We often relegate Mesoamerica's beautiful
scripts to the past. There were glyphs, then colonization, then...
well I guess Spanish or something? It's time to tell a different story about
the present and future. How are these scripts used today? I recently animated a journey back in time
to the oldest writing in Mesoamerica. But every one of the language families mentioned
in that video is still spoken today, some by hundreds of thousands or even millions
of people. So then, a followup: what about the modern
use of the glyphs? Here's one continuity: Nāhua place names are
spread throughout the region, and Nāhua glyphs still appear on local seals and emblems. Acapulco keeps its hands pulling reeds apart. Mazatlán remains the "deer place". Xochimilco puts flowers atop farmland. Even "Guatemala" is from a Nāhuatl word meaning
"place of many trees", and you can see those trees on the capital's flag. What must be the most famous glyphs though
are found on another flag. Incorporated into this compound of icons symbolizing
the story of the founding of Mexico's capital upon a lake, there's the glyph of a stone
and a cactus, tētl and nōchtli, both well known from old codices. There are masterful Oaxacan artists skilled
in weaving incredible patterns. Many textiles draw on ancient motifs like
the xicalcoliuhqui, which is a design not a writing system. Others though feature what in the last video we called
Zapotec and Mixtec glyphs. And symbols from across the region also get worked
into business logos and artists' murals, which I probably can't show here but need
to mention because it's popular. Notice so far we've seen expressions of art
and identity. These copy and repeat old texts. Their creativity is in updating the style
and the context. But what about taking the next step: using
glyphs to write new texts? One script is already on that path: Maya. Years ago I saw footage of a class learning
the basics with the help of outside academics. It's known in Maya studies that the script
was poured over and deciphered by outsiders, Mayanists more than Maya people themselves. And epigraphers today do write the script as part of their studies. I'll link a video of one who takes the time
to demonstrate inking two names. Many outside experts led the way by supporting
rather than calling the shots, and today glyphs are in the hands and pens of speakers of Mayan
languages and have been spotted on media from books to t-shirts. Organizations have done this kind of thing
for decades, so like in books I've seen page numbers or the emblem of an institute or publisher. Thanks to individuals, you don't have to be
contented with a glyph here or there around the edges. The Popol Wuj, a classic text remembered and
later passed down via colonial alphabet, is now rendered entirely in glyphs by a writer
identified on the cover as an ajtz'iib', a modern scribe. At the entrance to the archaeological site
of Iximche', beside the parking lot, there's a stela inscribed front and back. Its eighty glyph blocks narrate events from
the start of the long count thousands of years ago, to the founding of the site, to the Spanish
conquest, down to the planting of this stone in 2012. It's a new monument written and sculpted by
experts from among the Kaqchikel people. And there are more new texts, some as creative
as poetry. What's claimed to be the first poem in Maya
glyphs has already been written in a language from another branch of the Mayan family in
2015. The title here, Xikitin, is entirely composed
of phonetic syllable glyphs, and it reappears here in the first glyph block, just to give
you a taste of the versatility. And to read the rest, you follow the traditional path: zig-zag between two columns before moving over to the next two columns. But it might be a while before we're searching
and posting on the web using these glyphs. Mayan languages mostly get written in Latin
characters, as they have been for nearly five centuries. There is hope and research going into figuring
out how Maya glyphs could be encoded in Unicode. The way the script works, it's a surprisingly
big challenge. I mean, this is the first script to make me
add a third dimension to my reading axes. As much as I find glyphic history fascinating
(oh it is), I'm more intrigued by where the scripts, and people who speak the languages
today, will go from here. Developing your own quick handwriting? Inventing new glyphs? Reawakening more of the scripts? Since the word for write also means paint,
I'll say: get painting, and stick around and subscribe for language.
Here's a PDF with a guide on how to write using the Maya syllabary!
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I must say, I didn't knew a lot of what was said in the video, amazing!