System of writing used by people of the Maya civilization from about the 3rd century AD to the 17th century.
Of the various scripts developed in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, Mayan writing is by far the most elaborate and abundantly attested: about 800 signs have been inventoried in more than 5,000 instances (see Maya Codices ). Signs
some representational, some quite abstract
are either logographic, representing words, or syllabic, representing consonant-vowel sequences. Typically, up to five signs are fit into tight square or rectangular clusters, which are further arranged into rows or grids. The language of Classic Period writing ( 0441; AD 250900) is generally thought to be Cholan, ancestral to several modern Maya language s; later inscriptions were in Yucatec. By the 1990s scholars had an accurate grasp of 6070% of Mayan inscriptions, with some texts almost completely readable and some still quite opaque. Most inscriptions record significant events and dates in the lives of Mayan rulers.