The 260 KIN — the complete gallery of the Maya calendar

The KIN is the smallest unit that makes up the Tzolk'in. The 20 Solar Seals multiplied by the 13 Galactic Tones yield 20 × 13 = 260 combinations, and each one of them is a KIN. In Dreamspell, the KIN of your birth day is called your "Galactic Signature" and is read as a stamp of time unique to you, in which seal (quality) and tone (rhythm) are paired.

Why 260 days? There is no settled view, and many theories have been handed down. One overlays it with the roughly 260-day span of human gestation; another, an observational theory, notes that at a point near latitude 15°N the interval between the sun's zenith passages directly overhead comes to about 260 days; another bases it on the cycle of maize cultivation in the Maya highlands; and yet another holds it to be the product of two sacred numbers, 13 and 20. Each is compelling, but none is confirmed.

A connection to astronomy is also discussed. Because the interval at which Venus appears as morning star and evening star is roughly 263 and 260 days — close to the Tzolk'in — it is said the Maya actually used the Tzolk'in to predict the position of Venus and solar eclipses. That said, origin claims such as "260 because of gestation" are but one theory among several, and it is best to receive mythic symbolism and astronomical fact as separate things.

The 260 KIN are arranged as a 13 × 20 fabric. Thirteen columns down, twenty rows across. Twenty KIN share each tone, thirteen KIN share each seal, crossing as regularly as warp and weft, and together they form a single table of harmony (the Harmonic Module). The KIN, which at first glance seem scattered at random, are in fact arrayed upon a precise lattice.

Among the ancient Maya, this 260-day calendar lay at the center of life. While the 365-day Haab' calendar governed agriculture and administration, the Tzolk'in is recorded as having been used as a sacred calendar for ritual and divination, the naming of children, choosing the time for marriage and war, and reading a person's destiny. The date itself took on a divine character, and the KIN of one's birth day was thought to mirror that person's nature.

To know your own KIN is to know upon which single point out of 260 you were born. Yet it is not an isolated point but one stitch within the fabric. Connected to companions of the same seal and companions of the same tone, you come to see where you stand within the great circle of 260 days.

Here all 260 KIN are laid out. You may begin from your own signature, or gaze from one end as a journey that comes full circle. Take your time wandering through the 260 expressions woven by the 20 seals and the 13 tones.