Maya hieroglyphics

Maya hieroglyphics is the common name for the system of writing which was used by the pre-Columbian Maya civilization of the Mesoamerican region. The earliest inscriptions which are identifiably Mayan date back to the 1st century BCE, and it was in continuous use up until shortly after the arrival of the Spanish conquistadores in the 16th century CE. It reflects the language of the Maya people spoken at that time, known generally today as the Classic Maya language, although there are indications that this Classic language had regional and time-period variants which are noted in the script. It is essentially a logosyllabic system consisting of a highly elaborate set of glyphs which were laboriously painted on ceramics, walls or bark-paper codices, carved in wood or stone, or molded in stucco.

Related Topics:
Writing - Pre-Columbian - Maya civilization - Mesoamerica - 1st century BCE - Conquistador - 16th century CE - Maya people - Classic Maya language - Logosyllabic - Glyphs - Codices - Stucco

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Knowledge of the Maya writing system continued into the early colonial era and reportedly a few of the early Spanish priests who went to Yucatán learned it. However, as part of his campaign to eradicate pagan rites, Bishop Diego de Landa ordered the destruction of all written Maya works, including a library full of bark-paper codices. Later, seeking to use their native language to convert the Maya to Christianity, he derived what he believed to be a Maya alphabet. Although the Maya did not actually write alphabetically, nevertheless he recorded a glossary of Maya sounds and related symbols, which much later became a key resource in deciphering the Maya script. He was also involved in creating a Latin orthography for the Yucatec Maya language (meaning that he created a system for writing Maya languages in the Latin alphabet). This was the first such Latin orthography compiled for all of the still-living Maya languages, which number at least 30.

Related Topics:
Spanish - Yucatán - Diego de Landa - Bark-paper codices - Deciphering - Orthography - Yucatec Maya language - Maya language - Latin alphabet

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Only four Maya codices are known to survive to modern times. Most surviving texts in Maya hieroglyphics are to be found on pottery recovered from Maya tombs, or from monuments and stelae erected in sites which were mostly long-abandoned or buried before the arrival of the Spanish.

Related Topics:
Maya codices - Monument - Stela

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Knowledge of the writing system was lost, probably by the end of the 16th century. Renewed interest in it was sparked by published accounts of ruined Maya sites in the 19th century.

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The decipherment of the writing was a long and laborious process. 19th century and early 20th century investigators managed to decode the Maya numbers and portions of the text related to astronomy and the Maya calendar, but understanding of most of the rest long eluded scholars. In the 1960s progress revealed the dynastic records of Maya rulers. Since the early 1980s it has been demonstrated that most of the previously unknown symbols form a syllabary, and progress in reading the Maya writing has advanced rapidly since.

Related Topics:
Maya numbers - Astronomy - Maya calendar - 1960s - 1980s - Syllabary

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The Maya may seem to have inherited some elements, and likely the entire basis, of their ancient writing system from the Olmecs (Schele & Freidel, 1990; Soustelle, 1984), although it was already being significantly modified and expanded on by the Maya in the Pre-Classic era. The Pre-Classic texts are less numerous and less well understood by modern archaeologists than the later more plentiful Classic and Post-Classic texts. Other related and nearby Mesoamerican cultures of the period were also heirs to the Olmec writing system, and developed parallel systems which shared key attributes (such as the base-20 numerical system written with a system of bars and dots). However, it is generally believed that the Maya developed the only "complete" writing system in Mesoamerica (meaning that they could notate in writing anything they could say).

Related Topics:
Olmec - Numerical system - Mesoamerica

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