Home›Open Questions›How many Maya hieroglyphic books existed before 1562, and how many were destroyed at Maní?Open QuestionsHow many Maya hieroglyphic books existed before 1562, and how many were destroyed at Maní?Citation FormatsGeneral ReferenceGeneral Reference Citation TextDivinity Atlas. "How many Maya hieroglyphic books existed before 1562, and how many were destroyed at Maní?." Accessed August 30, 2026. https://www.divinityatlas.com/open-questions-index/how-many-maya-hieroglyphic-books-existed-before-1562-and-how-many-were-destroyed-at-mani.Copy General ReferenceAPA StyleAPA Style Citation TextDivinity Atlas. (n.d.). How many Maya hieroglyphic books existed before 1562, and how many were destroyed at Maní?. Retrieved August 30, 2026, from https://www.divinityatlas.com/open-questions-index/how-many-maya-hieroglyphic-books-existed-before-1562-and-how-many-were-destroyed-at-maniCopy APA StyleBibTeXBibTeX Citation Text@misc{divinityatlas-how-many-maya-hieroglyphic-books-existed, author = {Divinity Atlas}, title = {How many Maya hieroglyphic books existed before 1562, and how many were destroyed at Maní?}, year = {2026}, url = {https://www.divinityatlas.com/open-questions-index/how-many-maya-hieroglyphic-books-existed-before-1562-and-how-many-were-destroyed-at-mani}, note = {Accessed August 30, 2026} }Copy BibTeXOpen QuestionCross-Tradition ConnectionsSourcesComments (0)Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)Open QuestionFour Maya codices survive in the world. Landa records twenty seven books burned at Maní, but the Relación survives only as a shortened copy of a lost original, so his own figure cannot be verified against what he wrote. No census of the pre conquest manuscript corpus was ever made, and Maní was not the only burning. Nobody holds a position on the size of the corpus, which makes this an unfilled gap rather than a scholarly disagreement.What would resolve this A recovered fuller copy of the Relación would establish what Landa actually claimed. An archaeological find of interred or cached bark paper manuscripts, of the kind that has produced fragmentary codices in Maya burials, would begin to establish the scale of production. Systematic study of codex fragments already excavated but too degraded to read may become possible with improved imaging.OpenMaya epigraphy and archaeology; colonial Spanish archival history; conservation imagingDiego de Landa, Relacion de las cosas de YucatanCross-Tradition ConnectionsQuestion OnDiego de Landa, Historical Figures Well-attested Source Relacion de las cosas de YucatanDiego de Landatier 2SourcesRelacion de las cosas de Yucatantier 2Diego de Landa, Dante S.A., 1864View the SourceComments (0)No comments yet. Be the first to share a thought.Sign in to join the discussion.Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.View At A Past YearThe atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.Show This Year