Description
The Dresden Codex is considered the most complete of the three undisputably authentic Maya codices. The names of the codices indicate where they are housed. The Dresden Codex is made from Amatl paper ("kopó", fig-bark that has been flattened and covered with a lime paste), doubled in folds in an accordion-like form (sometimes called leporello after the servant in Mozart's opera Don Giovanni, who keeps an accordion-folded list of his master's conquests) of folding-screen texts. The codex of bark paper is coated with fine stucco or gesso and is eight inches high by eleven feet long.
The Dresden Codex totals 78 pages on 39 double-sided sheets, with an overall length of 3.56 metres (11.7 feet). Four pages are empty. Each sheet measures 20.5 centimetres (8.1 in) by 10.0 centimetres (3.9 in). Originally, the codex had been accordion-folded. Since 1835 it has been exhibited in two parts, each of them preserved between glass panes. The first part contains 20 sheets, the second 19.
The codex was written by six different scribes using both sides. They all had their own particular writing style, glyphs and subject matter. The images of the codex were painted with extraordinary clarity using very fine brushes. The basic colors used for the codex, made of vegetable dyes, were red, black and the so-called Mayan blue.
Around 250 of the approximately 350 signs of the Dresden Codex have been decoded. Most of them refer to the accompanying figures. They comment on the images in short phrases. There are also numbers, consisting of bars (meaning “five”), dots (meaning “one”) and stylized shells (meaning “zero”).
The Dresden Codex contains astronomical tables of outstanding accuracy. It is most famous for its Lunar Series and Venus table. The lunar series has intervals correlating with eclipses. The Venus Table correlates with the apparent movements of the planet. The codex also contains almanacs, astronomical and astrological tables, and ritual schedules. The specific numen references have to do with a 260-day ritual cycle divided up in several ways. The Dresden Codex also includes instructions concerning new-year ceremonies as well as descriptions of the Rain God's locations.
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