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

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.

Have you missed the story so far?

Who created this?
Art, animation and music by NativLang
CC-BY and public domain credits:

[pedrobolsas]

This single video inspired me to learn the maya writing system and the classical language, that was 2 years ago; now I can read and write the glyphs very well, but I'll continue learning it because every day you learn something new. Sorry for the text but, I'm sure you'll continue to inspire people like me.
Your chanel (and you) is one just word: "wonderful".

[xavierrosado]

The Maya didn't used the word "to write" specifically, they called their form of communication "to paint" wich is more accurate way to describe the way they expressed visual ideas.

[st]

That’s quite like Chinese or korean logic. I am a Taiwanese, learned Chinese since young. I feel Mayan characters are the most beautiful writings in the world.

[Oli]

I really like how the Mayan system works. It makes sense and seems quite simple. The images may be a little hard and time consuming to draw but you'd probably get used to that.

[marcustulliuscicero]

Jaguars wearing bowties because bowties are cool.

[TheOSullivanFactor]

It's basically the same as the relationship between hiragana and kanji in japanese. It'd be cool if someone could simplify and invent enough new characters that it could be used again.

[dogcowdogcow]

For those of y'all interested in learning about the history of how the written Maya language was deciphered, I'd recommend "Breaking the Maya Code" by Michael D Coe.

[sion]

Reminds me of Hangul, but less abstract as these still look like pictures. Maybe, had the Maya continued being the dominate literate people of Mesoamerica they would have made the glyphs more abstract characters instead.

[MadSpectro]

It seems to be that they're "almost" logographs, since a full character represents an entire word, but just like how Korean makes syllables out of alphabet-like characters, the Mayans made logographs by combining syllabographs.

[FidesAla]

This reminds me of how sometimes, in Japanese, especially in manga (or, at least, that's where I see it most) there will be a sort of double-meaning to a word, where one kanji is used, but the reading given in furigana is something different. This is how a lot of the English terms in "Kuroshitsuji" are done (it's set in Victorian England) - the word will be given in kanji, and on the side, there's katakana for the word in English (e.g. "Undertaker", "Yes, my lord", etc. - you know the ones if you know the series). It makes it really interesting to read it in Japanese, especially since I'm just learning the language. I've also seen a lot of times where a term will use a different kanji than it usually does (e.g. the manga series "Saiyuki" isn't "Journey to the West", it's "Journey to the Extreme"). I think the nature of manga encourages this sort of playing around, and it's really interesting and fun.

[wasweiich]

I love the Maya writing system. it's increddible to think to have soo many possibilities open to write differently. I thiink this might only work in picturesque writings like Maya - if you#d do that with letters you#d probably end up with a rather strange text.

Keep up the great work! This series is amazing!

[ChristianJiang]

Wooow! Thank you for uploading, this is so interesting!! I'm waiting for the next video!

[OnkelJajusBahn]

It is a shame, so much of the great Mayan books are lost.

[mosasidog]

interesting it uses the same system for the Philippine native written language baybayin or sometimes called alibatha

[KendrixTermina]

Thank you for looking at a less known system!
I guess here you see how writing systems adapt to different uses, seems this seems to be geared toward use by artisans, practical in logic but pretty in execution, it's like the direct opposite of cursive. (which is of course also falling out of use now)
Its sorta like Japanese tho

[Lucy-ngcw]

Why didn't the just have an extra symbol that canceled out the vowel? Because what if the echo vowels were meant to be there?

[lrgogo]

Why does your voice always appear before the title if the series has its own narrator??

[petergelman]

Well done presentation. Thank you NativLang!

[frankharr]

I don't know about anyone else, but I've always found it weird how sylabries very often have signs vowels that are not connected to consonents, but very rarely for consonants that are unescorted by vowels

[reynaldoramirez-arellano]

I loved this video, but I disagree with the "only two" ways to solve the balam problem. You could make like Japanese hiragana and just make an extra sound, i.e. ん "n".