·     This is not a word in Classic Maya. Instead, it is an orthographic feature of two (usually) touching dots, usually in the top left-hand corner of a glyph-block, which shows that the syllabogram it’s attached to is “doubled” – i.e., it is an abbreviation for writing the syllabogram twice.

·     It was first explained in Stuart&Houston-CMPN.p46.pdfp51.col2.para3 (1994).

·     The most common position for the doubler is touching or very close to the top left corner of the glyph which is “being doubled”. However:

o BPK SS5 G5 has a doubler which applies to the preceding glyph (tu, to the left of the doubler), not to the following glyph (ji, to the right of the doubler): tu.<²ji:ya> è tu-tu-ji-ya è tutjiiy = “(since) he visited”, not tu-ji-ji-ya è tujijiiy. Perhaps it was aesthetically more pleasing to attach the doubler to the left of a “wide”, even surface – the top left corner of the large ji glyph – rather than to the two small elements at the top of the tu, even though the doubling applies to the tu. [Sim: this is dependent on the correctness of reading the verb tut = “to visit” at this point in the inscription.]

o Phoenix ('Po') Panel E2 has a doubler in the top right corner of the glyph-block, not attached or even near to any glyph, but which applies to the glyph in the bottom right; i.e. it’s sort of to the top right of the glyph it applies to, but not placed near to it). [Sim: we can be quite confident of this reading because there is also a doubler at D4 of the same panel – in a more conventional position – and both instances write k’an tatbu, part of the name K’an Tatbu Maax, the Anaab of Yat “Uhman”, Lord of Ak’e.]

o TNA Monument 149 N has a doubler on the top left corner of ko, not attached to any lo, which it doubles. [Sim: we can be quite confident of this reading because there is also a doubler at G of the same panel – in a more conventional position – and both instances write Aj Kolol Te’. Furthermore, we know that we should let glyph-block N influence our reading of glyph-block G and not the other way around – i.e. it isn’t glyph-block G which has the doubler in the “correct” position – giving Aj Koklo Te’ / Aj Kokol Te’. We know this because there are other inscriptions (e.g. TNA Monument 82 pB01) with just AJ-ko-lo-TE’, with no doubler. The final consonant -l is frequently underspelled, whereas the final consonant -k is almost never underspelled. So the version with no doubler at all is far more likely to be  Aj Kolol Te’ than Aj Koklo Te’ / Aj Kokol Te’.]

·     Interestingly, it’s also occasionally written to accompany (monosyllabic) logograms which have the same initial and final consonant, like KUK, K’AHK’ and TZUTZ. In such situations, it doesn’t double the logogram itself – it’s not the case that k’ahk’-k’ahk’ etc is being written. Instead, the doubler only serves to (redundantly) reinforce the fact that the logogram begins and ends with the same consonant (lost reference; look for some examples to include). For example, searching in MHD on:

o “blcodes contains ZBBa” gives 854 hits (as of 2024-02-24):

§ “blcodes contains ZBBa” and “blcodes contains 22A” gives 14 hits.

§ “blcodes contains ZBBa” and “blcodes does not contain 22A” gives 840 hits.

ZBBa is the MHD code for K’AHK’ (both the full and the reduced variant) so we see that in about 1.64% of all the cases of K’AHK’ (in the Classic inscriptions), the doubler is redundantly written. This is a quite uncommon but not unknown practice.

o “blcodes contains MR6” gives 176 hits (as of 2024-02-24):

§ “blcodes contains MR6” and “blcodes contains 22A” gives 1 hit.

§ “blcodes contains MR6” and “blcodes does not contain 22A” gives 175 hits.

MR6 is the MHD code for TZUTZ (specifically, the “hand with finger pointing at ’jewel’/JUUN” variant), so we see that in about 0.57% of all the cases of TZUTZ (in the Classic inscriptions), the doubler is redundantly written. Again, a quite uncommon but not unknown practice.

o A similar set of searches on ZRJ (read as KUK by Bonn) gives 18 hits, with 2 of them have the redundant orthographic doubler.

o A similar set of searches on AW8 (the “inverted bat-head” variant of TZUTZ) gives 7 hits, but none of them have the redundant orthographic doubler.

o A similar set of searches on ZZ3 (CH’ICH’) gives 77 hits, but none of them have the redundant orthographic doubler.

o A similar set of searches on BP2 (K’UK’) gives 88 hits, but none of them have the redundant orthographic doubler.

o A similar set of searches on BVD or PA7 (two different variants of MAM) gives, in total, 129 hits, but none of them have the redundant orthographic doubler.

It seems that of the common logograms with the same initial and final consonant, only KUK, K’AHK’, and TZUTZ exhibit this occasional phenomenon of having a redundant orthographic doubler (and in the case of TZUTZ, only for the hand variant, not the bat-head variant).