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Latin American History Commons™

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Race, Ethnicity and Post-Colonial Studies

Selected Works

2005

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Full-Text Articles in Latin American History

The Enigma Of Mayan Hieroglyphs, Russell M. Franks Jan 2005

The Enigma Of Mayan Hieroglyphs, Russell M. Franks

Russell M. Franks

Much of the confusion in deciphering Mayan hieroglyphs that has occurred over the centuries can be traced directly to Bishop de Landa. Landa is infamous for his religious persecution of the Maya peoples, and beginning in 1562, the systematic destruction of their birch-bark books. It wasn't until 1922 that the Russian linguist Yuri Knorozov made the breakthrough analysis that the glyphs stood for sounds and not symbols.

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