Dresden Codex
The Dresden Codex, also known as the Codex Dresdensis, is a pre-Columbian Maya book of the eleventh or twelfth century of the Yucatecan Maya in Chichén Itzá.[1] This Maya codex is believed to be a copy of an original text of some three or four hundred years earlier.[2] It is the oldest book written in the Americas known to historians.[3]
The Dresden Codex consists of 39 sheets, inscribed on both sides, with an overall length of 3.56 metres (11.7 feet). Originally, the manuscript had been folded in accordion folds. Today, it is exhibited in two parts, each of them approximately 1.8 metres (5.9 feet) long, at the museum of the Saxon State Library in Dresden, Germany.
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[edit] History
Johann Christian Götze, Director of the Royal Library at Dresden, purchased the codex from a private owner in Vienna in 1739. How it came to Vienna is unknown. It is speculated that it was sent by Hernán Cortés as a tribute to King Charles I of Spain in 1519. Charles had appointed Cortés governor and captain general of the newly conquered Mexican territory. The codex has been in Europe ever since. The state library of Saxony, the Royal Library in Dresden, first published it in 1848.[4] It was not until 1853 that Charles Étienne Brasseur de Bourbourg identified the Dresden Codex as a Mayan manuscript.
Between 1880 and 1900, Dresden librarian Ernst Wilhelm Förstemann succeeded in deciphering the calendar section. Other parts could be decoded using the De Landa alphabet, developed earlier by Diego de Landa.
The library that held the codex was bombed and suffered serious damage during the firebombing of Dresden in World War II. The Dresden Codex was heavily water damaged. Twelve pages were harmed and other parts were destroyed. The codex was meticulously restored.[4]
[edit] Description
The Dresden Codex is considered the most complete of the three undisputably authentic Mayan codices. The names of the codices indicate where they were originally housed.[5] The Dresden Codex is made from Amatl paper ("kopó", fig-bark that has been flattened and covered with a lime paste), doubled in folds in an accordion-like form (sometimes called leporello after the servant in Mozart's opera Don Giovanni, who keeps an accordion-folded list of his master's conquests) of folding-screen texts. The codex of bark paper is coated with fine stucco or gesso and is eight inches high by eleven feet long.[5]
The Dresden Codex totals 78 pages on 39 double-sided sheets, with an overall length of 3.56 metres (11.7 feet). Each sheet measures 20.5 centimetres (8.1 in) by 10.0 centimetres (3.9 in). Originally, the codex had been accordion-folded. Since 1835 it has been exhibited in two parts, each of them preserved between glass panes.
The codex was written by eight different scribes using both sides. They all had their own particular writing style, glyphs and subject matter. The images of the codex were painted with extraordinary clarity using very fine brushes. The basic colors used for the codex, made of vegetable dyes, were red, black and the so-called Mayan blue.
The Dresden Codex contains astronomical tables of outstanding accuracy. It is most famous for its Lunar Series and Venus table.[2] The lunar series has intervals correlating with eclipses. The Venus Table correlates with the apparent movements of the planet. The codex also contains almanacs, astronomical and astrological tables, and ritual schedules.[2] The specific numen references have to do with a 260-day ritual cycle divided up in several ways.[5] The Dresden Codex also includes instructions concerning new-year ceremonies as well as descriptions of the Rain God's locations.
[edit] See also
[edit] Notes and references
[edit] Bibliography
- Anzovin, Steven et al., Famous First Facts International Edition, H. W. Wilson Company (2000), ISBN 0-8242-0958-3.
- Aveni, Anthony F., Empires of Time, Tauris Parke Paperbacks, 2000, ISBN 1-86064-602-6.
- Thompson, J. Eric S., A Commentary on the Dresden Codex: A Maya Hieroglyphic Book, Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1972.
- Ruggles, Clive L.N., Ancient Astronomy, ABC-CLIO, 2005, ISBN 1-85109-477-6.
- Sharer, Robert J. et al., The Ancient Maya, Stanford University Press, 2006, ISBN 0-8047-4817-9.
- Teresi, Dick, Lost Discoveries: The Ancient Roots of Modern Science—from the Babylonians to the Maya, Simon and Schuster, 2002, ISBN 0-684-83718-8.
- Van Stone, Mark (2008). "It's Not the End of the World: What the Ancient Maya Tell Us About 2012." Located online at the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies website.
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press.
[edit] External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Dresden Codex |
- Facsimiles of the codex at the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc., with PDF downloads
- The Dresden Codex Lunar Series and Sidereal Astronomy
- Dresden Library Scans High-resolution scans of the Dresden Codex (site in German, PDF link at right)
- 3D reconstruction and animation of the Codex Dresden in different conditions
