Maya Calendar Mystery Solved
A Boston University professor in the Archaeology Department, William Saturno (love that name given the Mayan context), has revealed what looks like a small "office" that once housed the town scribe in the lost Mayan city of Xultún first discovered about a hundred years but only now being excavated. The town scribe's job was to record - in paint on stone - the chronicle of his Maya community. In a sensational issue of June 2012 National Geographic Magazine (on sale from 29 May) the amazing Mayan city buried for a thousand years in thick jungle reveals never-suspected details about Mayan life portrayed on the walls in shades of ochre, red, and black. The paintings are of both Mayan Glyphs and portrayals of people but the primary purpose of the site seems to have been the calculation of the various Mayan calendrical cycles: ceremonial/lunar, solar, and orbital periods of Venus and Mars. Professor Saturno comments that the walls of this dwelling were treated like a kind of 'blackboard', a work space for record-keeping and calculating significant cycles such as eclipses. The more picturesque murals are the first known examples found in a Mayan dwelling. Until now it was thought that Mayan murals were used only for ceremonial purposes. This finding is reminiscent of Etruscan wall paintings from roughly the same time period but on the opposite side of the Atlantic.Maya Calendar Mystery Solved
Each of the three intact walls reveals a unique story. Opposite the entrance to the dwelling (north wall),
is an image of a man that takes up part of three walls. It is assumed that the image is meant to be that of the local 'king' but Saturno points out that it could be the scribe himself since the figure is holding a 'pen' in one hand. Also on the wall are four long numbers in glyphs that seem to indicate numbers between 1.3 million to 2.5 million days - literally astronomical figures that stretch about 7,000 years into the future.
is an image of a man that takes up part of three walls. It is assumed that the image is meant to be that of the local 'king' but Saturno points out that it could be the scribe himself since the figure is holding a 'pen' in one hand. Also on the wall are four long numbers in glyphs that seem to indicate numbers between 1.3 million to 2.5 million days - literally astronomical figures that stretch about 7,000 years into the future.
On the wall to the left (west) of the back wall there are three male figures. They are painted in black but wearing white loincloths. In addition, all three wear medallions and mitre-like head dresses decorated with a single feather. On the opposite wall (east) is another black-painted figure but faint outlines of others are still visible. This wall is covered in columns of numbers including numbers representing how to count as well as calendrical equations, some lunar and some solar. There are even inscriptions - in red no less! - that appear to be corrections to some of the calculations! That the space was used for teaching and learning seems beyond doubt.
So, the Maya did not believe the world would end on 21 /12/2012. An over-enthusiastic theorist in the 1970s and 1980s, Jose Arguelles, got carried away with a pet - and totally mistaken - theory. Had he left it at that - as a theory - he would have been fine. Instead, he and several his friends found their own non-evidential arguments more convincing than the deeply informed judgments of Mayan scholars and they went on to spawn what has become something of a 2012 mini-industry. No doubt the discovery of an older source than the Dresden and Paris Codices used by Arguelles et al will have little effect on those who are committed to their ideas despite proof to the contrary. Thank goodness we still have archaeology, history, and common sense to correct erroneous notions that take on a life of their own in the cyber-age.
For more information on Maya art, history, or culture, why not browse the 2012 Shop HERE.
Picture credit: Wikimedia Creative Commons
© Delia O' Riordan
