Good News: The Mayan Doomsday is Delayed

Photo: Tyrone Turner/National Geographic

Did you just put a down payment on that luxury missile silo condo to spend the Apocalypse in comfort? See if you can get your money back as archaeologist William Saturno has discovered a mural in a Mayan ruin that contradicted the Maya Doomsday of December 21, 2012:

Working with epigrapher David Stuart and archaeologist and artist Heather Hurst, the researchers noticed several barely visible hieroglyphic texts, painted and etched along the east and north walls of the room.
One is a lunar table, and the other is a "ring number"—something previously known only from much later Maya books, where it was used as part of a backward calculation in establishing a base date for planetary cycles. Nearby is a sequence of numbered intervals corresponding to key calendrical and planetary cycles.
The calculations include dates some 7,000 years in the future, adding to evidence against the idea that the Maya thought the world would end in 2012—a modern myth inspired by an ancient calendar that depicts time starting over this year.

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And still more:

Oldest Mayan calendar unearthed

Archaeologists report a striking find in Guatemala of the first Mayan art on a wall, as well as the oldest known Mayan calendar.

• Maya treasure found in Guatemala
• Historic Mayan mural found 'by chance'