Classic Maya Text Repository: An open-access collaborative platform for research and annotation of encoded hieroglyphic texts

FAIN: HAA-268887-20

Unicode Consortium (Mountain View, CA 94043-3941)
Gabrielle Vail (Project Director: June 2019 to December 2022)

The development of an open-access, online collaborative platform and repository of Maya hieroglyphic texts for use by scholars and descendent communities. This project contributes to the longer-term endeavor to expand the international Unicode Standard repertoire to include the Maya script.

Our Level II project seeks to annotate Classic period (ca. 250-900 CE) Maya hieroglyphic texts from the Northern lowlands, Central Peten, and Western regions and make them accessible for study online. Using an open-access online platform for annotating ancient documents (READ), texts from the Postclassic Maya codices (ca. 1250 – 1519 CE) that were digitally rendered during the project’s previous phase will be published in digital form for public use. Concurrently, select Classic period inscriptions will be encoded and annotated using READ, resulting in a repository of digitally encoded Maya hieroglyphic texts. These texts form an important part of the dataset of Maya literature extending from the second century BCE through the colonial, republican, and more recent periods—an almost unbroken record spanning two millennia. Through these tools, online users have the ability to examine, query, manage, edit, annotate, and render Maya texts in ways not previously imaginable.

Associated Products

Handouts for Workshop on Deciphering Maya Hieroglyphic Texts (Course or Curricular Material)
Title: Handouts for Workshop on Deciphering Maya Hieroglyphic Texts
Author: Gabrielle Vail
Author: Christine Hernandez
Abstract: Using the newly developed Mayan-READ database, this workshop provided Kaqchikel language speakers the opportunity to work with the images recently uploaded of Merle Greene Robertson's rubbings to segment and annotate hieroglyphic texts.
Year: 2021
Audience: Other

Enhancing the Classic Maya Text Repository using Rubbings from Tulane's Latin American Library (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Enhancing the Classic Maya Text Repository using Rubbings from Tulane's Latin American Library
Author: Gabrielle Vail
Author: Christine Hernandez
Abstract: Poster prepared for the poster session “Collaborative, Open-Source Tools for Researching Maya Hieroglyphic Texts,” organized by Gabrielle Vail for the Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting.
Date: 03/18/21
Primary URL: https://ncodex.org/publications.php
Primary URL Description: Website developed by project collaborator Carlos Pallan.
Secondary URL: https://app.gather.town/app/SxCqb3WBBUhsXvMa/classicmayatexts
Secondary URL Description: A Gather space where products from the Classic Maya Text Repository project are available for viewing by interested parties.
Conference Name: Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting.

Integrating Mayan Textual Repositories with Phase-Two Font Development (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Integrating Mayan Textual Repositories with Phase-Two Font Development
Author: Carlos Pallán Gayol
Author: Andrew Glass
Author: Céline Tamignaux
Abstract: Poster prepared for the poster session “Collaborative, Open-Source Tools for Researching Maya Hieroglyphic Texts,” organized by Gabrielle Vail for the Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting.
Date: 03/18/21
Primary URL: https://ncodex.org/publications.php
Primary URL Description: Website developed by project collaborator Carlos Pallan.
Secondary URL: https://app.gather.town/app/SxCqb3WBBUhsXvMa/classicmayatexts
Secondary URL Description: A Gather space where products from the Classic Maya Text Repository project are available for viewing by interested parties.
Conference Name: Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting

Comparing Linguistic Patterns within Maya Hieroglyphic Texts Across Time, Space, and Media (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Comparing Linguistic Patterns within Maya Hieroglyphic Texts Across Time, Space, and Media
Author: Holly Maxwell
Author: Stephen White
Abstract: Poster prepared for the poster session “Collaborative, Open-Source Tools for Researching Maya Hieroglyphic Texts,” organized by Gabrielle Vail for the Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting.
Date: 03/18/21
Primary URL: https://ncodex.org/publications.php
Primary URL Description: Website developed by project collaborator Carlos Pallan.
Secondary URL: https://app.gather.town/app/SxCqb3WBBUhsXvMa/classicmayatexts
Secondary URL Description: A Gather space where products from the Classic Maya Text Repository project are available for viewing by interested parties.
Conference Name: Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting

Making Maya Hieroglyphs Accessible Online via Script Encoding Initiative Project (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Making Maya Hieroglyphs Accessible Online via Script Encoding Initiative Project
Author: Deborah Anderson
Abstract: Poster prepared for the poster session “Collaborative, Open-Source Tools for Researching Maya Hieroglyphic Texts,” organized by Gabrielle Vail for the Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting.
Date: 03/18/21
Primary URL: https://ncodex.org/publications.php
Primary URL Description: Website developed by project collaborator Carlos Pallan.
Secondary URL: https://app.gather.town/app/SxCqb3WBBUhsXvMa/classicmayatexts
Secondary URL Description: A Gather space where products from the Classic Maya Text Repository project are available for viewing by interested parties.
Conference Name: Rocky Mountain Council of Latin American Studies Annual Meeting

Uses and Approaches to Archival Materials in the Digital World (Conference Paper/Presentation)
Title: Uses and Approaches to Archival Materials in the Digital World
Author: Gabrielle Vail
Author: Christine Hernandez
Abstract: The panel seeks to explore the innovative ways in which librarians have engaged with digital primary sources through innovations in teaching, research, and how their work has made these materials accessible to the broader academic community during the pandemic. Christine Hernández and Gabrielle Vail will speak their NEH/Unicode funded project to digitize Maya rubbings that will form part of an online repository where scholars can identify, transcribe, and translate Maya hieroglyphic texts; Patricia Figueroa and Heather Cole will give a short presentation on their findings as part of the Ithaka S + R Report and its application in teaching with primary sources; and Rachel Stein will present how she turned in-person instruction into an online activity using LibGuides.
Date: 07/19/21
Primary URL: https://salalm2021.us2.pathable.com/meetings/virtual/yaha24oCjQ2pu4A2J
Primary URL Description: SALALM conference website.

Classic Maya Glyphary (Database/Archive/Digital Edition)
Title: Classic Maya Glyphary
Author: Andrew Glass
Author: Gabrielle Vail
Author: Holly Maxwell
Author: Celine Tamignaux
Author: Maximillian Mermell
Abstract: Drawings of Maya glyphs from hieroglyphic texts dating to the Late Classic period from the Central, Southern, and Western regions. Catalog codes were assigned based on the system developed by Martha Macri, Matthew Looper, and Gabrielle Vail for the New Catalog of Maya Hieroglyphs (2003, 2009, 2022). Drawings by Maximillian Mermell and Celine Tamignaux.
Year: 2021
Primary URL: http://readvm.westeurope.cloudapp.azure.com/readmayan/plugins/dictionary/?section=classic
Access Model: Open access

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