David Humiston Kelley (April 1, 1924 in

Albany, New York Albany ( ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. It is located on the west bank of the Hudson River, about south of its confluence with the Mohawk River. Albany is the oldes ...

– May 19, 2011) was an American

archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of Artifact (archaeology), artifacts, architecture, biofact (archaeology), biofacts or ecofacts, ...

and

epigrapher Epigraphy () is the study of inscriptions, or epigraphs, as writing; it is the science of identifying graphemes, clarifying their meanings, classifying their uses according to dates and cultural contexts, and drawing conclusions about the wr ...

. He was associated with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and later with the University of Calgary. He is most noted for his work on the phonetic analysis and major contributions toward the decipherment of the

writing system A writing system comprises a set of symbols, called a ''script'', as well as the rules by which the script represents a particular language. The earliest writing appeared during the late 4th millennium BC. Throughout history, each independen ...

used by the

Maya civilization The Maya civilization () was a Mesoamerican civilization that existed from antiquity to the early modern period. It is known by its ancient temples and glyphs (script). The Maya script is the most sophisticated and highly developed writin ...

pre-Columbian In the history of the Americas, the pre-Columbian era, also known as the pre-contact era, or as the pre-Cabraline era specifically in Brazil, spans from the initial peopling of the Americas in the Upper Paleolithic to the onset of European col ...

Mesoamerica Mesoamerica is a historical region and cultural area that begins in the southern part of North America and extends to the Pacific coast of Central America, thus comprising the lands of central and southern Mexico, all of Belize, Guatemala, El S ...

, the

Maya script Maya script, also known as Maya glyphs, is historically the native writing system of the Maya civilization of Mesoamerica and is the only Mesoamerican writing system that has been substantially deciphered. The earliest inscriptions found which ...

Work and interests

David Kelley was a descendant of Amos Humiston, a Union Army soldier who was killed at the

Battle of Gettysburg The Battle of Gettysburg () was a three-day battle in the American Civil War, which was fought between the Union and Confederate armies between July 1 and July 3, 1863, in and around Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The battle, won by the Union, ...

in 1863. He graduated from

Harvard University Harvard University is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the History of the Puritans in North America, Puritan clergyma ...

with a PhD in 1957. From the late 1950s, he was one of the first

Mayanist A Mayanist () is a scholar specialising in research and study of the Mesoamerican pre-Columbian Maya civilisation. This discipline should not be confused with Mayanism, a collection of New Age beliefs about the ancient Maya. Mayanists draw ...

scholars to give credence to the theories of the Russian linguist and ethnographer Yuri Knorozov concerning the

phonetic Phonetics is a branch of linguistics that studies how humans produce and perceive sounds or, in the case of sign languages, the equivalent aspects of sign. Linguists who specialize in studying the physical properties of speech are phoneticians ...

and syllabic nature of the Maya script, which would later lead to breakthroughs in the script's decipherment. Kelley's landmark 1962 paper, ''Phoneticism in the Maya Script'', would provide important corroborating data of the phonetic interpretation of Maya glyphs, which ran counter to the then-prevailing view that the script lacked phonetic elements. In addition to his work on scripts and linguistics, he worked on calendrics and

archaeoastronomy Archaeoastronomy (also spelled archeoastronomy) is the interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary study of how people in the past "have understood the phenomena in the sky, how they used these phenomena and what role the sky played in their cultur ...

, particularly on application of archaeoastronomical data to the Maya calendar correlation problem. Kelley and Eugene Milone co-authored ''Exploring Ancient Skies: An Encyclopedic Survey of Archaeoastronomy'' (Springer, 2005). He was also interested in long-range cultural contacts, including trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic voyages (" Diffusionism"). He also published frequently on mediaeval and ancient genealogies, publishing papers on the Carolingians, the Jewish Exilarchs and the Nibelungs. He was elected a Fellow of the American Society of Genealogists in 1970.American Society of Genealogists: All Fellows.
/ref> Kelley was a

professor emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retirement, retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". ...

in the Department of Archaeology at the

University of Calgary {{Infobox university , name = University of Calgary , image = University of Calgary coat of arms without motto scroll.svg , image_size = 150px , caption = Coat of arms , former ...

. Before teaching at the University of Calgary, he taught during the 1960s at the University of Nebraska, and before that at Texas Tech. Studying under Alfred M. Tozzer, his doctoral dissertation (1957) at Harvard was entitled "Our Elder Brother Coyote". He met his wife Jane while they were both students at Harvard, where she also earned a doctorate; hers in Southwestern archaeology. She was also a professor in the department of archaeology in Calgary.

Published works

Academic papers and books published by Kelley include: * * * * * * *Kelley, David H. : ''Maya Astronomical Tables and Inscriptions'', Native American Astronomy. Edited versions of papers presented at a Symposium, held at Colgate University, September 23–26, 1975, Edited by Anthony F. Aveni. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1977., p. 57 *Kelley, David H. : ''Deciphering the Maya Script'', Austin: University of Texas Press, 1976 * *Kelley, David H. : "The Maya Calendar Correlation Problem". In :- R. M. Leventhal & A. L. Kolata (eds.) : ''Civilization in the Ancient Americas : Essays in Honor of Gordon R. Willey''. Santa Fe : University of New Mexico Press; and Cambridge (MA) : Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, 1983. pp. 157–208 *Kelley, David H. : "The Lords of Palenque and the Lords of Heaven". In :- M. G. Robertson & Virginia M. Fields (eds.) : ''Fifth Palenque Round Table, 1983''. San Francisco : Pre-Columbian Art Research Institute, 1985. pp. 235–240 *Kelley, David H. : "Mesoamerican Astronomy and the Maya Calendar Correlation Problem". In :- ''Memorias de Segundo Coloquio Internacional de Mayanistas''. Universidad National Autónoma de México, 1989. pp. 65–96 *Kelley, David H. : "Tane and Sina : a Uto-Aztecan Astronomical Cult in Polynesia". In :- Bruno Illius & Matthias Laubscher : ''Circumpacifica : Festschrift für Thomas S. Barthel''. Frankfort am Main : Verlag Peter Lang, 1990. vol. II, pp. 137–155 *''Exploring Ancient Skies: An Encyclopedic Survey of Archaeoastronomy'' by David H. Kelley (Author), Eugene F. Milone (Author), Springer, 2005

References

* * * * * * * * *

External links

Dr. Kelley's Faculty Staff page
University of Calgary

by Peter Mathews, on Mesoweb {{DEFAULTSORT:Kelley, David H. 1924 births 2011 deaths Mayanists Epigraphers American genealogists Fellows of the American Society of Genealogists University of Nebraska–Lincoln faculty Mesoamerican epigraphers Mesoamerican archaeologists American Mesoamericanists Canadian Mesoamericanists 20th-century Mesoamericanists Academic staff of the University of Calgary American historians Harvard University alumni American expatriates in Canada