EAL Nexus Resource The Mayans Mayan writing Subject: Age groups: History Age groups: 8-11 Topic: A non-European society that provides contrasts with British history © Bell Educational Trust 2016 EAL Nexus – free downloadable teaching materials https://eal.britishcouncil.org/ This resource was originally developed by L Webster and has been adapted for EAL Nexus.

Mayan writing dates back to 292 AD. They used hieroglyphs (pictures).

They carved hieroglyphs onto buildings, walls, pottery and precious stones.

Only priests and nobles could read them all.

Trained scribes could write them all. © British Council 2014

There were hundreds of hieroglyphs. It was difficult to learn them all There were hundreds of hieroglyphs. It was difficult to learn them all. Most Mayans could read some hieroglyphs.

Mayans wrote codices.

Codices recorded the important events in the reign of a king.

They wrote on the bark of fig trees They wrote on the bark of fig trees. The bark was steamed and beaten and then covered in a thin layer of plaster.

Mayans wrote on the bark using turkey feathers.

The Spanish burned the codices because they wanted the Mayans to become Christians.

The Mayans wrote thousands of codices, but today there are only four of them left.

© British Council 2014 Hieroglyphics https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APalenque_glyphs-edit1.jpg By User:Kwamikagami (English Wikipedia) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMaya_Hieroglyphs_Fig_52.jpgBy Sylvanus Griswold Morley, (1883–1948) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMaya_Hieroglyphs_Fig_25.jpgBy Sylvanus Griswold Morley, (1883–1948) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons Codex By Éclusette (Own work) [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commonshttps://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMexico_-_Museo_de_antropologia_-_Livre_maya.JPGOwn work, attribution required (Multi-license with GFDL and Creative Commons CC-BY 3.0) Free to share, copy , distribute https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACodexPages6_8.jpg See page for author [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons By Unknown - Scan, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=21891260 Priest https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AMayan_Priest_Sees_Conquistadors_in_Future_-_Mural_in_Municipal_Council_Building_-_Valladolid_-_Yucatan_-_Mexico.jpg By Adam Jones, Ph.D. (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons free: to share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work King https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/Tonin%C3%A1_Stela_1.jpgBy Simon Burchell (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia CommonsThis work is free and may be used by anyone for any purpose Fig https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Feige-Schnitt.pngThis work has been released into the public domain by its author, Kyle_the_hacker. This applies worldwide. In some countries this may not be legally possible; if so: Kyle_the_hacker grants anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law. Fig tree https://www.flickr.com/photos/ppym1/154644746 Creative Commons License Deed Attribution-NonCommercial 2.0 Generic (CC BY-NC 2.0) Fig tree bark (conceptmap) https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/94/Ficus_religiosa_Bo.jpg Marshman at the English language Wikipedia [GFDL (http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html) or CC-BY-SA-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/)], via Wikimedia Commons Turkey feather https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ATurkey_Feather.JPGBy gunthercox (Own work) [CC0], via Wikimedia CommonsThis file is made available under the Creative Commons CC0 1.0 Universal Public Domain Dedicatio © British Council 2014