The 2012 Story

it falls on an accurate solstice date, we should suspect that its location is not a random occurrence but was intentional. With this as a working hypothesis, we observe that the date is the end of a 13-Baktun cycle, a calendrical concept that appears occasionally in the inscriptions and dated carvings of the Classic Period, always in the context of cosmological Creation Mythology. The end of a 13-Baktun cycle, as recorded at Quirigua and elsewhere, is the end of an Era, otherwise known as a Sun or Age. These Ages, or World Ages, belonged to a World Age doctrine that, as a mythological construct, is described in the Maya Creation Myth (The Popol Vuh). In this way we can see that the Long Count’s 13-Baktun cycle and the Maya Creation Myth are both expressions of an underlying World Age paradigm. One is calendrical and the other is mythological, and as we will see they both encode astronomy.

Where were these two traditions formulated? By whom, and when? As we explored in Chapter 2, the pre- Classic Izapan civilization, centered on the astronomically oriented site called Izapa, was involved in the establishment of these two traditions. The site contains sixty carved monuments, many depicting episodes from the Creation Myth (also called “the Hero Twin Myth”), some of the earliest such portrayals that are known. As for the Long Count, its earliest dated carvings appear within the sphere of the Izapan civilization, toward the tail end of Izapa’s florescence. Although no Long Count dates have yet been found within the exact boundaries of the site of Izapa, we’ll see that Izapa encodes the astronomical alignment that culminates in era-2012, and thus was the observational laboratory that led to the inauguration of the Long Count system, taken up in earnest at nearby sites. The appearance of early Long Count monuments trend southward from Izapa, showing up at Tak’alik Ab’aj and El Baul, sister cities to Izapa.

My work presents evidence that Izapan astronomers formulated a cosmology of World Age transformation connected to a rare alignment that would culminate, for them, in the distant future. They knew it would eventually happen, but couldn’t know the precise timing until they inaugurated the Long Count, whose 13-Baktun cycle ending was designed to target the alignment. In other words, the mythological paradigm came first, was depicted on Izapa’s monuments as an early version of the Hero Twin Creation Myth, while the calendrical and astronomical system (the Long Count) that would calibrate the future alignment was still being perfected. This happened by the late first century BC, and thereafter Izapa was frozen in time and preserved, perhaps as a pilgrimage site, but certainly as an honored place that couldn’t be destroyed.

According to my theory, the key to understanding why the early Maya chose the solstice of the year our calendar calls 2012, to end a large World Age cycle, is found in a rare astronomical alignment called “the solstice- galaxy alignment” or “the galactic alignment,” and we’ve already explored the various issues and definitions connected with it. By the time I began examining and studying Izapa in 1994 I already suspected that the galactic alignment was the reason behind the 2012 end date. As such, I was alert to evidence at Izapa that would indicate a conscious awareness of the future galactic alignment. The first thing I noticed was the dark-rift symbolism of the frog’s mouth on Stela 11 out of which emerges a sun deity, facing the December solstice sunrise horizon. The second thing I noticed was that the ballcourt in Group F points to the December solstice sunrise horizon. Since the ballgame is going to be central to what follows, we need to take a brief detour here to concisely summarize the symbolism of Maya ballgame.

It’s really quite simple. The ballcourt symbolizes the Milky Way, the goal ring is the dark rift, and the game is about the rebirth of the sun. The ball represents the sun, and some ballcourts are aligned with the solstice, proving that, at least for those ballcourts, the solar rebirth occurred on the solstice. That’s it. This symbolism was integrated with the Creation Myth, in which One Hunahpu’s head represents the gameball. Generally speaking, the ball represents the sun and the game is about the rebirth of the sun. The game was not so much about athletic prowess; it was performed as part of the Creation Myth. It was an eschatological mystery play depicting the transformation and renewal that happens at cycle endings. In this play, the goal ring was the place of victory and rebirth. Thus, the ball’s passage through the goal ring symbolized the sun’s rebirth, its emergence from the underworld and the victory of light over darkness. It is easy to see that the goal ring represents the meanings given to the dark rift in the Milky Way. A more general interpretation loosely connects ballcourts with the underworld. According to Linda Schele, Creation myths played out in the ballgame “happened at the black hole.”³⁰ She clearly spelled out the connection to the dark rift, but didn’t pursue the implications. She wrote that the black hole toponym found in Creation Texts points to “the Black Road, through the Cleft in the Milky Way… from the ballcourts of the Maya to the Court of Creation in the Land of Death.”³¹ Her information for this assessment came from Dennis Tedlock’s observations on the role of the dark rift in The Popol Vuh.

Scholars haven’t paid a lot of attention to the specific significance of the goal ring and have been content to simply see ballcourts as underworld places. This is generally true, but the specific role of the goal ring in the game ball’s rebirth is unavoidable. It is the place where the game ball, symbol of the sun, is reborn, thus ending the game that ends a cycle of time and begins a new one. Here we see the relevance of the December solstice in this narrative, and how the game ball likely symbolizes not just the sun but the December solstice sun, because it is the December solstice sun that ends a cycle and begins a new one. For the purpose of our 2012 theme, it would be best to try to identify the site and the ballcourt that was most closely associated with the origins of the Long Count calendar. As we will see, the situation is rich and complex, but as I pursued my studies in the early 1990s it became clear that Izapa is this place.

Returning to the Izapa monuments, I read in the archaeological reports that the monuments were found in situ—as they were left some 1,900 years ago. On the west end of the ballcourt at Izapa, there is a throne with a head in the middle of the front edge, emerging from between two legs that indicate how a person would have sat on the throne. They would have sat facing down the lengthwise axis of the ballcourt, toward the December solstice sunrise. Behind the throne are six flat seating stones on a raised mound. People sitting on these seats would face the December solstice sunrise and would also be able to view the ballcourt over the throne. The sun reaches its farthest southern rise point on the December solstice, the day of greatest night, prior to the sun and the year being reborn to begin the return journey northward along the horizon. The Maya ballgame was about the rebirth of the sun.³² The head emerging from between the legs on the throne is a symbol of the sun, as well as the game ball. The game ball moving through the goal ring is a metaphor for the rebirth of the sun. Also, at one point in the Creation Myth, the head of the father of the Hero Twins, One Hunahpu, is used as the game ball. The ballgame and the Hero Twin Myth is a mystery play, enacted on the ball field, and is all about facilitating the resurrection of One Hunahpu.

These things are well known in Maya studies and we are firmly inside the boundaries of status quo consensus here. But what do they tell us about the astronomical symbolism of the ballgame as it was played at Izapa? First of all, the solar rebirth that the ballgame symbolizes was apparently, for the Izapans, referential to the sun’s rebirth at the December solstice. This is not at all surprising, as most ancient culture saw the December solstice as the time of the sun’s rebirth, for obvious reasons. That’s pretty neat, and tells us something about how the Izapans thought about their monuments, symbolism, and astronomy. This is a “reading” of the iconography and structural orientations at Izapa that gives meaning to the otherwise mute stones. Scholars similarly “read” or interpret hieroglyphic writing, which is an abstract form of miniature iconography. Interpreting iconographic symbolism is no less rigorous an enterprise than epigraphic interpretation; in fact, it is perhaps more rigorous because, especially at Izapa, astronomical orientation is an additional interpretive aid that is usually not relevant in hieroglyphic decipherment.

^{Throne monuments from the Izapan ballcourt. Transformation and renewal. Drawing by the author}

So we can say that the ballcourt at Izapa is telling a story about the sun’s rebirth on the December solstice. But something else is going on here. As I studied the many carved monuments found in the Izapan ballcourt, a cohesive story with more profound implications unfolded. On the eastern end of the ballcourt, opposite the throne, is a monument that shows the demise of the vain and false ruler Seven Macaw. A ballplayer, probably one of the Hero Twins, is standing over him as he has crashed on the ground (see figure below). This scene represents a key episode from the Hero Twin Myth—the Hero Twins must do away with Seven Macaw, make him fall from his pride ful perch, before they can resurrect their father. This event happens at the culmination of the World Age, at the end of the cycle. The death of the false god must precede the rebirth of the true one. Importantly, we have a solar cycle at work here, but it is much larger than an annual cycle of some 365 days. Yes, this is a World Age context. The sun gets reborn every morning and every December solstice, but