s a ruler, not only by his attitude of repose, but by
the fact that he wears a breast ornament in the form of a face or head (of
the sun) and holds in his hand (_i. e._ governs) a vase or bowl (see p.
72). Those show him to be the chief or head of all and the Cum-ahau, or
lord of the sacred vase or bowl (see p. 93). As the latter contains what
appears to be a variant of the glyph ik and the word ik signifies breath,
air and wind, by extension life, we realize that he is designated as the
lord of breath and life. The glyph which covers his face bears a native
cross-symbol and this, as well as the cruciform figure, the centre of
which he occupies, conveys the idea of quadruplicate power. The double and
bent arms of the cross-symbol strikingly resemble the conventionalized
puffs of breath or air which are so frequently depicted in Mexican
Codices, as issuing from the mouths of speakers. Almost identical
representations of curved puffs are figured as issuing from open serpents'
jaws in a bas-relief at Palenque, of which more anon.

Mr. Maudslay has pointed out that on stelae from Copan and Quirigua a
profusion of analogous curved signs occurs also in connection with
serpents' heads. A special feature of the curved puffs of breath on the
Copan "swastika," as it has been named, are small seed-like balls which
are distributed in detached groups of threes along their inner and outer
edges, and are usually accompanied by what resembles the small calyx of a
flower, making four small objects in all. These balls, which also recur in
the Palenque symbol, forcibly recall a passage of the Zuni creation myth
recounted by Mr. Cushing.

It relates that, at a certain stage of the creation, "the most perfect of
all priests and fathers named Yanauluha ... brought up from the
underworld, the water of the inner ocean and the seeds of life production"
... Subsequently, on a feathered staff he carried, "appeared 4 round
things, seeds of moving beings, mere eggs they were; two blue like the sky
and two red like the flesh of the earth-mother."...

I cannot but think that these words from a purely native source explain
the Copan sculpture more correctly than any inference that could be made,
and authorize the explanation that the central figure represents the "four
times lord," or "lord of the four winds," titles which were applied in
Mexico to Quetzalcoatl and Xiuhtecuhtli. At the same time the bas-relief
teaches us that "the four winds" had a d