[Aztlan] Astronomical basis of Long Count/2012

[robertleonardhall at sbcglobal.net]

Estimados listeros,
     It appears that John Jenkins has put the ball in my court. Yes, I have for years been trying to promote the idea of a 7182-day Jupiter/Saturn conjunction period prototype for the katun. I claim only independent invention for that idea, however. What I claim originality for is the idea that the proto-katun, the 819-day count, and an associated 13-proto-katun round originated not only before the tun but also before the uinal, before the 365-day vague year, before vigesimal numeration, before the baktun and, necessarily, before the Long Count. Much of my thinking on the calendar was published in 1998 and is summarized in the paper "A comparison of some North American and Mesoamerican cosmologies and their ritual expressions" in Explorations in American Archaeology: Essays in Honor of Wesley R. Hurt, ed. Mark G. Plew, pp. 55-88, University Press of America, Lanham.
     As for 2012, I suggest that the 13-baktun era ending in that year was instituted at its exact midpoint in 551 BCE, with the idea of a 13-baktun era being an elaboration upon two preceding Olmec calendars, one based on rounds of 13 proto-katuns of 7182 days each and a later one based on rounds of 13 katuns of 7200 days each. The idea of a 20-baktun era would have been a further elaboration based upon a logical Maya extension of the principle of vigesimal, positional numeration. In other words, the era for which 2012 was the end year was part of an original Olmec Long Count, not the derived Maya Long Count.. 
     Bob Hall