The world will end, but not now...

We passed January 2nd 2012, February 1st 212. We just survived the apocalypse of December 12th as well! I lost count... and you may already understand that I am fed up with these terrible stories of the end of our world. But where does the story come from that December 21st the world will end?

This stone calendar is often shown if articles mention the Maya calendar.
In fact it is an Aztek object. The Azteks base their calendars on the older
Maya culture. The stone has indeed calendrical and astronomical figures
and symbols  But scientists think that it wasn't used for watching the
clock. It was the decoration on an altar for human sacrifice. Mexican
anthropologists call it often the Sun Stone — for the sun god Tonatuih.
His face is visible at the center.

The news about December 21st says the Mayas are the bad guys. These dear people were innovative and well organised. All when we were still living in swamps in the Netherlands. In Maya society it was very important to keep a calendar. They developed a very ingenious calendar. They used more or less the following units: kin (1 day), uinal (20 days), tun (~1 year), katun (~20 years), baktun (~394 years) en pictun (~7.885 year). These units were used in the same manner as we use decade, century, millennium. For example: 1 katun is 20 tun in duration; and 1 pictun is 20 baktun; etcetera.

Four long numbers on the north wall of a ruined Mayan house
relating to the Maya calendar and computations about the moon,
sun and possibly Venus and Mars. Photo: REUTERS/William
Saturno and David Stuart/National Geographic

The Maya religion mentions that the world will end and be recreated after every pictun (let's call it the Maya millennium). It will become probably tough when this happens, but it will take a lot more time. Calculations with my own calculator on the actual pictun we are living in, tells me that the Maya world was created about 3.114 year before Christ. And the end of the world would be 12 October of the year 4.772. I'm not going to wait for that...

But what happens on December 21st 2012? This is exactly the date that the actual baktun finishes (let's call it the Maya century). This date is mentioned in some Maya writings, but what witches, fortune tellers, hippies, prophets or who-ever says about this date, has nothing to do with the Mayas. The apocalypse is an invention of the Christians to be exact... The Mayas don't even know a last judgment myth.

I think of the millennium bug all the time while reading about the fear for the end of the world. And we all know nothing happened at January 1st 2000. Humanity has some fear of finishing clocks, I guess. We also count away the last seconds at New Years Eve. Probably it's very human to fear the idea that there will not be a new year. Well, than next year will become very interesting! I wish you all the best for 2013...

More information
- Some good explanation on the Maya calendar: Maya calendar on Wikipedia
- For those who want to read it all: the 2012 phenomenon on Wikipedia
- A article on a relatively young finding which disproves the apocalypse ideas for 2012 even further: Newly discovered Mayan calendar further disproves doomsday myth

De Nederlandse versie van deze bijdrage: de wereld vergaat een andere keer