We often talk about the great astronomical knowledge of ancient civilizations such as the Sumerians and also about the perfect alignment of the Egyptian pyramids with the stars, but little is said about the sophisticated Mayan astronomy. In fact, it has taken Western societies more than five centuries to understand that Mayan knowledge is more than just meaningless codices, but rather has a deep connection with the cosmos and that ancient peoples already possessed information that modern man barely possessed. has been discovering thanks to its technology.
A vast corpus of written indigenous science, which the Spanish fought so hard to disappear, has been rediscovered and thanks to this, little by little the great Mayan wisdom about the cosmos and how this knowledge formed the bases of their culture is better understood.
In the 16th century, with the arrival of the Spanish to Mesoamerica, men from the Old World violently collided with pre-Hispanic life. Both their worldviews and their traditions and wisdom impacted the Spaniards who attempted to abruptly reform Mesoamerican cultures. In the process, dozens of codices were burned and with this, the explanation of why its impressive pyramids are carefully aligned with the stars and phenomena.
Unfortunately (or fortunately), many of the codices escaped the flames through the hands of looters. Thus, the sacred writings of the Mayos ended up appearing in foreign libraries many years later.
The resurgence of ancient astronomical knowledge
When astronomical knowledge began to emerge from the few codices that are still preserved, archaeologists and researchers set their eyes on the Mayan territories that extend through Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras and El Salvador. Vast ceremonial complexes have been found there that served as astronomers’ workshops and give clues to how they could have developed their great wisdom of the cosmos.
The codices have also played a crucial role in learning more about it. One of the codices that was saved from the flames and destruction is the one that was kept in Dresden and that fell into the hands of a German librarian and amateur mathematician named Ernst Förstemann. Although the librarian could not decipher the glyphs written by the Mayans, he did manage to decipher the numbers inscribed on one of the tables. According to Förstemann, these correspond to exact dates within the 260-day Mayan calendar.
*Dresden Code.
As far as we know, the Mayans were governed by a sophisticated and precise calendar called Tzolk’in. The Tzolk’in represented a sacred cycle of 260 days, which was made up of twenty trecenas (20 days counted 13 times). Within this calendar all the traditions of Mayan ritual life and cycles of days that intertwine like gears of perfect knowledge make sense. And although little by little some of the ancestral wisdom has been lost, today the traditional Mayan people continue to use it in their daily lives.
Förstemann was able to understand that the exact dates inscribed in the codex adhere to the sacred cycle of the Tzolk’in and mark within it the movements of the planet Venus in the celestial vault. The chart shows how the planet oscillates across the sky, positioning itself as a morning star, then disappearing and appearing as a night star, almost exactly five times in eight years.
In addition to this, the Mayans also calendared the movements of other stars with high precision, perhaps one of the most exact of the ancestral cultures, since they knew the movements in the celestial vault of the sun, the stars, some, and even understood the lunar phases with great precision. accuracy. Tables have also been deciphered in rescued codices that speak of a calendar of solar eclipses.
The connection of the cosmos and the ceremonial centers
Even for modern man with all the scientific and technological advances, it has been an enormous challenge to understand how the Mayan buildings are completely connected to the cosmos and its movements. Perhaps the greatest example of this great connection is the great Temple of Kukulkan in Chichén Itzá, through which the feathered serpent descends during the equinoxes and which tells us about the profound astronomical knowledge they possessed. But it is not the only example of alignment between a ceremonial building and astronomical phenomena.
Uxmal is another of them, from the Governor’s Palace that was ordered to be built by Lord Chac in 950 AD, you can admire the Venusian procession in the sky as a morning and evening star. The connection with Venus is so evident that the more than 350 glyphs inscribed on the temple mean ‘Venus’ or ‘star’. Even the numerous sculptures of Chac appear engraved with the number 8 (remember that Venus goes through its five cycles every 8 years).
Mascaron Palace of the Governor by Hector Cauich on Sketchfab
*A 3D model of a detail of the Governor’s Palace in Uxmal shows the curly, trunk-shaped nose of the rain deity Chac. Above Chac’s rectangular eyes is a horizontal bar and three dots: the number 8 in Mayan writing. Credits: Héctor Cauich/José Huchim/INAH.
But although this Mayan city has been a great tourist attraction and visited by millions of people, archaeoastronomers are still trying to decipher its deep connection with the knowledge of the cosmos. One of the theories is that when Venus reaches its southernmost point in the sky, anyone who stands at the main door of the Governor’s Palace will be able to admire to the East a pyramid completely aligned with the planet. In fact, it is believed that the buildings of Uxmal were placed in such an arrangement to create a perfect line of sight that is consistent with the cycles of Venus.
More evidence has been found about the great Mayan astronomical wisdom, however, astronomers and archaeologists work hand in hand with the Mayan peoples who still keep much of the knowledge in their traditions. But it seems that it will be a long road to understand how the Mayans managed to make accurate translations of the celestial vault and incorporated them into their great culture.