2012, end of the world

The Maya calendar is a system of calendars and almanacs used in the Maya civilization of pre-Columbian Mesoamerica, and in some modern Maya communities in highland Guatemala and Oaxaca, Mexico.

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 BC. 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 of it were the most sophisticated. Along with those of the Aztecs, the Maya calendars are the best-documented and most completely understood.

By the Maya mythological tradition, as documented in Colonial Yucatec accounts and reconstructed from Late Classic and Postclassic inscriptions, the deity Itzamna is frequently credited with bringing the knowledge of the calendar system to the ancestral Maya, along with writing in general and other foundational aspects of Maya culture.^[1]

Notes

Links

• Today’s Long Count
• Maya Calendar notes by M. Finlay, Maya Astronomy (Uses the proleptic Gregorian calendar.)
• Maya Cycles of Time at Convergence
• The Maya Calendar by the Maya World Studies Center in Yucatán Mexico
• Maya Calendar and Links on diagnosis2012.co.uk (The calculator uses the proleptic Gregorian calendar, with a number of links to other Maya calendar sites.)
• Interactive Maya Calendars
• Day Symbols of the Maya Year at Project Gutenberg 1897 text by Cyrus Thomas
• Maya Calendar, Date conversions, contemporary year version, Tzolkin and Haab day in Calendar Rounds

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