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Thomas Barthel

archical associations. His proposed identication of four


major or prime emblem glyphs was later expanded upon
by Joyce Marcus, and the Barthel-Marcus quadripartite
partitioning of Classic era Maya sites into four regional
capitals and an associated hierarchy of four levels of site
importance, became an inuential concept in Mayanist
research.[2]
Along with J. Eric S. Thompson, Barthel was a strong
critic of the phonetic approach to Maya decipherment,
and held the view that the Maya script lacked phoneticism
and did not constitute a true writing system.[3] In par-
ticular, Barthel stood solidly against the phonetic deci-
pherment methodology put forward in the early 1950s by
the Russian epigrapher Yuri Knorozov, who like Barthel
Thomas Sylvester Barthel (January 4, 1923 in Berlin
had also worked on both the Maya and rongorongo
April 3, 1997 in Tbingen) was a German ethnologist and
scripts. At a 1956 meeting of the International Congress
epigrapher who is best known for cataloguing the unde-
of Americanists in Copenhagen attended by Knorozov,
ciphered rongorongo script of Easter Island.
Barthels criticism of the phonetic approach contributed
Barthel grew up in Berlin and graduated from secondary to the continuing dismissal of Knorozovs ideas ideas
school in 1940. During the Second World War, he that would later be proved essentially correct when the
worked as a cryptographer for the Wehrmacht.[1] After phonetic approach championed by Knorozov provided
the war he studied folklore, geography, and prehistory the breakthrough in Maya decipherment from the 1970s
in Berlin, Hamburg, and Leipzig. He received his doc- onwards.[4] Barthel and Knorozov would remain at-odds
torate in Hamburg in 1952 with a thesis on Mayan writ- for the remainder of their respective careers.[5]
ing. From 1953-1956 he was a Fellow of the Deutsche
Forschungsgemeinschaft, in 1957 a lecturer in Hamburg,
and from 4 July 1957 to 1 February 1958 he was a guest
researcher with the Institute for Easter Island Studies at 1 Published works
the University of Chile.
In order to document rongorongo, Barthel visited most 1958a. Grundlagen zur Entzierung der Osterin-
of the museums which housed the tablets, of which he selschrift. Hamburg : Cram, de Gruyter.
made pencil rubbings. With this data he compiled the
rst corpus of the script, which he published as Grund- 1958b. The 'Talking Boards of Easter Island. Sci-
lagen zur Entzierung der Osterinselschrift in 1958. He entic American, 198:61-68
was the rst scholar to correctly identify anything in the
texts: He showed that two lines in the Mamari tablet en- 1971. Pre-contact Writing in Oceania. In: Cur-
code calendrical information. rent Trends in Linguistics 8:1165-1186. Den Haag,
Paris: Mouton.
In 1959 Barthel became Associate Professor of Ethnol-
ogy at the University of Tbingen, and from 1964-1988 1978. The Eighth Land: The Polynesian Discovery
he was Professor of Ethnology. His primary research was & Settlement of Easter Island. Honolulu: the Uni-
in the folklore of the Americas. He bequeathed his ron- versity Press of Hawaii.
gorongo data to the CEIPP (Centre d'tudes de l'les de
Pques et de la Polynsie), which is engaged in verifying 1990. Wege durch die Nacht (Rongorongo-
and expanding on his work. Studien auf dem Santiagostab)", in Esen-Baur,
Barthel was also active in the mid-twentieth century at- Heide-Margaret (ed.), State and Perspectives of
tempts to decipher the Maya script, the 'hieroglyphic' Scientic Research in Easter Island Culture. Courier
writing system of the pre-Columbian Maya civilization in Forschungsinstitute Senckeberg 125. Frankfurt
Mesoamerica. He was one of the rst to analyse emblem am Mein: Senckenbergische Naturforschende
glyphs in detail and in terms of their political and hier- Gesellschaft, 73-112. ISBN 3-510-61140-3

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2 3 REFERENCES

2 Notes
[1] Coe (1992, p.153); Kettunen (1998)

[2] Rice (2004, p.47)

[3] Coe (1992, p.153)

[4] For a full account of the Maya script decipherment, see


Coe (1992), Coe & van Stone (2005).

[5] In an interview given to the Finnish Mayanist Harri Ket-


tunen in 1998, Knorozov describes Barthel as his old
foe. See Kettunen (1998).

3 References
Coe, Michael D. (1992). Breaking
the Maya Code. London: Thames
& Hudson. ISBN 0-500-05061-9.
OCLC 26605966.
Coe, Michael D.; Mark van Stone
(2005). Reading the Maya Glyphs
(2nd ed.). London: Thames &
Hudson. ISBN 978-0-500-28553-
4. OCLC 60532227.
Kettunen, Harri J. (1998).
Relacin de las cosas de San
Petersburgo: An interview with
Dr. Yuri Valentinovich Knorozov,
Part II. Revista Xaman. Helsinki:
Ibero-American Center, Helsinki
University. 5/1998. Archived from
the original (online publication)
on March 31, 2005. Retrieved
2008-05-15.
Rice, Prudence M. (2004). Maya
Political Science: Time, Astronomy,
and the Cosmos. The Linda Schele
series in Maya and pre-Columbian
studies. Austin: University of
Texas Press. ISBN 0-292-70261-2.
OCLC 54753496.
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