The Glyphic Corpus from Ek’ Balam, Yucatán, México

The Name of the Kingdom of Ek’ Balam

Ek’ Balam has an Emblem Glyph of its own. The first identification of an Emblem Glyph associated to the site corresponds to William Ringle, who has identified the presence of this title in Stela 1 and was the first to outline the political implications of such fact. Though at that time, reading the name of the kingdom was not possible because of the poor preservation of the only known example, today we have more information to suggest a transcription.

The name of the ancient kingdom of Ek’ Balam appears now written in at least 13 occasions, 12 in texts from the city of Ek’ Balam, and one in a text originated outside the site, in Halakal. The references to the kingdom’s name appear in all of these cases in composite titles of the Emblem Glyph. Four times the title was preceded by the adjective k’uhul "sacred".

In 12 out of 13 cases, the transliteration of the name of the Ek’ Balam kingdom is T676.580, TAL-lo; in one occasion only, in Ukit Jol Ahkul’s nominal clause from Ek’ Balam’s Column 1, the transliteration is reduced to T676, TAL, infixed inside the body of the AJAW logogram. The absence of T580 lo in this latter case could be interpreted as a confirmation that T580 lo is a phonetic complement to logogram T676 TAL. However, according to the rules that govern the phonetic complements, and according to the known pattern, syllables Ce and Co are never used as a final phonetic complement for logograms other than CEC and COC, a function reserved to the syllables Ca, Ci and Cu, depending on each case, to indicate the type of vowels V, VV, or V’ (vid. Houston, Stuart, and Robertson 1998, in press; Lacadena and Wichmann, in press). For this reason, it is unlikely that T580 lo may be acting like a phonetic complement for the logogram TAL. Sequences like CVC-CV usually abbreviate the type of words CVC[V]C, as is the case in MUT-la, Mut[u’]l, B’AK-la, B’aak[a]l or B’AK-le, b’aak[e]l. This would indicate that TAL-lo possibly goes together with a word Tal[V]l. Given that the last sign is lo, with the vowel /o/, the most likely solution would indicate that the preceding vowel is /o/, wherefrom we would have TAL-lo, Tal[o]l.

We should also consider as a feasible possibility that TAL-lo may be consistent with a form TaloC, whereby C could be any of the usually abbreviated consonants, like /h, j, l, m, n, ’/. Though in this case perhaps we could have expected forms like TAL-hV, TAL-jV, TAL-lV, TAL-mV, TAL-nV or TAL-’V (in fact, the form TAL-lV is the one that could be present in TAL-lo, but once again, it would refer us to Tal[o]l). TAL-lo as an abbreviated form of Talo[’] should not be disregarded, but it would imply, however, an unusual transliteration. If the name of the kingdom was Talo’, we would expect to find a form TAL-o or TAL-lo-o, not identified so far. Therefore, and until new evidence is found, I am inclined to favor the transcription of TAL-lo as Tal[o]l.

It has been recently suggested (Voss and Eberl 1999) that there are two references to the kingdom of Ek’ Balam in the form of gentilics, in the text of the Hieroglyphic Jambs at Chichén Itzá. According to Voss and Eberl, those gentilic references might have adopted the form AJ-ta-la, a[j]tal, being aj- the agentive and tal the reference to the kingdom of Ek’ Balam. However, given the systematic reference to Ek’ Balam as TAL-lo and the possibility that the noun is read as Talol, even though TAL (Tal[ol]) may be an abbreviation of Talol, as shown in the example of Ek’ Balam’s Column 1 mentioned before, it seems to be highly unlikely that in an abbreviated syllabic version, such abbreviation could have been written as ta-la instead of ta-lo, as in the abbreviated syllabic forms, the vowel of the last written syllable anticipates the vowel of the suffix termination (like in the abbreviations of ma-su for ma-su-la, ma-ta-wi for ma-ta-wi-la, or k’u-ti for k’u-ti-ma). Thus, for example, the form ma-su-la may be abbreviated as ma-su, and that is how it appears in the inscriptions, but it could not be abbreviated as ma-sa.

At Ikil, the Emblem Glyph of Ek’ Balam is not mentioned. The Emblem Glyph documented at Ikil reads ma-TAL-lo, probably Matal[o]l, or even Talo’m, provided the sign ma is to be read at the end. A similar sequence, ma-TAL–but without T580 lo–is also present in the text of one of the jades found inside the cenote from Chichén Itzá, and in Altun Ha’, in Belize.

About the Name of the City of Ek’ B’alam in the Terminal Classic Period

If TAL-lo, Tal[o]l was the name of the ancient kingdom of Ek’ Balam and the rulers of the site called themselves kings of Talol, there is an interesting possibility that the name of the city in the Classic Period was Ek’ B’ahlam or Ek’ B’aalam, as documented in colonial times and still nowadays. Block E from the Mural of the 96 Glyphs shows an expression written as [ta?]-EK’-b’a-la-ma, ta? Ek’ B’a[h]lam. Even though the passage is not completely clear because the damages in that part of the text caused almost the total loss of the preceding block D, which would have been of great help for clarifying the meaning of the phrase, the sequence EK’-b’a-la-ma could be referring to the name of a place. It would be the place, in block C, where ([hu]-[li], huli,) the powerful king Chak Jutuuw Chan Ek’ arrived. Given that the meaning of the verb hul-i, "to arrive", incorporates the sense of "arrive in here ", Ek’ B’ahlam should be the name of the place reached, the city itself. The possible presence of a sign ta preceding the whole, probably representing the preposition ta "to, in", would support this interpretation of the form EK’-b’a-la-ma as the name of the place. The resulting syntax of the Intransitive verb–Name of the place–Subject, would also be correct.

To resolve whether EK’-b’a-la-ma in the text refers to the name of a place is of crucial importance, not only for understanding the historic information in the text. Ek’ B’ahlam could also be the name of a person, a second solution which in this precise context of the archaeological site of Ek’ Balam is also admissible. Very interestingly, in the Relación Geográfica de Ek’ Balam we may read "the capital of Tiquibalon [Ekbalam] was given this name after a great lord known as Ek’ Balam, which means black tiger, and he was also known as Coch Cal Balam, which means the lord above all" (de la Garza 1983: 138). Thus, a great lord known as Ek’ B’ahlam may have existed and may have arrived in the place–in fact, EK’-B’ALAM, Ek’ B’ahlam is attested as a name of person in texts from the Classic Period. Needless to say, the possible historical corroboration in a hieroglyphic text from the Classic Period of the story narrated in the XVI century would be of the outmost importance.

In any case, even though the solution I am favoring here is that EK’-b’a-la-ma represents the name of a place, possibly the name of the city, or either of its central sector, the appearance of the glyphic sequence EK’-b’a-la-ma in a text from the archaeological site of Ek’ Balam is by all means interesting.³³

Endnote

33. Like Marc Zender has correctly pointed out (personal communication, June 2002), the fact that the toponym is written as jaguar-star and not as jaguar-black, is interesting. The etymology usually assigned to Ek’ Balam, even in the XVI century by the local Mayas is that of "black tiger". However, perhaps originally the site meant "jaguar star".

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