"On the Tablet of the Cross, the Palenque account begins with the birth of First Mother six years before the Creation on 12.19.13.4.0 8 Ahaw 18 Tz'ek (December 7, 3121 B.C.) and five hundred and forty days earlier, the birth of First Father, Hun-Nal-Ye, on 12.19.11.13.0 1 Ahaw 8 Muwan (June 16, 3122 B.C.).

His birth is connected to the Creation day, 4 Ahaw 8 Kumk'u (August 13, 3114 B.C.), when, according to the inscriptions, thirteen cycles ended. The text mentions an action that First Father accomplished on Creation day, but we haven't been able to decipher what it was. However, in the next clause, the Palenque scribes repeated Creation again and described it as 'it was made visible, the image at Lying-down-Sky, the First-Three-Stone-Place'.

Then we learned that five hundred and forty-two days later (1.9.2 in the Maya system, Hun-Nal-Ye 'entered or became the sky' (och ta chan). This 'entering' event occurred on February 5, 3112 B.C. The act of 'entering the sky' is recorded on another extraordinary painted pot.

This pot depicts one of the Hero Twins (One-Ahaw in the Classic texts and One-Hunaphu in the K'iche' Popol Vuh) and a great bird who is trying to land in a huge ceiba tree heavy with fruit. This mythical bird is Itzam-Yeh, Classic prototype of Wuqub-Kaqix, 'Seven-Macaw', of Popol Vuh fame.

In that story, in the time before the sky was lifted up to make room for the light, the vainglorious Seven-Macaw imagined himself to be the sun. Offended by his pride, the Hero Twins humbled hime by breaking his beautiful shining tooth with a pellet from their blowgun. This pot shows One-Ahaw aiming at the bird as he swoops down to land in his tree. As Itzam-Yeh lands on his perch, the text tells us he is 'entering or becoming the sky'.

This particular 'sky-entering' is not the one mentioned in the Palenque text. It is the final event that occurred in the previous creation before the universe was remade. Before the sky could be raised and the real sun revealed in all its splendor, the Hero Twins had to put the false sun, Itzam-Yeh, in his place. If the date on this pot corresponds to that pre-Creation event, as we believe it does, then Itzam-Yeh was defeated in 12.18.4.5.0 1 Ahaw 3 K'ank'in (May 28, 3149 B.C.). After the new universe was finally brought into existence, First Father also entered the sky by landing in the tree, just as Itzam-Yeh did."