Among their many achievements, the ancient Maya of Central America invented, by 250 A.D. at the latest, a fully functional, phonetic writing system. Scribes recorded sophisticated texts containing religious, astronomical, and very likely historical, literary, and even medical content – in other words, an entire system of human thought – in bark-paper books, called codices. Of the many thousands of Maya codices that must once have existed, only four remain. Time, a humid climate, and the zealous, destructive tendencies of one 16th century Spanish friar named Diego de Landa combined to ensure the destruction of the rest. As a librarian and longtime student of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, I’ve often wondered about the nature of ancient Maya libraries. Were scribes, many of whom now appear to have been blood relatives of Maya kings and queens, responsible for safeguarding the codices, as seems likely? Or were a separate group of specialists the librarians? Maya codices were not particularly fragile. If properly cared for they could have lasted for many decades or more. It’s intriguing, then, to think about where codices might have been housed and by what system cataloged and shelved.

Of course it would be naive to expect these and other “burning” questions to be addressed in Mel Gibson’s new film Apocalypto. After all, this is Hollywood not PBS. On one level, most Maya archaeologists and art historians will probably be happy the film got made at all. Discounting J. Lee Thompson’s 1963 Kings of the Sun, Apocalypto is the first Hollywood epic to treat any ancient New World civilization. (One wonders why this is so, since the clash of Worlds we call the Conquest makes Russell Crowe’s Colosseum tour look like a walk in the park.) Certainly Apocalypto’s high production values, including especially its exquisite costuming in conjunction with the sheer joy (see Ardren, below) of hearing the very much alive-and-well Yucatec Maya language spoken on the big screen, are a great enticement. But unfortunately, in the end, Apocalypto is an enticement with very little substance. The fundamental disappointment among academics will likely not involve per se the film’s numerous and rather egregious historical inaccuracies, e.g. the conflation of pre-Classic, Classic, and post-Classic imagery; the absurd Yanomamo-like portrayal of the village Maya as hunter gatherers, unaware of the presence of a grand city less than a day’s march away; or even the anachronistic appearance of outsiders at the end of the film (the events depicted clearly reference the Classic, not the post-Classic). Nor will many scholars truly object to the elites’ propensity for extreme violence, although in reality the heart extraction technique used so salaciously by Gibson belongs to a cultural complex that likely originated in the post-Classic Highlands – that is to say, with the progenitors of the Aztec Empire – not with the Lowland Maya. Be that as it may, the Maya were certainly as violent as the next civilization and historical inaccuracies can be written off as artistic license, so neither of these is where the true beef lies.

University of Miami anthropologist Traci Ardren, in a review for Archaeology Online, has articulated the real problem with Apocalypto: “Gibson’s efforts at authenticity of location and language might, for some viewers, mask his blatantly colonial message that the Maya needed saving because they were rotten at the core. Using the decline of Classic urbanism as his backdrop, Gibson communicates that there was absolutely nothing redeemable about Maya culture, especially elite culture which is depicted as a disgusting feast of blood and excess.” This is indeed the most disturbing message of the film. As Ardren points out, it is a message that plays directly into a longstanding trope that has been used to subjugate the Maya for centuries. It has also been used to explain away the inestimable loss that resulted from the destruction of New World cultures. One need not fret too much about the passing of a people already decadent and, as depicted in the film, quite literally dying. The historical truth, of course, is much less comforting.

For me, the experience of viewing Apocalpyto was like flipping through an art catalog without bothering to read any of the accompanying text. For while images hold inherent meaning and value, it is upon the text that most observers will rely to provide some explanation for the images shown. Apocalypto has no “text” in this sense, no narrative or story that could help viewers accurately contextualize what they’re seeing on the screen. I hope that those who see this film will keep in mind that the Maya did and do have much to offer the world. The ancient Maya civilization was one of the greatest and most accomplished in all human history. The Maya had books and libraries, and so much more.

—David C. Murray