For all the modern hype surrounding the Mayan calendar's supposed end date of 2012, there was only one actual known reference to that end date ever found in Mayan text. We can now add a second reference to that collection, as it was announced Thursday at the National Palace in Guatemala that an ancient Mayan hieroglyph has been discovered referencing the 2012 date. It is already being considered one of the most important hieroglyphic finds in decades.
The text was uncovered at the site of La Corona in Guatemala, a site that was first explored by researchers in 1997, and later looted by bandits, who took many items of value. However the bandits did leave behind a large batch of carved stones at one building, presumably because they were too eroded to sell on the black market.
Those stones, once stairway steps, contain hieroglyphs that record 200 years of La Corona history. On one of those stones, which bears 56 hieroglyphs, the reference to 2012 was discovered.
The hieroglyphs commemorate a royal visit in 696 AD by Yuknoom Yich'aak K'ahk' of Calakmul, one of the Maya's most powerful rulers at the time, who was previously thought to have been killed by a rival months before his visit to La Corona.
The 2012 reference found on the stone is not an end of world prophecy, but a means to place the ruler's reign and exploits within the context of a larger timeframe and era; an era that ends in 2012 according to the Maya and their calendar.
While there is much being made of the Mayan Calendar's end date, Mayan historians and scholars are quick to point out that the Maya did not believe the world would end in 2012; that it would simply signal the end of an era (the 13th baktun, which ends on December 21, 2012), with another expected to follow it afterwards. In fact there are many references in Mayan texts to periods of time well beyond the 13th baktun.
Do you believe any of the hype surrounding 2012 prophecies? Will you be just a little edgier on December 21 of this year, even if you don't? Let us know your thoughts and predictions for 2012 and beyond.
