RECENT MAYA INVESTIGATIONS" 



By E, FORSTEMANN 



A bibliography of a science is the bouiidary mark in its history, 

 and such a homubiry mark has now been set for Maya investigation. 

 The CentralWatt fiir BibliotheksAvesen, in the last number for 1895, 

 contains an article by my former colleague, Prof K. Haebler, Die 

 Maya Literatur und der Maya Apparat zu Dresden. What I wrote 

 on the same sul)ject, in an article contributed in 1885 to the same 

 journal, has here been immensely expanded in accordance with the 

 surprising activity evinced in this branch of science in recent years. 

 No one has greater cause to rejoice than T that the Dresden Library, 

 since my retirement from it, continues to take an interest in the work 

 of this department, as becomes the custodian of the most important 

 manuscript in Maya literature. From 400 to 500 books, treatises, and 

 notices, some from quite obscure American journals, have been 

 recorded there by Doctor Haebler, Avith extraordinary labor and the 

 greatest care. Thus this literature has been rescued from the deplor- 

 ably scattered condition which characterized it, owing to the fact 

 that the book market supports no special journal for JNlaya literature, 

 nor even one for Central American research in general. It is a 

 matter of course that absolute completeness and jierfect accuracy are 

 unattainable, and for tliis reason 1 am glad to be able to announct* 

 that Mv Marshall H. Savillc, of New York, whom Ave have recog- 

 nized as an earnest Avorker in this field since 189'2, is just noAV occu- 

 pied Avith a Maya bibliography, Avhich Ave shall rejoice to see placed 

 side by side Avith the German one, and wliicli Avill certainly add nnich 

 that is ncAv to the material already in our possession. 



We, too, liaA^e neAV and important matter to record, Aviiich lias 

 appeared since the German bibliographer issued his treatise. The 

 fourth volume of the Veroffentlichungen aus dem Koniglichen 

 Museum fiir Volkerkunde, issued in 1895, contains two A^aluable 

 treatises in close succession, namely, on pages 13 to 20, "Altindianische 

 Ansiedelungen in Guatemala ", by Karl Sapper, and on pages 21 to 53, 



<» Neue Mayaforschunsen, Globus, v. 70, n. 3, 1896. 



53Y 



