I love Calenders

     This blog will talk about both the modern and Mayan calendar and how our sense of time and place revolves around the idea of maths and relates to the topic of ethnomathematics. Professor Mgombelo sent us all a Mayan Calendar and it has been something we have referred to throughout the last couple of months in EDUC-4P75. The Mayan Calender to me is very compelling because I find it very interesting to see how ancient cultures studied, learned, and made sense of the world around them. This also relates to one of my past blogs that discussed the numerical system we use coming all the way from India. Something very fundamental to the maths we use that is not even taught to kids in school. Firstly, in regards to the Mayans pyramid, being built in 1050 the pyramid already tells us something about their knowledge of maths and their perception of the year. 

The Mayans constructed the pyramids with 4 sides of stairs, they would construct 91 steps in total. If you multiply 91(Steps) x 4(Sides) + 1 (Top Platform) = 365, which equals the days of the year we all know and love today. It was also a way for the Mayans to actually use their calendar system. I also found their way of doing the days of the week both interesting and confusing at the same time. “Tzolkin”, (Both Figures) a term used to refer to the Mayans idea of a week. However, I found it interesting to see that they used two systems for their weekdays. One week was a numbered week of 13 days and the other named weeks from 1 to 20 days. The named days were also symbolised with both names and shapes. Today I think we do basically the same thing in the sense that the days of the week are symbolised with their actual name. We also value them with numbers 1 through 31 (depending on the month). It is not entirely the same thing, however, it is how I was able to understand the Mayans and their calendar. The study of the Mayans proves that maths and topics we discuss in Ethnomathematics are present in most aspects of human life and culture.

Another very important aspect from the Mayans that I thought would be important to mention was the article posing the question, “Did the Mayans think a Year was 365 Years?”. The article goes to explain that yes they did, however, they also knew like us today that it was not exactly 365 days. The maths used goes by dividing the estimated Mayan year (1,101,600 days) by the value of a year (365). Afterwards you take the result (3,018.08219), subtract 2 and divide 1,101,600 once more by the value 3,016.08219 to achieve 365.242036 days. Proving the Mayans did have an idea how the maths of the calendar and year worked. It would look like this: 1,101,600 / 365 = 3,018.08219… 3,018.08219 - 2 = 3,016.08219… 1,101,600 / 3016.08219 = 365.242036 (days in a year). Like us today in the modern age, the ancient world of the Mayans knew the fundamentals to the days of the year 1000 years ago. Love it.