A Letter for
Young Historians

To say I am excited to share this issue of Honest History with you would be an understatement. You see, we have wanted to cover Mesoamerica for quite some time, but we weren’t sure which way to approach it. When the decision was made to talk about the Maya, I was ecstatic, and from the beginning, I knew we wanted to explore this topic from a native perspective.

Most history books lump ancient Mesoamerican civilizations together with Columbus and the Spanish. And while they did play an important role in Mesoamerica, there is far more we can learn by focusing on the perspective of the ancient people who lived there. I decided early on that we were going to tell the story of the Maya outside of their conquest by the Spanish.
If we only look at a country, civilization, or specific ethnicity through the lens of their conquerors, then we aren’t getting the best representation of that culture. Like so many other ancient civilizations, the Maya have a rich and beautiful history that

still lives on today. And while their civilization did fall after the conquest of the Spanish, the Maya’s cultural legacy lives on, and that is what we are choosing to focus on.
So buckle up and enjoy this adventure through Mesoamerica.

I have a strong feeling you are going to love this issue of the magazine as much as I do!

Cheers,

Editor-in-Chief