Maya writing: Did you mean...?

This painted incense container is made from cut stone and dates from c. 600-900 CE. Maya artisans created it in what is present-day Guatemala during the Classical era. (Musée du Cinquantenaire, Brussels)

This structure had a ceremonial use for the Maya people as it lies in the middle of the plaza at San Gervasio, which is located on the island of Cozumel, Mexico. It therefore must have served as a dais from which the speaker addressed the...

This structure located at the Maya archaeological site of San Gervasio on the Mexican island of Cozumel was so named as numerous human remains were found inside during archaeological excavation. The temple no longer exists, but it originally...

This Maya relief depicting a nobleman is made from chalkstone, and it comes from what is present-day Tabasco, Mexico. It dates from the Late Classic Period around the year 780 CE. (Museum Rietberg, Zürich).

Kapilavastu (“Place of Kapila”) is the name of the city where Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha, l. c. 563-483 BCE) grew up and lived for the first 29 years of his life before leaving to pursue the spiritual path which led to his enlightenment...

Cuneiform is a writing system or script which was developed by the ancient Sumerians in Mesopotamia between 3500 and 3000 BCE. It is the earliest form of writing in the world and is thought to have developed so people could communicate long-distance...

Writing is generally agreed to be among the greatest inventions in human history, perhaps the greatest invention, since it made history possible. Subscribe for regular science videos: http://bit.ly/RiSubscRibe You can read more about...

Writing in runes isn't a simple one-to-one conversion of one letter to one rune. This video shows how Old Norse was written using the runes of the Younger Futhark, and then looks at examples of real inscriptions from the Viking Age. Contents...

Your vowels were invented in Greece, giving birth to the first "true" alphabet. Watch as your new toga-clad friend turns your consonant abjad into a consonant-vowel alphabet. It's such a useful mapping of letters to sounds that neighbor...

Not a syllabary. Not quite an alphabet. Totally Indian. Watch Ashoka discuss his land's exotic script and tell you his plans for this unique alphasyllabary. This episode traces the invention of the Indic alphasyllabary, the parent of so...