THE MAGNIFICENT MAYA CALENDAR SYSTEM AND HOW IT WORKS

Maya Calendar (historyonthenet.com)

"The deep time of the Maya calendar is stunning in its scale. . . It expressed the grandest expressions of time ever put down on stone or paper by human minds." David Stuart, archeologist and MacArthur Genius Grant recipient.  

THE CALENDARS

What if you thought of a calendar—or time—as a spiral, not a sheaf of papers that hang on a wall?

The Maya viewed time differently than we do today with the Gregorian calendar. The present was determined by the past. Everything repeated, everything was a recurring pattern. They only had to view the past to know what would happen in the future. Their intricate system of separate calendars was possibly used for predictions, say some archaeologists like Michael Coe, though others would disagree. It is widely thought that they borrowed the system from their Mesoamerican neighbors, the Olmec.

True Maya Calendar from Madrid Codex

Three calendars were a staple of every day Maya life. This triumvirate includes the Tzol'kin, or sacred round, which lasts 260 days; the Haab', which is a 360-day "solar"calendar to coordinate with the total number of days it takes the earth to rotate around the sun but with five 'days that had no name' at the end coming to 365; and the Long Count calendar, one of the most important cycles of Maya time, which lasts 5,125 years and which had been forecast to end on December 21, 2012.

COUNT OF DAYS

The 260-day Tzol'kin calendar is religious in its bearing. The count of days, as it is also known, was invented by pairing two smaller cycles—numbers one through thirteen—which equals the number of layers in Maya heaven, and the cycle of the twenty "day" names. The Tzol'kin is formed as a circle, not as a straight line.

"There is nothing quite like it, anywhere else in the world, " says archaeo-astronomer Anthony Aveni, author of The End of Time: The Maya Mystery of 2012. "The sacred Tzol'kin is the centerpiece of the Maya calendar system; it is the single most important chunk of time the Maya ever kept, and still keep, in remote areas.

"But why 260?" pondered Aveni. "Multiply numbers thirteen and twenty? Also the Venus cycle's appearance as morning or evening star is 263 days."

Aveni believes that 260 days came about as some enlightened daykeeper, eons ago, realized this particular number signified so much.

FOCAL HARMONY

"It was a focal harmony point. It brought together so many of nature's phenomena: the moon, Venus, planting cycles. It may not have come about in a flash," he continues, "but with Maya knowledge that number and nature are joined together perfectly, the discovery of the multiple significance of 260 was bound to be raised to prominence in Maya time consciousness. One even took their name and their fortune from the day name in the 260-day count calendar."

COMMUNING WITH THE GODS

Maya God Images (mayangods.com)

The Tzol'kin could have been used for making predictions, for communicating with the gods. The Maya believed a god ruled each day, and depending on that god's traits, it could be good or bad for certain activities. This calendar was used in the way one's horoscope would be viewed today.

The calendar is easy to remember and that's why it has been passed down and is still in use. It fits into the culture of the people, said Barbara Tedlock, anthropologist and author of Time and the Highland Maya.

The Haab' calendar, which works with the Tzol'kin, has 18 named "months" of 20 calendar days each. The Maya then added five days at the end of this 360-day cycle. It was considered a nineteenth month and these five odd days were considered unlucky but essential to bring a total of 365 days for a full rotation cycle.

Caracol Observatory at Chichen Itzá

CALENDAR ROUND

These two calendars, like cogs in a wheel, meshed a named day in the Tzol'kin and also had a conjunct day in the Haab'. But this same "double" day could never reproduce again for 52 years, roughly the length of a human life. This was called the calendar round, and the only annual time count possessed by the people of Mexico. There were 260 possible different combinations of number and name in this creation. A Maya Calendar Round date is actually two dates listed as a pair, with a separate reference point.

Night Star Gazing at Chichen Itza (by Chichenitza.com)

In this combined calendar round, slippage occurred because a year is actually 365.24 days which as mathematicians and stargazers extraordinaire they had computed, but this did not bother the Maya. Nor did they try to play catch up like we do with leap years. They just let time roll along.

"That would mean Christmas could back up to early fall or the Fourth of July might back up into the cold of winter for us," said Anthony Aveni. "It wasn't of concern to the Maya," he continued, "because they placed more emphasis on following an unbroken chain of time."

52-YEAR CYCLE

This 52-year cycle combination was celebrated throughout Mesoamerica. The Aztecs included it in their fire ceremony that was timed by sky events. At midnight, when the calendar keepers saw the Pleiades had passed the zenith, they knew the movements of the heavens hadn't stopped, the world had not ended, and they would have another 52 years. 

Third in the triumvirate of Maya calendars is the Long Count and although widely used in Mesoamerica, the Maya took it to its highest degree during the classic period. The Long Count consisted of 13 baktuns. One baktun is 400 years. The starting point of the Long Count calendar, according to early archeologist Eric Thompson, was August 11, 3114 BC. It was known as 4 Ahaw.

13TH BAKTUN

This date may have been chosen because it coincided with the completion of a cycle of successful crops, an August summer's day. If you flash forward 5,125 years you come to the cycle's end, and this is where the December 21, 2012 debate came in. It also ended the thirteenth baktun cycle, an auspicious time for the Maya or 13.0.0.0.0. as carved on Maya stela.

Oldest Known Maya Mural, San Bartolo, Guatemala (by sciencenews.com)

Aveni goes on to explain the Maya used this innovation in their calendar so royalty could create a dynastic narrative that covered vast stretches of elapsed time. It extended Maya culture all the way back to the creation of the gods, cementing the reputation of daykeepers and royalty as gods themselves.

DAYKEEPERS

The daykeepers act as go-betweens. "They are empowered to make prayers to the gods and ancestors on behalf of the lay people," Barbara Tedlock said.

Maya Scribe

He or she pays attention to each and every day, making offerings of copal incense and lighting candles; they also do dream interpretations. Through dreams and reading the day's influence, recommendations were then made for the best course of action and both were used to plot one's future. Barbara Tedlock, anthologist along with her husband Dennis, author, translator and anthrologist, were initiated as daykeepers in a Guatemala highlands pueblo where they lived from 1975 to 1979, a very unusual occurrence for those not of Maya descent. 

It's hard for the modern world to fathom why such a complex calendar system existed. Michael Coe, archeologist and author of The Maya (Editions one through eight), stated his belief of the why's and wherefores like this: "How such a period of time even came into being is an enigma, but the use to which it was put is clear: Every single day had its own omens and associations and the march of the twenty days acted like a fortune-telling machine guiding the destinies of all the Maya and the peoples of Mexico who used this calendar. It still survives in unchanged form among some indigenous peoples of southern Mexico and the Maya highlands, under the guard of the calendar priests."

Maya Stela of Ruler

With this calendar fashioned as a direct line to the cosmos, royalty and priests were able to govern and control the masses by predicting common events. Most likely with the aid of their calendars and the predictions derived from them, the Maya enjoyed 1500 years of relative stability. It was not until ninth century AD, the finale of the classic period of the Maya, that the Long Count was abandoned and not seen again on Maya stela. Times were changing. One wonders if the stars and calendars predicted that. And I would guess that yes, they did.

If you enjoyed this post, check out my other works, Where the Sky is Born: Living in the Land of the Maya. It's available on Amazon with tales of expat life and living within 100 miles of four major pyramid sites. Also, check out my website at www.jeaninekitchel.com. Books one and two in my Mexico cartel trilogy, Wheels Up—A Novel of Drugs, Cartels and Survival, and Tulum Takedown, are available on Amazon where you can find my overview of the 2012 Maya calendar phenomenon, Maya 2012 Revealed—Demystifying the Prophecy.*

*Excerpts of Chapter 6 from my book Maya 2012 Revealed—Demystifying the Prophecy were used in the post.

WHAT IS THE EQUINOX?

We’re living in the 21^st century. Western civilization is far removed from the jungles, the plains and the tundra – so why is the equinox important to us today? Often associated with the first day of spring, the vernal equinox – when day and night are equal in length all over the world – occurs on March 20th this year. 

At equinox, the sun crosses directly over the equator and the earth tilts neither away nor towards the sun.  Because the equinox is based on the earth’s movement around the sun, there’s a three-day window in which the spring equinox can occur – as early as March 19, and as late as March 21.   

WHY THE INTEREST?

But why do we take interest in the equinox?  Could be because we humans have always been stargazers.  Early on in our coming of age, the ancients made up the constellations and stories about the sky. Today, we’re still gazing at the same sky but with a little more oomph. We’re sending out advanced satellites, telescopes, and Rovers to bring back information from the stars and planets, and we’re writing scientific documents, basically new stories, extolling what lies outside our atmosphere.

So even though we’re in a sophisticated, high tech world, we still celebrate the importance of the relationship between our sun and our planet, the earth. In agrarian times, spring was ushered in by the equinox, which meant it was time to plant crops.  That may not be so important to us today, but have you ever wondered why Easter is a floating date rather than the same day each year?

EASTER

Easter’s date, even in these modern times, is the first Sunday following the first full moon after the vernal equinox. This year that full moon is April 6, and Easter falls on April 9.  So even though we may consider ourselves far removed from any consequences of the equinox, we are still rooted in a pagan cycle of historic events due to the date of that celestial occurrence.  Because the spring equinox has ties to Christianity’s most important event, Easter, many believe it centers on the theme of resurrection, and not only of the earth’s waking call from a dark winter.

One of the most famous equinox ceremonies in North America takes place at the Maya pyramid site of Chichen Itza in Mexico.  If you’ve had a chance to be there during spring or fall equinox, you’ve witnessed an astounding performance.  About 4 p.m. the sun casts a remarkable shadow onto the looming Temple of Kukulkan due to its placement in the sky, the building’s position, and the Maya’s precise mathematical calculations prefigured more than a millennia ago for this event. The shadow slithers down to the bottom of the staircase and ends at the serpent’s mouth.  This spectacular feat was made possible by the Maya’s ability to calculate the sun’s effects on earth at equinox.

THE ANCIENT MAYA AND THE EQUINOX

In the Maya world there are many buildings built to specifications that coincide with the equinox.  Some scholars believe the importance placed on it relays to the resurrection of the Maize God, Hunahpu, and the turning from the darkness of winter towards the light of spring, ushering in planting time. The fall equinox no doubt pays homage to the harvest.  

                       

WORLD CIVILIZATIONS

On the other side of the globe in Egypt, the equinox also represents a time of resurrection, for the god Osiris.  Because of this it is said, the Great Sphinx of Giza is positioned to look directly at the rising sun of the spring equinox.  In Cambodia, where scholars say the equinox represents the winning of the forces of light over darkness, the main temple Angkor Wat also aligns with the equinox sun.  This seems to be the universal meaning of what is represented by the equinox: rebirth, awakening and light overcoming darkness, exactly what happens as we tilt into spring.

So even though we may be entrenched in this modern world, über-connected with our smart phones and computers and all forms of social media, it’s important to remember there’s a bigger picture out there, and it affects all humanity on our green earth.  

It is a thing as simple as how the sun and the earth relate, two days a year, on the equinox.

By Jeanine Kitchel   www.jeaninekitchel.com