Maya Codices

GBonline

There are four Maya codices, usually known by the name
of the city in which they are now located. They are made from
tree bark that has been flattened, covered with a lime paste &
folded accordion-style. They are usually written on both sides.

Dresden Codex Current location: Staatsarchiv, Dresden, Germany Amatl paper screenfold painted on both sides. 39 leaves, 4 blank. Published in Kingsborough Antiguidades de Mexico Volume III. (A copy drawn by Aglio around 1825-30 for this edition is in the British Museum). . Facsimile reproduction by Ernst Forstemann,1880 with commentary. This was an early example of a "photographic" process known as "chromolithography". The black and white images were reused for an 1892 edition. Additional commentary appeared in German through 1901. Summary edition of previous work in English translation with revisions by the author was published in the Papers of the Peabody Museum of American Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University,4(2) pgs. 49-269 Cambridge 1906. There were other editions in the first half of the twentieth century, most importantly the 1930 edition redrawn by Villacorta & Villacorta. The most complete work on the Dresden is Commentary on the Dresden Codex by Eric Thompson. The 1972 original printing of this was only 1000 copies, so if you find it you're pretty lucky. A more widely available recent impression has been published by Fondo Cultura Economica (in Spanish as Commentarios al Codice Dresde), though I've heard this is now out of print. The reproduction used for the Thompson edition was based on black & white photographs of the original Forstemann 1892 printing, and were hand colored for this publication. In the original 1972 printing, the pages are printed three to a page in an oversized volume. Commentarios al Codice Dresde restores the pages to their original order in screenfold format, and is sold with the Thompson's text in Spanish translation as a two volume set. I've HTMLized raw data of Dresden Almanacs 40 & 47 from pages 16 through 18 with additional bibliographic information. Explanatory pages on Ring and Serpent Dates in the Dresden Codex have been prepared for the web by Gregory Reddick with images from his research group's presentation at the 1997 Austin Maya Meetings. A site called Bonfire of Liberties has a Dresden page at www.humanities-interactive.org as a part of their online discussion of the history of censorship. (There's not much more there on the Dresden Codex other than this image courtesy of the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center.) The pictures at the top and top left of this section are from Page 59 of the Dresden. The original scanned image can be viewed in your browser here. It's a huge picture (1125x1054 pixels; 407KB) and includes Page 59 and Page 47 (slightly cropped at the top). This photo was taken from the book Pre-columbian Art and later Indian Tribal Arts by Ferdinand Anton and Frederick J. Dockstader, Harry N. Abrams Publishers, no copyright date given (my guess would be 1968); used without permission. Thanks to Steve Kruse for providing this scanned image. Paris Codex Current location: Bibliotheque Nacional, Paris, France Amatl paper screenfold painted on both sides. 11 leaves. (Cover photo on left is copyright 1994 University of Texas Press) . The first comprehensive commentary was published by Ernst Forstemann in 1903. (An unpublished English translation resides in the Peabody Museum Library). The Codex is stored in Paris today in a sealed glass case which hasn't been opened in this century, for fear of damaging it. The reproduction available from Graz is a reconstruction using the Forstemann lithographs created in the late 1800s, and hand coloring extrapolated from the two pages that are visible in the current glass case. The relatively thin bibliography of recent books published on any of the Maya codices was updated by Bruce Love's The Paris Codex : Handbook for a Maya Priest. Published by the University of Texas in 1994, it includes an introduction by George Stuart that provides an annotated publication history. I encourage you to visit your local bookseller and order a copy of The Paris Codex : Handbook for a Maya Priest You can also place an order online at Amazon.Com where you'll find an interview with the author.

James B. Porter | Maya Glyphs Including a paper on the Paris Codex with extensive bibliographic information. (Thanks to Dr. Porter for the image on the right.) Mayanist & graphics artist James B. Porter has an online paper on the Paris Codex with extensive commentary and bibliographic information. It includes a detailed analysis of the physical construction, composition and content of the manuscript. Beyond the unique value of this self-published paper for students and researchers, the most important contribution of these pages are the carefully researched and meticulously rendered drawings of all pages from this document. Scholars and enthusiasts now have a valuable resource for the study of the Codex Peresianus that can be accessed across the globe. There are many other interesting papers and topics on the archaeology of Precolumbian Mesoamerican Indians at Dr. Porter's Maya Glyphs site. His Hall of Shame has precipitated a move to a new web site location at http://members.xoom.com/mayaglyphs/ that includes comments documenting the reasons for the move.

Madrid Codex Current location: Museo del Americas, Madrid Amatl paper screenfold painted on both sides. 56 leaves. Commentary by Ernst Forstemann, 1902, 1903 (Unpublished English translations in the Peabody Museum Library). Eric Thompson on the Madrid: "...appears to be of late date (15th century?); workmanship is crude and careless. The use of Yucatecan-Campeche year bearers is a pretty clear indication of when it was composed. ...Largely confined to divinatory almanacs, which include hunting, beekeeping, and idolmaking; it has no astronomical information" I think that the quality of "workmanship" is prejudiced, in this case, by a personal asthetic perspective. See for yourself by viewing this graphic from a server in the UK. For the most recent scholarship on the Madrid Codex, check out the collection of Papers on the Madrid Codex edited by Victoria Reifler Bricker and Gabrielle Vail, with papers by Chrisopher L. von Nagy, Cassandra R. Bill, Donald H. Graff, and the editors. Glyph passage above with example of T791 was crudely scanned from the fine Graz edition and carelessly converted to a transparent GIF with commensurate reckless abandon by GBonline Graphic inset from the Madrid codex at the beginning of this section comes to us by kind permission of The Digital Explorer. Grolier Codex Current location unknown.

Unlike the other three, this codex takes it name from the place where it was originally exhibited (today it is in a private collection). First published in the exhibit catalog for this show called The Maya Scribe and His World, by Michael Coe 1973. Some scholars think it is a fake, but most seem to share the opinion that it is genuine. (I'm under the impression that scholars have not had the opportunity to examine the original since it was exhibited twenty-five years ago; I would hope someone would write and correct me if this is not true.) It's a little difficult to see in the graphic above, but you'll note that each page has a single column of repeating calendrical glyphs, and a maya numeral tied in a bundle. This is quite a bit different from the more complex glypic texts, read typically in paired columns, found in the other three codices. It is most like pages found in the Paris Codex. This image is from the interesting Belize Archaeology site (with their permission). They don't attribute the source, but my guess is that it's from National Geographic. Muchas gracias for putting the Grolier on the web! If you've found this page, there's a good chance you've already seen the Maya Epigraphic Database. If not, check it out and get it bookmarked! Look for an update soon of GBonline | Maya Ceramics If you can, please consider a gift to the Linda Schele Precolumbian Endowment.   Help preserve the legacy of a great scholar. Navigate the GBonline web pages: [ Ancient Writing | Aztec | Borgia Group | Maya | Mixtec ] VIEW CURRENT PAGE WITHOUT FRAMES [ Exploring | Mesoamerica | GB Personal Info | Biblio | Websters ] Mail to: GBonline@prodigy.net This URL: http://pages.prodigy.net/gbonline/awmayac.html 1996-9 - GBonline [] Last Update: 9 Sept 1999 Revised intermittently