Germans Crack Dresden Codex, Find Mayan Treasure Map?

Notice the question mark on the title... not sure if it has been confirmed that they have cracked the codex... however, they think it will lead to 8 tons of gold tablets....

Buried beneath a lake in Guatamala sits a fortune in lost treasure -- Mayan gold to be precise -- and a group of German archaeologists has just set off to find it. Their only guidance, a freshly decoded ancient book containing a map to the treasure.

It sounds like a movie, but it's very much real, reported FoxNewsLatino. Joachim Rittsteig, an expert in Mayan writing who is heading up the mission to Guatemala's Lake Izabal, the site reported. Rittsteig claims to have cracked the famous Dresden Codex, a pre-Columbian Maya book possibly from the 11th century, and discovered in its pages specific information that leads to a treasure in the lake.

"The Dresden Codex leads to a giant treasure of eight tons of pure gold," said Rittsteig, who has spent more than 40 years studying the document. According to the German newspaper Bild, which is sponsoring the expedition, two reporters from the publication, a photographer, a television camera, and a professional diver will visit Izabal in an attempt to find the gold.

A professor emeritus at Dresden University and author of various publications about the Maya culture, Rittsteig stressed that the information is in the Codex.

"Page 52 talks about the Maya capital of Atlan, which was ruined by an earthquake on October 30th in the year 666 BC," he said. "In this city, they kept 2,156 gold tablets on which the Maya recorded their laws."

Source

I think they might find more than just 8 tons of gold tablets, and if they have truly cracked the Dresden Codex in its entirety, it will unravel a new world and probably a completely different understanding of the Mayan culture.... possibly even lead to one of the Hall of Records.

Exciting times indeed!

~Namaste

ATLAN?!?!?

Awesome!

Mayan was finally translated in the early eighties. The Dresden Codex included.

I'm not saying that the thing doesn't mention this Maya gold. Only that this book was not recently "cracked."

The first 23 pages appear here as the Graduate School Thesis of a student of Linda Schele. That was 15 years ago.

Schele is the one that finally figured out the Mayan glyphs.

It's not a completely done deal, though. However, it's light years beyond what it was before Schele did her seminal work in the field.

Harte

Sweet. Nothing like treasure buried under a lake, and it's physical treasure as well as knowledge-treasure.

Speaking of Maya translator Linda Schele - there is a documentary *somewhere* online featuring her work (and a few others if I recall) in translating Mayan and it is realllllly cool. I did a quick search, don't have time to sift through the nearly infinite digital video reservoir of youtube but I know it's out there. Great if you have no knowledge of Mayan (like me) but are interested in the language and artistry involved. Good luck locating it. It had a lot of footage from the actual times Ms Schele and the others were in the field.

reply to post by tetsuo


Here is a link to documentary regarding Linda Schele:

Breaking the Maya Code

Here is the PBS show of that documentary:



I haven't watched yet, hope I have time today.

S & F - Thanks for expanding my brain today, I hadn't seen this before!

reply to post by Julie Washington


thanks a lot Julie for finding that!

reply to post by Julie Washington


thanks that was very interesting

reply to post by SonOfTheLawOfOne


Mayans -> Atlan?

Could this be the clue to the lost city of Atlantis?

Were the America's once part of a great "Utopian" Nation which included Atlantis, Pre-Ancient Egypt, Civilization in Australia, Easter Island, South Japan Structure, Caribbean lost city, Stonehenge, and others?

It makes me wonder...

Originally posted by KOLTON
reply to post by SonOfTheLawOfOne

 

Mayans -> Atlan?

Could this be the clue to the lost city of Atlantis?

Were the America's once part of a great "Utopian" Nation which included Atlantis, Pre-Ancient Egypt, Civilization in Australia, Easter Island, South Japan Structure, Caribbean lost city, Stonehenge, and others?

It makes me wonder...

I think that's what they are trying to suggest but as far as I can make out Joachim Rittsteig's 'decoding' is the source of the name of this Mayan capital Atlan...

Are there any other references to the Name Atlan in connection to the Mayans? I dont know much about the Mayans but I can't find any other reference to Atlan.

Originally posted by Versa
I think that's what they are trying to suggest but as far as I can make out Joachim Rittsteig's 'decoding' is the source of the name of this Mayan capital Atlan...

Are there any other references to the Name Atlan in connection to the Mayans? I dont know much about the Mayans but I can't find any other reference to Atlan.

Geez, I guess I must've missed that one.

I'm gonna say the thing is bogus. Atlan (the homeland of the Aztecs) is a Nahuatl word. Nahuatl originates in the American Southwest, after the Maya were already long established.

This is likely a hoax, IMO. I say this only because of the inclusion of the word Atlan in a Mayan context.

Harte

Originally posted by Harte

Originally posted by Versa
I think that's what they are trying to suggest but as far as I can make out Joachim Rittsteig's 'decoding' is the source of the name of this Mayan capital Atlan...

Are there any other references to the Name Atlan in connection to the Mayans? I dont know much about the Mayans but I can't find any other reference to Atlan.

Geez, I guess I must've missed that one.

I'm gonna say the thing is bogus. Atlan (the homeland of the Aztecs) is a Nahuatl word. Nahuatl originates in the American Southwest, after the Maya were already long established.

This is likely a hoax, IMO. I say this only because of the inclusion of the word Atlan in a Mayan context.

Harte

Thanks for the confirmation.

I think this is a sneaky 'we've found Atlantis' story that will prove to be wholly unfounded. Smells like a book in the making to me.

Originally posted by Versa

Originally posted by Harte

Originally posted by Versa
I think that's what they are trying to suggest but as far as I can make out Joachim Rittsteig's 'decoding' is the source of the name of this Mayan capital Atlan...

Are there any other references to the Name Atlan in connection to the Mayans? I dont know much about the Mayans but I can't find any other reference to Atlan.

Geez, I guess I must've missed that one.

I'm gonna say the thing is bogus. Atlan (the homeland of the Aztecs) is a Nahuatl word. Nahuatl originates in the American Southwest, after the Maya were already long established.

This is likely a hoax, IMO. I say this only because of the inclusion of the word Atlan in a Mayan context.

Harte

Thanks for the confirmation.

I think this is a sneaky 'we've found Atlantis' story that will prove to be wholly unfounded. Smells like a book in the making to me.

Careful there, Versa!

They'll start calling you a disinfo agent like they do me if you don't occasionally pretend to be fooled!

Harte

reply to post by Harte


Bad form giving a disinfo agent away like that! Or are you just being very clever and muddying the waters?

Any additional info on this?

ttt

reply to post by SquirrelNutz


Mayan Blog

This blog seems to have some additional information, if you can trust a blog. It constantly mentions the Bild as a source but doesn't provide links to the articles on that paper's site.

On the bild.de I find the following article:
Bild.de article

This is apparently the most recent entry.

This just in, The United States is set to Invade Guatamala and overthrow its President Alvaro Colom Caballeros for humanitary reasons of course.

Howdy

Oh good old Joachim Rittsteig; he published his book on this about 12 years ago. He was a middle school math teach whose hobby was Mesoamerica. I met him once in Merida about 1982(?) we had a limited discussion on archaeology as his fringe ideas and my German were limiting factors. Good old style archaeological amateur enthusiast.

666BC? Ah no

His expedition was not a success unfortunately:

The Bild expedition

After many years of unsuccessfully seeking sponsors for an attempt to recover the archaeological treasure he believes to be at the bottom of Lake Izabal, by February of 2011 Joachim Rittstieg had persuaded the exploitative and sensationalist Bild newspaper to mount an expedition.

Accompanying him are reporter Tim Thorer, who previously covered the eruption of the Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajökull and interviewed former Palermo mayor and determined Mafia opponent Leoluca Orlando; reporter Jürgen Helfricht, who previously took part in South African and Zambian expeditions; photographer Holm Röhner, who previously travelled to the Israeli-occupied Palestinian territories, Russia and Bulgaria; videographer Claas Weinmann, who covered the largely peaceful 2011 Egyptian revolution from Cairo; and diving instructor Steffen Haufe, who has conducted previous underwater expeditions exploring shipwrecks.

The expedition ended up finding nothing but a pot located on the northern shore of Lake Izabel.

From the wiki Rittie

Good luk to the german team.
Makes me wonder, where did the mayans mine 8 tons plus gold.

Originally posted by Angelic Resurrection
Good luk to the german team.
Makes me wonder, where did the mayans mine 8 tons plus gold.

Well they didn't find it. If I remember correctly the Maya didn't mine gold, they traded for it and collected nuggets from alluvial sources - I'll check thou. The Maya didn't value gold that much they used Cocoa beans as money.