Mayan

[ mah-yuhn ]

adjective

1. of or relating to the Maya, their culture, or their languages.

noun

1. a member of the Mayan tribe.
2. a group of languages spoken by the Mayas Maya in southern Mexico, Guatemala, and Belize, including Yucatec, Quiché, and Huastec.

Mayan

/ ˈmaɪən /

adjective

1. of, relating to, or characteristic of the Maya or any of their languages

noun

1. a family of Central American Indian languages, including Maya, possibly a member of the Penutian phylum
2. See Maya
   another name for a Maya 2

Other Words From

• pseudo-Mayan adjective noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of Mayan¹

First recorded in 1885–90; May(a) + -an

Example Sentences

When he arrived in Valley Center, where he and his family found work as field laborers, around 1996 he spoke only Q’anjob’al, an indigenous Mayan language.

From Voice of San Diego

Most of the pieces went up for sale anyway, including a stone Mayan carving called “Hacha Maya,” depicting a bearded man with his head thrown back and struggling with a rattlesnake, which was sold for $800,000 to an unknown buyer.

From The Daily Beast

A stone Mayan carving called “Hacha Maya” up for auction at Christie’s.

From The Daily Beast

Waters studies records of algal blooms at the bottoms of lakes and other waterways in the Southeast, while his colleague Mark Brenner, a coauthor on the study, studies environmental conditions during the Mayan city-building period.

From Popular-Science

It was the ideal place to ask whether Mayan urban societies had impacted their water quality.

From Popular-Science

Los Angeles was wonderfully exotic; a polyglot mix of Aztec, Incan, Mayan and New World scents and sounds.

From The Daily Beast

While chipping away plaster from his kitchen wall, the Guatemalan man unearthed a series of centuries-old Mayan murals.

From The Daily Beast

One depicts a procession of figures wearing both Mayan and Spanish garb, some holding what appear to be human hearts.

From The Daily Beast

One of the largest sites of pre-Columbian Mayan ruins, Tikal was once one of the most important cities in the Mayan world.

From The Daily Beast

Paradise Island is now home to Vegas-style casino resorts and the Aquaventure Waterpark, with its mammoth Mayan Temple waterslide.

From The Daily Beast

Yucatan is covered with interesting ruins, the remains of different branches of the mighty Mayan race.

From Project Gutenberg

Such are the monuments of the Mayan people, of whom not many facts are to be disentangled from the early legends.

From Project Gutenberg

Aguilar, the interpreter, knew Mayan, but not one word did he understand of the Aztec dialect now spoken.

From Project Gutenberg

The cross occurs frequently, not only in the Mayan sculptures, but also in the ceremonial of the Aztecs.

From Project Gutenberg

Passing from the traces of Aztec and Mayan civilization, we may now glance at the antiquities of the Colombian states.

From Project Gutenberg