Three Mayan Calendars Confusion
That the ancient Maya used three calendars is, at first, very confusing. You want to say, “Why couldn’t those people have had one simple calendar like we do.”
The three calendars of the ancient Maya are:
- The 260-day ceremonial calendar which we call the Tzolkin (It was referred to as the ch’olk’ib (or day count) in Spanish colonial document.) No one knows what the ancient Maya called it. The Tzolkin kept a record of all the ceremonial religious days of the year. It was composed of 13 groups of 20 days.
- The Haab calendar of 365 days is the most closely similar to our present 365 day year – 366 days in a leap year. The Haab consisted of 20 months of 18 days plus five extra “evil” days which were spent in fasting and penitence.
- The Long Count Calendar represents an era of about 5,125 years. Correlated with Western calendar dates, our present era began on August 11, 3114 B.C. and will end on December 21, 2012. On December 22, 2012, the Long Count Calendar will start on day 1 again in the same way our centuries last for 1000 years and start on day 1 again.
