Isthmian script

Infobox Writing system
name= Isthmian script
type= Undeciphered
typedesc= (Hypothesized to be logographic)
time= Relatively unknown, perhaps 500 BCE to 500 CE
languages= Unknown

The Isthmian script is a very early Mesoamerican writing system in use in the area of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec from perhaps 500 BCE to 500 CE, although there is disagreement on these dates. It is also called the La Mojarra script and the Epi-Olmec script ('post-Olmec script').

Isthmian script is structurally similar to the later Maya script, and like Maya uses one set of characters to represent logograms (or word units) and a second set to represent syllables. [Lo.]

Recovered Texts

The four most extensive Isthmian texts are those found on:

* The La Mojarra Stela 1
* The Tuxtla Statuette
* Tres Zapotes Stela C
* A Teotihuacan-style mask (shown at right).

Other texts include:

* A few Isthmian glyphs on four badly weathered stelae — 5, 6, 8, and probably 15 — at Cerro de las Mesas.
* Approximately 23 glyphs on the O'Boyle "mask", a clay artifact in a private collection of unknown provenance.
* A small number of glyphs on a pottery-sherd from Chiapa de Corzo. This sherd has been assigned the oldest date of any Isthmian script artifact: 450-300 BCE. [Pérez de Lara and Justeson.]

Decipherment

In a 1993 paper, John Justeson and Terrence Kaufman proposed a partial decipherment of the Isthmian text found on the La Mojarra Stela, claiming that the language represented was a member of the Mixe-Zoquean language-family. In 1997, the same two epigraphers published a second paper on Epi-Olmec writing, in which they further claimed that a newly discovered text-section from the stela had yielded readily to the decipherment-system that they had established earlier for the longer section of text. This led to a Guggenheim Fellowship for their work, in 2003.

The following year, however, their interpretation of the La Mojarra text was disputed by Stephen Houston and Michael D. Coe, who had tried unsuccessfully to apply the Justeson-Kaufman decipherment-system to the Isthmian text on the back of the hitherto unknown Teotihuacan-style mask (which is of unknown provenance and is now in a private collection). The matter is still under discussion.

Notes

References

* [http://byunews.byu.edu/release.aspx?story=archive04/Jan/Isthmian Brigham Young University press-release] on behalf of Brigham Young University archaeologist Stephen Houston and Yale University professor emeritus Michael Coe disputing the Justeson-Kaufman findings.*Diehl, Richard A. (2004) "The Olmecs: America's First Civilization", Thames & Hudson, London.
*Houston, Stephen, and Michael Coe (2004) "Has Isthmian Writing Been Deciphered?", in "Mexicon" XXV:151-161.
*Justeson, John S., and Terrence Kaufman (1993), "A Decipherment of Epi-Olmec Hieroglyphic Writing" in "Science", Vol. 259, 19 March 1993, pp. 1703-11.
*Justeson, John S., and Terrence Kaufman (1997) [http://www.sciencemag.org/feature/data/justeson.dtl "A Newly Discovered Column in the Hieroglyphic Text on La Mojarra Stela 1: a Test of the Epi-Olmec Decipherment",] "Science", Vol. 277, 11 July 1997, pp. 207-10.
*Justeson, John S., and Terrence Kaufman (2001) [http://www.albany.edu/anthro/maldp/EOTEXTS.pdf "Epi-Olmec Hieroglyphic Writing and Texts"] .
*Lo, Lawrence; " [http://www.ancientscripts.com/epiolmec.html Epi-Olmec] ", at [http://www.ancientscripts.com/ Ancient Scripts.com] ] (accessed January 2008).
*Pérez de Lara, Jorge, and John Justeson [http://www.famsi.org/reports/05084/index.html "Photographic Documentation of Monuments with Epi-Olmec Script/Imagery"] , Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies (FAMSI).
*Schuster, Angela M. H. (1997) " [http://cat.he.net/~archaeol/online/news/la.mojarra.html Epi-Olmec Decipherment] " in "Archaeology", online (accessed January 2008).

ee also

* Cascajal block
* San Andrés (Mesoamerican site)

External links

* [http://obelix.ee.duth.gr/~apostolo/Epi-Olmec/highres.html High resolution image of the Isthmian glyph table]
* [http://www.kennethgarrett.com/imageSubject/popitem.php?ID=237 Tuxtla Statuette photograph]
* [http://www.pitt.edu/~pittanth/research/latin/photos/kaufman-full.jpgDrawing of La Mojarra Stela 1]
* [http://byunews.byu.edu//releases/archive04/Jan/Isthmian/Mask%20back-L.jpgHigh resolution photo of the Coe/Huston Mask]