Column with Hieroglyphs

The elaborately carved figures and symbols seen on this column are Maya hieroglyphs, a writing system that mixes pictorial representations with phonetic signs. Most Maya monuments focus extraordinary emphasis on chronological precision as they describe detailed political histories of competing city-states. In Maya writing, dots record single units and bars record five. Texts typically begin in the upper left, moving to the right and top to bottom in double columns. Here, the first nine glyphs record the date in an array of different Maya calendars that correspond to a day in April, 715. On that day, the ruler of Bonampak commemorated the 13th anniversary of his reign. The text goes on to document his status as the vassal of a Tonina ruler known as K’inich B’aaknal Chaak, ‘Great-Sun Bone-Place Rain God’.