Cascajal Block

The Cascajal Block is a tablet-sized slab serpentinite dated to the early first millennium BCE, incised with previously unknown characters that have been claimed to represent the earliest writing system in the New World.

"[1] The Cascajal Block was discovered by road builders in the late 1990s in a pile of debris in the village of Lomas de Tacamichapan in the Veracruz lowlands in the ancient Olmec heartland on the southeastern coast of Mexico.

[2][3] Archaeologists Carmen Rodriguez and Ponciano Ortiz of the National Institute of Anthropology and History of Mexico examined and registered it with government historical authorities.

The symbols on the Cascajal block are unlike those of any other writing system in Mesoamerica, such as in Mayan languages or Isthmian, another extinct Mesoamerican script.

In a letter, archaeologists Karen Bruhns and Nancy Kelker raise five points of concern:[17] A rebuttal to the criticism by the authors of the original study was published directly following the letter: A 2019 study by Joshua D. Englehardt et al. made an effort to establish the origin of the block via archaeometric techniques.