• Complain

Charles River Editors - Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars

Here you can read online Charles River Editors - Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars full text of the book (entire story) in english for free. Download pdf and epub, get meaning, cover and reviews about this ebook. year: 2021, publisher: Charles River Editors, genre: Religion. Description of the work, (preface) as well as reviews are available. Best literature library LitArk.com created for fans of good reading and offers a wide selection of genres:

Romance novel Science fiction Adventure Detective Science History Home and family Prose Art Politics Computer Non-fiction Religion Business Children Humor

Choose a favorite category and find really read worthwhile books. Enjoy immersion in the world of imagination, feel the emotions of the characters or learn something new for yourself, make an fascinating discovery.

No cover
  • Book:
    Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars
  • Author:
  • Publisher:
    Charles River Editors
  • Genre:
  • Year:
    2021
  • Rating:
    5 / 5
  • Favourites:
    Add to favourites
  • Your mark:
    • 100
    • 1
    • 2
    • 3
    • 4
    • 5

Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars: summary, description and annotation

We offer to read an annotation, description, summary or preface (depends on what the author of the book "Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars" wrote himself). If you haven't found the necessary information about the book — write in the comments, we will try to find it.

*Includes pictures
*Includes a bibliography for further reading
*Includes a table of contents
Many ancient civilizations have influenced and inspired people in the 21st century, and the Greeks and Romans continue to fascinate the West today, but of all the worlds civilizations, none have intrigued people more than the Mayans, whose culture, astronomy, language, and mysterious disappearance all continue to captivate people. In the past decade especially, there has been a renewed focus on the Mayans, whose advanced calendar led many to speculate the world would end on the same date the Mayan calendar ended in 2012.
The focus on the doomsday scenario, however, overshadowed the Mayans true contributions to astronomy, language, sports, and art. While many incorrectly presume that the Maya were predicting the world to end on that date, it is not a coincidence that their calendar ended on the winter solstice. The Maya developed a sophisticated method of calculating and creating a calendar that is astonishing even by todays standards, and their advancements in applied mathematics not only has intrigued archaeologists but has been incorporated into the beliefs of New Agers and modern apocalyptic doomsayers. In the history of arithmetic, their use of zero stands as a milestone of great significance, which placed them ahead of contemporary Europeans. In Europe, this essential concept was not part of the canon of calculation until the Renaissance.
For the Maya, astronomy was not a purely scientific pursuit but intimately linked to religious, mythological, and ideological elements that were of the highest importance. The celestial realm held a sacred nature, as did the many gods and goddesses that dwelt there, so for all Mesoamerican cultures, astronomy was a fundamental part of their everyday lives. Thus, astronomy was present in their calendars, religion, and even agriculture, and in close relation to astronomy, the concept of time was also an essential part of their worldview. The Maya recorded time on almost every surface they could, including lintels, cornices, panels, stelae, friezes, ceramics, and paper. This insistence on capturing dates has led many scholars to suggest the Maya were obsessed with time.
The Maya had some of the most advanced astronomical measurements in the world, and their work built upon thousands of years, spanning from around 2500 BCE until the the arrival of the Spanish in 1519. Thanks to their hieroglyphic writing, archaeologists have been able to learn a wealth of information about the way they lived and their complex system of beliefs. Susan Milbrath, a leading expert on Mayan astronomy, noted that the study of Pre-Columbian Maya astronomical imagery must begin with an understanding of the contemporary Maya worldview, because we cannot hope to penetrate the ancient beliefs without an understanding of what the Maya say about the heavens today. Many contemporary Mayans still use one or several of the ancient calendars, as well as Precolumbian rituals and astronomical cycles.
Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Mayas Measurements of the Planets and Stars examines what is known and unknown about the Mayas astronomy, and why their astronomy was among the most accurate in the world. Along with pictures and a bibliography for further reading, you will learn about Mayan astronomy like never before.

Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars — read online for free the complete book (whole text) full work

Below is the text of the book, divided by pages. System saving the place of the last page read, allows you to conveniently read the book "Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars" online for free, without having to search again every time where you left off. Put a bookmark, and you can go to the page where you finished reading at any time.

Light

Font size:

Reset

Interval:

Bookmark:

Make
Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Mayas Measurements of the Planets and Stars
By Charles River Editors
An illustration in the Madrid Codex believed to depict an astronomer About - photo 1
An illustration in the Madrid Codex believed to depict an astronomer
About Charles River Editors
Charles River Editors was founded by Harvard and MIT alumni to provide superior - photo 2
Charles River Editors was founded by Harvard and MIT alumni to provide superior editing and original writing services, with the expertise to create digital content for publishers across a vast range of subject matter. In addition to providing original digital content for third party publishers, Charles River Editors republishes civilizations greatest literary works, bringing them to a new generation via ebooks.
Sign up here to receive updates about free books as we publish them, and visit Our Kindle Author Page to browse todays free promotions and our most recently published Kindle titles.
Introduction
A picture of the Caracol at Chichen Itza which is believed to have been an - photo 3
A picture of the Caracol at Chichen Itza, which is believed to have been an observatory
Many ancient civilizations have influenced and inspired people in the 21 st century, and the Greeks and Romans continue to fascinate the West today, but of all the worlds civilizations, none have intrigued people more than the Mayans, whose culture, astronomy, language, and mysterious disappearance all continue to captivate people. In the past decade especially, there has been a renewed focus on the Mayans, whose advanced calendar led many to speculate the world would end on the same date the Mayan calendar ended in 2012.
The focus on the doomsday scenario, however, overshadowed the Mayans true contributions to astronomy, language, sports, and art. While many incorrectly presume that the Maya were predicting the world to end on that date, it is not a coincidence that their calendar ended on the winter solstice. The Maya developed a sophisticated method of calculating and creating a calendar that is astonishing even by todays standards, and their advancements in applied mathematics not only has intrigued archaeologists but has been incorporated into the beliefs of New Agers and modern apocalyptic doomsayers. In the history of arithmetic, their use of zero stands as a milestone of great significance, which placed them ahead of contemporary Europeans. In Europe, this essential concept was not part of the canon of calculation until the Renaissance.
For the Maya, astronomy was not a purely scientific pursuit but intimately linked to religious, mythological, and ideological elements that were of the highest importance. The celestial realm held a sacred nature, as did the many gods and goddesses that dwelt there, so for all Mesoamerican cultures, astronomy was a fundamental part of their everyday lives. Thus, astronomy was present in their calendars, religion, and even agriculture, and in close relation to astronomy, the concept of time was also an essential part of their worldview. The Maya recorded time on almost every surface they could, including lintels, cornices, panels, stelae, friezes, ceramics, and paper. This insistence on capturing dates has led many scholars to suggest the Maya were obsessed with time.
The Maya had some of the most advanced astronomical measurements in the world, and their work built upon thousands of years, spanning from around 2500 BCE until the the arrival of the Spanish in 1519.
Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Mayas Measurements of the Planets and Stars examines what is known and unknown about the Mayas astronomy, and why their astronomy was among the most accurate in the world. Along with pictures and a bibliography for further reading, you will learn about Mayan astronomy like never before.
The Enigma of the Maya
Depiction of Upakal Kinich in Palenque Ubiquitous in popular and scholarly - photo 4
Depiction of Upakal K'inich in Palenque
Ubiquitous in popular and scholarly descriptions of Maya civilization is the word enigma. In spite of tremendous advances in archaeology that continue to reveal more and more information on the highly developed Maya civilization of Mesoamerica, there remain many unanswered questions. Two examples of significant unresolved questions concerning the Maya illustrate the serious holes in our knowledge. Despite the existence of their civilization in South America for thousands of years, historians and archaeologists still cannot explain where the Maya came from or exactly why their civilization collapsed.
Why have these questions continued to go unanswered? These unsolved mysteries surrounding the Maya civilization persist in large measure due to the efficiency of the Spanish in eradicating the remnants of Maya culture. And unlike the Aztecs, the disappearance of the Mayans cannot be clearly traced to a series of battles. By the early 16th century, the Spanish conquistadors, along with the colonists and zealous propagators of the faith who followed the likes of Cortes and Pizarro, set out to systematically destroy the indigenous Maya civilization of the Yucatan that was already in decline even before their arrival. The land-grabbing colonists used the natives as virtual slave labor and pillaged their cities, while enthusiastic Catholic baptizers did their best to erase their heathen beliefs.
While the blame for the loss of much of the Mayan culture can be heaped upon the Spanish, much of what is known about life in a Maya community came from the writings of the Provincial of the Franciscans in the Yucatan, Bishop Diego de Landa. His 1566 book, Relacin de las cosas de Yucatn ( An Account of the Affairs in the Yucatan ), contains detailed observations on the culture of the Maya, including a record of their hieroglyphics and writing system. These have proved to be invaluable sources for those piecing together a picture of Mayan life. But Bishop Landa was also responsible for what in retrospect was an incalculable loss for the world. The Mayans developed the only full language during the Mesoamerican period, but Landa and his Franciscan cohorts confiscated a great number of books written in the Mayan language which they believed were full of heretical ideas and burned them all. Bishop Landas well-intentioned bonfire of books left the world with only four extant Maya manuscripts and a 1558 record written in Latin characters of Maya cosmology called the Popol Vuh , or book of the people preserving oral tradition of the K'iche Maya of Guatemala.
The Mayas writings obviously werent the only things lost to history. In the years after the conquest of the Maya some of their cities were mined by the colonists for building materials. A spectacular example of this is took place at Izamal, where Bishop Landa's Monastery of San Antonio de Padua was constructed with stones reused from a Maya building. The Monastery itself, rising above the colonial town, sits on a plinth that is, in fact, a truncated Maya pyramid. Other Maya cities still inhabited in the period of conquest were abandoned and eventually obscured by jungle vegetation. Explorers in the jungle still find lost ruins of the Maya in Central America, and one incorrect story that made the rounds in 2011 speculated that Mayan ruins were found in North Georgia, a reflection of the interest and uncertainty still surrounding the Maya.
In the early 19th century, explorers and adventurers began to rediscover several Maya sites. Following the opinions of the colonists. who at the time perceived the contemporary Maya as unsophisticated and culturally impoverished, the explorers were initially convinced that these people could not have been responsible for such elaborate building projects. Given some of their similarities to the ancient civilizations in Europe and Egypt, they concluded that the Maya pyramids and other structures they discovered must have somehow been the work of Greeks, Romans, Egyptians or Indians from India. How exactly these American city builders got to the region was explained by fanciful conjecture on cultural migration.
Next page
Light

Font size:

Reset

Interval:

Bookmark:

Make

Similar books «Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars»

Look at similar books to Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars. We have selected literature similar in name and meaning in the hope of providing readers with more options to find new, interesting, not yet read works.


Reviews about «Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars»

Discussion, reviews of the book Mayan Astronomy: The History of the Maya’s Measurements of the Planets and Stars and just readers' own opinions. Leave your comments, write what you think about the work, its meaning or the main characters. Specify what exactly you liked and what you didn't like, and why you think so.