What’s up with Mayan prophecies about the world ending in 2012?

Quick answer: There are no specific Mayan prophecies about 2012!

So what's this you've heard about the Mayan calendar coming to an end? Two analogies to help you understand the situation: If you drove your car for so many miles that the counters on the odometer ran out, what would happen when the mileage went back to 000,000? Or, if it turns out that the world still exists on December 31^st, 9999, what year will it be on the next day? As you can see, the main concern is Y2K-ish, because the counting systems in the Mayan calendar might not be set up to count these kinds of numbers.

A little more background, probably with flaws, because this is what I’ve come to understand by talking to folks on this trip—each with slightly different perspectives and information.

The oldest archaeological evidence of the Mayan civilization is found at Itzapa; we saw it at the beginning of this trip. Carvings there were marked with a Mayan calendar date which corresponds to about 300 B.C. This means that 2300 years ago, the Maya already had enough knowledge from astronomical observations to know that a year was 365 days. In fact, their calendar had 18 months of 20 days, and one “unlucky” month with just 5 days.

Can you see that there's a person on the right, holding what looks like a stalk of corn on the left?

Those people at Itzapa, in fact, believed they were living around the year 4000, because for them the year 0 was when they were created, out of corn. In fact, the humans made from corn were actually the third or fourth attempt by the gods to make people. The first created beings couldn’t talk, so they became the animals. Then the gods made beings out of mud, but they washed away in the rain. Then the gods made creatures out of wood, but they couldn’t think: these are the monkeys. Finally, the gods made a dough out of corn, and from that dough they created humans, making us all, as one Mexican told us, “walking tortillas”!

And how do we know these creation stories? Again, a few things to think about. The Maya civilization had thriving city states from about 300 B.C. to 1100 A.D. These cities, many of which Nichole and I visited, were often ruled by kings. They had elaborate religious ceremonies overseen by priests, honoring a pantheon of gods linked to nature and to astronomy. They had trade networks which stretched into northern Mexico, east into the Carribean, and south to the Amazon. They had systems for collecting water and growing corn and other crops, they had tools for construction and ceremony and war, and they had artists who carved and painted records of their history.  Most of the knowledge of reading and writing and astronomy was confined to a relatively small class of the wealthy people.

The Maya city-states had all basically collapsed by the time the first Europeans came to Mexico, probably because of internal political problems as the ruling class went crazy from too many generations of in-breeding or as a drought or some other problem incited the people to revolution. In any case, the Maya people the Europeans met were living in small agricultural communities, speaking their indigenous language, and still celebrating the Mayan religion—but the vast majority of them could not read or write or explain the astronomical underpinnings of their once-flourishing society.

This sign, at Yaxchilan, is written in Spanish, English, and a local Mayan language,
here written with the alphabet that is familiar to us.

There were, however, books on bark written in Mayan glyphs, and there was a vast oral knowledge of the history and culture, which Europeans listened to and recorded in books using the Latin alphabet (this one I am typing in). The most famous of the latter is the Popol Vuh; among other stories, it contains an account of the creation of the corn people.

At some point in the Spanish conquest of Mexico, Catholic priests determined that the bark books of the Maya were evil and ordered them burned; today, only four of these books, called the Maya codices, remain. There are abundant carvings and paintings with original Mayan glyphs, but, like the hieroglyphics of the Egyptians, these have taken a lot of time and effort to “decode,” as archaeologists try to match the recorded symbols with the spoken language which was recorded in the Popol Vuh and other books. Variations of this language are still spoken by Mayan descendents today.

Weren’t we talking about the calendar? Ok, back to the calendar! For the Maya, the modern calendar started with the creation of the corn people and progressed through a series of months and years fairly similar to the one we use today. Running concurrently with this 365 day calendar, they also had a religious calendar based on 260 day cycles. If you think of these two calendars as wheels with cogs, you can imagine that while they both started out at day one, having the beginnings of each cycle occurring simultaneously would be fairly rare. It’s a least common multiple problem—and the answer turns out to be that the cycles start over together every 52 years.

This means that these calendars were sufficient for keeping track of things that happened in 52 year spans of time—probably long enough for most people that any given combination of dates happened only once in their lifetime. But clearly, if the oldest records we have are dated in the year 4000, the Maya had something more than this calendar; it is called the “long count.”

This carving, from Yaxchilan, has glyphs (lower right)
which could indicate, among other things, the date of the events described.

The 365- and 260-day calendars are cyclical; they come back to the beginning and start again, much like the cycles of human lives, or of celestial bodies. The long count calendar starts at 0 and moves forward, or at least it kept moving forward during all of the time the Maya were actually using it. Was it truly a linear calendar with the capacity to keep counting infinitely forward (by essentially moving to larger place values)?  Or, was it also conceived as cyclical, with an exceptionally long cycle?

Well, we’ll probably never know, but on Dec. 21^st, 2012, the Mayan long count will reach the end of its current formation. Perhaps it was designed to recycle, like your odometer; perhaps it was designed to move to a new place value, like New Year’s Day, 10,000.

Sense the mystery?

We’ve asked everyone about it, and the impression we get is that most people see it as hype designed to boost the tourism industry! While there are a few Mayan communities in Guatemala and the highlands of Chiapas who still use the 365- and 260-day calendars in daily life, those people have adapted our “Roman” calendar for the “long count”—so even they don’t know or care what happens to the Mayan long count.  My personal theory is that if there is a new creation at that time, it will be people made of computer chips--which won't actually be an advancement after us walking tortillas!

 

--Kris

Pot Holes, and Pyramids, and Aleuxes? Oh My!

 

¡Buenas tardes from Valladolid, Yucatán!  I am sitting in the open-air restaurant of our hotel, not far from the kitchen where some of the most fantastic smells are pouring out.  Unfortunately, I am too stuffed from a delicious breakfast and lunch, so I will not be able to eat anything tonight, but I’m living vicariously through the people around me.

View from the table where I'm writing this

Today we went to Chichén Itzá.  You know we’ve been to just about every archaeology site from the Pacific Ocean to the Gulf of México when my reaction to walking into Chichén Itzá was, “Yep, here it is.  Can I get a few pics and go?  This place is HOT and overcrowded with tourists.”  Ha, ha!

No, seriously, Chichén Itzá is one of the Seven Wonders of the World, and it is easy to see why.  Unlike every single site we visited so far, where there was only one ruler, and s/he was considered divine, the evidence at this site points to shared leadership amongst several people.  What a concept!

The first place we visited was the observatory.  The tribe of Maya living in this site were avid astronomers, and they built this observatory to carry out their work. There is no physical evidence of even rudimentary tools, but the Maya placed windows in the four cardinal and four intermediate directions of this tower to keep themselves oriented.  We are told that the staircase inside the observatory winds around like a snail shell up to the top of the lookout, so it is known as “el Caracól,” (the snail).  

El Caracol - Observatory -- I'm sporting the ankle brace!

The main pyramid at Chichén Itzá is also based on astronomy.  Our guide gave us the complete breakdown of its significance.  Basically, the staircases are comprised of 91 steps each, times four staircases, that makes 364.  The platform at the top is considered one extra step, which makes 365—the days in the year.  There are also several connections to different calendars, religious and lunar, as well as special events that happen during the spring and fall equinoxes.  From there, it is very complicated, and I should let the video speak for itself.  Suffice to say, this is one amazing pyramid!

I am so thankful that I was even able to visit Chichén Itzá today because two nights ago I managed to sprain my ankle.  Scaling ruins, you ask?  Walking along uneven paths?  Climbing over rocks or fallen trees?  Nope, not Nichole.  I sprained my ankle on a pot hole while walking to a restaurant along a dimly lit path with Kris, on our way to do some unit planning.  After all the stories you’ve heard from us about our bumpy roads, I guess it’s pretty apropos!

Our guide and driver were kind enough to take me to a pharmacy on our way to Mérida the next day to get me a brace, which helped immensely!  As we were leaving the hotel, Juan, our guide, asked us if we had had any troubles during the two nights we spent at the hotel right on the site of Uxmal.  Aside from my fall, we told him, our stay had been pleasant.  Intrigued, we asked why he was wondering.

He then proceeded to tell us all about a different tour he had done with a couple of journalists from Argentina, who stayed at the hotel next to ours.  Here’s the story:

“I got a call late at night from the hotel front desk.  They said that the man from my tour was refusing to stay in his room because he was convinced that someone kept opening and closing his door.  The staff went to investigate, and found everything in working order.  They sent a hotel guard to watch his room.  Finding nothing amiss, the guard left.  Shortly thereafter, the man was back at the desk demanding that the guard stay the entire night outside his room because, once again, his door had opened and shut.  With the guard planted firmly outside his door, the man returned to his room, only to reappear not long after that.  This time, he said, someone had sat on his belly while he was trying to sleep!”

It was at that point, that Juan agreed to trade rooms with him (the hotel had been completely full), where he slept just fine…but knowing such things normally happen in that area.

The Yucatecos (or people living in Yucatán) are very superstitious.  They believe in goblin, or trickster-like, characters called Aluxes.  Apparently, these little guys like to play tricks on people.  I told Juan maybe one of them tripped me and made me fall in the pot hole!  He said that they are not malicious, so I can chalk my fall up to clumsiness.  Ha, ha!  He also said that they tend to leave you alone if you acknowledge them as soon as they make their presence known.  He illustrated by telling us a story about a time he was visited by one of these guys.  Evidently, it kept turning his hotel tv on and off.  It finally left him alone when he acknowledged it.  [Insert Twilight Zone music here]

So, in case you’re ever in the Uxmal area and something goes bump in the night, just make sure to tell the goblin that you’re not in the mood for trickery (or perhaps you are?), and he’ll usually leave you alone.

I hope this guy will do my work for me.

My ankle, by the way, is getting better—thanks to ibuprofen, pillows, and ice.  We’re off to the last set of ruins tomorrow—Cobá and Tulúm!  I can’t believe our adventure is coming to a close!  I’ve tried my best to write lesson plans along the way, but the heat wears me out and by night time, I’m pretty well spent organizing my photos, uploading pictures, and connecting with my family back home.  I’ll have my work cut out for me when I get back!

Maybe I can convince some Aluxes to do it for me???

¡Hasta luego!  

Uncovering, Rebuilding and Maintaining

Any of you who have driven by my house in the last few weeks may notice that the yard’s getting kind of shaggy, the flowers haven’t been deadheaded, and any branches downed by a summer thunderstorm are still scattered around. Take that image, then imagine what would happen if I left the place unoccupied for 1000 years—and if I lived in a jungle where the things that grow “like weeds” literally can grow a foot or more in just a few days.

 

Sometimes, when I pictured the Spanish explorers, or the 20^th century archaeologists who followed in their footsteps, coming upon a magnificent Mayan city in the wilderness, I kind of thought it would be like coming upon a resort up north that has been closed up for the winter. Clearly, no one lives there, but you can easily imagine what it might be like on a hot summer day.



Is there something here?

But, I’m quickly realizing that finding these cities must have been much more like recognizing a Native American ceremonial mound when you are plowing your cornfield—unless someone had told you it was there, you could drive right over it a thousand times without noticing.



At Uxmal, for example, we saw the side of this building :

  . . . looking like this:

The Maya moved out of these cities sometime around 800 A.D. Over hundreds of years, as the buildings were covered with soil and the seedlings grew into trees, the roots and the rain damaged the buildings, washing away some of the calcium in the limestone and separating the decorative facades from their more work-a-day underpinnings.

So what happens when the archaeologists figure out that they’ve found something? Well, they have to start to piece it all back together. 

Restoring the buildings is a painstaking process, which is often slowed by uncertainty about what exactly they are rebuilding. The Maya themselves often remodeled and rebuilt, so many of the pyramids and other buildings we see actually contain remnants of others inside, or were originally constructed with mismatched materials and architectural styles.

Even when the archaeologists can agree, they are disrupted by inconsistent funding from the government for these projects. Here at Kabah, you can see that they took the rubble and tried to organize it, but they have not yet reattached these pieces to the building.

As they set about restoring these sites, they clean up the original stones and carefully mark their position, often taking the walls down and rebuilding them with new mortar.

In many places, the structures are still open for tourists and others to climb on, but some sections have not yet been reinforced. Earlier this week, workers at Uxmal were chopping away old plaster, getting ready to put on a new coat to protect the stones.

Where original carvings and statues have been left in place (not carted off to museums) they are often shielded from the elements by roofs—which also make nice patches of shade for grateful visitors.

Visitors also appreciate that the native tall grasses have been replanted with grasses more suitable for short lawns, and less suitable for snakes, although even this tourist-friendly turf needs to be mowed--in this case, usually with machetes! --Kris

Familiar scenes in unfamiliar places

We're in Merida today, which is the capital of the state of Yucatan. Check out these public school teachers, standing across the street from the state captiol, holding protest signs about their governor! We told them "Si, se puede!"--Kris