kind of propaganda testimonies to their power. Most commonly monumental hieroglyphical texts describe: Lordship: ascension and death of rulers, and the claiming of ancestry from noble lineages Warfare: Victories and conquest Alliances: Marriages between lineages. Dedications of monuments and buildings The epigrapher David Stuart writes about the differences in content between the monumental hieroglyphical texts of Yaxchilan and those of Copan: "The major themes of the known Yaxchilan monuments are war, dance, and bloodletting rituals, with several records of architectural dedicatory rites." Most of the records of wars and dances accompany scenes of the rulers, who are featured prominently in all of the texts. Copán's texts have a far lesser emphasis on historical narrative. The stelae of the great plaza, for example, are inscribed with dedicatory formulae that name the ruler as "owner" of the monument, but they seldom if ever record any ritual or historical activity. Birth dates at Copán are virtually nonexistent, as also are records of war and capture. The Copán rulers therefore lack some of the personalized history we read in the texts of newer centers in the western lowlands, such as Palenque, Yaxchilan, and Piedras Negras." Codices See also Mayan codices and Aztec codices for fuller descriptions of a number of codices. Most codices date from the colonial era, with only a few surviving from the prehispanic era (the Conquistador invaders burned many original texts). A number of Precolumbian codices written on amate paper with gesso coating remain today. Historical narratives Mixtec codices Codex Bodley Codex Colombino-Becker Codex Nuttall (account of the life and times of the ruler Eight Deer Jaguar Claw and the Tilantongo, Tozacoalco and Zaachila dynasties) Codex Selden Codex Vindobonensis Aztec codices Astronomical, calendrical and ritual texts Central Mexican origins: Codex Borbonicus Codex Magliabechiano Codex Cospi Codex Vaticanus B (a.k.a. Codex Vaticanus 3773) Codex Fejérváry-Mayer Codex Laud Maya codices: Paris Codex Madrid Codex Dresden Codex Grolier Codex Other texts Some common household objects of ceramics or bone and adornments of jade have been found with inscriptions. For example, drinking vessels with the inscription saying "The Cacao drinking cup of X" or similar. Postconquest literatures written in Latin script The largest part of the Mesoamerican literature today known has been fixed in writing after the Spanish conquest. Both Europeans and Mayans began writing down local oral tradition using the Latin alphabet to write in indigenous languages shortly after the conquest. Many of those