I couldn’t agree more. Mayan, Mixtec, Tlaxcallan, and dozens of other cultures had the majority of their history obliterated. Knowledge built through millennia burned in a couple centuries.
I’ve got a couple books translated from Nahuatl into English that have some of the flowery words of the tlamatinime, “Scattering of Jades” and “Fifteen Poets of the Aztec World”. They are very precious because like you said barely anything survives. It’s incredibly sad.
Any day we uncover more texts that somehow escaped the Spanish book burnings is a good day.
Always makes me sad to think about all the literature lost with the Maya codices.
I couldn’t agree more. Mayan, Mixtec, Tlaxcallan, and dozens of other cultures had the majority of their history obliterated. Knowledge built through millennia burned in a couple centuries.
Not just history either but art. Barely any poetry survives, and I’m sure there were other works of fiction lost, like stories of myths and legends.
I’ve got a couple books translated from Nahuatl into English that have some of the flowery words of the tlamatinime, “Scattering of Jades” and “Fifteen Poets of the Aztec World”. They are very precious because like you said barely anything survives. It’s incredibly sad.