Archaeologists decipher name of a Maya astronomer for the first time

Archaeologists working at the ancient Maya ruins of Xultun in northeastern Guatemala have deciphered the name of a Maya astronomer-mathematician for the first time: Sak Tahn Waax, or "White-chested Fox." The discovery, published Monday in the journal Antiquity, links an individual by name to an original piece of scientific work — a first for the Classic Maya period.nationalgeographic+2

A Name Emerges From Faded Glyphs

The name was found among 11 hieroglyphs painted on the east wall of a small rectangular room known as structure 10K-2 at Xultun, an ancient city about 25 miles northeast of Tikal. The room, originally discovered in 2010 when a student peered into a looting tunnel, contained murals of royal scribes and more than 50 faint mathematical "microtexts."nationalgeographic

Franco Rossi, an archaeologist at MIT and lead author of the paper, identified the key passage after using software to enhance the faded markings. The final two glyphs in the cluster read "cheheen," roughly meaning "so says," followed by a personal signature.newscientist+1

"This is the first direct mention of an ancestral Maya astronomer-mathematician by personal name," Rossi told New Scientist. He added that it is also the oldest recorded name of an astronomer-mathematician known from anywhere in the Americas.newscientist

Pure Math on a Whiteboard

Alongside the name, the researchers decoded a formula combining the orbital cycles of Mars and Venus to calculate a 2,920-day period — equivalent to five cycles of Venus orbiting the Sun. Working backward from dates embedded in the equations, the team dated the formula to A.D. 781.sciencealert+1

"There were no nouns, there were no verbs; it wasn't saying something about an event," said Heather Hurst, an archaeologist at Skidmore College and director of the San Bartolo-Xultun Project. "It was just pure math."nationalgeographic

David Stuart, an archaeologist and epigrapher at the University of Texas at Austin who helped make the find, noted the name's simplicity compared to royal titles. "In a real way, we're looking at an old 'whiteboard' in someone's abandoned office," he said. "To have a name associated with it is incredible and makes Maya science appear much more human."nationalgeographic

A Scholar Joins the Canon

By placing his name at the end of the formula, Sak Tahn Waax claimed authorship — a practice never before documented for a Classic Maya mathematician. Anthony Aveni, an archaeoastronomer at Colgate University who was not involved in the study, called it "probably the most wonderful discovery leading to an understanding of Maya science."archaeologymag+1

Guatemala's Ministry of Culture also announced the findings, which researchers say place an Indigenous Maya scholar in a lineage alongside figures such as Pythagoras and Galileo — not in stature assumed, but in the simple act of signing one's intellectual work.nationalgeographic+1