We will never know the full extent of what Mesoamericans knew or believed, because Chriggers burnt almost all their literature
>>18531378Let's not pretend you wouldn't burn all religious texts yourself given the chance.
>>18531382I'm not an anti-theist
>>18531382>Implying that pre-Christian Mesoamericans weren’t religious
>>18531378They also killed the priests and disrupted the living tradition. The bastard monks also hyper-focused on the Mexica and other central Mexicans so we know vastly more about them than anyone else (bar the Maya).>>18531382Even the most rabid anti-theists will give lip-service to the idea that religious texts should be preserved for their Historical/Artistic/etc value.You aren't on even ground.
>>18531382Atheists are more interested in religions than theists
>>18531378While it is true, it is also fair to remember these things are unpreservable in local conditions so it's likely whatever the fuckers destroyed wasn't older than a couple decades.Definitely no Libraries of Alexandria keeping records made since the Olmecs over there could exist. Just like the Khmer made a fuckton of writing and we haven't found a single letter bar their stone inscriptions because the local terrain absolutely murders writing mediums not conserved with modern technology.
>>18531530Anon, the oldest surviving Mayan codex was at minimum three hundred+ years old when the Spanish made landfall in Mesoamerica. Don't talk about what you don't know.
>>18531550I'm referring to the Codex Grolier, btw. It's been tested and verified.
>>18531530>unpreservable in local conditionsNigga you really think the Aztecs lived in some kind of Amazonian rainforest?
>>18531651Did Romans? And yet the absolute majority of their writing survives from shit in Egypt and super-rare and specific kind of marshland.>>18531550>>18531552It's also been long considered an obvious forgery for a reason. It's just brutally unexpected for something like that to exist, even as badly fragmentary and falling apart as it is.
>>18531973>Did Romans? And yet the absolute majority of their writing survives from shit in EgyptNo, the majority of their writing survives from being copied over and over and preserved in monasteries and libraries.Are you genuinely retarded?
>>18532071Sure, anon. Now remember there is no record of such a tradition in Mesoamerica so you're down to physical preservation and...What they could write down for posterity they did. In latin. It's how we have Popol Vuh, all sorts of descriptions of myths and so on. Tinted with the conversion but what can you do.But the sort of things this whole thread laments only has one pathway of survival and that is not rotting away, most often and likely by the way of being looted and preserved in places that aren't quite as hostile to paper.
>>18532184>Now remember there is no record of such a tradition in MesoamericaWell yeah because the Spanish burned everything to do with native scribes, including their books and institutions
>>18531378they didnt burn shit. its just hidden in the vatican.
>>18531530>>18531550>>18531973>hurr it doesn't preserve wellMoron. A long-ass fucking aztec codex turned up like last year. Several of these things have turned up in attics, such as the mapa de cuahtinchan number 2. They can last a while if left alone. The fucking retarded Spaniards really did obliterate them all. I don't know how they did it, it was a colossal feat, but they did it.
>>18532189They unironically believe only Christians can preserve and copy writings.
Now I shall glorify my divine Maya ancestors by posting some of their preserved masonry.
Artistic depiction of commoner life.
>>18531378>nooooooo not my religious books telling me how to human sacrifice someone to the sun
>>18531530>these things are unpreservable in local conditions so it's likely whatever the fuckers destroyed wasn't older than a couple decades.Not really. Lots of books decayed naturally in the more humid areas of the Yucatan, but those books were the ones that were just lying around abandoned in people's houses. If you just leave paper exposed to the elements its going to fall apart pretty much everywhere. But the people of the Yucatan had libraries that they were able to keep dry and keep books for centuries in. Most of the rest of Mexican civilization lived in a climate similar to Italy or Greece
>>18532356Can't see a single titty. Sad.
>>18532460>implying that doesn't sound useful
Here's what they themselves said about it + one Indigenous noble/descendant of royaltyBernardino de Sahagun>...This...has happened to these Indians at the hands of the Spaniards...so...trampled...and destroyed, with all of their things, that no resemblance was left of what they were.... So now they are considered...barbarians...in reality, in matters of governance...they are far ahead of many other nations that presume to be...civilized. If even the little that has been found with great effort promises much profit, how much more might there be..."Jose de Acosta>...there is great knowledge...they [had[ letters and books, with which they preserved... the deeds of their ancestors...the distribution of time, and knowledge of plants and animals and other [natural things] as well as their ancient customs...the result of great...diligence. A missionary...thought that all of it must be witches’ spells...and insisted that they be burned...which was regretted...not only by the Indians but by curious Spaniards...The same fate has befallen other things, which...meant the loss of many...ancient and hidden things that might have been of...useDiego de Landa>These people...made use of certain characters...with which they wrote in their books their ancient matters and their sciences, and by these...they understood their affairs and...taught them. We found a large number of [these books]... and, as they contained nothing [that was not seen as]...lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they regretted to an amazing degree, and...caused them much afflictionFernando de Alva Ixtlilxochitl:>I have always...desired to know...the historical events in this new world...no less important than those of the Romans, Greeks...However...their histories were...burned...everything within the royal archives...this was one of the greatest losses that these lands...suffered....all the memories of their antiquity and other things that served as writings and records were destroyed1/?
Notice how neither the actual, high class Spaniards (white), or the Amerindian natives (red) were bad, neither was thinking of the genocide or systematic destruction of one another. The true bad was the scum sent by Spain; ie andalusian moor mutts (brown) who could only think of murdering, rape and destruction; and similarly, today, the multiracial latinX abominations (brown) are the violent ones, not the white or red peoples as all murder rate maps show. It truly must be miserable to be latinx. It's not about religion or technology, it's about simply not being brown. How hard is this to memorize?
>>18531382No, I like antiquities and wish to preserve ancient artifacts. Destroying them is quite literally barbarian behavior and recognized as such throughout time.
>>18532238>it was a colossal feat, but they did it.Your underlying assumption is that this would have taken great effort, but if there weren't many books to begin with and they all existed in a few easy to find locations, then it would have been easy. Whatever literature that existed was probably not in the hands of common people. It would have been in the hands of elites and located within special buildings.
>>18533734>but if there weren't many books to begin with and they all existed in a few easy to find locations, then it would have been easyWe have tribute documents recording the Aztec capital alone receiving around 500,000 pieces of paper annually
>>18533737Okay, maybe there was a library or state archives.If books concentrated in libraries and common people rarely have them, I guess you can just burn the libraries and it wouldn't take much effort.
>>18533737We also know Aztecs did not have a true writing system and that among other things, they used paper as a decoration and sacrificial object.They weren't running a colonial empire hovering up all of Mesoamerica's paper to feed into Gutenberg's presses there.
>>18535164>a true writing systemIt's not considered proto-writing.
>>18535164They preferred pictographic styles but we know for a fact that their writing was able to record large amounts of complex information. They had in depth history books, legal documents, tribute records, poetry books, etc. Their script was similar to early Egyptian where symbols often had dual meanings, a dog or a skull could represent a sound but it could also just be a dog or a skull for people who are only partially literate, or perhaps it'd relate to something named similarly to a dog or a skull like "dog day" or "skull town". They'd prefer to convey information via very visually complex pictorals when possible but obviously that wouldn't be possible for everything, and they had a more familiar system of numbers and symbols for more complex information they couldn't convey visually. It was RIDICULOUSLY overcomplicated but it was a true writing system perfectly capable of recording sounds and complex information.It's unfortunate that since so much knowledge about their culture and language has been lost, it's very hard to decipher a lot of this because their whole society was so reliant on metaphors. It's sort of like how an ancient Greek might associate a chariot with the sun or a tortoise with the messenger god, it makes perfect sense to them but without knowledge of their culture an outsider would never guess that. This depiction of the Mexico valley for example, the dudes around it are representing the rulers of the local city states, each associated with some symbol that presumably relates to their names, culture, and history, but without context we can only guess at wtf these symbols really meant, and without the writing the Spanish added you might not even recognize it as a a list of regions. Mesoamericans were OBSESSED with metaphor and symbolism, I can't think of any other society more fixated on them than they were.
Why do e-Christians in this thread unironically believe that only Christians are capable of copying down texts and ignore the fact that Christians are the main cause for the destruction of institutions who would have preserved them fine on their own? China has never been Christian, has fallen to foreign invaders and devastating wars countless times, yet they still preserve countless texts dating back to the 4th century BC.
>>18532460You're on the history board. If that doesn't sound intriguing to you then you shouldn't be here. Maybe it's time to go back to your religion vs atheism threads.
>>18531474trvke
>>18531382Hardly. I would keep them as a fascinating example of what ignorant, superstitious primitive people used to believe, so that we could collectively laugh at their silly nonsense.
>>18535247You have to be older than eighteen to post here
>>18531378who cares what savages know or believe?
>>18535266bait
