Chilam Balam
The Yucatec Maya books of prophecy, history, and medicine, compiled by unnamed town scribes and attributed by tradition to the priest Chilam Balam.
- Original byline
- Anonymous
- Published
- Date not recorded
- Form
- Other works
- Authorship
- Still unknown
- Reason for anonymity
- Unrecorded
- Copyright
- Public domain
- Reference
- Wikipedia · Wikidata
The authorship story
The Books of Chilam Balam are handwritten Yucatec Maya miscellanies from the colonial period, each associated with a town, mixing prophecy, chronicle, calendrics, and medicine. They take their name from Chilam Balam, a jaguar priest of Maya tradition said to have prophesied before the Spanish came. The actual compilers were generations of anonymous local scribes writing Maya in Latin script, copying and reworking older material. No individual author is documented for any of the books. The attribution to the legendary priest is a framing device, and the real authorship is collective and unrecorded.
Questions readers ask
Who wrote Chilam Balam?
Nobody knows. No author for Chilam Balam has been identified in the documented record.
Can I read Chilam Balam for free?
Yes. Chilam Balam is in the public domain and the full text is free to read at the Internet Archive.
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