Palenque Tomb Was “The House of the Nine Sharpened Spears”

MEXICO CITY, MEXICO—Guillermo Bernal of the National Autonomous University of Mexico has translated hieroglyphs on the tomb of the Maya king K’inich Janaab’ Pakal in the Temple of the Inscriptions at Palenque as “The House of the Nine Sharpened Spears.” Bernal’s study of the jaguar, an animal sacred to the Maya, connected a hieroglyph that looks like a jaguar molar and has been interpreted to mean “edge,” with an inscription in the tomb. “This is a name linked with war and an aspect which was not previously known as the hieroglyphic (could not be) deciphered until now,” Bernal said in a press conference reported by NBC News. To read more about the ancient Maya, go to "Tomb of the Vulture Lord."