The 1,300-Year Secret: Altar Q’s Hands as a Hidden Maya Language
Archaeologists have studied Altar Q for centuries, a rectangular Maya stone altar from Copán, Honduras, dating to the late 8th century. In a new study, linguist-anthropologist Rich Sandoval and colleagues from the Metropolitan State University of Denver examine the four carved faces, each depicting rulers of Copán with distinct hand positions and hieroglyphs. Sandoval argues that these hand poses encode a hidden language, a gesture-based script that operates alongside the visible glyphs. He says, 'I decoded these hand positions as gestures with very specific meanings.'
The Hand as Alphabet: Gesture Signs That Could Tell Time in the Long Count
Sandoval's theory challenges the long-held belief that Maya writing consisted of a single system. He suggests the altar's gesture signs imply a two-script writing tradition, making Maya writing more complex than previously thought. By focusing on the rulers' free hands on the eastern, western, southern, and northern faces, his team links each gesture to a Long Count date: 9.0.2.0.0 corresponds to November 27, 437 CE; 9.19.10.0.0 to April 30, 820 CE; 9.16.13.12.0 to October 21, 764 CE; and 9.17.5.0.15 to January 7, 776 CE. The Long Count date is written in five blocks: b'ak'tun, k'atun, tun, uinal, and kin, read left to right. Maya believed 13 b'ak'tuns made up one creation cycle.
A Bold Hypothesis, and a Skeptical Response
Not everyone agrees. Not all scholars share Sandoval's interpretation. Some caution that Altar Q’s hieroglyphs do not directly express any Long Count dates, which would be unusual for royal Maya inscriptions. Alexander Tokovinin, an archaeological anthropologist at the University of Alabama who specializes in Maya epigraphy, says the claim seems implausible: 'This looks very implausible. Visual and textual data seem manipulated to fit the author's hypothesis.' Still, Sandoval believes his findings could form the basis for future research into deciphering Maya writing, an ongoing challenge in the field. The debate shows how new interpretations can reshape our understanding of Maya civilization and its communication.
