A Method for Dating Venus Almanacs in the Borgia Codex

Marcus J. , ‘The origins of Mesoamerican writing’, Annual review of anthropology, v (1976), 44–45.

Capitaine F. , ‘La estela 1 de La Mojarra, Veracruz, México’, Research reports on ancient Maya writing, no. 16 (1988), 25, note 4.

See e.g. Bricker H. Bricker V. , ‘Classic Maya prediction of solar eclipses’, Current anthropology, xxiv (1983), 1–23; Bricker V. Bricker H. , ‘The Mars table in the Dresden Codex’, Research and reflections in archaeology and history: Essays in honor of Doris Stone, ed. by Andrews E. W. Bricker V (Tulane: Middle American Research Institute Publ. no. 57; New Orleans, 1986), 51–80; idem, ‘Archaeoastronomical implications of an agricultural almanac in the Dresden Codex’, Mexicon, viii (1986), 29–35; idem, ‘The seasonal table and related almanacs in the Dresden Codex’, Archaeoastronomy, no. 12 (1988), S1–62; Thompson J. E. S. , A commentary on the Dresden Codex (Philadelphia, 1972), 62–71.

See e.g. Bricker V. Bricker H. , op. cit. (ref. 3); Bricker H. Bricker V. , ‘More on the Mars table in the Dresden Codex’, Latin American antiquity, viii (1997), 384–97.

Bricker H. Bricker V. , ‘Zodiacal references in the Maya codices’, in The sky in Mayan literature, ed. by Aveni A. (Oxford, 1992), 148–83.

See e.g. Coe M. , The Maya scribe and his world (New York, 1973); Carlson J. , ‘The Grolier Codex: A preliminary report on the content and authenticity of a 13th-century Maya Venus almanac’, in Calendars in Mesoamerica and Peru: Native American computations of time, ed. by Aveni A. Brotherston G. (Oxford, 1983), 27–57.

Seler E. , ‘Die Venusperiode in den Bilderschriften de Codex-Borgia-Gruppe’, Zeitschrift für Ethnologie, xxx (1898), 346–83. See below, ref. 10, for an English version published in 1904.

Boone E. , ‘Aztec pictorial histories: Records without words’, in Writing without words: Alternative literacies in Mesoamerica & the Andes, ed. by Boone E. Mignolo W. (Durham, 1994), 50–76.

Seler E. , Comentarios al Códice Borgia (Mexico City, 1963), ii, 12–14.

Seler E. , ‘Venus period in the picture writings of the Borgia Codex group’, Bureau of American Ethnology bulletin, no. 28 (1904), 355–91.

See Lockhart J. , We people here: Nahuatl accounts of the conquest of Mexico (Berkeley, 1993), 43–44.

Bierhorst J. , History and mythology of the Aztecs: The Codex of Chimalpopoca (Tucson, 1992), 36–37.

Stahlman W. Gingerich O. , Solar and planetary longitudes for years −2500 to +2000 by 10-day intervals (Madison, 1963), p. xv.

Lounsbury F. , ‘The base of the Venus tables of the Dresden Codex, and its significance for the calendar-correlation problem’, in Calendars in Mesoamerica and Peru, ed. by Aveni Brotherston (ref. 6), 1–26.

The iconography in the third compartment of the almanac also supports this dating. It is the only picture with an agricultural motif, showing corn plants in full ear being attacked by worms (Figure 1). The dates associated with this picture (Table 2) fall between 30 October and 13 November, after the corn has come into ear. Using this seasonal information, the eleventh-century possibility can be excluded (Table 6), as well as one of the thirteenth-century possibilities (Table 4), which date the picture to February and March, the planting season in Central Mexico, months before the corn is in ear.

This four-day ‘window’ cannot be used as effectively for other stations of Venus. For example, the length of the intervals separating successive dates of elast ranges from 573 to 594 days, a span of 21 days. This means that elast and mfirst have an asymmetrical relationship to the tonalpohualli. The intervals between successive mfirsts fluctuate less widely from the 583.92-day mean than the intervals between successive elasts, which is necessary for using the tonalpohualli as a reliable predictor of Venus events. With intervals of c. 584 days, the dates for mfirst can move from one four-day compartment to the next in a systematic fashion, making them a more reliable predictor of Venus events. Because dates of elast cushion much of the variation in the length of the synodic period, they cannot be confined to four-day compartments. This may be one reason why mfirst received more attention than elast in Precolumbian Mesoamerican books.

Boone E. , personal communication, 9 August 1999.

Although not previously documented in the Central Mexican codices, multiple versions of the same almanac, referring to different periods of time, appear in the Maya codices, even though they were no longer current. See, e.g. Bricker V. Bricker H. , ‘A method for cross-dating almanacs with tables in the Dresden Codex’ in The sky in Mayan literature, ed. by Aveni (ref. 5), 51–61.

Seler assumed that the coefficient should have been ‘10’ and attributed the extra dot to scribal error. Seler, op. cit. (ref. 10), 366.

Seler , Comentarios al Códice Borgia (ref. 9), i, 253–4.

Bierhorst , op. cit. (ref. 12).

Aveni A. , ‘Astronomy in the Mexican Codex Borgia’, Archaeoastronomy, no. 24 (1998), S1–20, p. S9.

Bricker H. Bricker V. , op. cit. (ref. 3); Bricker V. Bricker H. , op. cit. (ref. 3).

Seler , op. cit. (ref. 10), 366; cf. ref. 19.

Bierhorst , op. cit. (ref. 12). The dates mentioned in the Anales de Quauhtitlan, when the first appearance of Venus as a morning star will have malevolent consequences for humans, all have a coefficient of ‘1’ (1 Jaguar, 1 Deer, 1 Flower, 1 Reed, 1 Rain, 1 Movement, and 1 Water). Table 2 suggests that heliacal rises of Venus occur only rarely on those days. In fact, during the entire period between 1473 and 1521, when the almanac on Borgia 53–54 was probably most relevant, only one heliacal rise of Venus fell on one of those days, that on 20 August 1513 (Gregorian), which corresponded to the day 1 Flower in the Central Mexican calendar. Coincidentally, this was also the year during which the almanac on page 70 of Codex Vaticanus B would have become relevant (1 Flower is three days after 11 Movement). The 104-year period covered by the almanac on Borgia 25 presented even fewer dangers: Not a single heliacal rise fell on the dates targeted by the Anales de Quauhtitlan (Table 7). Thus, the terrible prognostications mentioned in that text only rarely came to pass. It was necessary for people to be mindful of what could happen if Venus reappeared on one of those days, but they were not common occurrences.

Aveni , op. cit. (ref. 22).