Mayan Dream Interpretation
and the 4 Bearers of Time
In the Mayan Cosmovision, each solar year, or 365-day Haab year, is carried on the back of one of four Mayan Time Lords. These Bearers of Time are Nahuales. The Nahual Time-bearer, or carrier, helps to give that year its quality, or personality, as the thread of time advances. The Time Lord is represented as carrying the burden and responsibility of the year as a pack on its back, supported by a mecapal, or tumpline, stretched across the forehead.
There are 20 Nahuales, one for each of the 20 days in the Mayan 20-day month called the uinal. Twenty is a number of completeness, the Mayan have used a base-20 counting system, in contrast to the familiar base-10 system, since ancient times. A related word, also meaning 20 is winaq (Kaqchikel), and this is also a word for human being: twenty digits, one complete person. Twenty can be divided by 365 eighteen times with 5 left over. Therefore, as the calendars advance, each January 1 the cycle of 20 Nahual day-names is shifted forward 5 days. Since these 5 days divide into 20 four times, the same 4 Nahwal day-signs repeat themselves every 4 years. These 4 signs, E’, NO’J, IQ’, and K’EJ, are the Bearers of Time.
A day will be influenced by its day-sign Nahwal, but also by the Time Lord responsible for carrying the year it is in. If day-sign and Time Bearer are the same Nahual, the influence of its character is very strong.