Mesoamerican Long Count calendar
December 2012 marks the conclusion of a
b'ak'tun—a time period in the Mesoamerican Long Count calendar which was used in
Central America prior to the arrival of Europeans. Although the Long Count was most likely invented by the
Olmec,
[15] it has become closely associated with the
Maya civilization, whose classic period lasted from 250 to 900 AD.
[16] The
writing system of the classic Maya has been substantially deciphered,
[17] meaning that a
corpus of their written and inscribed material has survived from before the
European conquest.
Unlike the 260-day
tzolk'in still used today among the Maya, the Long Count was linear rather than cyclical, and kept time roughly in units of 20: 20 days made a
uinal, 18 uinals (360 days) made a
tun, 20 tuns made a
k'atun, and 20 k'atuns (144,000 days or roughly 394 years) made up a
b'ak'tun. Thus, the Mayan date of 8.3.2.10.15 represents 8 b'ak'tuns, 3 k'atuns, 2 tuns, 10 uinals and 15 days.
[19]
Apocalypse
The oldest surviving manuscript of the
Popol Vuh, dated to 1701
There is a strong tradition of "world ages" in Mayan literature, but the record has been distorted, leaving several possibilities open to interpretation. According to the
Popol Vuh, a compilation of the
creation accounts of the
K'iche' Maya of the Colonial-era highlands, we are living in the fourth world. The
Popol Vuh describes the gods first creating three failed worlds, followed by a successful fourth world in which humanity was placed. In the Maya Long Count, the previous world ended after 13 b'ak'tuns, or roughly 5,125 years.
[Note a] The Long Count's "zero date"
[Note b][Note c] was set at a point in the past marking the end of the third world and the beginning of the current one, which corresponds to 11 August 3114 BC in the
proleptic Gregorian calendar.
[7] This means that the fourth world will also have reached the end of its 13th b'ak'tun, or Mayan date 13.0.0.0.0, on 21 December 2012. In 1957, Mayanist and astronomer Maud Worcester Makemson wrote that "the completion of a Great Period of 13 b'ak'tuns would have been of the utmost significance to the Maya".
[24] In 1966,
Michael D. Coewrote in
The Maya that "there is a suggestion ... that Armageddon would overtake the degenerate peoples of the world and all creation on the final day of the 13th [b'ak'tun]. Thus ... our present universe [would] be annihilated [in December 2012]
[Note e] when the Great Cycle of the Long Count reaches completion."
Objections
Coe's interpretation was repeated by other scholars through the early 1990s.
[26] In contrast, later researchers said that, while the end of the 13th b'ak'tun would perhaps be a cause for celebration,
[3] it did not mark the end of the calendar.
[27] "There is nothing in the Maya or Aztec or ancient Mesoamerican prophecy to suggest that they prophesied a sudden or major change of any sort in 2012", said Mayanist scholar Mark Van Stone. "The notion of a 'Great Cycle' coming to an end is completely a modern invention."
[28] In 1990, Mayanist scholars
Linda Schele and
David Freidel argued that the Maya "did not conceive this to be the end of creation, as many have suggested". Susan Milbrath,
curator of Latin American Art and Archaeology at the
Florida Museum of Natural History, stated that, "We have no record or knowledge that [the Maya] would think the world would come to an end" in 2012.
[3] Sandra Noble, executive director of the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, said, "For the ancient Maya, it was a huge celebration to make it to the end of a whole cycle", and, "The 2012 phenomenon is a complete fabrication and a chance for a lot of people to cash in".
[3] "There will be another cycle", said E. Wyllys Andrews V, director of the
Tulane University Middle American Research Institute. "We know the Maya thought there was one before this, and that implies they were comfortable with the idea of another one after this."
[30] Commenting on the new calendar found at
Xultún, one archaeologist said "The ancient Maya predicted the world would continue – that 7,000 years from now, things would be exactly like this. We keep looking for endings. The Maya were looking for a guarantee that nothing would change. It's an entirely different mindset."
[31]
Several prominent individuals representing Maya of Guatemala decried the suggestion that the world ends in the b'ak'tun 13. Ricardo Cajas, president of the Colectivo de Organizaciones Indígenas de Guatemala, said the date did not represent an end of humanity but that the new cycle, "supposes changes in human consciousness". Martín Sacalxot, of the office of the
Procurador de los Derechos Humanos (Guatemala's Human Rights Ombudsman, PDH), said that the end of the calendar has nothing to do with the end of the world or the year 2012.
[32]
Prior associations
The European association of the Maya with eschatology dates back to the time of
Christopher Columbus, who was compiling a work called
Libro de las profecias during the voyage in 1502 when he first heard about the "Maia" on Guanaja, an
island off the north coast of
Honduras.
[33] Influenced by the writings of Bishop
Pierre d'Ailly, Columbus believed that his discovery of "most distant" lands (and, by extension, the Maya themselves) was prophesied and would bring about the
Apocalypse. End-times fears were widespread during the early years of the
Spanish Conquest as the result of popular
astrological predictions in Europe of a second
Great Flood for the year 1524.
[33]
In the early 1900s, German scholar
Ernst Förstemann interpreted the last page of the
Dresden Codex as a representation of the end of the world in a cataclysmic flood. He made reference to the destruction of the world and an apocalypse, though he made no reference to the 13th b'ak'tun or 2012 and it was not clear that he was referring to a future event.
[34] His ideas were repeated by archaeologist
Sylvanus Morley,
[35] who directly paraphrased Förstemann and added his own embellishments, writing, "Finally, on the last page of the manuscript, is depicted the Destruction of the World ... Here, indeed, is portrayed with a graphic touch the final all-engulfing cataclysm" in the form of a Great Flood. These comments were later repeated in Morley's book,
The Ancient Maya, the first edition of which was published in 1946.
[33]
Mayan references to b'ak'tun 13
It is not certain what significance the classic
Maya gave to the 13th b'ak'tun.
[36] Most classic Maya inscriptions are strictly historical and do not make any prophetic declarations.
[36] Two items in the Mayan classical corpus, however, do mention the end of the 13th b'ak'tun: Tortuguero Monument 6 and La Corona Hieroglyphic Stairway 12.
Tortuguero
The
Tortuguero site, which lies in southernmost
Tabasco, Mexico, dates from the 7th century AD and consists of a series of inscriptions mostly in honor of the contemporary ruler Bahlam Ajaw. One inscription, known as Tortuguero Monument 6, is the only inscription known to refer to b'ak'tun 13 in any detail. It has been partially defaced; Sven Gronemeyer and Barbara MacLeod have given this translation:
- tzuhtzjo:m uy-u:xlaju:n pik
- chan ajaw u:x uni:w
- uhto:m il[?]
- ye'ni/ye:n bolon yokte'
- ta chak joyaj
|
- It will be completed the 13th b'ak'tun.
- It is 4 Ajaw 3 K'ank'in
- and it will happen a 'seeing'[?].
- It is the display of B'olon-Yokte'
- in a great "investiture".
|
The Tortuguero monument connects the end of the 13th b'ak'tun with the appearance of Bolon Yokte' K'uh, shown here on the Vase of Seven Gods.
Very little is known about the god Bolon Yokte'. According to an article by Mayanists Markus Eberl and Christian Prager in
British Anthropological Reports, his name is composed of the elements "nine", 'OK-te' (the meaning of which is unknown), and "god". Confusion in classical period inscriptions suggests that the name was already ancient and unfamiliar to contemporary scribes.
[38] He also appears in inscriptions from
Palenque,
Usumacinta, and
La Mar as a god of war, conflict, and the underworld. In one
stele he is portrayed with a rope tied around his neck, and in another with an incense bag, together signifying a sacrifice to end a cycle of years.
[39]
Based on observations of modern Mayan rituals, Gronemeyer and MacLeod claim that the stela refers to a celebration in which a person portraying Bolon Yokte' K'uh was wrapped in ceremonial garments and paraded around the site. They note that the association of Bolon Yokte' K'uh with b'ak'tun 13 appears to be so important on this inscription that it supersedes more typical celebrations such as "erection of stelae, scattering of incense" and so forth. Furthermore, they assert that this event was indeed planned for 2012 and not the 7th century. Mayanist scholar
Stephen Houston contests this view by arguing that future dates on Mayan inscriptions were simply meant to draw parallels with contemporary events, and that the words on the stela describe a contemporary rather than a future scene.
[43]
La Corona
In April–May 2012, a team of archaeologists unearthed a previously unknown inscription on a stairway at the
La Corona site in
Guatemala. The inscription, on what is known as Hieroglyphic Stairway 12, describes the establishment of a royal court in
Calakmul in 635 AD, and compares the then-recent completion of 13 k'atuns with the future completion of the 13th b'ak'tun. However, it contains no speculation or prophecy as to what the scribes believed would happen at that time.
