OXFORD, ENGLAND—Live Science reports that David Howell of the Bodleian Libraries and colleagues have discovered pictographic scenes under the layer of gesso that covers Codex Selden, a 20-page document created in southern Mexico in the sixteenth century from a long strip of deer hide. They used a technique known as hyperspectral imaging to reveal the pictures beneath the layer of chalk and plaster, which presumably was applied to the document to prepare it for reuse. The researchers analyzed seven pages of the codex—one of only 20 such texts produced in the Americas before the arrival of Europeans to have survived—and found glyphs and figures formed with red, yellow, and orange organic paints. Some of the images may record genealogical information, including two figures thought to represent siblings, since they are connected with a red umbilical cord. Other figures depict people walking with sticks or spears, and some of the female figures have red hair or headdresses. The name of one individual preserved in Codex Selden resembles that of an ancestral figure recorded in other codices, but more research is needed into the possibility that the documents refer to the same person. For more, go to "The Maya Codices."