Linguistics of Maya Writing

Edited by Søren Wichmann

450 pp., 7 X 10
Cloth $60.00
ISBN 978-0-87480-769-1

Scholars first began to unravel the ancient Maya “script” during the 1980s, based primarily on phonetic decipherment of individual signs with reference to recorded languages. But to move beyond simple interpretation to a deeper, grammatical understanding required the application of historical linguistic techniques. From the late 1990s to the present, the understanding of the phonology and grammar of Maya inscriptions has undergone a further revolution. The Linguistics of Maya Writing catches that “second great wave in Maya epigraphy,” bringing together the work of some of the most prominent scholars in the field and perhaps providing the foundation for the next generation of breakthroughs in Maya hieroglyphic decipherment.
Contents and Contributors:
The Linguistic Epigraphy of Mayan Writing: Recent Advances and Questions for Future Research
Søren Wichmann
Chontal Linguistic Influence in Ancient Maya Writing:
Intransitive Positional Verbal Affixation Zachary X. Hruby and Mark B. Child
The Languages of the Dresden Codex: Legacy of the Classic Maya
Robert F. Wald
The Orthographic Distinction between Velar and Glottal Spirants in Maya Hieroglyphic Writing
Nikolai Grube
Disharmony in Maya Hieroglyphic Writing: Linguistic Change and Continuity in Classic Society
Stephen Houston, David Stuart, and John Robertson
On the Representation of the Glottal Stop in Maya Writing Alfonso Lacadena and Søren Wichmann
Passive Voice in Classic Mayan Texts: CV[h]C-ah and –n-ah Constructions
Alfonso Lacadena
On the Morphology of Intimate Posession in Mayan Languages and Classic Mayan Glyphic Nouns Mar
c Zender
Telling Time in Classic-Ch’olan and Acalan-Chontal Narrative Robert F. Wald
Tense and Aspect in Mayan Hieroglyphic Script John Robertson, Stephen Houston, and David Stuart
A World in a Grain of Sand: “Secondary Verbs” in the Classic Maya Script
Barbara MacLeod
The Grammar of the Half-Period Glyph
Søren Wichmann
The Preferred Argument Structure of Classic Lowland Mayan
Texts David F. Mora-Marín
Ch’olti’: An Analysis of the Arte de la lengua Cholti by Fray Francisco Morán
Mareike Sattler

Soren Wichmann is associate research professor of linguistics at the University of Copenhage.