Maya writing: Did you mean...?

Artist's impression of a Maya priest performing a temple ritual. Created by Amplitude Studios for the video game Humankind.

A Maya vessel decorated with warrior figures. They are wearing animal headdresses and have trophy heads hanging from their belts. From Mexico or Guatemala, c. 600-800 CE. (Brooklyn Museum, New York)

This photograph shows some Maya ruins from the San Gervasio archaeological site, which is located on the island of Cozumel in Mexico. In the center, one sees the "Niches" structure, which was once composed of miniature shrines that were built...

Mark Van Stone explains how Maya hieroglyphs are constructed, by writing a modern name in phonetic glyphs. Dr. Van Stone is an expert decipherer and calligrapher; author of "2012 - Science and Prophecy of the Ancient Maya" and co-author of...

Semitic languages like Hebrew and Arabic evolved a unique way to write vowels... with consonants! See how in this episode of Thoth's Pill: an Animated History of Writing. You're back in the ancient Middle East, where seemingly everyone's...

This is the outer cover of the ivory writing-boards (6 in number) incised with four lines of Assyrian cuneiform text, giving the title of the astrological script which was a compilation of omens ordered by Neo-Assyrian king Sargon II (reigned...

The Maya glyph for Tikal. From a stela in the Archaeological Museum of Tikal.

17th-century, woodcut recreation of Li Po writing 100 verses while drinking a quart of wine seated on the veranda with a group of men.

Juan de Grijalva (aka Grijalba, 1489-1527) was a Spanish conquistador who explored the eastern coast of Mexico in 1518. His notable achievements included a demonstration that the Yucatán Peninsula was just that and not, as previously thought...

My animation takes you through the birth and evolution of writing. Watch the story of the world's scripts unfold, from the early cave days to modern writing systems. But only if you choose to take Thoth's Pill... This animated documentary...