This volume provides a panoramic overview of Mayan civilization, interweaving essays by experts in the field with illustrations of the objects that the Mayan people left behind. The book illuminates topics including cities, architecture, script, the calendar, gods, ceramics, murals, trade, politics and the Maya today. A sophisticated artistic expression in sculpture, painting and pottery emerges, alongside: the Mayan concepts of time and space; their intriguing cosmic and cosmological theories; their mysterious religious beliefs; their complex economic, social and political organizations; and other cultural expressions such as an alphabetical system and antique codices that have survived through the ages.