The Multepal Project
By entering this site you recognize the data sovereignty of the K’iche’ people and the contributions of Indigenous women and men, present and past, to these kinds of scholarly research projects. Users who enter the site agree to us the wisdom and knowledge contained within this pages in ways that respect the art, history, and culture of the K’iche’ people.
Welcome
The Multepal project is dedicated to producing new editions of the Popol Wuj, an ancient Maya narrative that is considered to be the most well-known and influential Indigenous text of the pre-1492 Americas.
With teams in Mexico, Guatemala, and the United States, currently we are making a Yukatek version of the story in video form intended for children and a new K’iche’ version, based on the sole manuscript to survive the colonial era, intended for scholarly use.
In addition, we have produced annotated digital editions of the original 18th-century manuscript and associated texts, using standards of the Text Encoding Initiative (TEI) and open source principles coupled with those of indigenous data sovereignty. Part of this digital edition will be a variorum that integrates all of the project’s texts.
These efforts promote language acquisition, literacy skills, and the preservation of cultural heritage among children and adults. They also help preserve the two Maya languages, which are endangered.