Baines/Disappearance of Writing Systems, 11. The Death of Mexican Pictography

Mexican pictography—the graphic system of communication used by the Aztecs, Mixtecs, and their neighbours in central and southern Mexico c. AD 1300–1600—is not usually embraced within the term ‘writing’ by specialists in writing systems. This is because, as Houston et al. (2003: 430) have recently noted, Mexican pictography does not have as its goal the recording of speech or ‘meaningful sound’ and thus ‘depart[s] from the linguistic underpinnings that characterize the writing systems of the world’. These scholars further assert that the study of Mexican pictography ‘is not very helpful in understanding heavily phonic systems’. As a specialist in Mexican pictography, I am compelled to argue to the contrary.