k-punk

“Knowledge of Maya writing did not long survive the Spanish Conquest, owing to the diligence of church and government officials who rooted out any manifestations of this visible symbol of “paganism.” Diego de Landa, in a passage that ironically accompanies his invaluable eye witness description of Maya writing, described his own role in its suppression: “We found a large number of these books in these characters and, as they contained nothing in which there was not to be seen superstition and lies of the devil, we burned them all, which they [the Mayans] regretted to an amazing degree and which caused them great affliction.”
Robert Sharer, The Ancient Maya, p. 513

‘Here is Bishop Landa burning the sacred books. To give you an idea as to what is happening, imagine our civilization invaded by louts from outer space…
“Get some bulldozers in here. Clear out all this crap…” The formulae of all the natural sciences, books, paintings, the lot, swept into a vast pile and burned. And that’s it. No one ever heard of it…
Three codices survived the vandalism of Bishop Landa and these three burned around the edges. No way to know if we have here the sonnets of Shakespeare, the Mona Lisa, or the remnants of a Sears Roebuck catalogue after the old out-house burned down in a brush fire. A whole civilization went up in smoke. …
When the Spaniards arrived, they found the Mayan aristocrats lolling in hammocks. Well, time to show them what is what. Five captured workers, bound and stripped, are castrated on a stump, the bleeding, sobbing, screaming bodies thrown into a pile…
“And now get this through your gook nuts. We want to see a pile of gold that big and we want to see it pronto. The White God has spoken.”‘
Burroughs The Job, 198
But at least they made ‘aesthetically superior’ things out of that gold, folks, so don’t sweat it…