Dresden Codex
The finest surviving pre-Columbian Maya manuscript, an astronomical and ritual almanac painted by unnamed scribes around the eleventh to thirteenth century.
- 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 Dresden Codex is a screenfold manuscript of painted bark paper, the most complete of the four surviving Maya codices, containing Venus tables, eclipse tables, and ritual almanacs of remarkable precision. It was produced in Yucatan, likely between the eleventh and thirteenth centuries, by trained scribes working in a tradition that did not record individual authorship. Analysis of the hands suggests several scribes contributed. Whoever they were, their names were never part of the object, and the codex stands for a whole literature whose authors are unrecoverable after the destruction of the Maya libraries.
Questions readers ask
Who wrote Dresden Codex?
Nobody knows. No author for Dresden Codex has been identified in the documented record.
Can I read Dresden Codex for free?
Yes. Dresden Codex is in the public domain and the full text is free to read at Project Gutenberg.
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- Still unknown
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