Men (Tz'ikin): The Bird Day, Fifteenth Sign of the Maya Calendar
Prepared by the Mayan Astrology Calculator editors · Sources below · Reviewed 10 October 2026 · Calculation: gmt584283-proleptic-gregorian-v1
Quick answer. Men is the fifteenth of the 20 day signs in the 260-day Maya calendar; in K'iche' it is Tz'ikin, "bird". In central Mexico the same day was "Eagle". David Stuart's 2024 study shows that the Maya glyph began as a portrait of the Principal Bird Deity, a great mythic bird, "not simply a bird or an eagle". A 19th-century K'iche' calendar calls Tz'ikin the "most excellent of days". Dreamspell calls this slot "Blue Eagle". [1][3][5]
Men at a glance
| Position in the 20-day cycle | 15 of 20 [1] |
| How often it returns | Every 20 days; a pairing such as 9 Men returns every 260 days [2] |
| Yucatec name | Men (same in 16th-century spelling) [1] |
| Classic-period reading | Unknown; Stuart suggests Men may have been used widely in the lowlands [1][5] |
| Highland Guatemala (K'iche') | Tz'ikin; Tz'iquin, Tziquin in colonial calendars [3] |
| Meaning of the names | Tz'ikin, "bird"; Yucatec men, "make, do" [5][6] |
| What the glyph depicts | The head, or the eye, of the Principal Bird Deity [5] |
| Central Mexican counterpart | Quauhtli, "eagle" [5][6] |
| Haab' days it can share | Only day 3, 8, 13 or 18 of a Haab' month [1] |
| How we calculate it | GMT correlation 584283, proleptic Gregorian dates [8] |
| Dreamspell alias (modern, José & Lloydine Argüelles, from 1987) | "Blue Eagle", seal 15; a separate system with a different count [9][10] |
Your day sign is only half of your birth signature. The number from 1 to 13 is the other half.
Where Men sits in the 260-day count
Men follows Ix and precedes Kib; 1 Ix is followed by 2 Men. [1] In the 365-day Haab' Men can only fall on positions 3, 8, 13 or 18 of a month, the same set as Chikchan, Ok and Ajaw. [1]
Two names: "maker" and "bird"
The lowland and highland names mean different things.
- Men. This was the name in Yucatec and also in Ch'ol. Stuart writes that "the only plausible source for the name" is the root men, "make, do", which gives the Yucatec word hmeen, "a doer, maker", "best known as the title for a ritual specialist or curandero". [5] Thompson made the same point in 1950. [6]
- Tz'ikin. In the highlands the day is Tz'ikin, from Proto-Mayan *tz'ikin, "bird". This links it to the names meaning "Eagle" in Nahuatl, Otomi and other languages of highland Mexico. [5] Christenson's dictionary lists Tz'ikin as a day and also as the "second ranked Secretary Mam", a title in the K'iche' year-bearer system. [7]
The linguist Terrence Kaufman suggested that the day belonged to an "eagle god" whose Mayan name associates "with 'Bird' in general, as though he were the protean bird". Stuart agrees and adds evidence from the glyph. [5]
The glyph: the Principal Bird Deity
Stuart arranged Classic-period head variants of Men in time order. They show "a profile head of what appears to be a supernatural bird, with a distinctive squared inner eye". He identifies them with the Principal Bird Deity, the avian form of the old creator god known as God D, possibly named Kokaj Mut or Yax Kokaj Mut. [5] On a painted vessel (Kerr 4546) the deity's name is written with this same head, and in Tomb 12 at Río Azul four versions of it are painted on the four walls, one for each world quarter. [5]
A rarer, simpler variant is "an enlarged representation of the great bird's eye", the same shorthand that Lamat, Chuwen and Ix use. [5] His conclusion: "the Principal Bird Deity was the core mythical basis for Men, not simply a bird or an eagle." "Eagle" and "Bird" in later calendars are, in his words, generic reflections of that mythic origin. [5]
He also notes a link with the name. Men, "to make", fits a creator deity, and at Xcalumkin God D or his bird aspect is called an aj k'in, "day-keeper, diviner". [5]
An older theory: the aged moon goddess
In 1950 Thompson read the Men glyph in the codices as the head of an aged moon goddess, the patroness of weaving, and linked her to the Aztec "eagle woman". [6] Stuart's later study notes that many published drawings of Men, including Thompson's, "look to be highly inaccurate", and identifies the head variants as a bird deity instead. [5] We follow Stuart and mention Thompson's reading only for its history.
Tz'ikin in highland tradition
The 260-day count is still kept in highland Guatemala by Ajq'ijab' (daykeepers). [2] Tz'ikin is among the most favorable days in the records:
- 1854 manuscript. Vicente Hernández Spina's calendar calls it the "most excellent of days. On this day double offerings are made", in church and in caves, ravines and woods, praying "for all that is beneficial and useful to man". It was also "the day for the conclusion of marriage contracts and for the beginning of all important affairs". [3]
- 20th-century fieldwork. Weeks, Sachse and Prager, summarizing Bunzel (1952) and Tedlock (1992), describe it as "symbolic of good luck in material affairs, including money". [3]
- Paired days. 9 Tz'ikin, with 8 I'x, is a day to give thanks for one's lodging; 8 Tz'ikin, with 7 I'x, is a day to ask for good fortune in money; 7 Tz'ikin begins a run of days (with 8 Ajmaq and 9 No'j) for prayers for protection. [3]
These are records of what people did on the day. They are not forecasts for people born on Men. We are not daykeepers. Our reports use the image of the maker and the far-seeing bird as modern reflective writing.
Traditional Men vs Dreamspell "Blue Eagle"
"Blue Eagle" is seal 15 in the Dreamspell, a modern system begun by José and Lloydine Argüelles in 1987 and published as a kit in 1990. [10] Dreamspell gives it the keywords Vision, Creates and Mind. [9] Its "Eagle" follows the central Mexican name; Stuart's work suggests the Maya day was a broader mythic bird. [5]
The counts differ too. Dreamspell fixes 26 July 1987 as "Kin 34, White Galactic Wizard" and skips 29 February. [10][11] 24 Oct 2026 is 2 Men in the traditional count; Dreamspell calls it Kin 59, Blue Resonant Storm. The next Dreamspell "Blue Eagle" day, 20 Oct 2026 (Kin 55, Blue Electric Eagle), is 11 Chuwen in the traditional count. [Link: Dreamspell vs traditional converter → /dreamspell-vs-traditional-maya-calendar]
Colors, directions and "elements"
- Direction. Prehispanic calendars assigned the days to east, north, west and south in turn, which places the fifteenth day in the west. [4] Contemporary K'iche' practice gives the west to Kame. [4]
- Color. The west is black in colonial Yucatec texts; assigning that color to one day is a modern reconstruction. [12] "Blue" for this day comes from Dreamspell, not from Maya sources. [9]
- Element. Some charts, including earlier versions of this site, give Men the element "air". We found no traditional source for Greek-style elements on day signs; on this site it appears only as a labeled modern convention.
Upcoming Men days
Calculated with the GMT 584283 correlation, the same method as our calculator, as of 10 October 2026: [8]
| Gregorian date | Tzolk'in (traditional) | Haab' | Dreamspell, for comparison only |
|---|---|---|---|
| 24 Oct 2026 | 2 Men | 8 Sak' | Kin 59, Blue Resonant Storm |
| 13 Nov 2026 | 9 Men | 8 Keh | Kin 79, Blue Magnetic Storm |
| 3 Dec 2026 | 3 Men | 8 Mak | Kin 99, Blue Galactic Storm |
| 23 Dec 2026 | 10 Men | 8 K'ank'in | Kin 119, Blue Lunar Storm |
| 12 Jan 2027 | 4 Men | 8 Muwan | Kin 139, Blue Solar Storm |
| 1 Feb 2027 | 11 Men | 8 Pax | Kin 159, Blue Electric Storm |
| 21 Feb 2027 | 5 Men | 8 K'ayab | Kin 179, Blue Planetary Storm |
The date tables use your local date when JavaScript is available. Without it, they stay at the 10 October 2026 snapshot.
Each falls on day 8 of its Haab' month, one of the four positions (3, 8, 13, 18) open to Men. [1]
Men with each of the 13 numbers
- 1 Men · next: 1 Jun 2027
- 2 Men · next: 24 Oct 2026
- 3 Men · next: 3 Dec 2026
- 4 Men · next: 12 Jan 2027
- 5 Men · next: 21 Feb 2027
- 6 Men · next: 2 Apr 2027
- 7 Men · next: 12 May 2027
- 8 Men · next: 21 Jun 2027
- 9 Men · next: 13 Nov 2026
- 10 Men · next: 23 Dec 2026
- 11 Men · next: 1 Feb 2027
- 12 Men · next: 13 Mar 2027
- 13 Men · next: 22 Apr 2027
Each number links to its page. 7, 8 and 9 Tz'ikin are the three Men days named in the highland records above. [3]
Men and relationships
Our compatibility tool compares two full birth signatures with a modern reflective method, not a documented historical Maya formula. [Compare two birth dates → /compatibility]
Read your own signature in depth
Calculate your full signature free, with no sign-up. Under the result you can add an 11-page personal PDF report ($7, one-time).
Comparing two people? See the sample pair report →
FAQ
Are Men and Tz'ikin the same day? Yes. Men is the Yucatec name and Tz'ikin the K'iche' name for the fifteenth day. [1][3]
Is Men the eagle sign? "Eagle" is the central Mexican name. The Maya glyph shows the Principal Bird Deity, and the K'iche' name means "bird". [5]
What does Men mean? Yucatec men means "make, do"; hmeen is the title of a ritual specialist. [5][6]
Is "Blue Eagle" the same as Men? It fills the same slot in Dreamspell's list, but Dreamspell's count differs, so a "Blue Eagle" birthday is usually not a Men day. [9][10]
Why does another calculator give me a different day sign? It may use the Dreamspell count, or a correlation constant other than 584283, which shifts results by a day or two. [8][13]
Is Men a zodiac sign? No. It names a day that recurs every 20 days. → How we calculate
Sources
- Kettunen, Harri, and Christophe Helmke. Introduction to Maya Hieroglyphs, 17th rev. ed. Wayeb, 2020, pp. 49, 51, 57. https://www.mesoweb.org/resources/handbook/IMH2020.pdf
- Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian. "The Calendar System." Living Maya Time. https://maya.nmai.si.edu/calendar/calendar-system
- Weeks, John M., Frauke Sachse, and Christian M. Prager. Maya Daykeeping: Three Calendars from Highland Guatemala. University Press of Colorado, 2009, pp. 3 (Table 1.1), 15. https://www.upcolorado.com/media/acfupload/9780870819969.pdf
- Estrada Peña, Canek. "Anima' ri cho, anima' ri plo: Imox y el agua entre los k'iche'." Estudios de Cultura Maya 45 (2015): 191–224, pp. 202–203. https://www.redalyc.org/pdf/2813/281336894007.pdf
- Stuart, David. "Day Sign Notes: Men." Maya Decipherment, 19 Apr 2024. https://mayadecipherment.com/2024/04/19/day-sign-notes-men/
- Thompson, J. Eric S. Maya Hieroglyphic Writing: An Introduction. Carnegie Institution of Washington, 1950, pp. 82–84.
- Christenson, Allen J. K'iche'–English Dictionary. FAMSI, s.v. "Tz'ikin". https://www.famsi.org/mayawriting/dictionary/christenson/quidic_complete.pdf
- Mayan Astrology Calculator. "Calculation Methodology and Cultural Scope." https://mayanastrologycalculator.com/methodology
- Foundation for the Law of Time. "Learning the 13 Galactic Tones and 20 Solar Seals." https://lawoftime.org/infobooth/sealsandtones.html
- "Dreamspell." Wikipedia (citing Argüelles & Argüelles, Dreamspell kit, 1990). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dreamspell
- Argüelles, José. Rinri Project Newsletter II.2.1. Foundation for the Law of Time. https://www.lawoftime.org/pdfs/Rinri-II-2.1.pdf
- Stuart, David. "Day Sign Notes: Imix / Imox." Maya Decipherment, 14 Aug 2025 (on the colors of the imix che' world trees). https://mayadecipherment.com/2025/08/14/day-sign-notes-imix-imox/
- Van Stone, Mark. "2012 FAQ." FAMSI. https://www.famsi.org/research/vanstone/2012/faq.html
Reviewed: 10 October 2026 · Calculation: gmt584283-proleptic-gregorian-v1 · Corrections: contact us