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The Franciscan Contribution to Maya Linguistic Research in Yucatan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 December 2015

Ralph L. Roys
Ralph L. Roys*
Affiliation:
Department of Archaeology, Carnegie Institution of Washington
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Extract

Linguistic Science, like history, ethnology and epigraphy, is deeply indebted to the Franciscan missionaries who worked among the Maya Indians of Yucatan. About 1566 Fray Diego de Landa, later Bishop of Yucatan, not only wrote an ethnological treatise perhaps unique in the history of that science, but, as an outstanding contemporary epigrapher recently wrote: “Landa’s description of the calendar and his illustrations of day and month signs supplied a firm foundation on which to reconstruct Maya hieroglyphic writing; it is as close to a Rosetta Stone as we are ever likely to get.” Further development of our investigation of the Maya glyphs will in all probability be closely linked with our knowledge of the language.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Americas , Volume 8 , Issue 4 , April 1952 , pp. 417 - 429
Copyright
Copyright © Academy of American Franciscan History 1952

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