THE MAYA CALENDAR
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1) Drawing of the back of Stela C from the archaelogical site of Tres Zapotes. This artifact is particularly notable because it is one of the few set of glyphs in the Epi-Olmec script and because it is one of the earliest examples of the Mesoamerican Long Date calendar system |
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Maya calendar is actually a system of distinct calendars and almanacs used by the Maya civilization of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, and by some modern Maya communities in highland Guatemala.
These calendars could be synchronised and interlocked in complex ways, their combinations giving rise to further, more extensive cycles.
The essentials of the Maya calendric system are based upon a system which had been in common use throughout the region, dating back to at least the 6th century BCE. It shares many aspects with calendars employed by other earlier Mesoamerican civilizations, such as the Zapotec and Olmec, and contemporary or later ones such as the Mixtec and Aztec calendars. Although the Mesoamerican calendar did not originate with the Maya, their subsequent extensions and refinements to it were the most sophisticated. Along with those of the Aztecs, the Maya calendars are the best-documented and most completely understood.
The most important of these calendars is one with a period of 260 days. This 260-day calendar was prevalent across all Mesoamerican societies, and is of great antiquity (almost certainly the oldest of the calendars). It is still used in some regions of Oaxaca, and amongst the Maya communities of the Guatemalan highlands. The Maya version is commonly known to scholars as the Tzolkin, or Tzolk'in in the revised orthography of the Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala. The Tzolk'in combined with another 365-day calendar (known as the Haab, or Haab' ), to form a synchronised cycle lasting for 52 Haabs, called the Calendar Round. Smaller cycles of 13 days (the trecena) and 20 days (the veintena) were important components of the Tzolk'in and Haab' cycles, respectively.
A different form of calendar was used to track longer periods of time, and for the inscription of calendar dates (i.e., identifying when one event occurred in relation to others). This form, known as the Long Count, is based upon the number of elapsed days since a mythical starting point, and was capable of being extended to refer to any date far into the future. This calendar involved the use of a positional notation system, in which each position signified an increasing multiple of the number of days. The Maya numeral system was essentially vigesimal (i.e., base-20), and each unit of a given position represented 20 times the unit of the position which preceded it. An important exception was made for the second place value, which instead represented 18 × 20, or 360 days, more closely approximating the solar year than would 20 × 20 = 400 days. It should be noted however that the cycles of the Long Count are independent of the solar year.
2012 and the Maya Calendar
The end of the 13th b'ak'tun is conjectured to have been of great significance to the Maya, but does not necessarily mark the end of the world according to their beliefs, but a new beginning or time of re-birth. According to the Popol Vuh, a book compiling details of creation accounts known to the Quiché Maya of the colonial-era highlands, we are living in the fifth world. The Popol Vuh describes the first four creations that the gods failed in making and the creation of the successful fifth world where men were placed. The Maya believed that the fifth world would end in catastrophe and the sixth and final world would be created that would signal the end of mankind.
The last creation ended on a long count of 13.0.0.0.0. Another 13.0.0.0.0 will occur on December 21, 2012, and it has been discussed in many New Age articles and books that this will be the end of this creation, the next pole shift or something else entirely. However, the Maya abbreviated their long counts to just the last five vigesimal places. There were an infinite number of larger units that were usually not shown.
When the larger units were shown (notably on a monument from Coba), the end of the last creation is expressed as 13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.13.0.0.0.0, where the units are obviously supposed to be 13s twenty places larger than that b'ak'tun. In this age we are only approaching 0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.0.13.0.0.0.0, and the larger places would all need to similarly roll over to 13 again to match the date of the new creation.
This is confirmed by a date from Palenque, which projects forward in time to 1.0.0.0.0.0, which will occur on October 13, 4772 (a Friday). The Classic Period Maya likely did not believe that the end of this age would occur in 2012. According to the Maya, there will be a baktun ending in 2012, a significant event being the end of a 13th 400 year period, but not the end of the world.
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FURTHER SPECIAL THINGS TO GET TO KNOW AT
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_calendar
Funstuff: Your birth date in the Maya zodian: http://tortuga.com/eng/decode/index.php
Images:
(1) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Tres_Zapotes_Stela.C.back.Pt1.jpg
Obtained from Japanese Wikipedia. "This image has been released into the public domain by the copyright holder, its copyright has expired, or it is ineligible for copyright. This applies worldwide." Thanks to Siyajkak !
(2) http://emr.cs.iit.edu/home/reingold/calendar-book/images/
(3) http://maya.at