What's hiding inside Maya glyphs - History of Writing Systems #6 (Syllabary)

Video

Maya glyphs aren't just Mesoamerican eye candy. They're a working writing system!

Unlike the thousands of logograms encountered in your journey so far, the Maya syllabary lets you combine a very limited number of syllables into a block to write a word. With a few tricks, you can even use those syllables for more complicated sound patterns, like words that end in a consonant.

That's not all Mayan writing can do! There are logographs, logographs plus syllables, logographs plus sound hints (phonetic complements) that invite Maya scribes to indulge in all kinds of creative and inventive patterns.