MAYAN WRITING AND

LANGUAGE
BY JACKIE
MAYA HIEROGLYPHS ARE MADE OF MANY
DIFFERENT SYMBOLS PUT TOGETHER TO MAKE
A WORD. THIS IS CALLED SYLLABARY.
THERE ARE OVER 800 SIGNS. MORE THEN ONE SYMBOL
CAN STAND FOR THE SAME SOUND.
MOST SIGNS ARE SPLIT INTO THREE
GROUPS:
AFFIXES
Affixes are the smaller squished signs
PORTRAITS
Portraits are usually the heads of
Gods, and can be Affixes or Main
Signs.
MAIN SIGNS
Theses make up most of the signs
and are usually square.
TO MAKE WORDS, YOU MIX AND MATCH
EACH OF THE SYLLABLES INTO A WORD.
EACH WORD LOOKS LIKE AN INTRICATE
PICTURE, CARRYING MULTIPLE SOUNDS.
A FEW MAYA SYMBOLS CAN STAND ALONE
TO MAKE A WORD. THESE ARE CALLED
LOGOGRAMS.
POPOL VUH
THE POPOL VUH IS THE
ANCIENT RELIGIOUS TEXT OF
THE MAYAS.
IT DESCRIBES THE CREATION
ON PEOPLE AND ANIMALS.
BISHOP DIEGO DE LANDA WANTED TO
DESTROY ALL MAYA BOOKS
LANDAS FIRST
MISTAKE
He asked the natives how to say a,
b, and c. They gave him the
symbols for ah beh and she.
LANDAS SECOND
MISTAKE
He also immediately assumed the
Maya people had an alphabet.
LANDAS THIRD
MISTAKE
He included a summary of Maya
writing in his 'Relacin de las cosas
de Yucatn'. This preserved Maya
writing.
READING MAYA
In this picture, you would read 1A, 1B,
2A, 2B, 3A, 3B, etc. When you reach the
bottom of columns A and B, you move
onto 1C, 1D, 2C, 2D, 3C, 3D, etc.
GLOTTAL STOPS
CONSONANTS WITH
APOSTROPHIES AFTER
THEM ARE
GLOTTALIZED. BEFORE
PRONOUNCING THE
VOWEL, YOU
CONSTRICT YOUR
LARNX, FOR AN
EXPLOSIVE SOUND.