Meaning
Seven stands at the middle of the thirteen, with six numbers before it and six after. In the highland scale as reported it is a middle number; our middle band, 4 to 9, is our grouping, not a published scheme.
Our sentence makes seven a point of reflection and choice between the gentle and the strong numbers, with the keyword "the centre": EsoTerrier's reading aid. Other writers give it mystical meanings; none comes from the tradition.
Days and ceremonies
Its first day is 7 Kej, day 7 of the 260. 7 Tz'i' is the day before 8 B'atz': Andrés Xiloj of Momostenango described it in 2005 as a day on which daykeepers already offer incense and flowers, and on which one must not shame oneself.
Among the highland year bearers, 7 No'j bears the year that opens in February 2032.
7 Kej, its first day, is the deer's day at the middle of the first run; the same sign carried the number 1 when it opened the highland year in February 2026.
The numeral
One bar and two dots. Thompson identified the Classic head for 7 as the jaguar god of the underworld, with a twisted cord over the nose, the god of the day Ak'b'al.
In the count
The number 7 falls on twenty days of the 260: days 7, 20, 33, 46, 59, 72, 85, 98, 111, 124, 137, 150, 163, 176, 189, 202, 215, 228, 241 and 254, with the signs Kej, Ajpu, Aj, Kame, Kawoq, E, Kan, Tijax, B'atz', K'at, No'j, Tz'i', Aq'ab'al, Ajmaq, Toj, Iq', Tz'ikin, Q'anil, Imox and I'x in that order. A sign comes back every twenty days and a number every thirteen, so the same pairing, such as 7 Kej, returns only after 260 days. Each year the highland year bearer's number rises by one, because 365 days are 28 runs of thirteen and one day more.
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.
- Strength, in the highland reports
- The number gives the day its force: low numbers gentle, high numbers strong (Tedlock at Momostenango and Bunzel at Chichicastenango, as reported) sourced
- Our band
- middle; the bands and their edges are EsoTerrier's grouping, not a published scheme our construction
- Our keyword and sentence
- "the centre"; Seven sits at the middle of the thirteen, a point of reflection and choice between the gentle and the strong numbers. our construction
- Head variant of the numeral, after Thompson
- the jaguar god of the underworld, with the cruller over the nose, the god he gave to the day Ak'b'al sourced
- A fixed character for the number
- None established; which numbers are good differs from town to town disputed
How the schools read it
- Highland ethnography, as reported
- The number is the strength of the day, gentle in the low numbers and strong in the high.
- Thompson's survey of highland towns
- Which numbers count as good or bad differs from town to town.
- Classic scribes
- Wrote 7 as one bar and two dots, or as a god's head: the jaguar god of the underworld, with the cruller over the nose, in Thompson's identification.
- Dreamspell (1990)
- Gives each number a name of its own in a different modern count; not used here.
- EsoTerrier
- Middle in our bands; keyword "the centre". Our words, a reading aid.
Claims about it
-
The number 7 has a fixed traditional character.
unverifiedWhat the record shows: The highland reports give the numbers strength, low gentle and high strong; fixed characters per number are modern, and our own keyword is labelled as ours.
-
Seven is one of thirteen cosmic "tones" with a Maya name.
falseWhat the record shows: The tone names are Dreamspell's, from 1990. The Maya count has numbers 1 to 13.
