Evening star., 1931-12-12
CARNEGIE TRUSTEES
PONDER SECRET Of
RARE MAyAN URN
Highest Aboriginal Art Is
Revealed in Recently Dis
covered Tomb.
MYSTERY is PRESENTED
BY 1O4 DEAD SHREWS
Placed Beside Body of Person Of
Great Importance in
Ornate Grave.

NNAoNSN ~ AAotCCo Va IIlC SdI AGElG AIlSIA~
tuition of Washington at their annual
meeting here last week.
Some time near the beginning Of the
Christian era a great prince or priest
died in the old MAYA City of Uaxactun
and was laid away in stone vault.
Beside his body was placed an urn
containing the bodies of 104 shrews.
This tomb constitutes perhaps the most
notable find of Carnegie archeoIogists
during the past year. The decorations
on the urn, shown the trustees,
represented the highest development Of
the artistic genius of aboriginal Ameri-
ca. 1t was a veritable King Tut-Ank-
Amens tomb IN the New World.
Three skeletons were found in the
tomb two on one side of the vault
and the third, stretched out at full
length in royal dignity on the other
1t was the skeleton of a young man
and obviously, from the ornateness of
the tomb and the funeral vase beside
MIN, of person of very great i'm
portance.
New Excavations Started.
Why a vase should be filled with
oead shrews and placed in a great
mans tomb, according to DR.. Sylvanus
G. Morley of the Carnegie staff, can
not be explained. The only clue comes
from the number, 104, which may have
had some astronomical significance. 1t
can be associated with the Maya,
Venus year" calendar, and possibly
refers to the date of the young mans
death or to his age.
During the Ynor fha
ologists in Yucatan started excavations
Of another ancient city, Yaxchilan, a
few miles from their headquarters at
Chichen TIA. The ruins Of this old
metropolis, long since covered with
thick jungle growth, have been known
to archeologiSts for a long time, but
the Carnegie excavators made some
rich finds in few weeks and plan
to follow up the work
Missing Symbols Found.
The ruined temples and palaces Of
Yaxchilan stretch for a mile along the
bend Of river. Behind them, between
the river and the hills, lay wide plazas
which evidently were places of great
beauty in their day. Then the tops of
the hills themselves were leveled of
and more palaces and temples erected,
the ruins of which still can be found.
YaXchilan, DR.. Morley said, was -four
lshing at least in the third century
AID. The most notable find during the
two weeks spent there was door Intel
upon which was carved the date OF the
building. 1t gave the arcneologists al
most complete list of the number
symbols of the Mayas. Only two SYM
bols now are missing, those for 2 and
IL. The Maya, Dr. Morley explained,
had two ways of writing numbers-one
by dots and bars and one by a stand
ardized series of animal figures, prob
ably representing the gods supposed to
preside over the days.
1t was in this last series, DR.. Morley
explained in showing the exhibit yester-
day, that the Indian n mathematicians, who
had carried the science of numbers far
beyond any other people in the world at
the time, introduced weird concept.
They had separate symbols up to Is.
The figure 10 was a skull Tt was prac-
tically the equivalent of the Arabic zero.
So the figure IL could be written in two
Ways-either by its own symbol or by
combining the symbol for the figure l
with q skull.
Moon Study Method Shown.
The MayaS, DR.. Morley said, were the
first people to establish a fixed started
point for time, as the basis of a chro-
nology which was more accurate than
any used in the Old World until the
of the Gregorian calendar
in 1882. With this system they recorded
the chief astronomical and historical
events. Monuments were erected at in
terValS OF 1900 days, and may be
ikened to great stone almanacs. So
fixed was this custom that it has been
possible in some cities to predict the
existence OF unknown monuments on
the basis of gaps in the l,800-day Sc
quence.
Another exhibit shown the Carnegie
trustees yesterday was of the method by
which the institutions Committee ON
the Study of the Moon is finding out
the surface materials on this satellite,
more than 250,000 miles away. Rays
OF sunlight reflected from the moon
reach the earth in about second. They
are compared with rays of sunlight re-
hected from rock surface on earth, and
the changes in the nature of the light
120 Above to 100 Below Zero.
This method of comparison shows
that the moons surface must be covered
With rocks that have very little polariza-
ton effect on light, which limits them
to GRANTEES, sandstones and other Eight
rocks. 1t has been observed during an
eclipse Of the moon, however, that the
surface temperature falls rapidly from
about 120 degrees above zero to 100 de-
greeS below zero. Therefore the moons
rocks can have little power of absorbing
heat. This almost eliminates everything
but pumice and volcanic ash. The
Carnegie scientists, it was announced,
now are planning to explore the moons
surface in more detail.
The exhibit will be thrown open to
The public today, Sunday and Monday.
There will be public lectures explaining
the exhibits this afternoon and every
evening.
Walter S. Clifford. president of the
American Telephone and Telegraph
Company, and Senator Walcott of Con-
necticut were elected to TIE board of
trustees of the institution yesterday.
The trustees appropriated S1,673, ,432
for the work of the institution during
the coming year. This consists mostly
cf scientific researches. DR.. John G.
Merriam, president of the institution,
on the activities of the past
year.
The following trustees attended the
chett presided, in the absence of Elihu
Root chairman Of the board:
DR.. w. w. Campbell, president Of the
Academy Of Sciences; Gen.
John J. Carly, Whiteford r. Cole, Fred
eric A. Delano, Cass Gilbert, Frederick
Fl. Gillett, Andrew j. Montague, Will
liam Barclay Parsons, Stewart Patton,
Theobald Smith, william Benson
Storey, william S. Thayer, William II.
Welch and George W. Wickersham.
Following the luncheon after the
meeting the trustees viewed the annual
exhibit, which viii be open to the pub
lie today. The annual reception by the
president and trustees was held at the
Administration Building, Sixteenth and
P streets, last evening.
Penny Worth $3i0.
Three hun:red and ten dollars was
recently paid for a penny in London