·    YAX Lintel 23 (front) A2:

o K&L.p38.#3.2 is the same glyph-block with superfluous information removed.

o It is not entirely clear where the TUUN is. The element at the very top is probably not an unusual form of TUUN, but rather an unusual form of LEM, which K’AL often has above it. We know a TUUN must be present from the context of the inscription, where the verb k’al tuun is required. This is further strengthened by the presence of ni, the end phonetic complement for TUUN.

·    Features:

o Right hand viewed from the back of the hand, with fingers outstretched, pointing right.

o Thumb horizontal.

o Optional: a “LEM” above the hand (MC.p164.r2.c7 has no “LEM”).

·    Note that QRG Stela J F4 is known to be K’AL and not CH’AM:

o This is because K’AL (and not CH’AM) is the verb which is expected to go with the … huun tu’ baah … which occurs soon after at E6-F6.

o It’s a left hand with fingers pointing left, which is unusual, as the overwhelming majority of K’AL’s have a right hand with fingers pointing right.

o This shows that the essential difference between K’AL and CH’AM is actually (respectively) the horizontal vs. vertical thumb, rather than “right or left hand”, or “fingers pointing right or left”.

·    Do not confuse this with the homonym K’AL meaning “20”, for which the glyph is a moon glyph, with a circle in the bay.

·    Do not confuse this with the visually similar K’AB meaning “hand”, which is just the hand alone, with no “LEM”-like element above it.

·    As a general rule, K’AB has no LEM, and K’AL has a LEM, but see K’AB for more information.

·    The meaning assigned in the past was “to tie” / “to bind” / “to close”, but now considered to be “to present”.

o In particular, k’al-huun tu’ baah is not the old image of “(someone else) tying the headband onto/around the head (of the ruler)” but rather “(the ruler himself) presenting the headband (to the audience), once it had been put on/around his head”.

o This is despite the fact that there are existing images from the time showing stelae bound up in rope (e.g. the carved peccary skull of CPN Burial 1) or wrapped in cloth (CPN Altar X or Y, CPN Stela F). These were the images which initially gave rise to the translation “to tie”, “to bind”.

The above is “impressionistic” – what I seem to have picked up along the way. But it’s actually difficult to get concrete proof (from academic papers) that the above is correct.

o Boot-THHiCMHW.p8.pdfp8 (2003): In the above three examples the verb root k’al- may mean “to wrap, to present” (k’al- tuun “to wrap stone [i.e. tuun period]”; k’al-sakhu’un “to present [the] white headband”; k’al-hu’un “to present [the] headband”).

o EB.p105.pdfp110.#2 (2009): k’al- (2) tv. to bind, to tie.

o EB.p105.pdfp110.#2 (2009): k’al- (3) pv. to bind, to tie (?).

o EB.p216.pdfp221.#16: bind (v) k’al-.

o EB.p231.pdfp236.#11: wrap (v) k’al-.

o K&H (2020) – K’AL- è k’al-:

§ (1) to present (tv)

§ (2) to lift (tv)

§ (3) to bind/fasten (tv)

§ (5) to wrap (tv)

§ (6) to hold (tv)

EB gives a number of other meanings of k’al, some as a noun, others as a verb, but none of them related to “present(ing)”. This means that an earlier work by Boot (EB, 2003) lists “present”, but a later work by the same author (Boot-THHiCMHW, 2009) does not. Does this perhaps imply that Boot decided against the meaning “present”? On the other hand K&H (2020) is a recent and much later work, and does list “to present (tv)”. From K&L it would appear that the meanings of “tie”, “bind” have not been superseded after all.

·    k’al, na’, and t’ab are translated as “to present” in English, but they are quite different types of “presenting”:

o k’al: a ritual object (e.g. a headband or stela) is the object of k’al.

o na’: a human being (e.g. a bride or prisoner) is the object of na’.

o t’ab: a ceramic (or perhaps the inscription / painting on the ceramic) is the object of t’ab.