Yuri Knorozov

Yuri Valentinovich Knorozov (; 19 November 1922 – 31 March 1999) was a Soviet and Russian linguist, epigrapher, and ethnographer. He became the founder of the Soviet school of Mayan studies, and his identification of the existence of syllabic signs proved an essential step forward in the eventual decipherment of the Mayan script, the writing system used by the pre-Columbian Maya civilization of Mesoamerica. Provided by Wikipedia