Mayan Calendar Essay

Obtaining the knowledge that was passed down to them from earlier Mesoamerican cultures, the Aztecs carved the calendar stone in 1479 (Smith 253). At the time, the Aztecs lived in a very civilized world filled with amazing architecture, an impressively complex government system, and they also employed intricate systems of writing and calendric systems (Taube 7). The Calendar Stone was made by basalt stone. For the Aztecs, everything was pictorial in nature around this era. The calendar stone depicted different pictograms or Codex Magliabechianoand, which was primarily written on religious documents (Aztec-History). Art was centered around religion in this era. So the pictograms of the gods on the calendar stone would correlate with that

When most people think of the Mayans, they think end of the world prediction in 2012. Everyone knows the movie 2012 which portrayed the end of the world predicted by the Mayan calendar. What many do not know is that the Mayans developed three separate calendars; the Long Count, the Tzolk’in, and the Haab, which were represented by glyphs or pictures that were used in their daily lives in many different ways. The Mayans kept time in a very different way than we do today. The Mayans may not have invented the calendar, but they certainly developed it further, and still use their version today.

The ancient Maya believed in recurring cycles of creation and destruction because, The largest cycles were thought to be recurrent cycle of creation and destruction, and the Maya believed that each of the named says within their cycles contained a destiny which was relieved in each of the many eras of a cyclic universe. The Maya believed in many gods. They believed their gods could help or hurt them. They worshiped their gods every day. Religion was at the heart of everything they did. Human sacrifice was performed on prisoners, slaves, and particularly children, with orphans. Before the Toltec era, however, animal sacrifice may have been far more common than human - turkeys, dogs, and squirrels being among the species considered suitable offerings to Mayan gods.

| The development of the calendar was based on their observations and studies of the stars, moon, and sky. They also established a number system; a year was cut into 12 months, a month into 30 days, a day into 12 hours, an hour into 60 minutes, and a minute into 60 seconds. They also divided a circle into 360 degrees of the 60 arc minutes. Settlement patterns were based on the environment of the area and the need for a stable water supply.

The ancient Maya once occupied a vast geographic area in Central America. Their civilization inhabited an area that encompasses Mexico's Yucatan peninsula and parts of the states of Chiapas and Tabasco, as well as Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, and El Salvador. "From the third to the ninth century, Maya civilization produced awe-inspiring temples and pyramids, highly accurate calendars, mathematics and hieroglyphics, and a complex social and political order" ("Collapse..." 1). Urban centers were important to the Maya during the Classic period; they offered the Mayans a central place to practice religion.

The ancient Mayan civilization settled in the Yucatan Peninsula in around 900 AD. This civilizations was one of the most advanced of its times. They created their own religion, language, mathematical structure, a very precise calendar, and many other things.

“In the Western Hemisphere, no early culture was more remarkable than the Mayans” (Background Essay). The Mayans were an adept civilization and accomplished many exceptional things during their time. Their deeds include things such as a number system, immense cities, and a vast trade network but there is no Mayan achievement more remarkable than their calendars. The Mayans created three calendars: a sacred calendar called tzolkin, a solar calendar called haab, and a long cycle calendar.

Since the beginning, people have created calendars for order and to value life. Calendars have provided us a reference for measuring the passage of time throughout our existence. They have evolved from picking up more information from other ideas and ancient cultures. These include the Egyptian calendar, the Gregorian calendar (the one we use today) and the Mayan calendar. Historically, the creation of a calendar that provides both a satisfactory representation of time and practical value for the ordering of life has proved a vexing problem.

The ancient Maya were a group of American Indian peoples who lived in Southern Mexico. Their descendants, the modern Maya,live in the same regions today.

Mayan culture existed a thousand years ago, in what is now part of Central America. Its ruins were almost entirely abandoned by 600 A.D, and were not rediscovered until the early 1500’s, by Spanish settlers. Mayan architecture astounded the early conquistadors, and continues to be of great interest to modern archeologists as well. These scientists have labeled a certain period of Mayan architectural history as the “Classic” period.

On the 4th day, he created greater and lesser lights to govern the times of day. This consisted of stars among other things.

In Genesis God created the earth in six days and declared rest for the seventh day. On day one, God created light to part it from darkness, calling the light “day” and the darkness “night”. On day two, he created the sky, allowing him to create land and sea on day three. God created the sun, moon, and the stars to give light to the earth and to govern and separate the day and the night" on the fourth diurnal (Fairchild, 2013). These elements would also serve to establish days, season, and years. On the fifth day God created all the organisms on the land, sea, and sky and made sure they would flourish.

On the fourth day god creates the ‘lights in the sky of heavens to divide the day from the night', in simple terms this means the sun, moon and the stars.

The Maya of Mesoamerica, along with the Aztecs of Mexico and the Incas of Peru, made up the high civilizations of the American Indians at the time of the Spanish conquest. Both the Aztecs and the Incas were late civilizations, between 1300-1533 AD, but the Maya of the Yucatan and Guatemala exhibited a cultural

     The Africans use what is called a phenomenal calendar, rather than a calendar that is based on traditional time. Time is established by using events rather than time itself. A day is also constructed this way. Time is not known, it is perceived. Nine o’clock is not nine o’clock; rather nine o’clock is when the cattle are milked. Time is referred to as the event in which is taking place during that part of the day.