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Are you quick for the end ? Or perhaps a fresh beginning ?
Either way , buckle up , because today marks the one - month countdown until the 2012 Mayan Apocalypse , set for Dec. 21 . That date corresponds to the end of the 13th b’ak’tun , or 144,000 - day cycle , on the Maya Long Count calendar , mark a full cycle of creation , agree to the ancient Maya .
A tracing of an artistic representation of the Maya sun god found on the north side of the Diablo Pyramid at El Zotz, an archaeological site in Guatemala.
This milepost has activate both fear and excitement in some subcultures , peculiarly on-line . Some believerssee the day as a rightful doomsday , when the Earth will be destroyed in a planetary collision or other major cataclysm . Others see it as a solar day marking a new dawn of peace and unity .
All of this agitation halt from two ancient texts constitute in Central America and go out back to the heydays of the Mayan Empire . One calendar inscription was found on a repository made around A.D. 669 in Tortuguero , Mexico , and refers to the coming of a god consociate with wheel change on the Dec. 21 appointment . ( Of course , since December is an innovation of westerly calendar , they did n’t utilize quite those terms . ) [ Doom & Gloom : Top 10 Post - Apocalyptic Worlds ]
A second inscription , unearthed this class in Guatemala , advert to a struggling king who cry himself the " 13 k’atun lord , " an effort to splice himself to the 13th b’ak’tun of Dec. 21 , 2012 . This was potential a public relations move contrive to shore up up support after the king support a crippling defeat in struggle a few year before .
In neither text edition were revelatory predictions made . But when westerners overhear wind of the Mayan calendar , they mixed in their own end - of - the - reality mythology , much of it stemming from Christianity , and create a raw legend , according to University of Kansas Maya scholarly person John Hoopes .
Apocalypse predictions are a reasonably frequent occurrence in westerly refinement . Most latterly , radio preacher Harold Camping gained ill fame after foretell Judgment Day on May 21 , 2011 and the end of the creation on Oct. 21 of that year . encampment had initially claimed the world would terminate in 1994 , afterwards assert he had catch his Biblical mathematics wrong ; the real engagement , he say , would be Oct. 21 , 2011 .
The literal Mayan Empire did actually stop , of course , albeit tardily and not on anyone ’s foretell timetable . Environmental evidence suggests that drought helped break down ripe Mayan cities and may havekept them from rebuildingonce their political institutions collapsed .
