For instance,
we find this sign on the walls of the palace of Palenque, ### ; this is
not unlike the form of the Phoenician t used in writing, ### and ### ;
we find also upon these monuments the letter o represented by a small
circle, and entering into many of the hieroglyphs; we also find the tau
sign (thus ### ) often repeated; also the sign which we have supposed to
represent b, ### ; also this sign, ### , which we think is the
simplification of the letter k; also this sign, which we suppose to
represent e, ### ; also this figure, ### ; and this ### . There is an
evident tendency to reduce the complex figures to simple signs whenever
the writers proceed to form words.
Although it has so far been found difficult, if not impossible, to
translate the compound words formed from the Maya alphabet, yet we can
go far enough to see that they used the system of simpler sounds for the
whole hieroglyph to which we have referred.
Bishop Landa gives us, in addition to the alphabet, the signs which
represent the days and months, and which are evidently compounds of the
Maya letters. For instance, we have this figure as the representative of
the month Mol ### .
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