Selections from the Mayan calendar
One in 10 of us was said to be anxious that 21 December marked the end of the world. The Ancient Mayans were accused of predicting this doomsday, when they did no such thing.
That the world would end in 2012 was the most widely-disseminated doomsday tale in human history, thanks to the internet, Hollywood and an ever-eager press corps.
Recent hurricanes, unrest in the Middle East, solar flares, mystery planets about to collide with us – all “proof” of what the ancient Mayans knew would come to pass on 21 December 2012.
He points out that at a Mayan site in Palenque, Mexico, there is an inscription describing an event that takes place in 4,722 of our era, “and that is the turning of an even bigger cycle”, he says.
He adds that technically this is also not the start of a new cycle.
In 3114 BC the calendar reset to zero with the turning of the 13th bak’tun (which is a smaller, 400 year cycle). This time, however, it does not reset to zero but merely goes on to the 14th bak’tun.
“The Mayan Calendar is a weird and wonderful thing,” he says.
In the event an attempt was made to “create a moment of meditation and connection to the sacred sites around the earth,” says Daniel Pinchbeck, author of 2012: The Year of the Mayan Prophecy.
It was also the beginning of what many in the loosely-defined New Age movement regard as a process in the transformation of our consciousness – a transformation that goes into full effect at the end of this year.
Pinchbeck calls 21/12/12 the “hinge point” of the emergence of a new, more enlightened age – not an ending point for all civilisation.
“It is quite clear that the Mayan system envisages a new cycle of the calendar beginning on the 22 December 2012,” says Graham Hancock, author of Fingerprints of the Gods, and something of a rock star in the world of ancient mysteries enthusiasts.