- Presiding god of the day, after Thompson
- the jaguar god sourced
- Old augury, Yucatan and the highlands, after Thompson
- darkness; jaguar (Yucatan, uncertain); gradings differ between communities disputed
- The name, as the Zunil daykeepers explain it
- darkness; dawn and hand; the light of dawn and the dark sourced
- Direction and colour
- west, black (ek'): read off the four-direction cycle; not attested for this day itself, and not shown on our chart unverified
- Our reading
- The threshold of dawn and what is hidden: steady and reserved, carrying difficulty quietly until it comes to light. our construction
How the schools read it
- Classic inscriptions (epigraphers)
- Reading of the glyph: Ahk'ab?
- J. Eric S. Thompson, 1950
- The glyph as interior of the earth; the day's god the jaguar god.
- Komon Tohil daykeepers, Zunil
- Darkness; dawn and hand; the light of dawn and the dark.
- The Maya' Wuj manual
- Dawn and dusk, the two poles of light; bringing hidden things to light; a day for stability, learning and work.
- Momostenango (Andrés Xiloj, 2005)
- The dawn and the early hours; rise before the sun or the sun has beaten you.
- The Central Mexican count (tonalpohualli)
- Calli, house: the day of the same position in a related but different count.
- Dreamspell (1990)
- "Blue Night" for the same position in its own count; not our name for the sign.
- EsoTerrier
- The threshold of dawn and what is hidden: steady and reserved, carrying difficulty quietly until it comes to light. Our words.
Claims about it
-
Aq'ab'al means the house, as its Aztec counterpart does.
falseWhat the record shows: Calli belongs to the Central Mexican count. The Maya name means night or darkness, and the highland daykeepers read it as the dawn.
-
Aq'ab'al is the "Blue Night".
falseWhat the record shows: That is a Dreamspell name, from a modern count of 1990 that gives most birth dates a different sign.
-
Aq'ab'al has one meaning for all Maya.
disputedWhat the record shows: The Classic and Yucatec readings stress darkness; the highland daykeepers stress the dawn. Readings differ by place and period.
