Mayan Civilization’s Collapse: Deforestation

Does this sound familiar? Although this quote is excerpted from a Live Science article about the

The location of the ancient Mayan civilization in the Yucatan Peninsula

ancient Mayan civilization in the rain forests of Guatemala, the reference to tree pollen being replaced by weed pollen sounds a lot like our present civilization.

I live in a rural area in the U.S., and everywhere around me, forests are being cut down to create subdivisions.

From pollen trapped in ancient layers of lake sediment, scientists have learned that around 1,200 years ago, just before the civilization’s collapse, tree pollen disappeared almost completely and was replaced by the pollen of weeds. In other words, the region became almost completely deforested.

Aren’t we cutting down trees and replacing them with cities, farms, and industrial regions? Don’t most of us live in areas where tree pollen hardly exists any more? 

The above quote refers to the ancient Mayan civilization in the Peten region of Guatemala. According to a Live Science article, Ancient Mayan Canals Possibly Spotted in Satellite Images,  NASA climate scientist Bob Ogelsby at the Marshall Space Flight Center, learned from computer simulations that:

Without trees, erosion would have worsened, carrying away fertile topsoil. The changing groundcover would have boosted the temperature of the region by as much as 6 degrees, . . .

The article goes on to say that the basic cause of the Mayan civilization’s collapse was because of ongoing food and water shortages brought on by a “combination of natural drought and deforestation by humans.”  Could we be creating our own civilization’s collapse by deforesting our land? Can we learn from the ancient Maya?

From my point of view, the most important thing has to do with the disregard for our dependence on the nature kingdom.

Chicxulub, Yucatan, appears in the End of the World 2012 Movie, Kindle, and Book

This shaded relief image of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula show a subtle, but unmistakable, indication of the Chicxulub impact crater. Most scientists now agree that this impact was the cause of the Cretatious-Tertiary Extinction, the event 65 million years ago that marked the sudden extinction of the dinosaurs as well as the majority of life then on Earth.This image was catalogued by Jet Propulsion Lab of the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) under Photo ID: PIA03379. Image retrieved from Wikipedia Commons.

Chicxulub, presently a sleepy fishing village in Yucatan, makes an appearance in the End of the World 2012 Movie, Kindle EBook, and book. It is the site where, 65 million years ago, a  six-mile-wide meteor hit the earth leading to the extinction of the dinosaurs.

Chixculub appears in the End of the World 2012 series it that part of the movie/book in which we examine if the world can really end. What do you think? Can the world really end?

The crater is more than 180 km (110 mi) in diameter, making the feature one of the largest confirmed impact structures on Earth; the impacting bolide that formed the crater was at least 10 km (6 mi) in diameter.

Chicxulub crater

Book Excerpt – End of the World 2012

End of the World 2012:
The Latest Up-To-Date Information on the Mayan Calendar, the Alignment with the Galactic Center, and the December 21, 2012 Mayan Prophecies – Will the World End in 2012?

Chapter 6:
Prophecies of a New World from the Maya

To find out more about the Maya prophecies of a new world, we went to visit Dr. Robert K. Sitler, an authority on the Maya and also the Director of the Latin American Studies Program at Stetson University in DeLand, Florida. He is also the author of The Living Maya: Ancient Wisdom in the Era of 2012.

We talked with Dr. Sitler in his home. I liked that he was dressed casually in a cotton long-sleeved blue top, cotton trousers and sandals. There was something about the way he sat in a relaxed manner, that made me feel instantly comfortable in his presence.

I had first read about Dr. Sitler in an article he wrote, which was included in the book, The Mystery of 2012: Predictions, Prophecies, and Possibilities. Of all the articles in that book, his seemed to be one that appeared to address the actual Mayan prophecy that had originally started all the conjecture about the predictions of doomsday or, conversely, awakening.

Therefore, I felt grateful for the opportunity to interview him, because he seemed to be one of few who actually knew something about the Mayan prophecies and their origins.

Since I considered him to be a treasure trove of real information on the Maya and the Mayan prophecies, I first started by asking about prophecies of a new world.

I told him that I had heard, in my travels while filming the Yucatan Travel Movie that especially the Maya in the Tulum area were talking about something that was going to happen in “2000 and a little bit.” So, I asked Professor Sitler if he knew anything about this.

The Tulum Mayan ruins overlook a gorgeous white-sand beach. Photo by Miriam Balsley

Maya Prophecies of a New World from the Tulum Area

He replied, “Certainly one of the richest prophetic traditions in the Maya world—that particular area, starting at Tulum and going to the south and west from there, you’re in an area where people sometimes refer to themselves as ‘mas ehual’ [My best phonetic guess at how to spell what Dr. Sitler said, which is probably a phrase in Spanish, but it could also be Mayan.].

He continued, “These are the descendants of the rebels who fought the Caste War in the late 1800s and have been extremely resistance to assimilation into the Hispanic culture.”

By the way, as I mentioned earlier, in the Caste War the indigenous Maya fought the Spanish in an attempt to regain control of their ancestral lands. The Maya lost.

Dr. Sitler continued, “They have very strong prophetic traditions, most of which involve a war, and this time, instead of being brutally defeated, they would emerge victorious from the war. There would be a new world with Maya sensibilities in place.”

I had heard Alfred Rordame describe how Vedic Astrology predicted an opportunity for understanding the mysteries. Now, I heard Dr. Sitler talk about the prophecies of the Maya of the Tulum area, which involved a new world in which a Maya view of the world would predominate.

So far, I hadn’t heard anything about the end of the world.

Find out more about End of the World 2012 Book and EBook.