ed
Kab-ul, which was kept in a place in Yucatan to which people from all
quarters resorted regularly in great numbers, resolves itself into the
symbol of an ancient capital to which great high-roads led from the
cardinal points. But important as this capital may have been, its
connection with the hand-symbol proves that it was originally one of four
minor centres and formed but a part of a greater whole. It would
correspond to the image, in one of the native Codices, of a subdivided
circle with an arm and hand standing in its middle, and its Bacab would
undoubtedly have carried a sceptre in the shape of an open hand, such as
depicted in the Codices as a staff of office.

While we thus find the human figure distinctly associated with the lords
of the four quarters of the Above we find the four lords of the Below,
entitled Chac, symbolized by the quadruped figure of the native
jaguar=chacoh, associated with the color red=chac and with rain, storms,
thunder and lightning, all of which phenomena were, singly and
collectively, termed Chac.

If ever there has been an instance where language or the resemblance in
sound of certain words has caused certain symbols to amalgamate with a
name or title, it is surely this, and light is thereby thrown upon the
development of symbolism and associations of thought amongst primitive
people.

The Chacs of Yucatan were identical with the Tlalocs, the octli or rain
lords of Mexico, whose function, as votaries of earth-cult, was the
regulation of agriculture, irrigation and the collection and distribution
of all products of the soil. It is interesting to trace that, in other
regions of Yucatan, presumably where no chacohs or jaguars existed, the
minor rulers of provinces seem to have been termed ocelots=Balam, a title
found associated with Maya rulership.

With the foregoing data in mind it is easy to grasp the meaning of the
talon of a beast of prey, employed as an emblem of rank or office in the
native Codices or bas-reliefs and to perceive that this was the symbol of
a Chac or Balam, one of the four lords of the earth or Below, just as the
hand was that of the lords of the Above. The complete image of the dual
State is thus shown to have consisted at one time of an ideal group
consisting of a man with a beast of prey, a jaguar or ocelot. In Mexico we
have the man-bird and the man-ocelot respectively representing the rulers
of the two great divisions of the State.

At Chichen-Itza an