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Classic, Colonial and Contemporary
A Guide to Yucatecan Maya Literature

Few visitors to the Yucatan Peninsula leave without visiting archeological sites such as Uxmal, Chichén Itzá, or Dzibilchaltún where they can see pyramids, temples and a wide variety of other curiously adorned constructions built more than a thousand years ago. The attention of even the least observant visitors is drawn by the artistry of strange-looking stone carvings accompanied by hieroglyphs that are still not totally understood. The more curious among the visitors follow their interests and read about the ongoing efforts to decipher the hieroglyphs and thus "read Mayan writing." They learn that since almost 2000 years before Christ the Maya have persisted in their efforts to record their presence for the sake of succeeding generations (Lloyd 1). Their "writing" has been etched in stone, painted on ceramic, transcribed to bark paper codices, printed in books, and even digitized and made available in cyberspace. The written word of the Maya, their literature, thus transcends the temporal limitations of other testimonies of the culture, such as the enigmatic constructions of Uxmal or of Chichén Itzá, to form an evolving link between the earliest and most recent efforts of this people to preserve and perpetuate its identity.