About 2500 BC, in the area of modern Huehuetenango, Guatemala, there was a group of tribes whose members spoke the same language, called scholars Protoria. Over time, this language was divided into different languages of the Maya, the speakers of these languages emigrated and settled in different areas, and formed a wonderful civilization. The Mayan Civilization

In the greatest period of prosperity , 250-900 years of our era the Mayan civilization prospered on the territory stretching from the South of the current United States to Panama isthmus, and covered the modern territory of South-Western Mexico, Guatemala, Belize and part of El Salvador and Honduras. However, when the Spaniards arrived in the zone of the Maya, large ceremonial centers were abandoned, and culture was in full decline. The first meeting took place in 1511, when the ship sank expedition Valdivia, a flight from Panama in Santo Domingo. Two survivors, - Gonzalo Guerrero and Jeronimo de Aguilar, were taken prisoner. Guerrero took customs Maya, married, had children and even participated on the side of the Maya in the fight against the Spaniards. Aguilar had been a slave, and in 1519 joined the Cortes and was one of his translators during the occupation of Mexico.

Yucatan discovered in 1517, Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba, and between 1523 and 1525, Pedro de Alvarado captured Guatemalan territory. In 1526, Francisco de Montejo (father) started the capture of the Peninsula, which concluded Francisco de Montejo (son), founding the city of Merida (1542.) and Valladolid (1543). The last redoubt of Maya, the city Tasal, was captured by the Spanish until 1697

Maya left behind traces incredibly high culture, but the Spaniards did everything to destroy them. One night in July 1562, in Mani Bishop Diego de Landa ordered to collect and burn all manuscripts and works of art Maya - it was an act of vandalism, comparable to the burning of the Great library in Alexandria.

"We found a large number of books, and because they do not contain nothing but superstition and the devil the temptation, we burned them all Indians terribly sorry".

Perhaps you need a big luck that the jungle somewhere rescued from the Spaniards big cities of the Maya.

After more than 250 years, when we began to publish notes great travelers - such as Lord Kingsboro and John Lloyd Stephens, the interest in the Mayan revived. Only this time the incredible level of their culture has been recognized. Stephens saw overgrown with jungle ruins "...the traces of the people with refined and unique culture, the people, who passed through all stages accompanying rise and fall of Nations, reached its Golden age, and disappeared, remained completely unknown".

Attracted by the descriptions Stephens, archaeologists began, one after the other, opening in the hedge^tropical jungle amazing Mayan city its Grand palaces and quaint pyramidal temples, towering above the jungle. They worked on the decoding of an extraordinarily complex of Maya hieroglyphs, knowledge of which with time was lost. And more and more amazed that they opened. When Europe was experiencing dark medieval times, wrote George Stewart, "Maya has created one of the most remarkable ancient civilizations".

There are a number of different theories about what place can be called the cradle of Maya culture. For some researchers, the North Tabasco and South of Veracruz, the place where the group Maya had contact with olmakla. The second theory is inclined to think that this culture originated in the mountains of Guatemala, where it formed an agricultural society, which grew corn and also experienced the influence of culture of the Olmecs.

The culture of the Olmecs is considered an original culture, because it originate those elements that formed the basis for the development of other major cultures of Mesoamerica. The most important elements of culture, borrowed Maya in Olmec culture include: architectural details, the system of calculation and simple calendars on the basis vigesimal sequence, which later transformed into the exact Mayan calendar. Interesting version of Zechariah Sitchin, claiming that the Olmecs this is the first humans bred by the gods to work in the mines. Anyway facial features at the head, left them explicitly Negroid.

Now it is known that the Mayan community consisted from a number of city-States, grouped around the majestic ritual centres such as Copan in Honduras, Tikal in Guatemala and Palenque in Ciape (Mexico). These cities were ruled by kings, the priests, and there was a family dynasty; they were related trade and matrimonial ties. The Maya were great churches and great art. In addition to writings (made in the form of painted hieroglyphics), archaeologists discovered the jade ornaments, sculptures and pottery, well-executed from copper and gold original works of art.

But the most striking the Maya were astronomical knowledge. Many scientists tried to hush up the evidence of their existence in ancient astronomical knowledge in places like Machu Picchu and Tiahuanaco, but as for the Maya astronomy, the evidence of their wide knowledge so obvious and numerous described in such detail that it is impossible not to recognize. First of all, we have these three original books Maya, which survived until our days. They are called codes (books with illustrations), and each was given the name of the town, in the Museum of which they are: the Madrid Codex, the Dresden Codex and the Paris code. The first two are devoted to astronomy and divination, and a third rituals, gods and astrology.

Specialists admit that along with the naive belief that the Maya had an amazing knowledge about the moon and Venus, knowledge, which, they believe, have been accumulated over the years of observations. Were discovered astronomical Observatory Maya, for example, "Shell" in Chichen Itza, where in the tower were holes in Windows, through which observed the Sun in the day of the equinox. Here are two examples showing remarkable accuracy obtained by Maya astronomers results. First, evidence from Copan (astronomical center) show that the Mayans calculated the duration 149 lunar cycles in 4400 days. Modern astronomers call a number in 4400,0575 day. Secondly, in the Dresden Codex circulation period of Venus around the Sun was estimated at 584 days, and modern calculations gave a figure in 583,92 day. At the very core of religion and science Maya lay incredibly complex calendar, which for Dating history have used three different timelines. Because this chronological system is often depicted on the stone steles (vertical columns), it was able quickly to decipher. The first system, known as the Long account, was represented by one or another date as the number of days counted from the zero point, corresponding 3113 year from RH. Is this date that is attributable to a time long before the beginning of the Mayan civilization, and it has not been clarified .

In the second system (Haab) is more familiar to us solar calendar of 365 days, consisting of 18 months of 20 days and 5 additional days

The purpose of the third - 260-day sacred calendar Tzolkin remains a mystery. Tzolkin used to determine holidays gods and predicting fate was a combination of 20 characters and 13 numbers.. To lock in a particular year, every day was a new combination, and to avoid repeating the first, had to undergo 18.980 days - i.e. the day was repeated every 52 solar or 73 of the ritual year - this cycle is called Calendar Wheel.

Although Maya when the system was used to approximate a 365-day solar year, it is clear that they were well-known principle adjustments to the solar calendar, similar to the one with which we are now corrected leap years. It was found that they had the exact calculation of the solar year base in 365,2420 day. Modern astronomy currently believes that the duration of the year - 365,2422 day. It is clear that the Mayan calendar was in the limit is more accurate than the Gregorian calendar that we use now and which is based on the year in 365,2425 day.

To write a Long account of the Maya enjoyed developed dvadcatiiy number system, which included the concept of zero, and was used positional principle according to which the unit could mean 1 or 20 or 400 etc, depending on their situation (as well as in our modern decimal notation). Just as we currently have a special way to refer to the million" and "billion", the Maya used special characters for numbers up to the mark "Alau-Tun"denoting the number 23 040 000 000. The only thing that can explain the application of such a complex mathematical system is that the Maya had mania measure time, but our scientists are not able to understand why there were such huge numbers. Sign "Alau-Tun", in the long run, corresponds to a period of more than 63 million years!

The main characters were three: point had value units line was equal to five, shell symbolized zero. Combining these signs, was though, except that it was still 20 ideographs, which often took the place of points and lines.