.--- In LexiLine@yahoogroups.com, Andreas Szabo
>
> Dear List, Dear Andis,
>
> I would like to know if i may ask some understanding
> questions in this
> list or rather if, when its some lexiline topic, to you only.
>
> Maybe there are people on the list, that want to answer or that
would also profit of this for learning and understanding.
>
> One is, I have read again and again the page about the
>mayacalendar corrected (lexi75) and still do not understand
>why one must use [minus] 3116 for
> calculations, not 3117 (b.c.). >
Here is my (Andis Kaulins) answer to those questions:
If my explanations have not been able to help you then you will have
to read under "Gregorian Calendar" on John Walker's:
http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/
It is in fact helpful to read and understand that page IN FULL....
Walker, who co-authored Autocad, writes about this problem as follows
in his help file to the free downloadable astronomy program Home
Planet which he also programmed.
"This dialogue allows you to enter a Julian date (remember that the
day number changes at noon, not midnight) and see the corresponding
Universal time displayed. The Universal time is updated dynamically
as you change the Julian date. Click OK to have Home Planet display
the Earth and sky at the specified Julian date (doing this will halt
automatic updates; select Animate/Run to resume them). Clicking Now
resets the Julian date to the current date and time.
You can enter any Julian date zero or greater. For Julian dates for
years before 1 A.D., note that astronomers and historians use
different conventions those years. In history books, the year that
preceded 1 A.D. is called 1 B.C.; zero not having come into use in
European culture at the time. Astronomers consider the year before
1 A.D. as "year 0". Thus when an astronomer talks about an eclipse
having occurred in the year -412, that's the year historians refer
to as "413 B.C.". In converting Julian days to historical dates,
Home Planet assumes the canonical date for the adoption of the
Gregorian calendar, Friday, October 15th, 1582. Many countries
shifted to the Gregorian calendar much later; in Great Britain, not
until 1752. When investigating events in history, make sure you
express all dates after October 15th, 1582 in the Gregorian calendar.
To convert a Universal time to Julian date, use the Edit/Set
Universal time dialogue."
[end of quoted material]
Why is this not corrected by the historians?
Because it is always more comfortable for mainstream scientists to
work with erroneous "established" data than to change to "correct"
data. This happens all the time. The website referred to above
http://www.fourmilab.ch/documents/calendar/
provides other more modern examples of this "time-saving" phenomenon.
>I also failed to understand how the 819
> must be seen or added (?) in relation to the long count date.
>Aren't that long-count dates allways correct for themselfes?
>So do i have to add the 819 to the tzolkin ha'ab somehow?
>Or is it just a signal to the julian counting people?
>
> I would enjoy to feel more evidence in these researches by
>entirely understanding them.
> regards,
> Andreas
What is a year?
See here
http://scienceworld.wolfram.com/astronomy/Year.html
There are all kinds of possibilities.
A normal "calendric solar year" is 365 days.
But an astronomical or tropical "star" year is a year with a mean
average of 365.24219878 days, which is
"The period of time required for the earth to make one complete
revolution around the sun, measured from one vernal equinox to the
next and equal to 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, 45.51 seconds."
See The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth
Edition, 2000 at http://www.bartleby.com/61/50/S0545000.html
The Maya scholars use a "continuous count" of days in the Maya
literature to trace the calendar back to 3114 BC, i.e. as if the
Maya used a strict calendric solar year without corrections for the
fact that 365 days is not quite accurate but is off by about 1/4 of
a day, which, for example, is why we insert leap years every 4th
year in our modern calendars.
Now, if the Maya had been so stupid as not to adjust THEIR calendars
much as we adjust ours to the true astronomical year, then the date
for the start of the Maya calendar would be exactly that which the
Maya scholars allege in 3114 BC, thinking that the superb Maya
astronomers had no understanding of these things.
But the Maya astronomers were not as stupid as the Maya scholars
make them. Rather, the Maya adjusted their calendar for the tropical
year, just as we adjust it in modern times by inserting leap years.
As I have explained at
http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi75.htm
819 days is "added" as a notation to various Maya dates to show that
this number of days had been intercalated since the year 0 in the
Maya system at the time of the building of Tikal - which is why
TIKAL was built - to mark the recalibration of the Maya calendric
system, to adjust for the tropical year.
The ERA from 3117 BC (when I claim the calendar began)
running to the building of Tikal
- if we take the "year" to be correctly calculated by the Maya
as an astronomical tropical year of ca. 365.25 days -
shows a difference of ca. 820 days TO
the ERA starting from 3114 BC
(when the Maya scholars claim the calendar began - BASED ON A
CONTINUOUS COUNT OF DAYS WITHOUT CORRECTION FOR A CORRECT
ASTRONOMICAL TROPICAL YEAR)
and running to Tikal.
The Maya calendar as allegedly starting 3114 BC and as alleged by
the mainstream Maya scholars can ONLY be correct if the Maya did not
adjust at Tikal for the tropical year
- BUT the fact is that they did adjust,
and that is the intercalation of 819 days at Tikal.
Thus, the ACTUAL calendar began December 25, 3117, as I allege and
as is proven without doubt at
http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi75.htm
in showing how the Maya literature describes an appearance of
Halley's Comet in 375 AD,
which is NOT MATCHED by mainstream chronology
but which is WELL MATCHED
by my corrected Maya chronology.
For one calculation of the historical dates
of the appearance of Halley's Comet
by Joseph L. Brady
"Halley's Comet: AD 1986 to 2647 BC"
see
http://adsbit.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-iarticle_query?bibcode=1982JBAA...92..209B
There is nothing more to be said on this topic and we will just have
to wait until the Maya scholars get their act together. The facts
and evidence are clear - and I have heard no sensible rebuttal from
Maya scholars on my mesh of dates with Halley's appearance.
So, to answer your question - do you have to "add anything" to the
Maya counts? Well, you have to adjust backwards for 819 days.
As I write at
http://www.lexiline.com/lexiline/lexi75.htm
"Great Burning Claw" was Halley's Comet
and it did not appear on January 31, 378 AD as a "ruler" -
rather, because of the 819-day error,
Halley actually appeared on May 4, 375 AD,
i.e. much closer to the date of 374 AD calculated by Brady for this
appearance of Halley, which the Maya's can NOT - NOT have seen, this
being one of the closest passages of Halley's Comet on record. It
would have been quite a great sight and the Maya would have noted
it - and did note it - as "Great Burning Claw".
1 comment:
I am surprised you don't answer the question that is going to be on everyone's mind: What is your recalibrated Gregorian date for the end of the Long Count?
Taking just 819 off Dec 21, 2012 would give us September 2010, but using your tropical vs sidereal calculation difference of 1038 days gives us February 2010. Are either of these dates correct?
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